Eating Animals

That means I will be eating meat forever.

Needs the caveat that farming isn't necessarily cruel, however.

I don't think I ever said it was. I've been to the more intensively reered pork farms and even they are not as bad as many would have us believe, nevertheless one cannot ignore the cruelty that does happen, not merely on an animal level but at human expenses also, particularly where exploitation of less economically developed countries is concerned. The key to an ethical solution to this somewhat unsolveable problem of meat consumption is in the economics of it, its an industry, industries must be changed economically and with patience and dilegeance. One cannot wave a magic wand and make the problem go away, and we must expect any change we desire to be a gradual process not a sudden process. Sudden economic changes are invariably disastrous in the long run.

This goes for animal experiment ethics also. A lot of people have a problem with using animals as living shields in all toxicology tests, as human clinical trials with drugs that have not first been used on animals is strictly illegal. People want to know, "why the discrimination? Why are humans more important?"...answer: economics. Humans cost more, so much so that the buisness cannot function without this system and I do not need to tell you the utilitarian ethical concerns of having all pharmasutical companies go bust thus rendering a total lack of worldwide healthcare for both humans and animals. So, if you have a serious ethical problem with experiments on animals and wanna do something about it, please don't beat up scientists and burn their offices because that acheieves nothing, rather, do something productive. Come up with a plausible alternative system that we can more ethically use and which actually works economically (using humans in initial clinical trials would NOT work and would do more harm overal, sorry) and then join a pharma company, get promoted into management and then start working the system to change the industry gradually, and market the fact that your ethical because people dig ethical companies, ethics is good PR... or stop complaining and put up with it!

"the ethical questions accompany intelligence. does a wolf think about whether or not its prey feels pain?"

As far as we know, animals are amoral. However, wild animals generally kill their prey efficiently, with a minimum of pain and suffering - cut off the wind pipe and go straight for the jugular, as they say, not for moral reasons, but to be quick about it. And we've found that prey animals will go into a numb trance-like state when they know they've lost the battle and death is imminent. Apparently, only men are intentionally cruel to other creatures. We can act morally and treat animals humanely or we can be be crueler than any animal would ever be, we've been given that choice and obligation.

And as I said earlier, besides the ethics of meat eating, we should consider the economics of it: is raising animals to eat an efficient use of our land and resources? Cows consume an awful lot of food and water. We could grow nutritious high protein foods to eat ourselves rather than feed them to livestock and then eat them.

Alan Watts called life on Earth the "mutual eating society." Everyone must join, no exemptions will be given.

I will not deny that the cognitive abilities of humans are vastly superieor in many ways and that much of what animals do is more reflex than thought. I think it is a bit of a wild assumption though to presuppose than humans are the only animal on the planet that ever thinks about anything however, I would certainly think that some animals have the capacity for thought and judgement. Even on an ethical level. What we know of ethics is no merely from intuition and introspection and self evident truths, knowledge of ethics comes from obervation also, namely, observations in behavioural psychology in human relationships, now if you take the time to make some comparrisons in the behavioural traits of humans besides some behavioural traits of other animals you will see some startling similarities.

Name a "human" ethical virtue, say, compassion. Are humans the only creatures that show compassion in their behaviour? Compassion is an emotion prompted by the pain of others. More vigorous than empathy, the feeling commonly gives rise to an active desire to alleviate another's suffering. "A desire to alleviate another's suffering"...well, what is the behavioural result of such a desire? Helping others, teamwork, collaboration, and even altruism. Do we see altruism in nature? Absolutely, it is by no means an exclusively human behaviour. When a pack of lions attempt to kill an elephant calf, do the other mothers NEED to flock to defend a calf that is not their own? Does it even make much darwinian sense, for surely the selfish gene should dictate that they only care for their own young? Apparently not, for when lions attack, the entire herd flocks to defend that one calf, why? Elephants are clever creatures, I have difficulty believing that they never think about these issues.

Elephants may or may not be able to reason deductively i.e. putting two and two togethar (because we have no way of knowing that), but they, like others clearly posses the capacity for inductive reasoning, the ability to learn via experiance and adapt to new situations, so they clearly do posses a rudamentary sense of logic as do many animals in fact! They show signs of emotion also, when presented with the image of a dead elephant corpse the physiological reactions are strikingly similar to the physiological reactions observed in a human who can only be describes as "grief stricken", aka, slower heart beat, increased tear production, little or no motivation to do anything, passive attitude, lack of awareness or interest in the environment etc.

Hell elephants have even been thought to possess a sence of aesthetics, when elephants are given a canvus and a paint brush they don't always merely have fun with it, but do posses the ability to represent their environment via a painting which is quite impressive in itself!

