Eating Meat is Ethical/Unethical

[Trust]

@xtisme

So what? We are omnivorous and we murder and rape. Plus we pilot ships and planes. And? We are still what we are, and that means we are meat eaters by nature and general inclination as well, which means…it’s ‘ethically’ appropriate for us to eat meat.-XT
It depends on the action, I’d say. If you hit my knee with a small hammer, it would be reflexive for my leg to move. If I eat a burger, it would be hunger that is driving my actions…that, and my own dietary inclination (I’d want cheese and perhaps bacon as well…and if I could taste the fear, with perhaps a flame broil, that would simply make it perfect. Well, perhaps with some mustard and a few onions tossed in as well). Other, more complex actions would depend on my own worldview and outlook, molded by my cultural and philosophical mores and upbringing, and controlled by my own intellect and conscience.

-XT

I am sure you are aware of this, but if you define self interest as ethical, then there really is no point in taking a hard look at our actions. Very convenient.

@Odesio

At one point we were obligate omnivores in that we had to consume animal matter in order to survive. So at what point in human history did eating meat become immoral?

From a high level, at the point we no longer needed meat to survive. From a practical standpoint, at the point we no longer needed meat to survive and the point we were smart enough to realize that it breaks the three main ethical principles.

If you look back at history, hundres of years ago many people of the day believed it was perfectly normal to own slaves. However, some dude by the name of Jeremy Bentham spoke out against slavery. Not only that, but he also realized how terrible our treatment of animals was. This was in the 1700’s. The freakin 1700’s! He realized that, “the question is not, Can they reason? , nor, Can they suffer?, nor, Can they talk?, but, Can they suffer?” Many consider him the first patron saint of animal rights. What you find is that he was not necessarily some special genius way ahead of his time. He simply understood ethics and applied them to every day life. He simply used the golden rule on a grand scale to figure out things people could not figure out at the time.

Bentham in turn inspired William Wilberforce who fought until, literally, his dying days, to stop slavery. When no one would listen to him, he would not take “no” for an answer. For years he took anti-slavery legislation to parliament, but he was always turned down. What started out as most people against him, eventually had a change of heart and joined his team. They knew that slavery was wrong. Even though they supported it with everything they had years earlier. Wilberforce also helped found the RSPCA. Three days before Wilberforce died, he heard of concessions that guaranteed the passing of the Bill for the Abolition of Slavery. Without Wilberforce, the Quakers and Bentham, abolition would never have been achieved.

Leo Tolstoy in turn wrote, “The Kingdom of Heaven Is Within You”. This inspired Gandhi to practice non-violence. Gandhi in turn inspired Martin Luther King Jr. to practice non-violence which led to the freedom of the people. But where did this all begin?

Where did Bentham get his ideas for Utilitarianism? Where did Tolstoy get his inspiration for non-violence. The inspiration for Bentham and Tolstoy came from none other than the gospels.

Christ starts with the golden rule. But he takes this one step further to its logical conclusion. He tells us to deny our part of the equation. Regardless of our own self-suffering, he wants us to do everything for the greater good. Completely ignore any suffering we will go through. “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it.”

In the temple, priests were sacrificing animals. As Christ says, "If you had known what that text meant, ‘I desired mercy, not sacrifice’, you would not have condemned the innocent. Christ knew it is impossible to see how the injustice of our sin, plus the injustice of killing an innocent animal could ever equal justice. For Christ, this injustice had to stop. In the temple they were selling sheep… and making a whip of cords, he drove them out. During this time, he quotes Jeremiah which goes on to say that God never even asked for the sacrifices to begin with (Jeremiah 7:22, 8:8). Christ realizes the ignorance of the people who fell for sacrifices but is more concerned about freeing the animals and forgiving the people than any sort of judgment on them. Christ had become the first great animal liberator.

However, no one f$ck$ with the priests primary source of income, and they quickly arrest Christ as word gets out. Knowing the purpose he was sent to fulfill, Christ says nothing as he is dragged on his way to being slaughtered. “I am the Good Shepherd. I lay down my life for the sheep”. When any one of us would have given up long ago, he tells us to turn the other cheek and to deny our part of the equation for the greater good.

Years later, James the Just is killed and justice dies with him. Parts of the Utilitarian ethics of the original Christian followers also die. Years later, gospels are written which, though clearly contain many of the core teaching, are very focused on only a single representation on the cross. The faith of the cross. While faith is an incredibly important aspect of the cross, it is merely one meaning behind the cross that is easily abused. The greater good of the cross is hidden. The rest is history.

One might think Utilitarinism was invented by Bentham in the late 1700’s. It was really invented more than 1700 years earlier by Jesus Christ.

