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Yeah, my wife studied animal science in undergrad and is now getting a graduate degree in animal behavior and welfare. Oddly enough she wasn't vegetarian but ta

Yeah, my wife studied animal science in undergrad and is now getting a graduate degree in animal behavior and welfare. Oddly enough she wasn't vegetarian but talking to her made me go real vegetarian real fast (and I'm almost vegan, I'm currently phasing out cheese and I've cream). My guess is that whenever we get lab grown meat and we don't "need" animal agriculture anymore people will start to realize how bad the current practices can be.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
What's really interesting is that even plants have more awareness of the world around them than we like to give them credit for. So if we are to assume that plants can suffer similarly to how we do, how does that change our relationship to them? If you extend the concept further and just assume that everything has some experience of reality, whether you can relate to it or not, what does that tell us about how we ought to behave?
- inerte 8y ago
  First, setting the stage: https://yourveganfallacyis.com/en/plants-are-alive https://yourveganfallacyis.com/en/plants-are-alive Second, assuming for example that molecules have some experience of reality, and we just don't "relate" to the air around us, I am going to assume we will continue breathing.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
    I disagree with the link's assessment. > Plants lack nerves, let alone a central nervous system, and cannot feel pain or respond to circumstances in any deliberate way (not to be confused with the non-conscious reactions they do have). The argument is circular. Plants cannot act in a deliberate way because they are not conscious and are not conscious because they cannot act deliberately. From a pure materialist perspective, the human mind is just as reactionary in its behavior as a plant, born of a combination of genetics and external stimuli. That it is sufficiently complex enough to obscure the direct relationships from our understanding is irrelevant. We have very little understanding of a plant's experience of the universe, it may well be that they experience suffering through some mechanism other than having a central nervous system, it just isn't the same experience as our own forms of suffering. This whole thread is about how things different from ourselves can never the less experience the world similarly, why would we think this stops at animal life? > Second, assuming for example that molecules have some experience of reality, and we just don't "relate" to the air around us, I am going to assume we will continue breathing. Not an unreasonable position. The question is, why is this ok? I don't think it is one people should just write off and not think about, even though their conclusion will probably be the same as yours. In general, I think it is a trap to allow yourself to say "well, this is where the line is, because of X" and not also question your assumptions about X and, in particular, why X matters. Why do people draw the line at sentience when it comes to what we can and cannot do to another entity? Why is sentience important? Why not simply draw the line at being human, or go the other direction and draw it at all life? On what axis are these two choices and why did we pick that one? Why is feeling pain important? Is it ok to kill someone afflicted anhidrosis? I don't believe there are easy answers to these questions, or even necessarily answers at all if you insist on some kind of empirical and well defined rule, which is also why I think they're important to ask ourselves.
    - inerte 8y ago
      I eat plants because it's the best balance of survival and how much suffering I cause. If one day we invent an affordable pill not made of plants that fulfills my biological needs, and its production causes less suffering than eating plants, sign me up. Then let's suppose this pill is a mash of different rocks (which we have to extract from the earth with all its consequences) but then we invent nano bots that change my organic needs to be fulfilled by the energy of the sun, then sign me up for that too.
      - goldenkey 8y ago
        The whole plant argument is commonly used by meat eaters in denial as some type of catastrophic excuse. "Its all bad man!! No solution to what Im currently doing!" Really irritates me to see such petty denial of their poor virtue.
        AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
        Using this argument as a justification for eating meat is silly, since meat animals must also eat plants and therefore more plants are consumed per calorie when you eat meat than when you don't. To argue that if plants suffer then eating meat is no worse is to argue that increased suffering is no worse than decreased suffering simply because suffering still exists.
- svieira 8y ago
  > Then Tolstoy and the Humanitarians said that the world was growing more merciful, and therefore no one would ever desire to kill. And Mr. Mick not only became a vegetarian, but at length declared vegetarianism doomed ("shedding," as he called it finely, "the green blood of the silent animals"), and predicted that men in a better age would live on nothing but salt. And then came the pamphlet from Oregon (where the thing was tried), the pamphlet called "Why should Salt suffer?" and there was more trouble. ~ GCK - The Napoleon of Notting Hill https://www.gutenberg.org/files/20058/20058-h/20058-h.htm https://www.gutenberg.org/files/20058/20058-h/20058-h.htm

AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago

What's really interesting is that even plants have more awareness of the world around them than we like to give them credit for. So if we are to assume that plants can suffer similarly to how we do, how does that change our relationship to them? If you extend the concept further and just assume that everything has some experience of reality, whether you can relate to it or not, what does that tell us about how we ought to behave?

inerte 8y ago
First, setting the stage: https://yourveganfallacyis.com/en/plants-are-alive https://yourveganfallacyis.com/en/plants-are-alive Second, assuming for example that molecules have some experience of reality, and we just don't "relate" to the air around us, I am going to assume we will continue breathing.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
  I disagree with the link's assessment. > Plants lack nerves, let alone a central nervous system, and cannot feel pain or respond to circumstances in any deliberate way (not to be confused with the non-conscious reactions they do have). The argument is circular. Plants cannot act in a deliberate way because they are not conscious and are not conscious because they cannot act deliberately. From a pure materialist perspective, the human mind is just as reactionary in its behavior as a plant, born of a combination of genetics and external stimuli. That it is sufficiently complex enough to obscure the direct relationships from our understanding is irrelevant. We have very little understanding of a plant's experience of the universe, it may well be that they experience suffering through some mechanism other than having a central nervous system, it just isn't the same experience as our own forms of suffering. This whole thread is about how things different from ourselves can never the less experience the world similarly, why would we think this stops at animal life? > Second, assuming for example that molecules have some experience of reality, and we just don't "relate" to the air around us, I am going to assume we will continue breathing. Not an unreasonable position. The question is, why is this ok? I don't think it is one people should just write off and not think about, even though their conclusion will probably be the same as yours. In general, I think it is a trap to allow yourself to say "well, this is where the line is, because of X" and not also question your assumptions about X and, in particular, why X matters. Why do people draw the line at sentience when it comes to what we can and cannot do to another entity? Why is sentience important? Why not simply draw the line at being human, or go the other direction and draw it at all life? On what axis are these two choices and why did we pick that one? Why is feeling pain important? Is it ok to kill someone afflicted anhidrosis? I don't believe there are easy answers to these questions, or even necessarily answers at all if you insist on some kind of empirical and well defined rule, which is also why I think they're important to ask ourselves.
  - inerte 8y ago
    I eat plants because it's the best balance of survival and how much suffering I cause. If one day we invent an affordable pill not made of plants that fulfills my biological needs, and its production causes less suffering than eating plants, sign me up. Then let's suppose this pill is a mash of different rocks (which we have to extract from the earth with all its consequences) but then we invent nano bots that change my organic needs to be fulfilled by the energy of the sun, then sign me up for that too.
    - goldenkey 8y ago
      The whole plant argument is commonly used by meat eaters in denial as some type of catastrophic excuse. "Its all bad man!! No solution to what Im currently doing!" Really irritates me to see such petty denial of their poor virtue.
      - AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
        Using this argument as a justification for eating meat is silly, since meat animals must also eat plants and therefore more plants are consumed per calorie when you eat meat than when you don't. To argue that if plants suffer then eating meat is no worse is to argue that increased suffering is no worse than decreased suffering simply because suffering still exists.
svieira 8y ago
> Then Tolstoy and the Humanitarians said that the world was growing more merciful, and therefore no one would ever desire to kill. And Mr. Mick not only became a vegetarian, but at length declared vegetarianism doomed ("shedding," as he called it finely, "the green blood of the silent animals"), and predicted that men in a better age would live on nothing but salt. And then came the pamphlet from Oregon (where the thing was tried), the pamphlet called "Why should Salt suffer?" and there was more trouble. ~ GCK - The Napoleon of Notting Hill https://www.gutenberg.org/files/20058/20058-h/20058-h.htm https://www.gutenberg.org/files/20058/20058-h/20058-h.htm