CSflim

When we examine racism, we see that the justifications for it came from dividing the world into the 'in-group' and the 'out-group'. We are obligated to extend to those in the in-group (for example, white people) rights and ethical treatment. Those in the out-group are inferior and unimportant and as such, are not worthy of such rights. We are justified in treating them in whatever manner we so choose.

Of course we rightly cringe at such an argument (or at least I hope so!). Yet what is the fundamental difference between racism and 'specisism', wherein the 'in-group' is defined as humans, and the out-group, all other animals. How can we justify allowing them to suffer?

There are two obvious ways in which many are content with allowing them to suffer; eating them and scientifically experimenting on them. These cruel practices must end if we are to be able to condemn racism (among other things) without being morally inconsistent.


EDIT: I do not want to hear arguments from religious beliefs.
If your justification for eating animals is because animals don't have souls, unlike humans, then you are entitled to this belief. But I don't want this particular thread to be dragged down into the messy and pointless (and all too ubiquitous) arguments which have been discussed time and time again on this board.
Any arguments presented must not use religious beliefs as a starting point.







Some possible objections:
1. Animals don't feel pain.
The only reason we have for assuming other humans feel pain is based on the fact that they show the appropriate behaviours in certain situations. They cry and scream and struggle when in these situations. Animals show the same behaviours. Hence, we are presumably justified in assuming that they do feel pain. (Once again, one could make a racist argument by claiming that we don't know if other races feel pain).

2. Animals aren't intelligent like we are/Animals aren't capable of reason.
But young infants aren't intelligent. Can we treat them in whatever manner we please? What about the mentally retarded?

3. We evolved to eat meat. It is natural.
It does not follow that because something is natural, it is good. If it could be shown that humans evolved so as to be naturally xenophobic that it would make racism moral? Or what if it could be shown that male dominance over women is a natural product of evolution?
It simply does not follow that because humans evolved to behave in some particular way, that this way is ethically good.

4. Experimenting on animals prevents suffering in humans.
But a huge amount of animal experimentation is not done for vital medical purposes, but instead, for cosmetic testing; seeing how animals react to shampoos or seeing how large a dose is a 'lethal dose' of some food additive.
What about the cases where the experimenting is not for commercial use, but for medical and scientific purposes?
Many experiments are of uncertain value. They appear to exist solely to satisfy the curiosity of some scientists. In most cases the benefits to humans are either uncertain or non-existant, while the suffering of animals is certain and real.

5. Farmed animals live good, pain-free lives. What more can you ask for?
But this is simply not true. Many farm animals lead miserable lives. Many hens are kept in cages so small that they cannot even move their wings. The cattle which provide most of the beef in America also live in extremely cramped conditions. And when it comes to finally committing the act of killing, the conditions in a slaughter-house are far from 'pain-free'.
Even if these particular practices were put to a stop, farming animals, in general, causes much suffering; castration, separation of mother and young, branding and so on.
Although it is possible that conditions could be set up so as to allow farm animals to lead quality lives, this would not be able to supply us with the large amount of meat we currently consume (and it would not be commercially viable). And anyway, it is beside the point to argue what 'could' happen. The fact is, that by buying meat now you are supporting cruelty being inflicted upon animals.



(For the record; this post is done in a purely 'devil's advocate' manner. I love my pork sausages, hamburgers and chicken nuggets! )

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Yakk

Practical lines must be drawn. Using a taboo that overly restricts behaviour, and making the mentally retarted and young infants out of bounds, is far more practical than actually measuring this. And the benefit to eating babies and mentally retarded people is small, so the taboo is low in costs.

There are other reasons not to kill/experiment/eat retarded people and infants, but I believe the above is sufficient.

As an aside, I suspect that a number of animals deserve protection. Some sea mammals (Dolphins, Whales), as well as some of our closer kin on dry land.

As a second aside, I am aware my decision to value intelligence and reason is arbitrary.

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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.

tecoyah

I eat meat.......I enjoy the flesh of dead animals. I could not kill an animal. I am a walking Hypocracy.

If you really wanted to create the implied scenario reality......Force people to kill that which they eat, I would likely starve.

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martinguerre

i've asked this question elsewhere. if it indeed is wrong to kill animals because they are equivilent to humans...where does this leave lions?

Are they murderers?

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-John 3:16

CSflim

So your decision to not treat infants and the mentally handicapped in a cruel manner is one of practicality, rather than any real moral commitment.
So a mother who physically abuses her child is not really doing anything wrong? Her punishment that she would recieve is just the result of technical loop-hole, due to the fact that we must keep practicallity in mind when deciding on the law?


Why does biological relation to us and/or living on land have a bearing on our responsibility to treat them morally?

Indeed it is. As arbitrary a trait as, dare I say it, sex, religion or skin colour?

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CSflim

We cannot judge lions in this manner.
They do not have the mental facilities to engage in moral reasoning. They can only do what comed naturally them. As 'ought implies can', what they do cannot be judged as moral or immoral.
Furthermore, even if a lion 'wanted to' it would be unable to survive on a vegetarian diet. It is not biologically equipped to do so. We have the luxury of being able to make a choice.

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flstf

Life forms high up on the food chain wreck much havoc on the life forms below them. I wonder what it must be like to be a wheat plant when the combine comes thrashing me and all my fellow plants ripping us apart.