@erislover

Given the OP’s trio of golden rule, utilitarianism, and do no harm, it seems like it was always immoral. I see no way the OP’s position can find a way for a human to kill an animal for food.

Given that we needed meat to survive in history, it was not immoral. Why? Because we take into account our lives. We also take into account the lives of the animal that would have to die for us. Our lives are slightly greater than the lives of the animal, so we are ethical in our choice to take the animals life. However, the better option would be to willingly give up our life, regardless of the consequences so that we may spare the animal. This is going above and beyond ethics at this point though.

@Namkcalb

A question for the OP If we assume it is unethical to kill fish/birds/mammals.
Do you eat 100% organic?(otherwise, animals are killed by pesticides)
Do you *carefully *harvest by hand everything you eat?(lots of animals are killed in mass harvesting)
Do you avoid travelling by boat or plane? (lots of critters are caught in the turbines)
Do you make sure you don’t distrupt the local ecosystem?(distrupting the ecosystem could cause many cute critters to starve)
Do you carefully watch where you step and where you drive/cycle? (otherwise, the small birds and mice you hit quickly add up)

If you do all of the above, all the time, then you might be able to call us omnivores unethical. might

1. You seem to think that I am saying this out of judgment as if I can judge anyone’s soul. I have no idea about the millions of factors that go into why someone is the way they are. I am not concerned with how God judges someone. I leave that up to him.

2. What I am concerned with is that we are causing suffering to others, that can be prevented. I realize that even if we go vegan, we still kill 0.4 animals per year (or whatever the statistic is). However, this is being used as a cop out. If you don’t give all of your money to charity… screw it. Don’t give any money. That is a lie we tell ourselves to keep doing the same things we have been doing. Causing massive amounts of suffering.

3. Let me make this as clear as day… I am unethical. Let me say that a few more times.

**I am unethical.
I am unethical.
I am unethical. **

Why am I unethical? While I have been able to easily replace meat, milk, butter, sour cream, etc. and buy products that do not harm animals or humans, I have not been able to give up cheese. While I am a vegetarian, I do not eat any vegetables. Very strange I know. But I am a very picky eater and don’t care too much about health. It is all about ethics for me. While this is my current best, if you want to judge me and use it as an excuse to keep causing massive amounts of suffering, go for it. Just know, it is not ethical.

Does this mean that we should keep causing suffering? No. We should look for alternatives.

Does this mean we should just make up excuses and say f the whole thing? No. We should do our absolute best to prevent suffering. I am giving up things I never would have if I was not giving my absolute best. Is my best going to still cause some amount of suffering? Sure. It does not give us the right to say f the whole thing.

@kanicbird

We don’t know if we are the most intelligent species. We have a entire universe out there, with possible space travel and star seeding. We might be one of the least intelligent species. I would say with the size of the universe it is most likely false that we are the most intelligent species. The question gets a bit fuzzier if you add with contact with earth. But it is the premise that our intelligence is nothing to boast about.

Also we might be guided by other intelligent beings, from a space seeding race to God Himself, so we should consider our knowledge and wisdom imperfect as a species.

Your premise seems to be be kind to animals and that will bring about a better humanity. I sort of agree with it and think the factory farming of animals has lead us to think that it is OK to ‘factory farm’ our children in public schools, so yes there is a relationship, but that again has to do with factory farming and not to the eating of animals. Also it is by equating animals and humans that you can better accept that what we do to animals we can do to humans, it is by elevating humans over animals that makes it possible to say that it is unacceptable to treat humans as animals. So your premise of extending the golden rule to animals would ahve the effect of extending animal cruelty to humans.

While there certainly could be other intelligent beings out there that are smarter than us, we have no (good) evidence that they exist. If we find them, I will gladly revisit the discussion on them

My premise is not that we should be kind to animals so that we are kinder to humanity. Although I do think that is a natural consequence. My premise has more to do with treating others how we would want to be treated.

I am not elevating animals to the same level as humans. I am elevating farm animals and other animals to the same level as cats and dogs.

[erislover]

@Trust

Given that we needed meat to survive in history, it was not immoral. Why? Because we take into account our lives. We also take into account the lives of the animal that would have to die for us. Our lives are slightly greater than the lives of the animal, so we are ethical in our choice to take the animals life.

Nothing you offered in your OP supported such a conclusion.

However, the better option would be to willingly give up our life, regardless of the consequences so that we may spare the animal. This is going above and beyond ethics at this point though.

It is exactly what your OP demands.

[Trust]

@erislover

Nothing you offered in your OP supported such a conclusion. It is exactly what your OP demands.

Well let’s walk through it.

