Pyrrho

We have no reason to believe that plants feel pain, and we have every reason to believe that most animals do. Furthermore, even if both plants and animals felt pain, fewer things would die if we ate plants exclusively, because when we eat animals, the animals had to eat many plants in order to grow such that we could eat them.



Why treat human babies morally, since they don't appear to have morals? Something not having morals does not mean that we should not behave in a moral way toward it. If it did mean that, then it would mean that we should not behave in a moral way toward human babies.



What do you mean by this? If you thought that I was expecting non-human animals to behave according to some moral code, that is not what I was saying at all (though, rather interestingly, there have been several cases where animals do seem to behave in such a way: http://ar.vegnews.org/macaques.html ).

All I have been suggesting is that the way we treat animals is a matter that involves ethical considerations.


Jamie_L already addressed that issue at:

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.p...44#post1071744

I may add that one who was a vegetarian for environmental reasons exclusively would likely not have a problem with synthetically grown meat. If synthetically grown meat were identical to "natural" meat, and if it could be created in an environmentally friendly way, the only reason to not eat it would seem to be health considerations.

You might find the information at this link interesting:

http://ar.vegnews.org/Questions.html

It answers many questions about vegetarianism, and some motives and reasoning behind it.

JusticeMachine

From the http://ar.vegnews.org/Questions.html web sit.

Q:Why is it wrong to eat meat?

A:Regardless of what we think about the more controversial aspects of animal rights, such as medical experimentation, there is a general consensus in our society that it is ethically reprehensible to set a cat on fire for entertainment. However, since we do not need to eat meat to survive, when we choose to eat meat, we are choosing to inflict death and suffering on others simply for the pleasure of tasting meat. Considering what goes on in factory farms and slaughterhouses, setting a cat on fire is, by comparison, actually relatively humane. In both cases, all that we gain in return is just a few moments of trivial pleasure.

Problem, applying human ethics, morals and emotions to other animals.

Who is to say that a cow is any happier roaming and foraging for food, or sitting in a pen and being fed.
You can argue both ways, "how are we to know it isn't happier", but the point to me is moot.

We are human, we may share some commonalities with animals, but we are set apart, whether by GOD or evolution, we are vastly different IMO

Rusting Car Bumper

The arguments there are not relevant. For the sake of discussion even if I grant that if everyone became a vegan or vegetarian that farm use would decrease overall, this point does not adress the one I made.

That point, being that when one chooses to create a farm then one chooses, at least implicitly, the choice of harming one set of animals over another because the introduction of new farms requires the harming of species currently dependent on such land.

This seems plainly a fact to me and not in dispute.

Yes you are correct. I was confused about who said what.

However, I didn't make that claim you just attributed to me.

I said, "If I am a vegetarian then I add to farm use and farm use by its very nature kicks native animal species off of lands. Thus, it contributes to another form of animal suffering." As this is not entirely clear (because its a side point anyway and doesn't really address the root question... the problem of evil). I then clarified it, "However, this fails to note that when one creates a farm where there is none before that NECESSARILY native species are kicked off the land in favor of the species the farmers wants to allow on the land."

DC

JusticeMachine

The double standard I see is this:

All life has a right to exist. (implying equality)

We are the only species with ethics/morals and need to regard other forms of life with the same ethics/morals that we apply to humans. (implying inequality).

sweep

well, currently, the trend is to flatten massive areas of tropical rainforest, wiping out entire micro-systems, then turning the flattened land in pasteurs for cattle. I can't realistically envisage what you are getting at with your point. Replace what with what and why? We need to get specific with environments here, as I would like to know what's affected.

I wonder if this has something to do with the human/animal dichotomy that we humans are so fond of pulling 'out of the hat'?
The thing with this double standard is that it relies on the first proposition (all life has a right to exist). It is only a problem if you choose to see it that way. Even so, it doesn't really deal with any issues regarding animal rights.

to start with we all die, and winstonjen pointed out another interesting double standard. That in which animals are allowed to die, whereas We humans do everything in our power to keep people alive no matter what standard of life they lead. Cattle are raised in pasteurs, then they get their throats cuts and their bodies are processed.

