To me, "animal suffering will not persist" implies that animal suffering would drop to zero -- and, since all life contains some possibility of suffering, this implies that animal life would drop to zero.

I'm glad to hear that wasn't the meaning you intended, and I hope that the others who voted on the poll were voting on your intended meaning rather than the one I got!

If animals continue to exist in a post-AGI world, animal suffering will not persist

This question scares me because it feels like it's coming from a perspective of negative utilitarianism.

I really hope nobody tries to align an AI with a negative-utilitarian value set, because negative-utilitarian values are a half-step away from a really bad conclusion like "we need to eradicate all life in order to eliminate suffering."

A meta question: of the EAs currently working on AI alignment, what percent would you say are negative utilitarians?

I would have been more comfortable with a question like "...will animal happiness be on balance greater than animal suffering?"