1. We start with the Golden Rule. We imagine ourselves as the animals. We imagine we are looking from their viewpoint and feeling their heart beating. We recognize that we feel sensations and pain just as humans do. We then imagine ourselves as a human (easy enough). If you say, there literally is no other option but to either kill or be killed, then both options violate the golden rule. Neither the human nor the animal wants to die. This is the less than 1% of situations where we have to go outside of the Golden Rule and move on to Utilitarianism.

2. Utilitarianism says that we should choose the option that produces the greatest good. While animals are not necessarily less valuable to God (“Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten before God”), they are more valuable in a practical sense. Since we have already established that humans are slightly more valuable, we would choose to save ourselves and to eat the animal.

3. The least harm principle does not really apply quite as much here but if it did, it would probably say that the least harm is killing the animal since killing a human is a greater harm.

Having said all of this, the best option would be the Christ-like option. Dropping the stone and following love over these laws instead.

[erislover]

@Trust

1. We start with the Golden Rule. We imagine ourselves as the animals. We imagine we are looking from their viewpoint and feeling their heart beating. We recognize that we feel sensations and pain just as humans do. We then imagine ourselves as a human (easy enough). If you say, there literally is no other option but to either kill or be killed, then both options violate the golden rule. Neither the human nor the animal wants to die. This is the less than 1% of situations where we have to go outside of the Golden Rule and move on to Utilitarianism.

Only if I am picturing myself as an elk-human. But what if I choose a wolf? Then I can eat what I want? What about a chimpanzee? Different animals are different. You focus on their aversion to pain. But this is not the issue for a lion or hyena. So how can I put myself in an animal’s mind in order to decide whether or not to eat meat without monumentally begging the question?

2. Utilitarianism says that we should choose the option that produces the greatest good. While animals are not necessarily less valuable to God (“Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten before God”), they are more valuable in a practical sense. Since we have already established that humans are slightly more valuable, we would choose to save ourselves and to eat the animal.

This has not been established at all… certainly the golden rule doesn’t establish it. But what utilitarian demands is a way to measure suffering and what I am asking for is how do I compare sticking a needle in a human eye versus sticking a needle in a cat’s eye? For all I know, cats value their eyes 8 times as much as humans, but humans live 8 times as long, and I am just stuck… what is the measure? No one disputes animals can suffer. But what is the measure? You say, today, eating meat is unethical, in part because of utilitarianism. So, you’ve made the measure. How? What is it?

3. The least harm principle does not really apply quite as much here but if it did, it would probably say that the least harm is killing the animal since killing a human is a greater harm.

I do value human life more than animal life, in general. It’s blatant speciesism. I do not fault a bear defending its cub rather than join the military to defend the United States government. And I don’t think it is moral for a human to kill a bear just cuz. But neither do I wish to organize our society around punishing humans for killing bears just cuz. And if I jump into the golden rule, do we then make a law that you can kill a bear if the bear would, in your shoes, kill you? And then I want to know… would a bear eat a person?

[DSeid]

Full disclosure - I eat meat. But there is an ethical argument that has at least convinced me to eat significantly less of it and for me to have more of it be chicken: informed self-interest as a member of our species. Factory farming of most animal protein, especially of ruminants, is a major contributor to greenhouse gasses and thereby to climate change risks.

[XT]

[QUOTE=Trust]
I am sure you are aware of this, but if you define self interest as ethical, then there really is no point in taking a hard look at our actions. Very convenient.
[/QUOTE]

And if you define ethics as ‘whatever my own world view is’, then there is no point in talking to others about it, and you’ll never take a hard look either, being convinced that everyone should see the world through your own filters. Very convenient, ehe?

[QUOTE=Borzo]
That was an interesting experiment in idiocy, congratulations. Now try it again, but this time pretend to be an intelligent, logical, rational human being. What happens then? You might realize that you have the ability to reason, weigh pros vs cons, assess different situations, circumstances, and outcomes, and make informed decisions.
[/QUOTE]

Why should I pretend when you aren’t making an effort to play an intelligent, logical or rational human being who wished to have a debate? Here’s the thing…I realize that both I and others have the ability to reason and make rational judgements, but this seems to be something that you lack. I’m not the one attempting this ridiculous argument to couch the consumption of meat in terms of some minimalist formula of eating only the minimum necessary, and everything else is obviously all about self pleasure, and thus unethical (which I STILL don’t have any notion of how that’s being defined wrt this discussion).

I have no problem with people who CHOOSE to eat only a strict vegetarian diet…or even those who CHOOSE to eat a minimalist diet, devoid of anything like self pleasure. Hey, whatever floats thy boat. What I DO have an issue with is ridiculous holier than thou attitudes about what I CHOOSE to do, how I CHOOSE to act, or what the fuck I CHOOSE to eat.

Or are you suggesting (through the above quote) that this is impossible? Please clarify.

