Ethical Consistency - Humans vs Animals
I created a thread a while back, which sort of went off course, and I do admit that my definitions for some things were a bit confusing. But I wanted to create a similar thread, that tied into veganism, which typically starts with being morally consistent.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1157oWUs6KYeRAKATUEKisl6LsGvEATYfc_OQeZN87vE/edit?usp=sharing
That google doc displays a 5-step consistency test I created, in which you can find out if the justification you use to initiate moral (or immoral) actions, is consistent and reasonable. So after you take this test, I have some follow up questions.
1. Why are some Animals worthy of love and affection, while others are sent to slaughterhouses for our consumption?
2. Do you think that all Animals should have equal moral value, in the way we treat them and care for them?
3. Does every Animal deserve the basic right to life and freedoms that we desire for ourselves? (Such as freedom from slavery, fear, etc.)
Lastly:
A) Do you think actions that cause unnecessary pain and/or suffering are wrong?
B) Do you think Animal cruelty is wrong?
C) Do you think actions become unnecessary when they are not required for our survival?
D) Do you think we need to eat animals to survive?
If you said yes to A, B & C, and no to D, then you must think eating animals is cruel and wrong because it is unnecessary, since we don't need to eat animals to survive.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1157oWUs6KYeRAKATUEKisl6LsGvEATYfc_OQeZN87vE/edit?usp=sharing
That google doc displays a 5-step consistency test I created, in which you can find out if the justification you use to initiate moral (or immoral) actions, is consistent and reasonable. So after you take this test, I have some follow up questions.
1. Why are some Animals worthy of love and affection, while others are sent to slaughterhouses for our consumption?
2. Do you think that all Animals should have equal moral value, in the way we treat them and care for them?
3. Does every Animal deserve the basic right to life and freedoms that we desire for ourselves? (Such as freedom from slavery, fear, etc.)
Lastly:
A) Do you think actions that cause unnecessary pain and/or suffering are wrong?
B) Do you think Animal cruelty is wrong?
C) Do you think actions become unnecessary when they are not required for our survival?
D) Do you think we need to eat animals to survive?
If you said yes to A, B & C, and no to D, then you must think eating animals is cruel and wrong because it is unnecessary, since we don't need to eat animals to survive.
Comments (53)
Just because an animal is worthy of love and affection doesn't necessarily stop us from sending it to a slaughterhouse with "ethical" justifications in tow. We send young men to die in wars quite frequently (veritable slaughter-houses) and sometimes we deem it moral to slaughter one-another outside of war theatres (eg: self-defense).
The reason why people send animals to slaughterhouses for their consumption is because it is beneficial to their survival and happiness. I reckon many-a-farmer has had to slaughter an animal that they cared for (maybe even loved) in order to feed themselves and their families.
Quoting chatterbears
Not possible. By building dwellings we displace and destroy multitudes of critters and creatures. Our roads disrupt, our fires and excrement pollutes; we cause harm and it's just a matter of choosing who or what will pay the price for our existence.
However, if there is a spectrum of sentience (that is to say, if a beetle feels less than a dolphin) then given the choice to save only one of them, I would certainly choose the dolphin barring extraneous circumstances. The more sentient (and perhaps by extension, intelligent) a thing is, the more I tend to extend moral consideration toward that thing.
Quoting chatterbears
Rights are given or agreed upon; they are not inherent (though want itself seems to be). Earth's natural environment actually is the most terrible kind of place to hope that every creature might have a right to freedom from subservience, fear, suffering, or unjust death. By its own evolution it has come to be a place filled with competition, consumption, opposition, selection and death. Almost ironically, the very thing which gives life its relative stability is the massive payment in blood made to it by all the non-ancestors of a given thing, which by unhappy circumstance were not capable of producing a next generation (i.e: suffered and died).
Modern civilization has allowed us to stabilize the average life-cycle of humans beyond anything else in nature (no other animals are as free from unpredictable death as modern humans) and from our very comfortable pedestal it makes sense to extend our own security and comforts to other animals (if through empathy alone) but we simply cannot afford it. The farm animals we raise would need to be euthanized because we cannot afford to raise and care for them if they do not contribute to our own survival needs. The rest of nature finds balances that emerge naturally out of chaotic forces, and interference there is too costly and would likely cause more harm than it prevents (though we do have many small scale initiatives which seek to do so, for example, culling deer can actually be in the interest of many animal species, including deer themselves).
No animal, human or otherwise, has the right to be free from fear. The one-way contract that farm animals have with us is the only thing that causes farm animals to even exist in the first place, and so it becomes a decision between annihilation (and never having existed) vs living for a time and eventually being slaughtered.
It is not clear that inevitably being slaughtered makes a life not worth living.
Quoting chatterbears
Yes.
Quoting chatterbears
Yep. The world cannot go vegan (at least not yet). In other words, some people must eat meat to survive.
We're not yet fully emancipated apes, and even among first world nations there may still be some individuals whose health will suffer on the available meat-free diet. When we have the agricultural and logistic capacity to provide adequate nutrition to all humans with animal-free practices, then we will be morally obligated to do so
95% of people on this planet do not need to eat animals to survive. We have plant-based alternatives, and many of the poorest countries survive on things like grains, beans, vegetables, fruits, etc... Meat is typically more expensive in other countries compared to the US, because we mass produce it here and it gets fueld by subsidies.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Agreed. We are a selfish species in which we cause destruction when we build roads and homes for ourselves. But this desctruction comes as an indirect result, rather than a direct result when we kill animals for food.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Agreed. So if we acknowledge that a pig, cow and chicken has similar sentience to us and dogs, why do we slaughter them by the billions every year?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Or we could stop breeding them into existence and let them die off naturally, since the farm animals we bred do not even exist in the wild.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
You are taking "right" in a too literal sense, as if there's a contract or document that comes with it. I can rephrase this simply to mean, does every sentient being deserve to live in a state of comfort, rather than a state of fear? Of course this isn't possible for every sentient being, because even some humans are born into slavery in some countries. But generally speaking, if we had the choice, as Humans, to strike fear or provide comfort, should we not provide comfort instead?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
What are you basing this on? The amount of people that need to rely on meat to survive, is incredibly trivial. But also, these questions are directed at you as well, but you seemed to have answered for the group, instead of for yourself. Do you, Vagabond, need to eat meat to survive?
I don't acknowledge that at all.
Niether cows, nor chickens nor dogs are similar to us in term of sentience. Other great apes, dolphins, elephants, and perhaps many others have high degrees of sentience and intelligence, but they are still not on the level of homo-sapiens.
Quoting chatterbears
We can't even afford to let them die off naturally as if we're to go vegan we need all available resources to ensure the success of that endeavor. (setting them loose would be much more cruel than euthanasia)
Quoting chatterbears
Yes, unless we have sufficient cause not to, such as self-defense.
Striking fear into farm animals is counter-productive though, and is not the same moral question as whether or not we're ethically justified to slaughter them.
Quoting chatterbears
I suspect that I need to eat meat to have optimum health (and not because I like the taste). I am very tall (6'4) and thin, and for whatever reason despite the large (and well rounded) volume of food that I consume I have a very difficult time gaining weight (I've only ever managed to gain weight by over-eating meat). The fact is that I already eat a lot, and if I stop eating meat I'm going to have to increase the volume even higher as non-meat alternatives are not as protein/fat dense.
I don't need to eat meat to survive, just to maintain adequate health.
The simple fact is, cows, chickens and pigs have sentience. Of course they do not have the same intelligence level as us, but that is irrelevant to whether or not they do in fact have sentience. They can experience pain and pleasure, which is all you need when deciding whether or not an animal deserves moral consideration. Cows, chickens and pigs are deserving of moral consideration, at the most basic level. Which is, do they deserve to live and not be exploited? I think the clear answer here is yes.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
It would be a slow gradual change. Breeding animals would decrease over time, while plant based foods would increase. It's not like farm animal would disappear overnight, but a gradual replacement of farm animals with plants, would be the most practical and logical option. For example, the more that the consumer demands Vegan foods, the more a company will supply them. As more and more consumers demand Vegan options, restaurants/stores will start replacing regular meats with Vegan 'meats'. Less farm animals would be bred and slaughtered, and animal farms would start to evolve into plant farms. Farmers would be able to keep their same job and land, but replacing it with vegetables/fruits/grains/etc.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Are you ethically justified in slaughtering farm animals?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
This is just scientifically false.
