Animal Welfare

[Rob_86]

So the "people" I harm are actually the animals bred for the purpose of food? Again, I'm not seeing how my eating a steak is harming anyone.

Cows are beefy crops, simple as that. I'm all for them being treated well and fairly while they are alive, but they are bred for the purpose of being food, and food they shall become.

Well how would you qualify person-hood? There are many people with just the same degree of intelligence as cows, but if you're saying these are 'people' then you're saying cows are too - if we abandond the irrelevant characteristics of physicality.

Cows are creatures with desires and a life which fares experientialy better or worse for the cow whose life it is, just like humans. To say this just means we should be nice to them before ending their lives, or whilst denying them the freedom their natural desires would give us a similar argument for doing so the mentally impaired. I know you hate that argument, but it's a very relevant analogy.

[Rob_86]

Errr, i did qualify it by saying it depended on the circumstances. I'm not out with a steak knife on a nightly basis offing people to fix a habit. If there was a scenario where human flesh was the only option i wouldn't have a problem eating or killing to get it. That doesn't mean i think that people should be subjected to needless harm. What sort of skewed logic led you to make that deduction?

Oh sorry, I just took it from what you said before. No I agree there is nothing immoral about eating human flesh if you have to, there is no great moral argument that would stand against that. Similarly that's the point with consuming animal flesh - if we don't need to eat it we shouldn't. For years we were under the illusion we did have to - but nutritional science, and just plain common sense would say we don't need to anymore, so it becomes a similar argument to that against eating humans (if we accept that animals live conscious lives etc).

[Neil]

Cows are creatures with desires and a life which fares experientialy better or worse for the cow whose life it is, just like humans. To say this just means we should be nice to them before ending their lives, or whilst denying them the freedom their natural desires would give us a similar argument for doing so the mentally impaired. I know you hate that argument, but it's a very relevant analogy.

This is a silly comparison. A cow does not have "desires". It has instinct and that's about it. It certainly doesn't have a desire for freedom (try leaving a gate open to a field full of cows - you won't find them suddenly stampeding out mooing "Freedom!" You'll be lucky if then even notice you've opened it).

And if the were to be given freedom then they would likely die. Cows need people way more than people need cows.

[Rob_86]

Exactly. Or if not food, we'll at least keep them for milking and/or breeding.

I think it is worth reminding people that all domesticated animals would struggle to survive without some degree of human care and supervision. So for those of you who would like to see an end of farming cattle then you would be also be inadvertently denying their right to survive as a species. Is that moral?

A species has no rights, rights relate to individuals. The only right being denied would (I guess) be the right to re-produce (if there is such a thing). Nature witholds this from many, and we don't see a moral issue with this, so presumably this problem would be solved by letting the animals back into the wild where we no longer withold anything from them. Personally I would prefer the idea of looking after these creatures the best we can, and the denying of their right to procreate (which the more I type, the less I think it exists!) being a neccesary denial. I don't know though, that's a complicated one. Either way, it certainly isn't moral to continue a system of seeing individuals as property to avoid such practical issues - there are better options that that.

[Rob_86]

This is a silly comparison. A cow does not have "desires". It has instinct and that's about it. It certainly doesn't have a desire for freedom (try leaving a gate open to a field full of cows - you won't find them suddenly stampeding out mooing "Freedom!" You'll be lucky if then even notice you've opened it).

And if the were to be given freedom then they would likely die. Cows need people way more than people need cows.

I would like to see you try and state why humans have desires whilst cows have only instinct. Especially given the nature of evolutionary theory, and the existence of determinism as a counter to 'free will'.

Instinct/desire whatever you want to call it - we shouldn't respect your right to live, after all it's just an instinct to survive isn't it? There's no rationale governing it, until you reduce it back to 'instincts' or 'base desires' which are one and the same.

[paranoid]

Well how would you qualify person-hood? There are many people with just the same degree of intelligence as cows, but if you're saying these are 'people' then you're saying cows are too - if we abandond the irrelevant characteristics of physicality.

Cows are creatures with desires and a life which fares experientialy better or worse for the cow whose life it is, just like humans. To say this just means we should be nice to them before ending their lives, or whilst denying them the freedom their natural desires would give us a similar argument for doing so the mentally impaired. I know you hate that argument, but it's a very relevant analogy.

But cows are bred as food.

As previously mentioned by Chris, you should direct this pent up anger at fisherman who remove wild animals from their natural habitat, as opposed to cows being farmed for the purpose of being food.

I don't think it is a hard concept I'm getting at - cows as crops. Would a photoshop of some wheat to give it black and white splodges help?

[Rob_86]

But cows are bred as food.

As previously mentioned by Chris, you should direct this pent up anger at fisherman who remove wild animals from their natural habitat, as opposed to cows being farmed for the purpose of being food.

I don't think it is a hard concept I'm getting at - cows as crops. Would a photoshop of some wheat to give it black and white splodges help?

It's not a hard concept at all, I just don't think it's a very informed one and makes little sense as an argument. 'cows as crops' okay. 'slaves as products'...this isn't a viable argument. What are you getting at? Cows are bred as food, slaves were 'bred' as slaves (and still are in some parts of the world), it doesn't make it right to support either though - doing so just provides the demand which it requires to continue.