That you can make your own choices about what YOU think is or isn’t ‘ethical’, and that your stance on that has nothing to do with my own? Certainly. Sadly, the reciprocal seems to elude you.

You sound like your projecting your anger and bitterness towards previous and past environmentalists and animal rights activists onto me. Would you perhaps consider that this might be unreasonable? Or perhaps a bit emotional and irrational?

Seriously…wtf? Am I supposed to not have read your posts and not drawn exactly the conclusions from them that are self evident? Again, I don’t have a problem with you choosing to do whatever the fuck you want to do. Want to eat a minimalist diet, with only the minimum ‘recommended daily’ allotment of meat? Go for it, if that blows your skirt up. Want to eat zero meat? No worries…whatever makes your bunny jump. However, when you try to take a moral high ground for YOUR choices and project them on ME…well, that’s an issue, to be sure.

I consistently find it amusing that humans have this need to think of things in terms of black & white. They run in panic at the sight of grey! Heaven forbid they have to think about something or assess a situation that doesn’t have a simple answer.

Well, the irony here (pretty much off the ole irony scale, actually) is that I DO see things as shades of gray, since I’m cool with folks making their own ‘ethical’ decisions about what the fuck they choose to eat or not eat. And you are the one trying to project a black and white stance on this question. It’s amusing how you project your own moral stance and then try and trot out a black and white verse shades of gray comparison, however.

The choices we make have consequences. We have differing levels of need - and the associated choices we make have differing levels of consequences. Each choice you make should involve some sort of decision-making process where you weigh the ethical and moral pros and cons. Or at least that’s what I’d expect of an intelligent, logical, and rational human being.

Really? Choices have consequences? I didn’t know that. The circular point here is that you are projecting what YOU think are valid needs onto the discussion. As I said, if YOU want to eat a minimalist diet, or if you want to eat 9 steaks a day, with a hamburger milkshake and a side of fried chicken, that’s your look out…I’m cool either way. To paraphrase from Eddie Murphy, you go ahead and eat that tofurkey…I’ll have this nice steak, thanks all the same. Oh, and could I get a nice lobster tail and some drawn butter with that, there’s a good chap…

What you seem to be saying sounds a bit like whining: Oh noes! I have too many choices and decisions to make! And thinking about the ethics and morality behind my decisions is just so hard! I’m so lazy and of such weak intellect that I’m just gonna ignore the consequences of my actions completely, and reject any responsibility for them!

I don’t know, it seemed pretty clear to me…I was mocking you, if you need a sign along with a diagram. I was mocking you because you and the OP are trying to project your own world view on others. See, I DON’T see the morality behind eating or NOT eating meat. It has nothing to do with being lazy, it has to do with me not attempting to project my own stance on this issue on others…and being a bit bent out of shape when someone doesn’t give me the same curtsy.

I’m also more than a little amused in your handwaving on this. 'Samatter? Don’t like having it pointed out to you that you and the OP are being more than a little hypocritical? That you are trying to take the moral high ground on the meat issue, while ignoring the consequences of your own actions…such as those I mockingly pointed out concerning electricity, CO2 emissions, and the fact that no matter what you eat, animals were harmed in the process somewhere along the lines. Even if you strictly eat only ‘organic’ food grown locally, I can guarantee you that animals were harmed somewhere along the line. Consequences of your actions, right? And that doesn’t even get into the electricity you are using to type your posts (plus that used by your ISP and this board), the manufacturing process that made the computer you are typing it on, or all the other myriad impacts your decision to use technology brings about. From MY part, I accept them as the price of doing business as a human in a technological society, while striving to minimize my own impact to the best extent I can. I don’t try and cram that down anyone’s throat, however, nor do I attempt to take a moral high ground concerning my own stance and world view…or couch things in terms of ‘ethical’ verse ‘unethical’ wrt my stance verse others concerning something as trivial as their fucking diet. Nor do I attempt to make ridiculous analogies of rape and pillage verse eating a hamburger. Nor do I attempt to make silly assertions about minimalist diets and ‘personal enjoyment’, with the implication that ‘personal enjoyment’ is somehow a bad thing, to be avoided, and that those who don’t are somehow in the wrong about the choices they make, while thing posting about black and white verse shades of gray and blowing out my fellow posters industrial strength irony meter…

Ethics and morality is a complex issue… but that’s not a good enough reason to simply surrender and claim intellectual defeat and ignore it.

