>(a) is relevant because I would not wish imposed upon myself Ok, so perhaps it's relevant in a philosophical sense but not in any kind of practical sense. We

>(a) is relevant because I would not wish imposed upon myself Ok, so perhaps it's relevant in a philosophical sense but not in any kind of practical sense. We know better than to humanely kill animals and eat them, so instead we will leave them in the fields to be ripped apart by other animals. Which is ok because the predators didn't know it was bad. I'm personally ok with eating animals because that's just nature. It would be better to be caught by a human hunter than most predators. I also don't see animals as having some higher purpose, i.e. killing an animal to eat it is not the same as killing a human to eat them. If you believe killing animals is wrong because they are living beings then how can you reconcile killing plants? In my opinion the problem is these industrial farms. There is a never ending pressure to bring prices down so that means cutting corners for the animals who can't write their congressman. I would like to see something done to shape behavior. For example, if you waste meat you should have to pay, say 10x the price of that meat. Restaurants would pass this charge onto their customers and hopefully we would have people asking for less meat on their plates pretty quickly. Which should drive demand down some. >(c) Can you please clarify why you do not consider the statement "we should exterminate all predators" to imply genocide? Of course it does imply genocide but it obviously wasn't a serious suggestion, it was poking fun at the other position. >I am trying to provide an argument based solely on the logical (in)consistency of the GP's statement without introducing any new measures. Ok, then I concede you have effectively done that. What I was reacting to is that such an argument doesn't help anything. So it's morally inconsistent, so what? I like the taste of meat and pointing out some logical formula that says I shouldn't doesn't effect anything. We won't make life better for the animals by pointing out logical inconsistencies. We'll make life better for them by driving behavior.