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5638464/
- https://www.bda.uk.com/news/view?id=179
- https://www.eatrightpro.org/practice/position-and-practice-papers/position-papers/vegetarian-diets
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3662288/
Those are just a few studies (there are many more out there), that showcase a plant-based diet having more benefits to your health.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Why are you trying to gain weight to begin with? Are you underweight? But even so, all this can be resolved with plant-based proteins. Tofu, tempeh, edamama, lentils, chickpeas, nuts, quinoa, chia seeds, beans, potatoes, etc... People who avoid animal products can eat balanced diets that support a healthy body and reduce the risks of some diseases.
And if you worried you aren't getting enough protein, you can use 100% Hemp Protein, which gives you around 15g of protein per 3 tbsp. I make smoothies with Hemp, that taste great. If you're worried about fat intake, eat 1 cup of Avocado, which can supply you with 21g of fat by itself. Other things that have high fats are things like walnuts and almonds. There are plenty of ways to supply yourself with the necessary fats and protein you need, but I think you haven't even tried to do the research. Correct me if I am wrong.
What is wrong in the idea that the human species, however advanced it has become and superior to other species, is still a species of and thus eats other fauna?
What is wrong in the fact that life exists because one type of animals eat others and not only fauna eating flora?
Why the idea that veganism is found to be so morally superior?
And while industrialized breeding comes with its horrible share of end-product waste (the butcher plants are actually really good at not producing waste), you cannot either deny that its historical rise has coincided with a massive reduction in the number of famines we have had to endure. We used to have one every decade or so, now we worry about a 5% increase on the cost at the market. So we might want to hold of on judgements that it doesnt contribute to our survival.
Likely an animal of prey is slaughtered far more violently and suffers more long when it is killed by a pack of wolves than how their domesticated relatives meet their death in the industrialized slaughter house. And the reason for us to farm animals is quite logical: there is so many of us.
Yet really, how does this industrialization differ from what we have done to the flora?
That is and has been for ages a likely far more "industrialized nightmare" that has changed the landscape of our planet totally and has changed plants from the way how plants would grow in the wild. Rye, which is found growing wild in Turkey, likely wouldn't be so common and would not be growing as it grows now, just to give one example.
We no longer need to eat animals to survive. And we really never did, as even our closest ancestors (gorillas, chimpanzees, etc) are 95% vegetarians (plants and fruits). Chimpanzees rely heavily on fruits and plants, but sometimes eat insects and smaller mammals. Similarly, we do not need meat at all to survive and thrive. Matter of fact, it is healthy for us and the environment, if we adopted a plant-based diet.
Quoting ssu
If we are 'superior' to other species, why do we cause so much harm and desctruction to each other, as well as the planet and animal life? A superior species would be more responsible and initiate actions that would benefit the planet, not diminish the life of it. I am superior to a dog, but that doesn't mean I am morally justified in torturing that dog, just because i can. Might does not make right.
Quoting ssu
Yes, animals eat other animals out of necessity. They are obligate carnivores who NEED to eat meat to survive. We are not obligate carnivores (or obligate omnivores) who need to eat meat to survive. As I said before, it is actually healthier for us and the planet if we stopped eating meat.
Quoting ssu
Because causing unnecessary pain and suffering is better than causing it, would you not agree? Read the last part of my initial post, and you'll come to the same conclusion. Or I will paste it here again:
- Do you think actions become unnecessary when they are not required for our survival?
- Do you think unnecessary actions that cause pain and/or suffering are wrong?
- Do you think Animal cruelty is wrong?
- Do you think we need to eat animals to survive?
Actually no. At birth, female chickens are de-beaked (with no anesthetic). Male pigs get their testicles removed (with no anesthetic). Pigs get their teeth clipped (with no anesthetic). And those are just a few things. Most of these animals have horrible living conditions on a daily basis. Crammed in very small areas, where they eat and defecate in the same spot.
Not to mention, an animal of prey dies in the wild, naturally. Because other predators eat meat out of necessity, while we eat meat out of pleasure (for the taste). Also, these farm animals wouldn't even exist in the wild, as we have genetically modified them to be bigger and grow faster, so we can have more bang for our buck.
Quoting ssu
It seems you haven't done much research on this topic. The amount of grain we grow for animals could feed hundreds of millions of people. We killed 50+ Billion animals every year, and a single cow eats far more grain every day than a human would. If we stopped animal agriculture, all the grain that is currently being used to feed these animals, could be used for us. We could wipe out most of world hunger.
As I've pointed out to you seemingly hundreds of times, we cannot afford to let chickens and cows live unless we exploit them; for them it's either live and be exploited or never live at all. Is it better to live and be exploited than to never live at all?
I think the clear answer is yes.
Quoting chatterbears
Not in the least. The kind of forage that many free-range cattle live off is ground that no crops can be grown upon. Field corn (which is what the U.S uses to feed its numerous amount of grain fed cows and chickens) is largely grown on land that is not high enough quality to grow vegan foods like sweet corn or other veg/fruit. The economics and logistics of all-produce agriculture are radically different from what we currently have (In terms of available/suitable ground, fertilization capacities, processing and distribution infrastructure, etc...). We already import tons of fruit in North America, and many farmers with suitable land and infrastructure have already switched over to fruit and veg production for economic reasons, but if it made economic sense for every farmer to do so then they already would have. Many farmers continue to raise livestock because it makes the most economic sense for them to do so, and some farms and ranches, by their very nature, can never be profitable without livestock.
We can gradually shift away from livestock production, but we cannot increase our fruit and veg production at arbitrarily fast rates (in order to grow and store enough of our own produce to be nutritionally self-sufficient, we would need massive innovations in indoor growing and refrigerated infrastructure out the wazoo).
Aside from being much more expensive, another problem with eliminating animal husbandry entirely is that planning vegan diets (especially a nutritionally adequate national supply) is more difficult than planning diets with some meat (because you need to consume a greater volume of vegan foods to gain the same levels of nutrition, meaning you need to plan what you eat more carefully to have well rounded nutrition).
Animal free agriculture is actually much less efficient than some animal husbandry for a lot of farms, while being logistically more complex in almost every way.
A lot of people will buy whatever food stuffs have the best balance between affordability and tastiness (evidenced by present-day average diets). If super-healthy and tasty vegan diets weren't so damn expensive, more people would be vegan; demand can eventually impact supply, but increased demand doesn't always guarantee increasing supplies (in our case it guarantees increased prices because most or all of all the land suitable for fruit and veg is already being used as such). If you want to put an avocado on every plate and a juicer in every pantry you've really got a lot of work to do. For starters, where are you going to get all the fertilizer once we no longer breed cows? (you will need more fertilizer than ever but have less of the ingredients than ever before (same story for oil based synthetics)). Opening up new land to use for growing fruit and vegetables has got to be hellishly expensive. Have we been holding off on doing so because we just don't like the taste?
Agriculture and the food market are complex systems, and by that I mean they are interconnected in many complicated and messy ways which makes outcomes hard to or impossible to foresee. I mean to say that treating the entire industry/enterprise as a single and simple system which can be planned centrally from the top by one individual with a bunch of bright ideas is beyond foolish. The many autonomous parts of the industry (the insurers, the subsidizers, the seed providers, the farm owners, the farm workers, food processors, transportation/distribution agents, grocers, and buyers) who each follow their own interest and overcome the individual problems and inefficiencies they face is what allows the food industry to operate with the stability that it does. The logistic hurtles, safety concerns, and engineering problems that the food industry overcomes on a daily basis are so numerous that I strain to believe a single person can comprehend even most of them. As it stands, more people are becoming vegan, and vegan foods are already more expensive. Farmers presently have incentive to grow more produce and I reckon they are doing so at whatever rate is most efficient.
How does the national vegan diet get enacted? Gradually by consumer demand? Or by legislation?
If it's gradual and by consumer demand (assuming that's your view) you should be prepared for food to become much more expensive than it is right now, for the reasons I've mentioned, and for many more reasons which we'll never get into.
