10 ms·

Why Not Eat Octopus?

57 points by samclemens 12y ago

Gys 12y ago
Great article !
adrianN 12y ago
While I agree that we should think twice about eating sentient animals like octopuses, pigs are quite intelligent too (more so than many dogs!) and few people hesitate in front of a hot dog. Unlike the pigs we eat, the octopuses at least had a nice life and weren't cramped into tiny, dirty pens. Furthermore, octopuses have a very low life expectancy, they die after reproducing, and eating them is ecologically more sensible than many other seafood, tuna for example.
- XFrequentist 12y ago
  Yeah, that really should have been discussed in the article...
  - MiguelHudnandez 12y ago
    This article was linked at the end, and I presume the author didn't feel the need to address the same issue, even though it was a big part of the experience at the heart of the article. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/09/flesh-of-your-flesh http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/09/flesh-of-your-f...
- tootie 12y ago
  I think the case of dogs is very interesting. Any dog lover will readily admit their dog is intelligent and emotional. Is owning them and keeping them on leashes not therefore slavery?
  - vinculuss 12y ago
    The domestication of dogs was something that was mutually beneficial at the time. The use of leashes on a walk is for the sake of safety, not because the dog wants to escape. If you're talking about abused dogs being chained up and not taken care of, you're right. That is unethical.
    - goldfeld 12y ago
      Dogs all around the world today live more often than not on small cramped apartment demarcations (or kennels), much like a baby's playpen even though--and as opposed to how owners tend to treat cute ones--dogs are not babies forever. They're pretty much kept "on notice" for whenever owners feel like playing with them, at the end of a hard working day. I tend to think that's pretty close to slavery, you could make a case for Stockholm's syndrome at the least, since owners normally end up preventing dogs from interacting with other dogs at will (!) or even castrate (!!) them. You know, smoke a joint, have kids--find some other stress reliever and bonding mate, and as a bonus you get not to feed a reckless breeding industry.
      - Stratoscope 12y ago
        Point well taken - for people who abuse and mistreat their dogs. But I hope you're not tarring everybody with the same brush. We rescued our three dogs through a wonderful no-kill shelter here in Redwood City, Pets in Need: http://www.petsinneed.org/ http://www.petsinneed.org/ I don't know what industry we were feeding with our modest adoption fees and donations, other than Pets in Need's mission of rescuing dogs from kill shelters. So here's an example of how badly we abuse our dogs. Meet ThinkPad Dog: https://www.flickr.com/photos/geary/12356111084/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/geary/12356111084/
        goldfeld 12y ago
        I guess my bigger point is that if you're someone whose work day involves the dog (a farmer, a policeman, blind people), that's great, "man's best friend" for me is exactly in this sense of the dog thinking of you as peer, not owner, of being side-by-side helping along and being an active dog. If you're gonna keep your dog in close quarters for the limited time you can see him and walk him, I don't think that's to be encouraged--dogs as house pets, that is. Of course, much like adopting abandoned kids, what you do is very noble and lessens the suffering of dogs, but I don't think that leads to being supportive of "pet culture", especially where people buy brand new pups and of races breeded for quality X that end up with all sorts of cruel diseases--that's feeding the industry.
  - Stratoscope 12y ago
    That's an interesting question, and I have two answers for it: 1. My dogs live a much longer, happier, healthier life with me than they would out in the wild. Their lives are orders of magnitude better here. 2. Have you ever shown a dog a leash? :-)
    - DanBC 12y ago
      It's safe to say that pet ownership is fucking terrible for dogs. Over-breeding leads to painful life limiting genetic flaws. Excess breeding gives a huge population of dogs with no hope of kind ownership, leading to thousands of dogs being killed each day and many others living in pounds.
      - dublinben 12y ago
        Canis lupus familiaris only exists through millennia of domestication. They literally would not exist if not for "pet ownership."
        DanBC 12y ago
        That's the point. Without this cruel industry you wouldn't have genetic freaks living shortened often painful lives.
      - Stratoscope 12y ago
