Silk production involves the killing of millions of silkworm pupae through boiling or steaming to preserve continuous filaments, raising questions about invertebrate welfare in an ancient and culturally important industry.
Silkworm welfare sits at the uncertain frontier of invertebrate sentience science. Silkworms possess nociceptors and show avoidance responses, but whether boiling or steaming causes subjective suffering is genuinely unknown. The precautionary principle suggests applying moral caution to the killing of billions of individual animals in a welfare-uncertain context, particularly when alternatives exist. Peace silk demonstrates that silk can be produced without killing the caterpillar, though at higher cost and with different fibre characteristics. Fermentation-based silk protein alternatives would eliminate the killing entirely, and their commercial development deserves welfare-motivated support.