Quoting chatterbears
If the farm animal was bred and raised for slaughter, and if that's the only way it ever could have existed in the first place, then yes.
Quoting chatterbears
What if different people benefit differently from different diets?
On average vegans might be more healthy (especially as North America is over-weight on the whole) but I don't see evidence that vegan diets would benefit me. (I'm worried about losing weight, which is what I fear a vegan diet would cause).
- Likely an animal of prey is slaughtered far more violently and suffers more long when it is killed by a pack of wolves than how their domesticated relatives meet their death in the industrialized slaughter house
That is questionnable, but also largely irrelevant. It would depend on the prey, the slaughtering methods used and the level of care. When I was on the kill floor, we used a gas chamber, electrical rods and then would bleed the hog from the jugular. The eletrical rods would paralyse the hog if it came out alive of the chamber, but sometimes even that wouldnt be enough. So the hog would have his ankle pierced and hooked to a chain, get lifted, have his jugular sliced, then sent into a room where he would be dunked in boiling water and then brazed by flamethrowers (so as to give it the rosy look and burn all hairs and parasites). Not exactly a great end.
As for care, the plant I worked at had received a lot of negative feedback concerning cruelty, so the government had actually forced the company to accept having an permanent inspection officer on location to prevent abuse. Even that didnt stop much, in my opinion.
And would they eat more meat, if they would be better hunters? It's absolutely logical for an omnivore to eat meat than things like grass.
Quoting chatterbears
OK, I'll answer. But why assume I'll come to your conclusion?
Of course not! If I live in a city, it's still quite good to know basic survival skills like which berries or mushrooms you can pick and eat from the forest. I really don't need the skills for survival as I can buy everything from the supermarket (and be rather confident that nothing there is poisonous to me). I really like to go with my children to the forest, pick up mushrooms and make great food.
- Do you think unnecessary actions that cause pain and/or suffering are wrong?
Yes.
- Do you think Animal cruelty is wrong?
Yes.
And do you think that domesticated animals cannot have a good life? Or that they don't deserve a life? (Basically that's the end result with your thought)
Quoting chatterbears
And this brings us to the philosophically important question: why do you think that we basically aren't part of nature?
Because it seems like obviously what we do is unnatural (kill animals) for you, but what other animals do (kill other animals) is natural.
I still think that animal cruelty is a different question than veganism. Or to think that being against animal cruelty means that you have to be a vegan is simply illogical.
I hope you realize that being an omnivore (as humans) is a choice. You do know that right? We choose to live in an omnivorous way, when we don't have to do that in order to survive. We can also choose to live on plant-based diets. And as far as logic goes, the science supports plant-based diets being healthier for our bodies and the environment. So wouldn't the logical conclusion be to adopt a plant-based diet?
Also, if you really think we have evolved to eat meat. Try killing an animal with your bare hands, with no tools or cooking utensils. And when you eat it, make sure it is uncooked and raw, just like an actual omnivore in nature would do.
Quoting ssu
Did you read the question fully? The idea of survival is real, meaning someone would die without their needs being met. This includes things like food, water, and shelter. A want, is one step up in the order from needs and is simply something that people desire to have, that they may, or may not, be able to obtain. There is no NEED to know which berries or mushrooms you can pick and eat when you have the option of a supermarket. So again, learning about which berries you can pick is not necessary for your survival. Unless you are trying to appeal to some rare situation that will probably never happen. At that point, you could say that learning how to fly an airplane is necessary for your survival, because one day you may get stuck in a situation where the only way to survive is to fly away in an airplane. This is sort of nonsensical and I think you should re-answer that first question. And I'll type it again.
Do you think actions become unnecessary when they are not required for our survival?
And you never answered the last question, which was, " Do you think we need to eat animals to survive? "
Quoting ssu
When did I ever say we are not part of nature? What even gave you that impression. Humans are animals, just as dogs, sheep, cows and chickens are animals. We are all a part of nature. But breeding animals into existence, while torturing and slaughtering them on a mass scale, is not natural. Factory farms are not part of 'nature'.
This is a false dichotomy. When black people were enslaved, were the only two options these:
1. Live and be exploited
2. Never live at all
Absolutely not. We can allow these animals to live and die naturally, but also STOP the breeding.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
47% of soy and 60% of corn produced in the US being is being consumed by livestock. Feed this to humans instead of livestock, and the amount can drastically decrease (or kept the same and be fed to millions of people who starve).
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Which is why the public would demand plant-based products, in which I can almost guarantee you that these farmers (and the government) would figure out how to become profitable with plant-based products. They continue to profit from livestock, because there is a demand for it. And the government provides substantial subsidies for it.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Why is this a problem? Figuring out the technicalities is the least of our problems. Actually putting in the effort to make the change is our worst problem.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
This is not true. Every diet needs planning, and a vast majority of people have a poor planned diet. You can be Vegan and eat french fries and oreos all day, but that doesn't mean you're healthy. It's just as easy to plan for a Vegan diet, as it would for any other diet. Saying you need to be more careful is an exaggeration. Have you seen the health of the US population?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Less efficient how? But even if that were the case, I am sure we could figure it out just fine. For how technologically advanced we are, you really don't think we could figure out how to change animal farms into plant farms efficiently?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
So people's taste pleasure of 5 minutes is worth more than the life of an innocent animal? Even if the food isn't as tasty right now, would you not rather eat a less tasty food, than contribute to animal torture and slaughter?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
There are plant-based fertilizers already. But again, I am sure we could figure this out. You're naming a bunch of technicalities that won't matter in the long run. We, as humans, are smart enough to figure out things. It's just a matter of how bad we want it, and how selfish we are willing to be.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Why would food be more expensive? Some of the cheapest food on the planet is plant-based. Grains, beans, vegetables, etc... But even if it were more expensive to become Vegan (which it is not), I would still pay MORE per meal, rather than pay less and contribute to unnecessary animal torture and slaughter.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
And white people thought the same thing about black people. People used God/Bible to condone slavery, and said things like "Black people were bred and raised to become slaves." - Basing your moral decisions on "if that's the only way it ever could have existed", is a very poor way to come to a conclusion. How about, causing any unnecessary pain and suffering, regardless of whether it could have existed in another way or not, is wrong. Just because farm animals were bred and raised for slaughter, doesn't mean they should be. And just because black people were raised for slavery for hundreds of years, doesn't mean they should have been.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
I gave you plenty of sources and real life examples (nuts / soy) that you can start with. If you actually did the research yourself, the evidence is clear. If you want to deny the evidence and demonstrable studies, that's up to you. But you might as well deny most of scientific peer reviewed study at that point.
Isn't ALL life imbued with the same value, all things which can self-replicate? Why do we kill and eat plants. Shame on us.
Life in massively industrialised breeding farm causes the animals to suffer a form of 'systematic' cruelty, tho. Hogs are raised in cages that do not allow them to move or stand. They are mutilated so as to not hurt themselves to death. And then, after a year of being fattened, they are piled one over the other and then fed into the grinder.
'Cruelty' is the best term to describe the overall tone of their existence.
No. I spent a few months working there, and then at some point I counted the number of hogs I had seen going in. 2 millions. My dad had told me, when he sent me working there, to work hard at it, but to always be looking for a reason to quit and get myself a better job. That I had a (shared) killcount of anything in the millions was a good enough reason for me.
Seems you don't have any idea what is the philosophical question about humans being part of nature. OK, I'll try to explain my point better.
Is it part of 'nature' that beavers build dams? They do it for their protection and to get food more easily especially during winter. Yet what the beavers as quite smart mammals (and herbivores) have done is that they have altered their environment in their favour. And the fact is that we aren't the only species that can farm. Ants can farm fungus and even herd other insects for food.
Now I assume that this kind of alteration of the environment or 'farming' by a species you deem 'natural', but when it comes to our species, suddenly everything we do becomes so 'unnatural'. The judgement is solely based on your own views on morality, what is deemed 'good' and what is 'bad' and that is totally understandable to me. Yet you try justify it by reason and above all, by science. As that if we can survive on a vegan diet, then it is by 'reason' and 'science' that we should be vegans.
And you still didn't answer to the following question:
Do you think that domesticated animals cannot have a good life?
Or that they don't deserve a life?