If elephants have all these amazing cognitive abilities why not other animals?

As far as we know, animals are amoral. However, wild animals generally kill their prey efficiently, with a minimum of pain and suffering - cut off the wind pipe and go straight for the jugular, as they say, not for moral reasons, but to be quick about it. And we've found that prey animals will go into a numb trance-like state when they know they've lost the battle and death is imminent. Apparently, only men are intentionally cruel to other creatures.

Never seen a cat (any size, any species) playing with wounded prey? Never heard of predators tracking bleeding wounded animals until they collapse? Didn't realise that ducks engage in rape and necrophilia?

Ah, well. Disney has a lot to answer for.

Everything unpleasant which humans do, animals do too. But which animals can do the good that we can? Which can make the progressive decisions which we do?

as far as i am aware, only domesticated cats play with their food.

as for the others, i will have to trust you on this one.

and you pose an excellent question.

but more imortantly, what defines good in this case?

the collective good is only good so long as all individuals benefit. how many humans can say they do good on a regular basis? far too few im afraid.

as for progressive decisions, how many humans make those anymore?

Wild species do too, it's documented, though I regret that the BBC programme doesn't seem to be hosted online anywhere.

More humans make progressive decisions now than they did before, perhaps. Consider the wider and growing awareness of the importance to ecological sustainability, social justice and recycling of waste products.

As much as there are many historical heroes who ended the slave trade (well, mostly), emancipated women (in the West, at least), and built our democracies, we still have comparable campaign groups today, and on top of that we are increasingly seeing a more ethically alert population.
One can point to modern crime, but in actual fact there's much less crime now than there was in the heady Victorian days of emancipation and intellectual discovery.

But Invictus, I said they were amoral, you have merely given examples of that. Are you implying that animals intentionally torture their prey? Sorry but I can't swallow that (pardon the pun).

I was not taking issue with the "As far as we know...", but with the "However..." which contained the explicit suggestion that animals are more humane than mankind is, and the implicit suggestion that we are morally inferior to them.

"the implicit suggestion that we are morally inferior to them."

I didn't mean to imply that, only that we have more choice in the matter. I accept Simon's caveat too that we can't make a general statement that "all animals are amoral." Obviously some are more intelligent than others and with intelligence comes the capacity for moral discernment.

P1: Sentience is the primary faculty humans consider when dealing with ethics concerning pleasure, pain, survival, and posterity.
P2: Animals are sentient.
P3:Therefore, animals are worthy of moral consideration.



Rationality is not the first consideration for morals; it's a qualifier.

[/i]

Why should moral consideration prevent us from eating them?

Why should moral consideration prevent us from eating them?

If an animal dies accidentally or is euthanased eating the corpse could damage only your own health.

David Drum Bum is right, and the way in which farm animals are intensively bred,reared and fattened is wrong because it causes them sustained pain.

You're lucky you weren't born an animal 'cause some ever-so-wise human would come and eat you. I, the fool, would allow you to live.

Why should moral consideration prevent us from eating them?

If an animal dies accidentally or is euthanased eating the corpse could damage only your own health.

David Drum Bum is right, and the way in which farm animals are intensively bred,reared and fattened is wrong because it causes them sustained pain.

i. Then kill it healthy.

ii. Then don't buy meat produced in that way.

I guess it should be noted that I'm a pescetarian. I've gotten criticism as well as understanding for this stand.

This means I eat fish, seafood, and other low-sentience yet non-harvested in captivity. I eat eggs and milk, even though I know theoretically that milk contributes to veal harvesting profit. A 'boycott' is only so effective.


1.The sentience argument I sustain: Fish and crustaceans live a well-lifestyle as far as I'm concerned--they don't expect to die (like most animals) and do not interact with humans until they are harvested, limiting the amount of pain they would or could experience; they are for sustenance. This is just my practical split I made 2 years ago so I could eat relatively easier instead of a purely vegetarian diet. I still don't eat red meat or poultry of any sort.

2. I could offer hundreds of arguments for vegetarianism and/or my diet, but the point here is that animals in captivity experience a diminished style of living compared to those are not. Happy cows from California is a misnomer; Chickens are brutal. The argument for organic or 'knowing where it's coming from' is erroneous--how often, even if you try to investigate, know where your meat from market is coming from?

I'm not cynical in the sense that I scorn those who eat meat--as I said, I'm a hypocrite of sorts for eating fish, clearly sentient creatures, but as a college student it's expensive to sustain a purely vegetarian diet and get all the nutrients required.