        I am the dog owner you are talking to. So I have to ask: do you think being owned by me is terrible for my dogs? See, I can't do anything about "pet ownership", whatever that is. I can't do anything about over-breeding. I can't do anything about the thousands of dogs killed or living in pounds. Oh wait! Yes I can! I rescued three of them. They have happy lives with us and our friends and each other now. A big safe yard with squirrels to chase, good food (not the squirrels!), soft beds (they're all on my bed right now), laps to sit on, baths and teeth brushed, no fleas (usually), and not getting eaten by raccoons or caged and killed in a pound. Fucking terrible, isn't it?
        12y ago
  - robotresearcher 12y ago
    Domestic dogs want to be owned, cared for, and for many breeds, worked hard. This makes them happy. We have bred them this way for thousands of years. Abusing dogs is cruel, keeping them (well) is not.
nodata 12y ago
I wanted to like this article, but it didn't address or resolve the pig versus octopus debate adequately really.
alelefant 12y ago
Okay between this and the lobster story you guys and gals are really starting to make me feel bad about the seafood Christmas my family does ever year (we're each responsible for a different seafood dish). I'll surely bring this up at the dinner table and I can tell ya right now, grandma isn't going to agree! :) Back on topic though, this was another good read. The debate about how to cook it was hilarious: He insisted that there was an art to cooking octopus correctly. His includes a Neapolitan trick: a wine cork in the cooking liquid. Éric Ripert and Harold McGee dismiss this step as mere legend—to which Pasternack gleefully responds, “Éric Ripert is full of shit!”
davidw 12y ago
If anyone stops by Padova, Italy, (I have a standing invitation like patio11's: http://www.kalzumeus.com/standing-invitation/ http://www.kalzumeus.com/standing-invitation/ ), there's a fantastic seafood street stand that serves octopus: http://www.tripadvisor.it/LocationPhotoDirectLink-g187867-d3185414-i66002712-La_Folperia-Padua_Province_of_Padua_Veneto.html http://www.tripadvisor.it/LocationPhotoDirectLink-g187867-d3... It's so good even my kids love it! "More tentacles, please!"
GraffitiTim 12y ago
Reminds me of this (surprisingly powerful, IMO) video of a kid who doesn't want to eat an octopus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJNntUXyWvw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJNntUXyWvw
- geuis 12y ago
  Wow great video. Thanks for sharing.
tom_devref 12y ago
I've been a strict vegetarian for close to 5 years. While I support any reduction in meat consumption, grading the edibility of animals by our perception of their intelligence is Nazism.
- GuiA 12y ago
  You might want to develop your comment instead of just using words that are mostly used for blind trolling ("nazism"). Wanting to exterminate all the jews and maintain the superiority of some concept of an Aryan race is nazism. Grading the edibility of animals by our perception of their intelligence might be right or might be wrong depending on your moral/ethical framework, but I'm not sure there is any consistent worldview in which it actually is nazism. In other words, your comment doesn't help the vegetarian cause, and maybe being a bit more thoughtful is a small price to pay to turn that around.
  - tom_devref 12y ago
    There are many lines of argument to support meat consumption (all of which are easily refuted). Justifying it via a genetic hierarchy is one of the sickest.
    - gnaritas 12y ago
      Perhaps so, but it isn't nazism.
    - MichaelDickens 12y ago
      You're not going to get anywhere by calling an argument "sick" but then not explaining why it is mistaken.
- gnoway 12y ago
  So is asserting superiority on the basis of not eating meat. Edit: I don't understand the downvotes for this. Nazism is not all about racial cleansing and gas chambers; it has a strong social darwinist component in general. The vegetarian/vegan group know they are better people for having made the decision to stop eating meat. There is no gray area: they are right and everyone else is wrong, as illustrated by the parent comment.
undershirt 12y ago
It's interesting to me that the dolphin and octopus seem to be separated from us by some missing feature. The Dolphin is social and intelligent, but lacks graspers (for tools). The Octopus is intelligent, has capable graspers, but is not social and doesn't live long. I wonder if having those missing features would cause critical tipping points toward civilization.
- GuiA 12y ago