Apparently they don't deserve one. From what you answered to VagabondSpectre it seems like that. You propose as your 'humane' final solution be to gradually stop breeding the domesticated animals. Yet what you are promoting is still the extinction of what you apparently think as 'unnatural' animals as they have been produced 'unnaturally'.
Somehow for you the solution cannot be that cruelty (that Akanthintos gives examples of) would be reduced by simply improving living standards of domesticated animals. No. Your 'benevolent' answer is the mass extinction of this kind of life. Because it's not 'natural', even if you admit that we are one natural species just like others in the World altering our environment to fit our desires.
Just like the beavers do with their dams.
Not sure if you're being sarcastic, but I will address your statement. We have a higher moral consideration to life that is sentient, since that life can experience pain and suffering. Which means, our actions toward that life can cause pain that may be unnecessary. And if it is unnecessary, it is our responsibility to stop it. Plants are not sentient, as they don't have a brain or nervous system to process things like pain and/or pleasure.
It's good you don't work there anymore. Did you become vegetarian/vegan because of that experience? Or do you still eat animals? If so, why.
When did I say that everything we do becomes unnatural? I was referring to one specific thing, which is breeding animals into existence (rather than letting them exist/evolve/breed on their own), and then torturing them, followed by slicing their throats. A beaver builds a damn out of necessity to survive, while we have built torture chambers for animals out of pleasure, because we prefer the taste. If you're going to claim that factory farming is natural, was slavery also natural? The word 'natural' is defined as: " existing in or caused by nature; not made or caused by humankind. " - So maybe you should define what you think the word 'natural' even means. You seem to be confused.
Quoting ssu
This is false. The judgment that I make on what is or isn't natural, is based on the actual definition of natural. It has nothing to do with my moral outlook, so I don't even know where you got that from. Also, science supports a Vegan lifestyle being healthier for the planet and for ourselves. And I can reference peer reviewed studies to backup my claims. Are you denying the science behind adopting a plant-based diet?
Quoting ssu
I believe domesticated animals can have a good life.
Quoting ssu
All sentient life deserves to have a life. Free from unnecessary torture and slaughter.
Quoting ssu
They don't need to go extinct. Many of these farm animals would be put in farm sanctuaries, while the rest would die naturally, as they lived their full natural lives. This still aligns with my answers to your two questions. Cows could have a good life, while deserving a long and torture free one, in which they die of natural causes, just as a human would.
Quoting ssu
Improving living standards of farm animals, while still ending their lives abruptly and not allowing them to live out their natural lives? When a life is in constant pain, it is actually more benevolent to end it, rather than slightly improve it (which wouldn't even happen). There's no way to regulate all these farms 24/7, so it is better to end the suffering all together, and only keep a small amount in animal sanctuaries. This also has nothing to do with what I think is natural. It has everything to do with causing unnecessary pain and torture, when we absolutely do not need to. Not sure why this is such a hard concept for you to understand. If you are causing unnecessary pain to a sentient creature, and there's an easy/practical way to end that pain, you should do so. Otherwise, you're acting immorally.
Black people are people, they aren't farm animals. If left alone, black people can take care of themselves and survive. If left alone, farm animals cannot survive (they'll starve during the first winter or be killed by predators). There are so many farm animals that if we decided to keep feeding and caring for them without harvesting their meat then every meat farmer would go into debt.
Quoting chatterbears
Do you know the difference between field corn and sweet corn?
This is the kind of statement that makes me think you have no sweet clue how farming works.
Quoting chatterbears
There already is substantial demand for fruits and vegetables, which is why we import a shit ton for human consumption. Given the added cost of importing, one would think that if farmers could cheaply grow their own equivalents there would be economic incentive to do so (the price and the demand are already high, but the supply isn't magically expanding). If there was no demand for meat then everything else would suddenly become more expensive while meat farmers go out of business.
The fact is that 90% of the land used to grow field corn isn't suitable for human quality produce (unless high fructose corn syrup is healthy). It's simply not more efficient to stop farming animals.
Quoting chatterbears
It's a problem because we don't have the technology science or infrastructure to make the switch yet.
Quoting chatterbears
Not unless you know some kind of alchemy that can magically fertilize fields and turn feed corn into sweet corn.
Quoting chatterbears
Even if we burned off all our taste buds it's still more expensive.
Quoting chatterbears
So you're going to use plant-based fertilizers to fertilize other plants? What will you use to fertilize your plant based fertilizers?
Eventually we may figure out how to adequately nourish the entire planet without the use of animals, but we havn't yet figured that out.
Quoting chatterbears
Humans are much more sentient than farm animals, which is my first objection to this comparison. Secondly, if I was a slave who could only ever have existed if I am eventually slaughtered, I would still rather have existed than never have existed at all.
Quoting chatterbears
You don't know me, the research I've done, or the diets I've tried. Copy/pasting the studies you find is the laziest kind of research possible (it's not even a citation, you might as well just start dropping book titles), and you have given me utterly zero reasons to take your assertions with any grains of authority.
You're presumptive in the extreme about the science of nutrition, and ignorant in the extreme about the realities of agriculture.
Why are people deserving of living a life without exploitation, but animals are not? Also, of course the farm animals that we genetically modified into existence by altering their DNA, could not survive in the wild. Because we made them to be that way. Their specific purpose is for our consumption, not sustaining a long life.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Meat would get replaced by lab-grown meats, or soy based 'meats'. Farmers wouldn't go out of business. Their business would just evolve into something else.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Meat, in and of itself, is not even of 'human quality'. Most people do not care about what is actually healthy, they care about what tastes good. You really think McDonalds provides 'human quality' food? People will devour anything, as long as it tastes good. And as I said before, is taste preference more important than the life of an animal?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Based on what? As I said previously, the problem is our lack of effort to initiate.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Which I am sure they can do. But also, it doesn't necessarily have to be corn that we grow. It can be something else, that isn't based on torturing and slaughtering sentient beings.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
So is the price of an item more important than the life of an animal? It's like saying. Abolishing slavery will cost too much, because we get cheap/free labor when owning slaves. Nobody would say this, because a small price increase is worth the money if it results in abolishing slavery. Same with animals. I would pay more to end the suffering of these animals, and that shouldn't even be a question.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Do you think that we might have already figured this out, if humans actually took this seriously and made it our priority? Imagine a world of all minds thinking together and trying to figure out a solution to this problem. We probably would have had this figured out decades ago already.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
And a severely mentally handicapped person has about the same sentience as a cow. Does that mean we should group up all the mentally ill people and exploit them? Also, would you rather live as a factory farmed animal, where you're mutilated at birth, while being kept in a small confined area your entire existence, until you were eventually sent off to get your throat slit? Or would you rather not live at all. To say you would rather be a factory farmed animal, than to not live at all, is a bit dishonest. No logical and caring person would ever say this.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
And why don't you show me the research you have done that apparently contradicts the mounds of research in favor of plant-based diets? I am the only one who has provided any type of scientific research, yet you think you're more credible in your assertions than I am with actual studies I present to you?
Also, if showing you scientific studies is considered lazy, what do you consider someone who shows you nothing? Such as what you have done. Which is provided me with nothing to counter any of these studies, other than saying, "You don't know me. You're a lazy research paster. You're ignorant about agriculture."
I'm also curious how one should provide information to another person, regarding scientific studies. I'd love for you to provide me with some research that isn't lazy. Also, one of the studies I linked, did have a citation.
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5638464/
Cited by other articles in PMC
Recommending plant-based diets [Canadian Family Physician. 2017]
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5729135/
It's not about who deserves what, it's about what is thermodynamically viable and necessary to sustain our existence, and the existence of farmed animals. Life exploits life, and as I have tried to explain, we're not yet fully emancipated from nature. In other words, unless we keep eating meat in the immediate and short term, some people will be malnourished and die.
Quoting chatterbears
Can you imagine the initial cost of switching from a cattle farm to a synthetic meat farm?
Quoting chatterbears
But we are trying, and you seem to ignore that entirely. Why do you think there are so many vegans? Why do you think they're inventing lab grown meat?