They are complex issues that each individual needs to examine and decide on for themselves. There are some ethics and morality issues that are common ground among the majority of humans…and some that aren’t. Eating meat isn’t one of them, IMHO, though I’m perfectly willing to let individuals decide without judgement on my part. If you want to eat meat, then that’s good. If you don’t, then that’s good…for you. If you want to get all worked up about eating meat because you think it’s immoral or unethical (for you), then it’s your life…whatever floats thy boat, and all that jazz. As with religious folks, all I ask is you don’t attempt to project your ridiculous (from MY perspective) world view onto me. Live and let live, etc etc.

-XT

[XT]

[QUOTE=DSeid]
Full disclosure - I eat meat. But there is an ethical argument that has at least convinced me to eat significantly less of it and for me to have more of it be chicken: informed self-interest as a member of our species. Factory farming of most animal protein, especially of ruminants, is a major contributor to greenhouse gasses and thereby to climate change risks.
[/QUOTE]

What is the rational argument that it is or isn’t ‘ethical’? What does that term mean to you in this context? I can understand how you might be concerned about the ecological impact…hell, you are right to be concerned about it. I don’t see how one can rationally get around the fact that, considering our population, that factory farming is pretty much the only option to sustain those levels, but I can see why it would be a concern. And certainly it is causing an impact wrt green house gases, both methane (I GhG with a huge impact) as well as CO2…and tons of other harmful things. In a technological society, there is always a cost to benefits ratio involved in the mix, and that’s true in what we eat as well.

But ethics? Morality? About eating meat? I really, truly don’t get it. I know you are a rational poster from past experience, so could you explain it to me? What does ‘ethical’ mean, to you, in terms of this discussion?

-XT

[elucidator]

Eating chickens is OK. Chickens got it coming.

[DSeid]

Well it would be a significant digression to debate what “ethical” means. To me stewarding resources for future generations counts.

We’ve had the thread on this before (and I am sorry that I don’t have the time to find it right now) but per units of inputs (grains, energy, etc.) and unit of harmful outputs, protein from vegetable sources and poultry feed many more than does protein from ruminants. It really does not come close.

[Trust]

@erislover

Nothing you offered in your OP supported such a conclusion. It is exactly what your OP demands.

Most animals have not reached the ability to make moral decisions in the same way a newborn baby has not reached the ability to make moral decisions. Can we just kill or abuse the baby because it does not make moral decisions? Of course not.

@erislover

Only if I am picturing myself as an elk-human. But what if I choose a wolf? Then I can eat what I want? What about a chimpanzee? Different animals are different. You focus on their aversion to pain. But this is not the issue for a lion or hyena. So how can I put myself in an animal’s mind in order to decide whether or not to eat meat without monumentally begging the question?
This has not been established at all… certainly the golden rule doesn’t establish it. But what utilitarian demands is a way to measure suffering and what I am asking for is how do I compare sticking a needle in a human eye versus sticking a needle in a cat’s eye? For all I know, cats value their eyes 8 times as much as humans, but humans live 8 times as long, and I am just stuck… what is the measure? No one disputes animals can suffer. But what is the measure? You say, today, eating meat is unethical, in part because of utilitarianism. So, you’ve made the measure. How? What is it?
I do value human life more than animal life, in general. It’s blatant speciesism. I do not fault a bear defending its cub rather than join the military to defend the United States government. And I don’t think it is moral for a human to kill a bear just cuz. But neither do I wish to organize our society around punishing humans for killing bears just cuz. And if I jump into the golden rule, do we then make a law that you can kill a bear if the bear would, in your shoes, kill you? And then I want to know… would a bear eat a person?

Different animals are different. You can put yourself in the animals mind by studying them. You are not trying to decide what is right or wrong for the animal. You are trying to decide what is right or wrong for you as a human. Animals are not usually capable of making rational reasons that go against impulses. We are. Hence why there is such a thing as ethics in the first place.

So you agree with me that humans are more valuable than animals from a practical sense, but you still want me to prove it? We could write libraries on this but suffice it to say, if you recognize that an inanimate object has no worth accept what it gives to those who do, and you realize that an insect has more worth than an inanimate object, you can start to see the trend.

Like I said earlier… If I have the choice between saving only a white baby, or an old black man, if I choose to save the life of the old black man, am I a racist? Of course not. The life of a child is probably the most precious of all life. Likewise, if I have the choice between saving an animal or a human and I choose to save the human, does that mean I am a speciesist? Of course not. The important point is that you first imagine yourself as the old man or as the animal and recognize the incredibly huge injustice that is occurring. As long as you look at the situation from all perspectives and make the choice that benefits the greater good, you are not being unethical. If you only look at the situation from our own selfish perspective, then we are being unethical. In reality, there is rarely a time where you have to choose two choices where someone gets f-ed either way. Normally there are other alternatives that you can come up with to prevent the suffering.