  Both animals live underwater, where it would be really hard for any advanced civilization to form (no fire, much harder to extract raw resources, much harder to build shelters out of dirt/straw/etc.), etc. It's probably not a coincidence that all civilizations (for a perhaps loose definition of civilization- bees, ants, termites, humans, etc.) live on firm ground.
  - boulos 12y ago
    I was with you until bees and such. In what way do you feel bees are more of a "civilization" than say a pod of whales or dolphins? Is it a "has a structure" requirement?
    - oscarduignan 12y ago
      There are a lot more bees in a hive than in a pod of whales or dolphins, we're talking potentially many tens of thousands of bees per hive. I think that's the qualifier here, scale of numbers
    - robotresearcher 12y ago
      Cetaceans don't have technology - they don't build things, adapting the environment to themselves. Their niche doesn't afford placing and combining materials like others do. So as Douglas Adams observed, all the dolphins seem to do is muck about and have a good time.
- rch 12y ago
  Jaron Lanier speculates the lack of cultural knowledge passing from one generation to the next has put a cap on Cuttlefish development. Once the eggs hatch, the latest brood has to start from scratch.
Jun8 12y ago
I found the "bargain with humanity" argument mentioned to justify eating pigs disturbing, since it was also used many times to rationalize human atrocities, too and many a situation that is disguised economic slavery, e.g. "Yes, their condition is bad but wouldn't they be worse off if we weren't doing this to them?".
SoftwareMaven 12y ago
Humans became human by eating meat. We aren't nearly as good as we think we are at creating fake replacement foods (see the number of people who have health problems clear up after going Paleo). Some day, we may be able to replace real animal protein, but we aren't there yet. In the meantime, I think we owe it to the animals and the environment to give the animals that will sacrifice their lives to propagate our own a happy existence. My goal for the past year has been to convert to sustainably raised, pastured meats exclusively. I'm not perfect, but I try. And I am grateful for the sacrifice these animals make. On the specific topic of Cephalopods, I think our highest moral imperative is to ensure the survival and continued evolution of the species. If that requires farming some, fine, but we may find the intelligent life on earth in the next two million years belongs to them. Breaking that branch of, either trough ignorance or gluttony, is intolerable.
- aaron-lebo 12y ago
  You can entirely replace animal protein with a combination of plant-based proteins. Ethical or humane methods of killing animals is a step forward, but it absolutely is not required.
  - SoftwareMaven 12y ago
    Some people can. Some people find that the phytochemicals associated with those plant proteins, when consumed in quantities, cause significant gut and hormonal problems (phytoestrogens impacting androgen production, for example). And that says nothing about the current questions about whether soy increases breast cancer risk. Soy is obviously not the only plant protein. My current favorite is mushroom-based, but it is new, and industrial food doesn't have a good track record.
  - kelnos 12y ago
    I don't think that's even close to universally true. I know quite a few vegetarians (and vegans) who were "doing it right", but were later advised by their doctors (even after getting 2nd and sometimes 3rd opinions) to eat meat as a means of curing their systemic health problems. And guess what? Eating meat made them healthy. I'm not saying that there aren't tons of people who are very healthy vegetarians and vegans (some of them healthier than they would be eating meat), but I'd just like to point out that it's not universally true that you can replace animal protein with plant-based protein and be healthy. Nutrition is a complex topic, and not all bodies behave the same when it comes to food.
DodgyEggplant 12y ago
As Benjamin Franklin famously noted, even animals eat animals. The problem is quantity. Never in human history, even modern times, meat was served daily, in mass. For most people, it was an expensive food, affordable once or twice a week. And that before population increase we see. If people consumed meat once or twice a week, the diet, and for those who like it - taste, were OK, yet many many problems would be solved. Much more food, and less cruel industrialisation of animals to food. (full disclosure: vegan)
- aaron-lebo 12y ago
  That's a good observation by Franklin, but in so many ways we like to think of ourselves as superior than animals. An animal doing something is a poor justification for a human doing something. (This is probably obvious to you already being a vegan).
  - meowface 12y ago