To me it isn't so much the question of death, more the question of life. The same standards are not applied to all animals. To me machine industry is bad for all animals because it reduces choice for the living product and the human workers. Battery hens peck one another, and cause injury to other hens, because they have so little space. (we don't have to measure happiness, we look at the behaviour of the animal, or measure galvanic skin response to check stress levels.) The salmon raised in salmon farms is more fatty than free range salmon. The point is that mass production results in less quality and less choice for the life involved.

As for the issue of pets, we should take care of them, and why not? Well why would you have an animal in your house and not treat it well? To me this isn't a question of evil, it's a question of ignorance. Get this on a massive scale and things start to die, and consequences are bound to occur. Morals are bound with practice, as our actions have revealed, the way we have treated animals, I iterate, has led to food poisoning and poor diet. Bad practice, is bad for humans.

As for the problem of evil, It's only a problem if we choose to make it one according to some foolish notion of absolute rights. Why people are still asking this question in an age of world wide information, I neither know, nor care.

sweep

when I am scared, I sometimes find my dog to be reassuring. He comforts me and I relax. He usually has boundless enthusiasm and Is eager to run outdoors. He was a lighting guide upon a pitch black pathway in the night; he is the faithful bait that will signal intruders. He will be the first to bite the knife if my enemy should decide to get me.

When I can't hear him in the night, I worry and call for him. Fortunately he returns> but last Christmas day he went further away to another street. Not knowing is the worst part; the imagination, the fear, the 'crush pornography' I read of...

thank goodness he is here now... he has earned his rights to biscuits, chicken, fish and other human delicacies.

Rusting Car Bumper

It does? So that means I can't eat plants either? I can't call the pest control guy? I can't take antibiotics?

DC

Rusting Car Bumper

It doesn't matter what the trend is.

Its very simple.

Here is some land.
It doesn't have a farm.
You choose to farm it.
You clear the land to farm it.
Thus, you have killed animals, caused them to suffer or kicked them off of their native habitat.
If harming animals is wrong, then this is morally wrong as well.
If the claim is then made that "well its better than ranching" then the decision has been made that one set of animals suffering was of more important than another.
Thus, it implies utilitarianism.
If utilitarianism is implied then this further impies an abandonment of the "problem of evil" stance that was first proposed.
Further, if utilitarianism is implied then this implies some thing or things which is valued over another which itself requires justification.

Maybe people ought to read more about ethical and philosophical reasoning isntead of just reading vegan and environmentalist websites.

Not really. One general problem with some things that pass for high and mighty ethical reasoniong is that they do not in the least bit address their own implications and usually are propounded without anything except vaguest notions of ethics.

Going straight to specifics is to put the cart before the horse.

None of these are double standards because they speak to values which people do not hold. "All life has a right to exist" is not held by anyone except a very very few people such as Jianists.

DC

sweep

use of analogy is like carrying a bucket full of water with holes in the base. a holy bucket does not solve the problem of evil.

the problem of evil is a problem when we try to use umbrella concepts. When we state that harming animals is wrong we need to apply a context. Do we stop cats from catching mice? Do we revert to nomadic hunting for fear that we might have to compete with anything that wriggles, squeaks or chirps?

I thought It was simple too. The fact that I said the same thing in the text you quoted is simply baffling.

Rusting Car Bumper

I have no idea what this means.

The problem of putting specifics first is that one misses the problems of the larger questions. What is morality? How do I decide what is Good and what is not? Why be moral in the first place? Once I've decided what morality is how do I decide if a particular decision is moral?

It is my opinion that animal rights advocates that I have conversed with, more often than not, have not answered these questions or have answered them in order to please their a priori prejudices.

As I re-read that i don't see that to be the case but I'd be quite pleased if you could point it out.

DC