@DSeid

Full disclosure - I eat meat. But there is an ethical argument that has at least convinced me to eat significantly less of it and for me to have more of it be chicken: informed self-interest as a member of our species. Factory farming of most animal protein, especially of ruminants, is a major contributor to greenhouse gasses and thereby to climate change risks.

Something to think about. Cows have humane slaughter laws. Roughly 3-4% are not properly stunned and have their throats slit. Although this use to be closer to a third of all cows slaughtered before more auditing came about.

Chickens on the other hand have no humane slaughter laws and all have their throats slit. Millions per year are dumped into the scolding hot tanks to remove the feathers while still alive.

While cows mostly have their testicles cut off without anesthetic, the slaughter is probably worse for chickens. But more importantly, since chickens are so small, we have to put so many more through factory farms compared to cows.

If I had the choice of which farm animals life I would live, it would probably choose a cow. Though all would be horrific.

So if I were to eat meat from a animal ethics standpoint it would be:

hamburger > steak > pork > eggs > chicken

This would probably also be the order for the amount of protein per animal killed since egg laying hens requires killing the male chicks since they are useless to egg laying industry. It is interesting to note that in theory (though probably never in real life), it is possible to cause more suffering to animals by being a vegetarian if you only ate eggs. I have yet to meet a vegetarian who only eats eggs but maybe there is one unique individual in the world.

@xtisme

And if you define ethics as ‘whatever my own world view is’, then there is no point in talking to others about it, and you’ll never take a hard look either, being convinced that everyone should see the world through your own filters. Very convenient, ehe?
-XT

I am defining ethics according to the three ethical principles. If we had used these ethical principles years ago, we would have never had slavery or any of the bruises we have on our historical conscience.

[Trust]

Since we are not necessarily born with the ability to include others, we need to use a tool to help us change our minds. During the years of slavery or racism, most people had a particular mindset that is completely different from today. Regardless of the actual chances of it being true, Panentheism is a tool that can help us comprehend ethics.

 Panentheism is the belief that we will *literally* be everyone else in the world. That animal in the factory farm? You will live that life. That insect you just stepped over? You will live that life. Your neighbor next door? You will live that life. Essentially, everything in the Universe plus some, is God and you are a part of God. Time is not some continuous line but overlaps. So you begin to ask yourself.... If that is me in the factory farm... Do I want that for myself? 

Why is this needed? Well, right now we tend to only look at issues from our own viewpoint. Sometimes we will involve those who are similar to us (same skin color, same hobbies, same class, etc.).  But often times we tend to exclude others who are different from us. Assuming you believe that you will live the lives of everyone else, you start to think differently of those who are different from you. You start to imagine yourself as them. All of a sudden, if you are incredibly seflish, you will try to actually sacrifice of yourself so that the greater good will win and you will not have to suffer when you are that other life. Since I am not very good at explaining this, I will use a quote by Einstein: 

“A human being is a part of a whole, called by us ‘universe’, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest… a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”

When we think in these terms and put them in action, we have already reached the Kingdom of Heaven.

[Lynn_Bodoni]

While cows mostly have their testicles cut off without anesthetic

Trust me, no cow has EVER had her testicles cut off, with or without anesthetic.

[Czarcasm]

@Lynn_Bodoni

Trust me, no cow has EVER had her testicles cut off, with or without anesthetic.

“Oh my ghod-That’s not milk!!”

[Trust]

@Czarcasm

“Oh my ghod-That’s not milk!!”

@Lynn_Bodoni

Trust me, no cow has EVER had her testicles cut off, with or without anesthetic.

Good point! Let’s hope so!

[elucidator]

Its like the difference between ham and eggs. The chicken is involved, but the pig is committed.

[rat_avatar]

@Lynn_Bodoni

Trust me, no cow has EVER had her testicles cut off, with or without anesthetic.

Has ewe ever been castrated?

[erislover]

@Trust

Most animals have not reached the ability to make moral decisions in the same way a newborn baby has not reached the ability to make moral decisions. Can we just kill or abuse the baby because it does not make moral decisions? Of course not.

Of course not. But the problem is you are comparing an ideal of the average animal with something that isn’t an ideal of the average human. You can draw all kinds of odd conclusions by using exceptional cases—being an infant for example—as canonical examples. This is why, even though “yellow and blue make green”, we don’t use green as an exemplar for yellow or blue.

Different animals are different. You can put yourself in the animals mind by studying them. You are not trying to decide what is right or wrong for the animal. You are trying to decide what is right or wrong for you as a human. Animals are not usually capable of making rational reasons that go against impulses. We are. Hence why there is such a thing as ethics in the first place.

I agree with all this. So why would I put myself in the animal’s mind when you admit already that animals are very different? If you want me to take something from this thought experiment, but you pick and choose just those things which support your conclusion and ignore all the things that don’t, you don’t have an argument, you have a story. It’s a nice story, because I like animals. But it doesn’t tell me eating meat is unethical.