    Agreed, that's a very flawed line of reasoning. Many animals rape, torture, and kill other animals. Just because they do that purely by nature doesn't mean it's ethical for us to do so as well.
- jeffpetes 12y ago
  > Never in human history I'm curious, when did Inuits stop being human?
  - scott_karana 12y ago
    Very fair point! Though, a single-word revision would reconcile both your statements: > Never in human history, even modern times, fresh meat was served daily, in mass The Inuit diet contains many heavily preserved or fermented meats. That, and their prey is often very large, sufficient to feed numerous humans for months.
aaron-lebo 12y ago
It strikes me as rather bizarre to oppose eating octopus because they are "too smart", but to continue to eat other animals because they "aren't smart enough". That's a really arbitrary line to draw. An analogy I like to use is that there presumably could be aliens out there that would like to eat humans. You could imagine said aliens landing on Earth and trying to eat us, and even imagine some argument among themselves that humans aren't smart, and thus can be eaten - something that we'd all obviously find issue with. Now obviously animals cannot think of or cannot communicate with us that they do not want to be eaten the same way we could with another species, but I believe part of the responsibility of having any kind of power (whether intellectual or otherwise), is to take the utmost care of those who are somehow weaker than you. To do otherwise is to take advantage (might makes right), and that notion is disturbing. In those terms, I have a very hard time justifying raising, keeping, and killing (and in most cases causing incredible suffering) to animals purely for our pleasure, when it is both entirely possible and likely more efficient for us to not eat them. Basically, the only reason we eat animals today is because we've always done things this way. I do not mean to be offensive, as putting it this way suggests that those eating animals are wrong or doing evil, but instead I just think it is one of the many little things that we as society and individuals do without much thought.
- riquito 12y ago
  We are animals that eat animals. You are putting too much thought into it.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - bobthechef 12y ago
    Exactly. That topics like these receive any attention is ridiculous. It shouldn't come as a surprise to us, however, that a topic so empty has appeared in what amounts to a lifestyle magazine run by first world, white, upper middle class slackers disconnected from reality. And perhaps most amusing of all is that these are exactly the same kinds of people that are pro-choice. There's something wrong going on here, some state of stunted development. These are exactly the kinds of people who blather on about "speciesism" but fail to understand that there's a seething sanctimony to their moralizing. The official message is "we're no better", but the very idea of speciesism is speciesist and incoherently so. "We, the great moral humans, are better than these other animals for we do not behave as they do. Where they would have no qualms about eating us or any other animal, we, the morally superior, do not." I suggest the author be shipped promptly to the third world, some war zone in Africa suffering from famine, without resources, without her Lexus, her cashmere turtle necks, and her credit cards, and be put in a position where she must learn resourcefulness and survival or perish. Heck, if we put all of our limp-wristed, hipster millennials through that kind of experience, there might be fewer hipsters. Reality is the greatest teacher. Eat the damn octopus.
wyager 12y ago
I honestly can not come up with a comfortable moral basis for eating meat derived from sentient animals. I do it anyway, mostly out of practical concerns, but I really hope artificial growth technology picks up over the next few years and tank-grown meat becomes viable.
gweinberg 12y ago
Octopuses may be much smarter than any other invertebrate, but does anyone seriously think they are as smart as pigs?
zorrb 12y ago
Just started reading the article but Jaron Lanier has a whole section on this (surprisingly) in his book, You Are Not A Gadget.
jessaustin 12y ago
More cladistic thoughts: http://lesswrong.com/lw/kvk/the_octopus_the_dolphin_and_us_a_great_filter_tale/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/kvk/the_octopus_the_dolphin_and_us_a... Octopus is definitely on my menu.
dmritard96 12y ago
Rather than assessing a species intellect, I tend to look for things to eat that are healthy, nutritious, delicious, environmentally sound/sustainable and most importantly, low carbon.