Quoting chatterbears
The problem is field corn is an extraordinarily robust crop that can grow where other food-stuffs cannot. You could say that the reason we grow so much is to feed the livestock, but on the other hand the fields where livestock feed is grown aren't usable for much or anything else. At the end of the day we would need to recoup these lost calories and nutrients elsewhere which may very well cost us more money despite the existence of subsidies for meat and dairy farmers.
Quoting chatterbears
This is a question about relative wealth and security. How much extra expense can we afford incurring unacceptable losses to our security or quality of life?
If to live in balance and harmony with nature we actually needed to depopulate the planet to around half a billion, would we be obligated to do so to avoid causing the suffering of other animals?
Quoting chatterbears
We just have bigger problems, and it's not been long since we have become enlightened enough (by and large) to actually extend moral consideration to animals where possible.
Quoting chatterbears
There's an interesting dilemma here I think.
How expensive is it for us to care for the severely mentally handicapped?
If it is true that farming some meat is economical, is exploiting an animal justified if it is required to care for the severely mentally handicapped?
I'm not in favor of setting them loose in the wild, that's for sure; I would rather farm animals.
Quoting chatterbears
"Citation" is more than just a link to a study. In order to facilitate good communication, etiquette demands that you somehow process the source you're referencing and show directly how and where it makes your point. You're supposed to paraphrase or quote verbatim (with explanation ideally). Pasting links is asking me to read the entire articles and to pick out which points I think best make your argument for you (do you think asking me to surmise your argument and evidence from a haystack of links is fair, or persuasive?). This is what I meant by "it's not even a citation". It's your evidence and you need to explain the relevant bits yourself in the context of our discussion.
If you would like me to reintroduce the sources and arguments I've expressed in the other thread, I will happily do so. They will show that there would be short term nutritional deficits, even under ideal circumstances if everybody stopped eating meat in a short period of time (hence it is ethical for some people to eat meat at present) and that the engineering problems, logistics, and economic hurtles associated with such a total and rapid switch are insurmountable.
We're heading toward more ethical and animal free agriculture, but it will take time. Are you saying we're unethical because we should be there already? (should we fall on our pitch-forks?) Are you saying we're unethical because we're not presently heading there fast enough? How quickly do we need to stop eating animals for you to cease your ethical rebukes?
Life exploits life? What are you talking about. Also, majority of the US and many other parts of the world are obese, if not at least overweight. And as I said before, all the crops being grown to feed farm animals, could be used to feed the people who are currently malnourished. You're appealing to a very small amount of people, while ignoring the excess of food we currently produce.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
There you go again with price/cost. I get it. You value the cost reduction over a cow's quality of life. But I'd assume you wouldn't say the same thing if we were farming humans, would you.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
So many Vegans? We are an overwhelming minority. Not to mention, the Vegan movement has barely started to grow in the past few years. I was stating, if our species wasn't such selfish assholes, we would have started this movement years ago, while already have been creating replacements for everything.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Yes, back to cost again. Instead of constantly telling me that you don't want to pay more to help another species live peacefully, tell me why they don't deserve to live peacefully? Tell me why an innocent animal, who we bred into existence, doesn't deserve to NOT be torture and exploited unnecessarily for our selfish benefit of taste pleasure?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
At the very least, we would be obligated to come up with other alternatives that do not harm the planet and everything living inside of it. Which is a step that Veganism takes in the right direction.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
What bigger problems are you referring to? This is a big problem. If you don't care about the animals, the environmental detriments alone are enough to take it seriously. Not to mention the negative health impacts on our bodies.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Not sure. Do you have the numbers for this?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
A severely mentally handicapped person does not need animal products to survive. To claim that they need the exploitation of an animal is already a false premise.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
I will happily do so. But just to recap what happened, you first stated, "I suspect that I need to eat meat to have optimum health (and not because I like the taste)." - In which I replied and stated, "This is just scientifically false." - And I proceeded to show you studies by pasting some links. Here they are one-by-one to make my point.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5638464/
- We humans do not need meat. In fact, we are healthier without it, or at least with less of it in our diets. The Adventist Health Studies provide solid evidence that vegan, vegetarian, and low-meat diets are associated with statistically significant increases in quality of life and modest increases in longevity.1 The world that we inhabit would also be healthier without the commercial meat industry. Factory farms are a waste of resources, environmentally damaging, and ethically indefensible.2 It is time to accept that a plant-predominant diet is best for us individually, as a race, and as a planet.
https://www.bda.uk.com/news/view?id=179
- The document states the BDA and The Vegan Society will work together “to show that it is possible to follow a well-planned, plant-based, vegan-friendly diet that supports healthy living in people of all ages”. The organisations will also “promote reliable, evidence-based advice on a healthy vegan diet to members of the public, services users and medical professionals”.
https://www.eatrightpro.org/practice/position-and-practice-papers/position-papers/vegetarian-diets
- It is the position of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics that appropriately planned vegetarian, including vegan, diets are healthful, nutritionally adequate and may provide health benefits for the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. These diets are appropriate for all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, adolescence, older adulthood and for athletes.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3662288/
- Healthy eating may be best achieved with a plant-based diet, which we define as a regimen that encourages whole, plant-based foods and discourages meats, dairy products, and eggs as well as all refined and processed foods.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Yes, please do.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
We are unethical because we continue to support these industries that torture and slaughter innocent sentient life. Each individual person can make the greatest impact themselves, by simply choosing to incorporate other foods into their diet. While at the grocery store, go down a different isle, it's really that simple. We are the most selfish and destructive species on the planet, and I am not surprised this is happening. We barely even care about each other, let alone other species of animals. We are an extreme disappointment of a species, but I hope we will wake up one day. People look back on slavery, and think about how ridiculous it was that it took so long to abolish it. The same is true for the animal holocaust, but people are just as selfish today as slave owners were back then. Everyone turns a blind eye, until they are the ones in the gas chamber. Everybody talks about how great and superior the human race is, yet we are the least compassionate and most destructive. To use the word 'superior' to describe us, is laughably ignorant and dangerously illogical. I bet the white man justified his actions by thinking he was superior to the black man, while we justify our actions by thinking we are superior to cows and chickens. Might makes right, right?
None of the articles you just cited focused on the elimination of meat entirely. Americans eat too much meat and there can be some health benefits statistically associated with vegan diets, but this does not show that moderated meat consumption doesn't confer the same benefits or that there may be statistical outliers who do not benefit from the elimination of animal products.
Here's a quote from one of my posts in another thread, which is related to economics (cost)
Here is another quote examining the nutritional impact of a switch to animal free food production:
Quoting chatterbears
And somehow we're also the most compassionate and most creative...
We're a lot of things, but perfect is not yet one of them. We're not so compassionate to endure any cost to spare the other animals we compete with (sometimes this includes each-other). We'll get there one day, just not today...
Yes, although I would go farther. :up: I'm not so opposed to us being carnivores, as so many other species are. The mass breeding and slaughter is bad, but I'm more worried about the less necessary (to humans) things, such as how we treat (just one example) horses. We enslave them, break them, and force them to carry the weights we choose not to. If we ate them, I could live with that, but this is just slavery. I thought we abolished slavery some time ago. :fear: We use animals (plants and fungi too), we don't respect them or live with them.
We treat other living creatures with the moral respect we extend to concrete.... :chin:
Arbitrary. How do you feel about tadpoles? Or algae? What's the difference between them? Can either carry on a conversation with me, and can they object to how I decide to treat them if my intent is 'injurious' to them? How about that nice roan in yon pasture....would it (notice my choice of pronouns) object, or is it your opinion that it would object if it could? How about that hapless tadpole; would it not object if it could?
"... And if it is unnecessary, it is our responsibility to stop it..."
Who decides what is and what isn't 'necessary?' Are each of us exempt from finding out and enduring what we must in order to survive? Is that all there is to homo sapiens, that he/she ekes out a living on plants? Is the digital device you are using to read my response really 'necessary', or is it something we enjoy to our advantage because we ARE homo sapiens? Shouldn't every life form be entitled to maximization in any number of ways? Why do plants get the short end of the stick on this one, or why do horses get the beneficent nod that plants don't simply because we think we can interact with them on an exalted level? Or that our women like them? Or that children adore them? Or that they have cute young? It's arbitrary.
"... Plants are not sentient, as they don't have a brain or nervous system to process things like pain and/or pleasure..."