So you agree with me that humans are more valuable than animals from a practical sense, but you still want me to prove it?

I don’t want you to prove it. I think the fact that we’re more valuable than animals is part of the argument that eating meat isn’t unethical. That you would bring it up in an argument that eating meat is unethical is very curious.

Like I said earlier… If I have the choice between saving only a white baby, or an old black man, if I choose to save the life of the old black man, am I a racist? Of course not.

That evidence does not seem conclusive. So I agree that that evidence alone is insufficient to call one a racist.

Likewise, if I have the choice between saving an animal or a human and I choose to save the human, does that mean I am a speciesist? Of course not.

Agreed: this is insufficient evidence.

The important point is that you first imagine yourself as the old man or as the animal and recognize the incredibly huge injustice that is occurring.

It is not very hard to empathize with another human. But when my cat meows, it is not always obvious if he wants me to change the litterbox, give him more food, or if he’s just vocalizing to be part of the family. Can I hear my cat cry when he’s in a carrier and imagine that he’s anxious and unhappy? Of course. But what has this got to do with eating him?

As long as you look at the situation from all perspectives and make the choice that benefits the greater good, you are not being unethical. If you only look at the situation from our own selfish perspective, then we are being unethical. In reality, there is rarely a time where you have to choose two choices where someone gets f-ed either way. Normally there are other alternatives that you can come up with to prevent the suffering.

My problems with utilitarian analysis are numerous. I find the whole system irritatingly bad. But even if I grant you that somehow utilitarianism is a sound ethical system, I don’t understand the analysis. For instance, if we could make everyone in the entire world perfectly happy, but to do it we have to horribly torture one individual, it is my understanding that we should torture that individual under a utilitarian analysis. Because his suffering is not of the same magnitude as the sum of all the happiness brought about. So if animals suffer, this is not substantive, because humans relish animal flesh. So what needs to be demonstrated is that removing meat from the diet of humans reduces animal suffering enough to make up for the decreased pleasure humans experience from not eating meat anymore. I have to say that I find performing analysis totally hopeless; but, this is why I am not a utilitarian.

If I had the choice of which farm animals life I would live, it would probably choose a cow. Though all would be horrific.

If you kept your human awareness, definitely life as a cow would be absolutely horrible. No thumbs. I mean, seriously, if you want to picture a horrible life, basically everything without a thumb would be horrible.

I am defining ethics according to the three ethical principles. If we had used these ethical principles years ago, we would have never had slavery or any of the bruises we have on our historical conscience.

Man is the measure of all things. Most of us don’t count animals if we apply ethical codes to analyze situations. You wish for them to count. I don’t think there is a solid position that can come from that, but that’s only because I’ve not been convinced, not because I’m not willing to listen.

You are focused on all the results that follow from you counting animals more significantly than others count them. I don’t think your results are logical conclusions from that, but I am asking you to start from the idea that we all disagree with you: animals don’t count that much, even if the word “suffering” is a fair use of the word in context. Pet owners often call vocalizations by their pets “talking” but I would not then conclude that we should start interviewing pets around the world—that talk is different from our talk. So I don’t think that your position that I can sympathize with animals is equivalent or directly entails that eating meat is unethical. And that’s the second question—what is the actual argument?

This is important because you cannot judge a situation in isolation under a utilitarian analysis. Sure, something is going to cause suffering, but the question is Is what we’re going to do cause more happiness and/or less suffering than what we’re currently doing? So this is the question: what is the alternative? We stop eating meat, cows stop living. We all become vegetarians, and we continue to reproduce, there’s nowhere for now-feral chickens to flourish, because they’re our farms now, they’re our homes now, they’re our roads and shopping malls—they’re not unused land lying around for feral chickens. So the balance sheet somehow has got to compare whether it is better, to a farm animal, to not have existed at all. And I think this kind of analysis is a pretty heady question in itself. But that’s my problem, because to a utilitarian, it’s easy to count things that don’t exist. Zero! So what you are saying is that the animals that exist in the alternative scenario have so much happiness and so little suffering that they overwhelm the loss from human happiness due to not eating meat less the suffering of animals in a farm. And, in general, I think that’s a pretty tough sell. I’ve seen how animals live. It’s not a party.

[rat_avatar]

@Trust

Most animals have not reached the ability to make moral decisions in the same way a newborn baby has not reached the ability to make moral decisions. Can we just kill or abuse the baby because it does not make moral decisions? Of course not.

Different animals are different. You can put yourself in the animals mind by studying them. You are not trying to decide what is right or wrong for the animal. You are trying to decide what is right or wrong for you as a human. Animals are not usually capable of making rational reasons that go against impulses. We are. Hence why there is such a thing as ethics in the first place.