57 points by samclemens 12y ago

Gys 12y ago

Great article !

While I agree that we should think twice about eating sentient animals like octopuses, pigs are quite intelligent too (more so than many dogs!) and few people hesitate in front of a hot dog. Unlike the pigs we eat, the octopuses at least had a nice life and weren't cramped into tiny, dirty pens. Furthermore, octopuses have a very low life expectancy, they die after reproducing, and eating them is ecologically more sensible than many other seafood, tuna for example.

XFrequentist 12y ago
Yeah, that really should have been discussed in the article...
- MiguelHudnandez 12y ago
  This article was linked at the end, and I presume the author didn't feel the need to address the same issue, even though it was a big part of the experience at the heart of the article. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/09/flesh-of-your-flesh http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/09/flesh-of-your-f...
tootie 12y ago
I think the case of dogs is very interesting. Any dog lover will readily admit their dog is intelligent and emotional. Is owning them and keeping them on leashes not therefore slavery?
- vinculuss 12y ago
  The domestication of dogs was something that was mutually beneficial at the time. The use of leashes on a walk is for the sake of safety, not because the dog wants to escape. If you're talking about abused dogs being chained up and not taken care of, you're right. That is unethical.
  - goldfeld 12y ago
    Dogs all around the world today live more often than not on small cramped apartment demarcations (or kennels), much like a baby's playpen even though--and as opposed to how owners tend to treat cute ones--dogs are not babies forever. They're pretty much kept "on notice" for whenever owners feel like playing with them, at the end of a hard working day. I tend to think that's pretty close to slavery, you could make a case for Stockholm's syndrome at the least, since owners normally end up preventing dogs from interacting with other dogs at will (!) or even castrate (!!) them. You know, smoke a joint, have kids--find some other stress reliever and bonding mate, and as a bonus you get not to feed a reckless breeding industry.
    - Stratoscope 12y ago
      Point well taken - for people who abuse and mistreat their dogs. But I hope you're not tarring everybody with the same brush. We rescued our three dogs through a wonderful no-kill shelter here in Redwood City, Pets in Need: http://www.petsinneed.org/ http://www.petsinneed.org/ I don't know what industry we were feeding with our modest adoption fees and donations, other than Pets in Need's mission of rescuing dogs from kill shelters. So here's an example of how badly we abuse our dogs. Meet ThinkPad Dog: https://www.flickr.com/photos/geary/12356111084/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/geary/12356111084/
      - goldfeld 12y ago
        I guess my bigger point is that if you're someone whose work day involves the dog (a farmer, a policeman, blind people), that's great, "man's best friend" for me is exactly in this sense of the dog thinking of you as peer, not owner, of being side-by-side helping along and being an active dog. If you're gonna keep your dog in close quarters for the limited time you can see him and walk him, I don't think that's to be encouraged--dogs as house pets, that is. Of course, much like adopting abandoned kids, what you do is very noble and lessens the suffering of dogs, but I don't think that leads to being supportive of "pet culture", especially where people buy brand new pups and of races breeded for quality X that end up with all sorts of cruel diseases--that's feeding the industry.
- Stratoscope 12y ago
  That's an interesting question, and I have two answers for it: 1. My dogs live a much longer, happier, healthier life with me than they would out in the wild. Their lives are orders of magnitude better here. 2. Have you ever shown a dog a leash? :-)
  - DanBC 12y ago
    It's safe to say that pet ownership is fucking terrible for dogs. Over-breeding leads to painful life limiting genetic flaws. Excess breeding gives a huge population of dogs with no hope of kind ownership, leading to thousands of dogs being killed each day and many others living in pounds.
    - dublinben 12y ago
      Canis lupus familiaris only exists through millennia of domestication. They literally would not exist if not for "pet ownership."
      - DanBC 12y ago
        That's the point. Without this cruel industry you wouldn't have genetic freaks living shortened often painful lives.
    - Stratoscope 12y ago
      I am the dog owner you are talking to. So I have to ask: do you think being owned by me is terrible for my dogs? See, I can't do anything about "pet ownership", whatever that is. I can't do anything about over-breeding. I can't do anything about the thousands of dogs killed or living in pounds. Oh wait! Yes I can! I rescued three of them. They have happy lives with us and our friends and each other now. A big safe yard with squirrels to chase, good food (not the squirrels!), soft beds (they're all on my bed right now), laps to sit on, baths and teeth brushed, no fleas (usually), and not getting eaten by raccoons or caged and killed in a pound. Fucking terrible, isn't it?
      - 12y ago
- robotresearcher 12y ago
  Domestic dogs want to be owned, cared for, and for many breeds, worked hard. This makes them happy. We have bred them this way for thousands of years. Abusing dogs is cruel, keeping them (well) is not.