Yes, we tell ourselves that. It helps, doesn't it, while we masticate them with glee. If you are a plant and incapable of objecting to what we do with you, well....it just sux. But, if you're a horse, and every bit as incapable of objecting, you'll be anointed with beneficium humanae.
Its true that using animals as labour also carries its own ethical (and environmental) dilemmas. And in the case of horses, yes, a large portion of those used nowadays in tourism industries live a horrible life. But usage doesnt always correspond with abuse. If you have ever had the chance of doing some dogsledding, you'll know that the dogs can barely contain their excitement as you rope their harness in. Here, use correspond with something the animal wants and does naturally, which has simply been appropriated by the musher, structured and imposed back on the dog.
I dont know much about horses, must admit I cant stand being close to one, but I assume that it must be possible for one to live domesticated, doing some amount of labour,and still be a happy beast. I think Tiff here has a ranch, and has a few horses. She doesn't seem like the kind of person that would raise an animal to an unhappy life.
No. It is you that is totally contradicting yourself all the time and are quite illogical.
On one hand you say the human race is a species just like other and hence, part of nature. Then you define natural by being anything not made or caused by humankind. So what is the human race, natural or separate from nature? So what beaver does is natural, but what we do isn't. Actually with your definition nearly all of our food is unnatural as the flora that we eat is cultivated and farmed, just like uh, the domesticated fauna. But that contradiction doesn't concern you.
Then your totally hypocritical idea of mass genocide of the domesticated fauna. First you accept that domesticated animals can indeed have a good life and all sentient life deserves to have a life. Then you purpose a mass extinction of domesticated animals. Because they are killed in a bad way.
Then you argue it's not genocide because the animals are 'benevolently' simply separated by gender and left die of old age. Perhaps let to starve to death once they are so old and frail they cannot walk, so that you can proclaim their death 'natural' or something. And for you not to get a bad conscious (of the catastrophic reduction in numbers of the animals which could be called genocide), you propose sanctuaries. Well, how big would these sanctuaries are for you to feel good? 50 Ayrshire cows in a sanctuary in Ayrshire? 80 Holstein-Friesian cows in Holstein? More? Less? Because there is absolutely nothing 'natural' (by your definition) in your sanctuaries.
Quoting chatterbears
Never have I seen anyone contradict himself in PF like you do. You go on and on about torture chambers, the suffering of animals, the inhumane treatment animals when they are killed, but then you declare it has NOTHING to do with your moral outlook! Nothing. You're even confused where would I get this kind of idea.
Well, have to say it: you are totally confused and in some kind of denial that I don't know.
Quoting chatterbears
Science is a method, which tells how things are. Not how things ought to be. You should teach yourself the definition of science.
And if you are going to argue nonsensically this illogical idea by referring pro-vegan articles, then there's a multitude of articles done by scientists promoting a healthy diet with small part of the diet consisting of fish and meat. And when in those studies the writers have used the scientific method and have come to the fact that some diet is more healthy than another, that is not "Science" saying anything. It never is. That is a scientist making normative statement after intrepreting the result.
But anyway, that's useless because there's actually no logic in your views, where you start from denying that your reasoning comes out from ethical views.
If a domesticated animal is treated well, I cannot see their wild counterparts being happier...
Wild animals live in fear and near constant struggle (a struggle ensured by all the natural competition); starvation and predation are constant threats. A goat who is protected by a fence or gate at night, no longer has to live on the sides of mountainous cliffs for protection and has access to all the grass and shrubs it can eat. Wouldn't that make them happy?
Good farmers have always been able to reduce the amount of stress experienced by their animals.
It's just that people have through urbanization grown apart from countrylife. They don't see how much care farmer can give to their domesticated animals. Farmers are a small minority today.
Why this wouldn't be simply a discussion of treating domesticated animals better, I don't know. Because otherwise it doesn't make much sense.
Yes, humans are a part of nature.
Quoting ssu
Yes, things that humans create (such as watches) are not found in nature. Things that occur naturally, such as trees and beaver dams, are different from things that do not occur naturally, such as airplanes, watches, phones and automobiles.
Quoting ssu
The human species are part of the animal kingdom, which occurs in nature. What humans actually create, such as helicopters, are not naturally occurring.
Quoting ssu
This depends on how you define the word 'natural', which is why I told you to define it (but you still have not). But yes. In how I define it, a beaver builds a dam to provide ponds as protection against predators such as coyotes, wolves, and bears, and to provide easy access to food during winter. When a species of animal, in nature, creates things for its own survival out of necessity, it is deemed as natural. Humans do nothing of the sort. Almost everything humans create is unnatural. If you define natural in a different way, then explain your definition. But I have not contradicted myself within my own definition and how I use the term.
Quoting ssu
Yes, all of our food is unnatural. And your point is?
Quoting ssu
There's a difference between causing an extinction and letting animals die off naturally. If we created Robots, but then stopped creating them because they were causing too many problems, would you call that a mass extinction? That's just an incorrect use of the term extinction. You're trying to inject a contradiction where it does not fit. And I've already address this point once, so go back and read my response to you on the last page.
Quoting chatterbears
This was my original statement. In which you then only quoted part of it.
Quoting chatterbears
Can you be more dishonest? If you actually comprehended the FULL context, I clearly stated how I use the term 'natural', which has nothing to do with my moral outlook. Whether or not something is natural, does not say whether or not something is morally acceptable. Lions commit infanticide in nature, yet I wouldn't state that is morally acceptable (even though it is natural).
Quoting chatterbears
Please point out the contradict, in context. Without quoting one part of a sentence like a dishonest tool. When did I ever say that my objection to animal torture chambers have nothing to do with my moral outlook? Please quote where I said that, and you better do it properly this time.
Quoting chatterbears
Science uses a method, but it is not a 'method' by definition. Science builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Therefore, if science tells us that eating meat is unhealthy for your body, it can make a probable prediction about your health in reference to how you eat. You should teach yourself the concept of understanding how something is defined.
Quoting chatterbears
Yes, in which most of those articles/studies are funded by the industries who create those products. Not to mention, the argument that states "Incorporating a small amount of meat into your diet won't hurt you." - Is the same as saying, "Smoking 1 cigarette per week won't hurt you." - Yeah, of course a small amount of something bad won't have a significant impact on your health. That doesn't mean that it isn't bad for you.
Quoting ssu
Coming from the person who dishonestly misquotes and misrepresents my position.
(ought we intervene to save the cubs?)
Is it morally acceptable for lions to slaughter animals for meat consumption?
-It's good you don't work there anymore. Did you become vegetarian/vegan because of that experience? Or do you still eat animals? If so, why.
No, it did not affect my habits at the time, at least much. I tried avoiding sausages for a while, simply because I had worked on the casing line, which is super eewwww. I was conscious of the animal's suffering, of how much better off they wouod be even in a regular family farm, at least for a psrt of their existence. But honestly, I beleived that back then the conditions of effective protest against the meat mass industry were not there. Our plant was selling mostly to Americans, Japanese and Chinese markets. Even if I stopped althogether eating pork, there was no way for Olymel to register my act of economic protest.
I'm also comfortable with the fact that my existence might cost others theirs. Or that theirs might end up costing mine. I didnt make up those rules, would change them if I could, but honestly, I'd rather be the wolf then the deer, if the choice was mine.
It is also important to realize that most of us meat eaters are quite simply addicted to it. I tried piscarism (only seafood, no red or white meat) for about a year and half, and its stupid to say, but walking next to a salami stand at the market was one of the worst craving moments I've ever felt.
Still, I find the willful blindness to the horrible conditions of livestock to be seriously infuriating. One of the thing that struck me, working at the plant was how, if it was humans being gased, proded, hooked, cut at the throat, dunk in boiling waters, passed through flamers and then broken for parts, that this would be the very best and most vivid presentation of evil and Hell ever. And we've been pretty good, as a specie, at coming up with those. And yet I didn't feel horror for the hogs, none of us did, even when we agreed the conditions were terrible.
I would put into the ground anyone who would do to my cat what I did to those hogs, and yet, even when I'm writing this, I can't help but feel that this is normal and in no way hypocritical. Our worst curse is probably our ability to justify just about anything to ourselves...