[Le Stu]

Oh sorry, I just took it from what you said before. No I agree there is nothing immoral about eating human flesh if you have to, there is no great moral argument that would stand against that. Similarly that's the point with consuming animal flesh - if we don't need to eat it we shouldn't. For years we were under the illusion we did have to - but nutritional science, and just plain common sense would say we don't need to anymore, so it becomes a similar argument to that against eating humans (if we accept that animals live conscious lives etc).

If we accept that animals do live conscious lives then why should we view ourselves as any different from them? If they're carnivores or omnivores they prey on other animals with indifference to the pain and death it causes. Surely arguments in support of vegan lifestyles, claiming people can rise above the instinctive feeding habits of our animal past, contradict the assertion that animals are people, since they cannot.

[Fluff]

Well how would you qualify person-hood? There are many people with just the same degree of intelligence as cows, but if you're saying these are 'people' then you're saying cows are too - if we abandond the irrelevant characteristics of physicality.

Cows are creatures with desires and a life which fares experientialy better or worse for the cow whose life it is, just like humans.

You do realise that all cows aren't like this?

[Neil]

It's not a hard concept at all, I just don't think it's a very informed one and makes little sense as an argument. 'cows as crops' okay. 'slaves as products'...this isn't a viable argument. What are you getting at? Cows are bred as food, slaves were 'bred' as slaves (and still are in some parts of the world), it doesn't make it right to support either though - doing so just provides the demand which it requires to continue.

Then what do you suggest? We should just stop farming cows and slowly make them extinct by preventing them from re-producing?

I don't understand your argument. Cows, as we know them today, would not exist if it was not for the interference of man. A "slave" is not another species. It's still a human being. An individual might be forced into the life of a "slave" from a very early age, but that's completely different and not a fair comparison.

The cow has evolved in order to farmed by man. This is not something it is forced into - quite the opposite. If it was left to its own devices and not cared for by man then it simply wouldn't survive. This is what I'm trying to get across.

[Alkaline]

If we accept that animals do live conscious lives then why should we view ourselves as any different from them? If they're carnivores or omnivores they prey on other animals with indifference to the pain and death it causes. Surely arguments in support of vegan lifestyles, claiming people can rise above the instinctive feeding habits of our animal past, contradicts the assertion that animals are people, since they cannot.

I've mentioned that approach to it before in this thread and conveniently it gets sidestepped by the people it's directed to as there is no answer to it that furthers their argument.

[paranoid]

If we accept that animals do live conscious lives then why should we view ourselves as any different from them? If they're carnivores or omnivores they prey on other animals with indifference to the pain and death it causes. Surely arguments in support of vegan lifestyles, claiming people can rise above the instinctive feeding habits of our animal past, contradict the assertion that animals are people, since they cannot.

[Rob_86]

If we accept that animals do live conscious lives then why should we view ourselves as any different from them? If they're carnivores or omnivores they prey on other animals with indifference to the pain and death it causes. Surely arguments in support of vegan lifestyles, claiming people can rise above the instinctive feeding habits of our animal past, contradict the assertion that animals are people, since they cannot.

Not really. We have moral agency, which other animals don't. But of course there are a good deal of mentally impaired humans who don't either. The reasonable thing is to use our moral agency to deal with individuals, treating them with the respect the moral agency would demand.

It seems like a contradiction if we are trying to either say 'we are the same as animals' or 'we aren't the same as animals'. But the truth is that it's somewhere inbetween. We are higher than them in regard to capacity for morality, but we're not higher than them if we don't use it. Same with the way we treat those humans who don't have a capacity for morality - they can't respect my rights (though often happen to anyway, like cows etc would as well), but it doesn't mean I can't respect theirs. If you need to defend yourself from a lion, go ahead, stab him with your pencil. Similarly if you need to eat animals/humans to live, go ahead. But if you don't need to, the obvious answer is leave them alone.

[Guest Hobo]

Same question to you - Who do I harm when I eat meat?

Do you mean meat! or meat! as in artificially bred fungus (which is a living organism) used for vegetarian foods such as Quorn?

[paranoid]

Do you mean meat! or meat! as in artificially bred fungus (which is a living organism) used for vegetarian foods such as Quorn?

I mean meat. Stop trying to be clever, it doesn't seem to be working for you.

[Rob_86]

Then what do you suggest? We should just stop farming cows and slowly make them extinct by preventing them from re-producing?

I don't understand your argument. Cows, as we know them today, would not exist if it was not for the interference of man. A "slave" is not another species. It's still a human being. An individual might be forced into the life of a "slave" from a very early age, but that's completely different and not a fair comparison.

The cow has evolved in order to farmed by man. This is not something it is forced into - quite the opposite. If it was left to its own devices and not cared for by man then it simply wouldn't survive. This is what I'm trying to get across.