nodata 12y ago

I wanted to like this article, but it didn't address or resolve the pig versus octopus debate adequately really.

alelefant 12y ago

Okay between this and the lobster story you guys and gals are really starting to make me feel bad about the seafood Christmas my family does ever year (we're each responsible for a different seafood dish). I'll surely bring this up at the dinner table and I can tell ya right now, grandma isn't going to agree! :) Back on topic though, this was another good read. The debate about how to cook it was hilarious: He insisted that there was an art to cooking octopus correctly. His includes a Neapolitan trick: a wine cork in the cooking liquid. Éric Ripert and Harold McGee dismiss this step as mere legend—to which Pasternack gleefully responds, “Éric Ripert is full of shit!”

davidw 12y ago

If anyone stops by Padova, Italy, (I have a standing invitation like patio11's: http://www.kalzumeus.com/standing-invitation/ http://www.kalzumeus.com/standing-invitation/ ), there's a fantastic seafood street stand that serves octopus: http://www.tripadvisor.it/LocationPhotoDirectLink-g187867-d3185414-i66002712-La_Folperia-Padua_Province_of_Padua_Veneto.html http://www.tripadvisor.it/LocationPhotoDirectLink-g187867-d3... It's so good even my kids love it! "More tentacles, please!"

GraffitiTim 12y ago

Reminds me of this (surprisingly powerful, IMO) video of a kid who doesn't want to eat an octopus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJNntUXyWvw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJNntUXyWvw

geuis 12y ago
Wow great video. Thanks for sharing.

tom_devref 12y ago

I've been a strict vegetarian for close to 5 years. While I support any reduction in meat consumption, grading the edibility of animals by our perception of their intelligence is Nazism.

GuiA 12y ago
You might want to develop your comment instead of just using words that are mostly used for blind trolling ("nazism"). Wanting to exterminate all the jews and maintain the superiority of some concept of an Aryan race is nazism. Grading the edibility of animals by our perception of their intelligence might be right or might be wrong depending on your moral/ethical framework, but I'm not sure there is any consistent worldview in which it actually is nazism. In other words, your comment doesn't help the vegetarian cause, and maybe being a bit more thoughtful is a small price to pay to turn that around.
- tom_devref 12y ago
  There are many lines of argument to support meat consumption (all of which are easily refuted). Justifying it via a genetic hierarchy is one of the sickest.
  - gnaritas 12y ago
    Perhaps so, but it isn't nazism.
  - MichaelDickens 12y ago
    You're not going to get anywhere by calling an argument "sick" but then not explaining why it is mistaken.
gnoway 12y ago
So is asserting superiority on the basis of not eating meat. Edit: I don't understand the downvotes for this. Nazism is not all about racial cleansing and gas chambers; it has a strong social darwinist component in general. The vegetarian/vegan group know they are better people for having made the decision to stop eating meat. There is no gray area: they are right and everyone else is wrong, as illustrated by the parent comment.

undershirt 12y ago

It's interesting to me that the dolphin and octopus seem to be separated from us by some missing feature. The Dolphin is social and intelligent, but lacks graspers (for tools). The Octopus is intelligent, has capable graspers, but is not social and doesn't live long. I wonder if having those missing features would cause critical tipping points toward civilization.