I rest my case.
I've never seen anyone as self-contradictory as you in the PF.
- I think it's also worth wondering just how happy wild animals actually are...
I would recommend reading Being a Beast, by Charles Foster. Its not rigorous phenomenological research, but it gives you a sense of just how alien to us even an otter' umwelt really is, and how hard it would be to relate something like happiness to his existence. Still, the problem of suffering is far more apparent than that of happiness, as well for beasts as for humans.
But this is a bit otiose to the question. We have little responsability to the welfare of wild animals we do not interact with. But, given our imprints extension on this world, we almost always have some degree of interaction and therefore responsabilities. Domestication is not the problem, really, its the mass industrialization and complete and utter commodification of independant, sentient living beings. I am actually of the opinion that the domestication of companion species demonstrate one of the most noble aspect of humanity, despite the fact that it is far from being a perfect relationship.
Going to ignore you from this point on, since it is clear you're a troll and/or uninterested to have an actual discussion, while dishonestly misrepresenting my position.
1. I defined natural. And part of that definition was when a species of animal creates things for it's own survival out of necessity. Such as a spider creating a web to catch prey to eat and survive.
2. Humans do not create things out of necessity for their survival, which is why almost all of our food is unnatural. We do not need to eat animals to survive, which is why factory farms are not natural.
There is no contradiction here, other than you asserting there is one. As I said, I'm going to stop responding to you from here. GL on another thread.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Vaga, a few points here.
1. I'll respond to your last post. It was a bit long and I'm going to take a bit more time to respond to it. Probably will by tomorrow.
2. Lions do not have the same intelligence level as we do, and do not have the same moral thought process as we do. In the same way I am not going to hold a severely mentally handicapped person accountable for their wrongdoings, I don't necessarily hold the lion accountable either. On some level, they may or may not have empathy (we know some animals do display empathy, while others may not). But again, as humans, we can think and reflect on our actions on a much deeper level. We know that infanticide is immoral, unless of course the child was suffering in pain from a disease they were born with, in which it would be more moral to end their suffering than to continue it. But at that point, it probably wouldn't be labeled as infanticide anymore, as that is usually associated with an unjust killing of a young infant.
And yes, as I said before, some animals need to kill other animals in order to survive out of necessity. And if you couple that with their very limited reasoning ability to process their actions and reflect back on what they have done, I would not say a lion is immoral for killing a zebra. It is the only way that the lion knows how to survive. But on the other hand, we as humans, can survive on plants. Yet we still choose to create a system that breeds animals into torture and slaughter, just so we can have a better taste pleasure. We know of many ways to survive, while the lion does not. Yet we still choose to survive on the unnecessary exploitation of animals.
Also Vaga. (and I welcome anyone else to critique this as well). Can you tell me if you see the same "contradictions" that SSU is seeing within my argument. Because according to him, he has never seen anybody contradict themselves more than me on this forum. (smh)
Understood, but would you stop unnecessary violence if you could? I understand that much of us have probably benefited from the exploitation of another living being. Even something like the tires on my car, were probably made from cow by-products. This is something I have no control of, unless I want to ride a bike to work. But even the bike would have tires made with the same ingredients. Veganism isn't perfect, but it is a step in the right direction. It is basically stating that we can help where we can, practically and simply. How cars are made, is not in my control. What I eat, is completely in my control. (Aside from a food allergy or other anomalies.)
So again. If you could help another living being not suffer, why wouldn't you?
Quoting Akanthinos
Well, you would just have to explain why you put more value on your cat, rather than a pig or a cow. Would you also feel the same about a random person's cat? Or is it only your cat, that you would be upset about? But I think it is clear, that society has essentially indoctrinated us to believe that some animals deserve love and care, while others to not. This is where the inconsistent belief system starts. Why is a dog/cat deserving of life, but a cow/chicken/pig is not? It has been researched that pigs are more intelligent than dogs, so you cannot point to intelligence as the determining factor. If it is about a special bond with your specific cat, your reasoning becomes part of the special pleading realm, with a hint of being arbitrary. And I doubt that you would want your existence to rely on someone's arbitrary decision to keep you alive, or based on how special you are to them.
I know many people - people who genuinely love animals - who have pets. Or animal captives, if I'm being provocative. We've used animals for so long now (millennia...) that we don't even notice that we're doing it, I think. We love our dogs; we have five. (!) But they cannot come and go as they wish; they are captives. Morally, is this OK? That's what I'm asking. ... And my answer is: I'm not sure. (Yeah, I know, lacking decisiveness. :smile:)
The main distinction that you seem to be ignoring here is, our pets cannot survive on their own. They wouldn't be able to eat normally, while also being put in more danger from things like cars and possibly other animals (coyotes / mountain lions / etc.). We, as humans, can survive on our own. If someone drugged you, tied you up and locked you in their home, we would see this as captivity. But if that person let you go, could you not survive on your own, given the current resources our world has for human survival.
On the flip side, owning pets is a selfish endeavor that humans have engaged in. Most of the time, the pet is sleeping and/or doing nothing. And if the dog barks, we tell it to be quiet. Many people rarely even take their dogs for an adequate walk (at least 1 hour). Many people ignore and/or neglect their dogs. Most people would put their dog down if it needed a surgery that costed too much money, yet wouldn't think twice if the same situation applied to their children.
But for the people who actually treat their dogs like family, and treat them like they have physical and emotion needs (which they do), it is more moral to take care of this dog in their home, than to let it be 'free', as it cannot survive on its own.
OK, so I'm a troll and you will diss me now for giving some critique. But fine, seems you really didn't get my point and obviously don't care, so enough of that. I won't bother anymore.
Infanticide among lions isn't immoral if their killing of prey isn't immoral. Cold as this reality may be, competition for survival between lions and other animals leads to a breakdown of all avenues of cooperation and leaves only direct conflict as a viable survival strategy.
To various degrees, the avenues of peaceful coexistence between humans and animals also break down and leave us more and more reliant on selfish behavior as a means of survival.
Tribal society simply cannot live vegan (and even if you can find one of the ultra-rare examples, it only works in a very particular climate and ecosystem which happens to allow it). Meat energy got us out of the forest and into the fields (farms). Since its invention agriculture has relied on animal husbandry in some form, and while today there are technological options that are newly becoming available which can help us be less reliant on animals, many are not proven or even tested on commercial scales. For any non-first world nation meat is an absolute must for nutritional self-sufficiency. In first world nations, the expense of eliminating meat entirely would be massive, which would cut directly into other important infrastructural investments in things like education and medicine. The poorest individuals who already suffer from poor nutrition would almost certainly need to pay more money to acquire the same amount of nutrients than they would in a meat-inclusive market. If we eliminated meat consumption entirely,at some point we would be trading the health and well-being of humans to avoid the slaughter of farm animals. In this sense, to a certain degree, it's either us or them. There is yet no possible world in which we can extend full moral consideration to farm animals while maintaining the same moral consideration for other humans.
Your energy would be much better placed by attacking those aspects of meat consumption which aren't actually efficient or are needlessly cruel (factory farming for instance). You could argue that eating at KFC is immoral because it is not done to save money or to acquire nutrition (it's not healthy) and is ONLY done for the taste, which requires the insanely massive industrial scale chicken farms which we all know are describable as hell for chickens. You should attack the over consumption of meat, inefficient agricultural practices used to over-produce meat, and the cruel farming practices necessary to do it.
Once we're closer to a world where nobody is overeating meat in the first place, where cruel industrial farms are unnecessary, and where the existing farms which do produce meat are ethical and efficient (e.g: free range cattle foraging rough land), then we will have a much better idea of how much it will cost to eliminate meat entirely along with our moral obligation to do so.
I want you to remember that I'm not saying we should not reduce our consumption of meat; it's clear we over-eat meat and we produce too much of it. What I'm saying is that the total and complete elimination of meat entirely is both too expensive, and ethically neutral (or worse). It's too expensive because some meat reduces the volume of food we need to consume and has a convenient mix of particular nutrients which can be hard to source elsewhere (especially without getting too much of other things) and because traditional animal husbandry is severely productive. It's ethically neutral (or worse) to eliminate the farming of animals entirely because many farm animals do lead happy lives despite eventually being intentionally killed (farm animals can lead lives that are worth living), and so ending their existence via the sanctuary-genocide you propose would plausibly be unethical.