Okay I see your point. But the individual cow being forcably impreganted etc, isn't going to be thinking 'well, if it wasn't for me doing this, my kind would be dead'. Individuals should be our concern. If a single category of animals die in the wild, it isn't our job to prevent it (though some might want to). Similarly if a species which exists because of us is going to die out, and the only way to keep it going is through immoral practices - then why should we want to save the species, and not spare the animals? You wouldn't forcibly breed types of human to keep the race going, why do so with types of animal?

[Rob_86]

I've mentioned that approach to it before in this thread and conveniently it gets sidestepped by the people it's directed to as there is no answer to it that furthers their argument.

I actually studied this argument in quite a lot of detail before I went vegan (as it was in Philosophy at university) - don't think it poses any problem whatsoever to the issue of animal rights, and hence was one of the very reasons I went vegan (as slowly all my arguments for not being so were disbanded)

[Shaki]

The cow has evolved in order to farmed by man. This is not something it is forced into - quite the opposite. If it was left to its own devices and not cared for by man then it simply wouldn't survive. This is what I'm trying to get across.

as a bit of an aside, feral cows survive on the Isle of Swona:

Swona - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[paranoid]

Okay I see your point. But the individual cow being forcably impreganted etc, isn't going to be thinking 'well, if it wasn't for me doing this, my kind would be dead'. Individuals should be our concern. If a single category of animals die in the wild, it isn't our job to prevent it (though some might want to). Similarly if a species which exists because of us is going to die out, and the only way to keep it going is through immoral practices - then why should we want to save the species, and not spare the animals? You wouldn't forcibly breed types of human to keep the race going, why do so with types of animal?

But we are not breeding them to keep them going. Them being around is a by-product of the fact that they are bred as food. We are not being immoral in breeding cows for food, I am yet to see a shred of convincing evidence that proves this. All we get are neat side-steps of points you can't explain away, and regurgitation of the same slaves/mentally challenged pish that has been pedalled countless times throughout this thread.

[KimyReizeger]

. A cow does not have "desires".

.

A cow desires to not feel pain. Is this not a valid desire?

So for those of you who would like to see an end of farming cattle then you would be also be inadvertently denying their right to survive as a species. Is that moral?

The theory of natural selection goes a long way in explaining how a species' existence is generally determined on this earth. The notion of vegetarians denying a species its natural 'right to existence' is silly. Do you think slaughtered cows view themselves as necessary sacrifices to the continuity of the cow species? And that by breeding them as food we're doing them a favour by respecting their right - as a species - to existence which would otherwise be broken if we let nature take its course? Bloody nature, always trampling on everyone's right to survive as a species! Individual cows aren't concerned with the legacy of their species, rather, with eating, sleeping drinking, and not feeling pain.

[Guest Hobo]

I mean meat. Stop trying to be clever, it doesn't seem to be working for you.

Thank you thats so sweet, but rather, it doesn't seem to be working for you!

#######

To the people in this thread who are vegetarians

At which point do you define a living organism as sentient? Plants/Virus/Fungus/Bacteria/Insects/Fish/birds/Mammals? Do they require locomotion, awareness of their surroundings or method of copulation which involves both sexes going at it?

If an animal is killed accidentally is it acceptable to harvest its body for organs, medicines and meat?

If an animal, say a cow willingly walks to a milking station and doesn't complain but rather just stands there eating grass does that mean its ok since the cow seems happy?

[Alkaline]

A cow desires to not feel pain. Is this not a valid desire?

No, that is a natural thing. Nothing alive generally has a desire to feel pain (aside from a select few fetishists in our species, even then though there are limits). So i'm afraid, no, that's not a valid desire as it's inbuilt into anything that lives naturally.

[Skubbs]

Okay I see your point. But the individual cow being forcably impreganted etc, isn't going to be thinking 'well, if it wasn't for me doing this, my kind would be dead'

It's a cow... I doubt it's thinking about it's "feelings", let alone philosophical issues.

[Le Stu]

Not really. We have moral agency, which other animals don't. But of course there are a good deal of mentally impaired humans who don't either. The reasonable thing is to use our moral agency to deal with individuals, treating them with the respect the moral agency would demand.

It seems like a contradiction if we are trying to either say 'we are the same as animals' or 'we aren't the same as animals'. But the truth is that it's somewhere inbetween. We are higher than them in regard to capacity for morality, but we're not higher than them if we don't use it. Same with the way we treat those humans who don't have a capacity for morality - they can't respect my rights (though often happen to anyway, like cows etc would as well), but it doesn't mean I can't respect theirs. If you need to defend yourself from a lion, go ahead, stab him with your pencil. Similarly if you need to eat animals/humans to live, go ahead. But if you don't need to, the obvious answer is leave them alone.

Which is exactly my philosophy, as a meat and dairy eater, since I determined from study that I will attain an optimal diet with some consumption of animal produce. Why would I ever harm an animal for other reasons? I even chuck spiders out.

I would not refer to animals as people, personally, but I see the grey area you drew, with regard to the mentally impaired, as a good point. I wouldn't refer to them as animals, after all. This would be unnacceptable in our society.

[Skubbs]

A cow desires to not feel pain. Is this not a valid desire?

Is it actually desire, and not just instinct? Desire would hint at logical thought, whereas instinct tells the animal to avoid pain if it can help it.