GuiA 12y ago
Both animals live underwater, where it would be really hard for any advanced civilization to form (no fire, much harder to extract raw resources, much harder to build shelters out of dirt/straw/etc.), etc. It's probably not a coincidence that all civilizations (for a perhaps loose definition of civilization- bees, ants, termites, humans, etc.) live on firm ground.
- boulos 12y ago
  I was with you until bees and such. In what way do you feel bees are more of a "civilization" than say a pod of whales or dolphins? Is it a "has a structure" requirement?
  - oscarduignan 12y ago
    There are a lot more bees in a hive than in a pod of whales or dolphins, we're talking potentially many tens of thousands of bees per hive. I think that's the qualifier here, scale of numbers
  - robotresearcher 12y ago
    Cetaceans don't have technology - they don't build things, adapting the environment to themselves. Their niche doesn't afford placing and combining materials like others do. So as Douglas Adams observed, all the dolphins seem to do is muck about and have a good time.
rch 12y ago
Jaron Lanier speculates the lack of cultural knowledge passing from one generation to the next has put a cap on Cuttlefish development. Once the eggs hatch, the latest brood has to start from scratch.

Jun8 12y ago

I found the "bargain with humanity" argument mentioned to justify eating pigs disturbing, since it was also used many times to rationalize human atrocities, too and many a situation that is disguised economic slavery, e.g. "Yes, their condition is bad but wouldn't they be worse off if we weren't doing this to them?".

SoftwareMaven 12y ago

Humans became human by eating meat. We aren't nearly as good as we think we are at creating fake replacement foods (see the number of people who have health problems clear up after going Paleo). Some day, we may be able to replace real animal protein, but we aren't there yet. In the meantime, I think we owe it to the animals and the environment to give the animals that will sacrifice their lives to propagate our own a happy existence. My goal for the past year has been to convert to sustainably raised, pastured meats exclusively. I'm not perfect, but I try. And I am grateful for the sacrifice these animals make. On the specific topic of Cephalopods, I think our highest moral imperative is to ensure the survival and continued evolution of the species. If that requires farming some, fine, but we may find the intelligent life on earth in the next two million years belongs to them. Breaking that branch of, either trough ignorance or gluttony, is intolerable.

aaron-lebo 12y ago
You can entirely replace animal protein with a combination of plant-based proteins. Ethical or humane methods of killing animals is a step forward, but it absolutely is not required.
- SoftwareMaven 12y ago
  Some people can. Some people find that the phytochemicals associated with those plant proteins, when consumed in quantities, cause significant gut and hormonal problems (phytoestrogens impacting androgen production, for example). And that says nothing about the current questions about whether soy increases breast cancer risk. Soy is obviously not the only plant protein. My current favorite is mushroom-based, but it is new, and industrial food doesn't have a good track record.
- kelnos 12y ago
  I don't think that's even close to universally true. I know quite a few vegetarians (and vegans) who were "doing it right", but were later advised by their doctors (even after getting 2nd and sometimes 3rd opinions) to eat meat as a means of curing their systemic health problems. And guess what? Eating meat made them healthy. I'm not saying that there aren't tons of people who are very healthy vegetarians and vegans (some of them healthier than they would be eating meat), but I'd just like to point out that it's not universally true that you can replace animal protein with plant-based protein and be healthy. Nutrition is a complex topic, and not all bodies behave the same when it comes to food.