Quoting chatterbears
I do see contradictions, but I've seen bigger...
I think the main contradiction SSU is concerned with is that you treat humans as wholly separate from nature and therefore indictable by standards which apply to nothing else. I've said it before, we aren't yet fully emancipated from nature; we're still playing a survival game and the risks are still considerable. To some degree we're not yet systemically free from the need to eat meat, and I firmly believe that a national or global switch at our present level of infrastructure and understanding would court too many risks. Your attack against anyone and everyone who eats meat is misplaced; you should attack those who are economically capable of supporting meat alternatives, and also attack those who contribute to the over-production of meat (and accompanying cruelty) by supporting places like KFC.
When did I say humans are wholly separate from nature? Humans are animals. Animals are a part of nature. Humans are a part of nature. I never denied this.
Also, why wouldn't we apply different standards to a species that has a higher capacity for moral consideration and intelligence? Do you not hold an adult to a different moral standard than a child? Similarly, do you not hold a human to a different moral standard than a lion? I think the answer is clear here.
Humans are not separate from nature, but they are more accountable for their actions than all other animals. Please tell me exactly where I contradicted myself? Maybe finding the exact line-by-line would help me, because I still don't see it. And I am not just saying this sarcastically. If I am actually contradicting myself, I would like you to show me exactly where.
I claim that it is arbitrary to place humans on one plain, the warm 'n fuzzies a close second, and slugs, snails, tadpoles, shrimps, sea anemones, and plants sufficiently far below those-in-the-club that we can tread on them or eat them as we wish. I claim this because of the very intelligence and superior grasp of moral principles that you say humans possess. For example, I haven't seen a compelling argument yet that mere sentience, if that truly applies to any one of the warm 'n fuzzies, is a sufficiently distinctive quality to place them outside of our list of consumables. There isn't even a good argument against cannibalism, except for a few glitches arising from prions and other defects. Instead, the arguments seem more to rely on the 'ick' factor than anything else.
If it is immoral to eat animals, as the more zealous insist, and not just to farm them more efficiently, then it is immoral for all humans because we are deemed to be equal. How would you fault, in a compelling argument, those who subsist on animal byproducts? After all, their prey are 'sentient'....aren't they?
A rhino isn't warm n' fuzzie, yet I would put him on the same plain of moral consideration as dogs. Also, it is not arbitrary to state that sentient creatures are deserving of life. Since, sentient implies the ability to feel pain and suffer. And to feel pain and suffer, directly relates to how we make moral decisions. If a plant cannot feel pain or suffer, then moral consideration does not apply to it. That is not arbitrary. And as I said to Vaga, humans should be held to a higher moral accountability than other animals, similar to how an adult should be held to a higher moral accountability than a child. As the famous quote goes, with great power comes great responsibility. And with great intelligence and the ability to reflect on one's actions, comes great accountability to ensure those actions are morally correct and ethically consistent.
Quoting gloaming
There are different levels of sentience, but at the baseline, a sentient creature should not be exploited or used for an unnecessary purpose. Plain and simple. Also, I am not against cannibalism, at it's core. A human can die of natural causes, and someone else could eat them. I have no problem with that. The problem comes in when people place value on the dead person's body, in which they would not want their loved one eaten by somebody else. But if you're referring to a different cannibalism, where people are being killed and eaten unnecessarily, then yes I am against that.
Quoting gloaming
Your sentence doesn't make sense. "If it is immoral to eat animals, and not just to farm them more efficiently, then it is immoral for all humans because we are deemed to be equal" - Huh?
It is immoral for all humans to what? It is immoral for all humans to eat animals at all? It is immoral for all humans to exist? I don't understand what you just said there.
If lions are allowed to prey on other animals in order to prosper, why are we not allowed to prey on other animals in order to prosper?
You could say that the lion doesn't know better or that it has no other choice (and these reasons apply to humans in various degrees), but the very existence and prosperity of lions and other predators necessitates that they go around exploiting other forms of sentient life. Going by the basic standards you've outlined, it would not be immoral to exterminate all lions and other predator species in order to preserve the other forms of life which are unfairly exploited by them. If I see a mountain lion trying to kill a family of deer, can I not shoot the lion in defense of the innocent deer?
If you disagree because what lions and other predators do is natural, then you've unfairly or irrationally delineated between humans and all other nature.
Well yes, but what is the cause of this? Could it be that there is no "wild" for them to live in any more? If we consider dogs, and their 'wild' cousins, wolves, there is nowhere they *could* live. We have paved the wild, and built houses on it. There is no room for wolves (or wild dogs) in our human-dominated world. If there was, I offer the suggestion that dogs could survive quite happily in the wild. :chin:
I never stated we can perfectly refrain from exploiting any form of life. We do it all the time, and it will be almost impossible to eradicate it. What I am saying is, to refrain from exploiting another animal unnecessary, when it is practical and easy to do. Changing your diet, is an easy way to refrain from the unnecessary exploitation of animals, and it is easy to do compared to other things.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
I have explained this already. Lions prey on other animals in order to survive. Do we need to prey on other animals in order to survive in the same way the lions do? Absolutely not. Also, if you are going to look to a lion for moral guidance and action persuasion, then do you believe it is ok for humans to kill their babies since lions do it as well?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Yes. When an animal has no other choice to survive, other than killing other life, I don't find it immoral to do so. We, as humans, are in a position where we do not need to factory farm in order to survive. We are not in the same position as the lions.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
To kill that lion would mean that you believe it is wrong to take an innocent life, even if it is based on survival. And to do so, would mean that you surely believe factory farming is immoral and would stop contributing to it.
I do not think it is immoral for an animal to survive by killing another animal. If that the only way they know how to survive, there is nothing immoral about it. Not to mention, lions are not moral agents. They do not have the capacity to reflect on their actions in the same way we do, which is why it would be asinine to deploy human standards of morality to a lion. In the same way it would be asinine to deploy adult standards to a 3-year old.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
I have never stated that I base my moral outlook on what is natural. It is based on the unnecessary suffering of sentient creatures. A zebra does not unnecessarily suffer from a lion, because that lion's survival is dependent upon the necessity to hunt and kill. Farm animals unnecessarily suffer from humans, because a human is not dependent upon a farm animal in order to survive.
What is natural and what is moral, are two completely separate things. And I have made this clear multiple times, so I am not sure why you and SSU keep coming back to that. As I said to you once already, please copy/paste a line of me stating something, and another line of me contradicting myself.
Still not sure I understand your point, but I'll try to answer.
I don't think it is immoral to kill an animal for your survival. Whether that is a dog, cat, or even a human But humans are never put in this situation, aside from the extremely rare hiker who gets lost in the woods and can't find his way home, in which he is forced to kill an animal in order to survive. Bringing up this type of hypothetical doesn't apply, because it is not a real world scenario that everybody in this forum faces. It's also irrelevant to the original point of this thread, which is that humans do not need to eat animals in order to survive.
There's a rare case for every type of situation. But the overwhelming majority of humans never experience this themselves, let alone hear about it.
Quoting chatterbears
At least some people actually do need to eat meat in order to prosper (and some to survive).
Quoting chatterbears
There's a spectrum of positions that individual humans and human groups occupy, and some are not unlike the position of the lion.Quoting chatterbears
But you've neglected to deny the charge (to answer the question).
You would not be opposed to the extermination of all lions (or at least your framework does not portray it as immoral and you have not objected to it).
Both the lion and the deer are innocent, but one has to die for the other to thrive. Why should I not kill the lion to spare the deer?
Quoting chatterbears
I'm not interested in pinning you down on a naturalistic fallacy, I'm much more interested in getting you to accept that human agriculture is not yet advanced enough to completely eschew the use of animals.
You can say that we could be capable of doing so if we were prepared to accept any cost to do so, but we're not prepared to accept any cost. Just like you're (presumably) not prepared to accept the extermination of lions to preserve the herbivores, humans aren't yet willing or prepared to risk sacrificing their ability to thrive for the sake of another species (read: we're not yet capable of logistically planning and funding an animal free national diet). The cost would be too much and at some point the stability of our prosperity would be threatened.