So you agree with me that humans are more valuable than animals from a practical sense, but you still want me to prove it? We could write libraries on this but suffice it to say, if you recognize that an inanimate object has no worth accept what it gives to those who do, and you realize that an insect has more worth than an inanimate object, you can start to see the trend.

Like I said earlier… If I have the choice between saving only a white baby, or an old black man, if I choose to save the life of the old black man, am I a racist? Of course not. The life of a child is probably the most precious of all life. Likewise, if I have the choice between saving an animal or a human and I choose to save the human, does that mean I am a speciesist? Of course not. The important point is that you first imagine yourself as the old man or as the animal and recognize the incredibly huge injustice that is occurring. As long as you look at the situation from all perspectives and make the choice that benefits the greater good, you are not being unethical. If you only look at the situation from our own selfish perspective, then we are being unethical. In reality, there is rarely a time where you have to choose two choices where someone gets f-ed either way. Normally there are other alternatives that you can come up with to prevent the suffering.

Something to think about. Cows have humane slaughter laws. Roughly 3-4% are not properly stunned and have their throats slit. Although this use to be closer to a third of all cows slaughtered before more auditing came about.

Chickens on the other hand have no humane slaughter laws and all have their throats slit. Millions per year are dumped into the scolding hot tanks to remove the feathers while still alive.

While cows mostly have their testicles cut off without anesthetic, the slaughter is probably worse for chickens. But more importantly, since chickens are so small, we have to put so many more through factory farms compared to cows.

If I had the choice of which farm animals life I would live, it would probably choose a cow. Though all would be horrific.

So if I were to eat meat from a animal ethics standpoint it would be:

hamburger > steak > pork > eggs > chicken

This would probably also be the order for the amount of protein per animal killed since egg laying hens requires killing the male chicks since they are useless to egg laying industry. It is interesting to note that in theory (though probably never in real life), it is possible to cause more suffering to animals by being a vegetarian if you only ate eggs. I have yet to meet a vegetarian who only eats eggs but maybe there is one unique individual in the world.

I am defining ethics according to the three ethical principles. If we had used these ethical principles years ago, we would have never had slavery or any of the bruises we have on our historical conscience.

Note, and I am not justifying the action but newborn boys in this country are circumcision in this country without pain killers. Having grown up in a ranching family, when we were turning calves into steers, we did try to use spray analgesic. I am in no way there is no pain cutting is less painful than Elastration and at least the ranchers I know do care and there are studies trying to find ways to reduce discomfort. From what I saw, from an anecdotal perspective is that de-horning caused much more discomfort.

Commercial chicken raising is pretty brutal to be honest, animals are kept in closed buildings with no light for most all of their lives, I actually avoid chicken when possible due to this. I know many vegetarians who won’t eat meat who eat chicken because “it doesn’t have a face”

As for the beeve’s life I think you may have the idea that they spend their entire lives on a feed lot, they don’t, they spend at most 4 months of their life there. Beef cattle graze most of their life and having gown up on beef that was not finished on grain I would buy “grass fed” beef over corn finished beef any day just due to taste. Beeves, unlike chickens seem to produce the best when they are happy, there may be people who abuse their cattle but they are doing so at their own detriment.

The same is true, at least in my area with dairy cows. reducing stress is one of the top priorities as it tends to increase yields. In all grain dairies voluntary milking systems are very popular if the farmer can afford them. In these systems the cows walk in by themselves to be milked.

Once again, I am not claiming raising beef is 100% pure niceness but you have to also think that these cows get medical attention, protection from predators and someone actively ensuring they have food year round. Those are items that ruminants in the wild are always battling with.

[XT]

Is it ‘ethical’ for animals to eat humans? I mean, this has to be a two way street here. Some ‘food’ animals would and have happily munched on humans in the past (I’m thinking pigs here, but I’m guessing that at some time or another a chicken has probably taken a nibble on a dead human, and possibly even ruminants…I know deer have been seen scavenging carrion at least). So, is it ‘ethical’ for them to munch on us? If not, why not? And if so…well then, why wouldn’t it be equally ‘ethical’ for us to munch on them?

I’d say that ‘ethics’ really doesn’t enter into it…same with the converse. It has nothing to do with ‘ethics’ or ‘morality’.

[QUOTE=elucidator]
Its like the difference between ham and eggs. The chicken is involved, but the pig is committed.
[/QUOTE]

You know how painful snorting Dr. Pepper out of your nose is?? Plus it makes a horrible mess…

-XT

[Scholar_Beardpig]

Oh, I’m sure it’s unethical to eat meat. I just don’t care.