DodgyEggplant 12y ago

As Benjamin Franklin famously noted, even animals eat animals. The problem is quantity. Never in human history, even modern times, meat was served daily, in mass. For most people, it was an expensive food, affordable once or twice a week. And that before population increase we see. If people consumed meat once or twice a week, the diet, and for those who like it - taste, were OK, yet many many problems would be solved. Much more food, and less cruel industrialisation of animals to food. (full disclosure: vegan)

aaron-lebo 12y ago
That's a good observation by Franklin, but in so many ways we like to think of ourselves as superior than animals. An animal doing something is a poor justification for a human doing something. (This is probably obvious to you already being a vegan).
- meowface 12y ago
  Agreed, that's a very flawed line of reasoning. Many animals rape, torture, and kill other animals. Just because they do that purely by nature doesn't mean it's ethical for us to do so as well.
jeffpetes 12y ago
> Never in human history I'm curious, when did Inuits stop being human?
- scott_karana 12y ago
  Very fair point! Though, a single-word revision would reconcile both your statements: > Never in human history, even modern times, fresh meat was served daily, in mass The Inuit diet contains many heavily preserved or fermented meats. That, and their prey is often very large, sufficient to feed numerous humans for months.

aaron-lebo 12y ago

It strikes me as rather bizarre to oppose eating octopus because they are "too smart", but to continue to eat other animals because they "aren't smart enough". That's a really arbitrary line to draw. An analogy I like to use is that there presumably could be aliens out there that would like to eat humans. You could imagine said aliens landing on Earth and trying to eat us, and even imagine some argument among themselves that humans aren't smart, and thus can be eaten - something that we'd all obviously find issue with. Now obviously animals cannot think of or cannot communicate with us that they do not want to be eaten the same way we could with another species, but I believe part of the responsibility of having any kind of power (whether intellectual or otherwise), is to take the utmost care of those who are somehow weaker than you. To do otherwise is to take advantage (might makes right), and that notion is disturbing. In those terms, I have a very hard time justifying raising, keeping, and killing (and in most cases causing incredible suffering) to animals purely for our pleasure, when it is both entirely possible and likely more efficient for us to not eat them. Basically, the only reason we eat animals today is because we've always done things this way. I do not mean to be offensive, as putting it this way suggests that those eating animals are wrong or doing evil, but instead I just think it is one of the many little things that we as society and individuals do without much thought.

riquito 12y ago
We are animals that eat animals. You are putting too much thought into it.
- deleted 12y ago
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- bobthechef 12y ago
  Exactly. That topics like these receive any attention is ridiculous. It shouldn't come as a surprise to us, however, that a topic so empty has appeared in what amounts to a lifestyle magazine run by first world, white, upper middle class slackers disconnected from reality. And perhaps most amusing of all is that these are exactly the same kinds of people that are pro-choice. There's something wrong going on here, some state of stunted development. These are exactly the kinds of people who blather on about "speciesism" but fail to understand that there's a seething sanctimony to their moralizing. The official message is "we're no better", but the very idea of speciesism is speciesist and incoherently so. "We, the great moral humans, are better than these other animals for we do not behave as they do. Where they would have no qualms about eating us or any other animal, we, the morally superior, do not." I suggest the author be shipped promptly to the third world, some war zone in Africa suffering from famine, without resources, without her Lexus, her cashmere turtle necks, and her credit cards, and be put in a position where she must learn resourcefulness and survival or perish. Heck, if we put all of our limp-wristed, hipster millennials through that kind of experience, there might be fewer hipsters. Reality is the greatest teacher. Eat the damn octopus.

wyager 12y ago

I honestly can not come up with a comfortable moral basis for eating meat derived from sentient animals. I do it anyway, mostly out of practical concerns, but I really hope artificial growth technology picks up over the next few years and tank-grown meat becomes viable.

gweinberg 12y ago

Octopuses may be much smarter than any other invertebrate, but does anyone seriously think they are as smart as pigs?

zorrb 12y ago

Just started reading the article but Jaron Lanier has a whole section on this (surprisingly) in his book, You Are Not A Gadget.

jessaustin 12y ago

More cladistic thoughts: http://lesswrong.com/lw/kvk/the_octopus_the_dolphin_and_us_a_great_filter_tale/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/kvk/the_octopus_the_dolphin_and_us_a... Octopus is definitely on my menu.

dmritard96 12y ago

Rather than assessing a species intellect, I tend to look for things to eat that are healthy, nutritious, delicious, environmentally sound/sustainable and most importantly, low carbon.