(For the record; this post is done in a purely 'devil's advocate' manner. I love my bread, bisquits and pancakes! )

CSflim

But wheat does not have the ability to feel pain.
This should be quite clear from the point of view of evolution: Wheat simply cannot take any action to avoid the threat to its well being (source of 'pain'), hence it would not evolve the entirly usless ability to feel pain.
This is in confirmation with what we observe: the reaction of wheat to being cut up does nothing to suggest to us that it feels pain (unlike a dog or a human).

This is also backed up from the anatomy of wheat: its lacks a central nervous system and a brain!

Hence eating wheat and other plants is acceptable. Eating animals is not.

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Coppertop

Life feeds on life. This is necessary.

At least until we learn how to photosynthesize, I suppose. But the earth hardly needs an unchecked human population.

CSflim

I am not denying that. There is a readily available food source, which we can avail of without causing widespread sufferring.
There is nothing wrong with eating plants, as they do not have the capacity to suffer.

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flstf

Well sure, we are mammals and high up on the food chain. It's easy for us to ignore any pain that the plant might feel after all they are not like us.

Lebell

When a combine mows down a field of wheat, literally hundreds of creatures are slaughtered in the form of voles and mice.

How are these creatures any less deserving of life than a cow? Because of their relative size?

To live means to strive with your fellow creatures for precious resources and to deprive them of the same.

Our cities and roads deprive them of habitat.

Our use vehicles means we hit them and kill millions every year.

But we are no different than any other species would be if they had risin to the top of the scrum.

Any morality I see has to do with the responsible use of our resources for all life and the minimizing of suffering whenever possible.

Fortunately, you can do this and still enjoy a good steak

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MageB420666

Eating meat is something that allowed humanity to survive. Animals provide a food source during the winter when vegetation is scarce. And as the saying goes, old habits die hard. Besides, a nice medium-rare steak is just sooooo gooood.

In your argument your making a division yourself those that can express/feel pain vs. those that can't. Your entire argument supporting that we should not eat meat is at a basic level supporting that we should not eat at all, because we will be making an "exclusion". Your contradicting your own argument with your argument. A line has to be drawn somewhere, and unfortunatly for the cows, chickens, pigs, etc., they got put on the shitty side. That's life, everyone and everything suffers in some form or another, although to different extents.

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Suave

My reasoning behind it is that no matter what you eat to survive, you are killing a living being. Even if you subsist purely on fruit, you are eating "baby trees". May as well eat things that taste good and provide protein as well.

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"Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions." - Albert Einstein

"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something." - Plato

Dbass

An Itemized response:
It is not true that we know someone feels pain because they express an aversion to pain. There is hard physical evidence, based on nerve patters, that some animals feel pain more acutely than others. The fact that they do feel pain is unfortunate, but there are increasinly humane means of killing them.
The fact that eating meat is natural does make it good. Vegetarians and vegans are required to supplement their diet (or get sick) and this means that they would be unable to survive in nature. The idea that men might be naturally dominant over women is irrelevant, because both must survive in order for the species to survive, and people and meat animals are similarly codependant. If predator species were wiped out, prey would die out because of high competition for resources.
Modern farming processes are disgusting. The food that comes from them is inferior, and often causes problems for the consumers. It would doubtless be better if we had more "organic" practices, but as long as corporation control this, it's not gonna get any better.

Seer666

I can go with expermenting on animals. that I can see being argued as "wrong". However, you know those two lagre pointy teeth you have near the front of your mouth? Canines? You know the only reason for them is to rend, tear, and chew fleash, right? We are meat eaters. Veggies to, but really, at least meat has a chance to run. Saying eating meat is wrong is like saying breathing is wrong. Makeing the animal suffer mor then is need to kill it, that is wrong, sure, but killing it to eat? Go right ahead.

Besides, if God didn't want us to eat them, he would have made them out of something other then meat.

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Amnesia620

I agree. We need the vitamins/minerals/nutrients from animals.

Vegans and Vegetarians, unless taking a high level vitamin or supplement combination, have been show to have teeth that are less healthy (chewing softer foods), more susceptible to colds/flu/other ailments, bone loss occurs earlier, etc.

Animals are a source of life-sustaining nutrients. They are not poison. If they were, we'd know then that it was wrong to eat them.

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CSflim

A plant does not have a central nervous sytem or a brain. There is no reson to believe that it is sentient. Sentience is a necessary condition for pain, hence there is no reason to suggest that plants feel pain.
Similarly a loud-speaker connected to a pressure sensitive pad the beeps everytime it is struck would not be considered to be feeling pain.

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CSflim

Yes, it is unfortunate that these creatures die. It is almost certainly unavoidable. However we should still make an effort to minimise the slaughter.
The majority of crops harvested are used as feed for farm animals. If we were to eat the crops directly, we would need to grow much less, and hence we would reduce the amount of sufferring in the world even more (by not slaughtering animals for meat, and not killing creatures living in crop fields.

Could a similar argument be made to extend this from specisim to racism?
Does your ultimate moral philosophy boil down to 'let might make right'? Presumably not?

This is similar to the "but it's natural" argument I wrote in the orignal post. Just because things are the way they are does not imply that this is right.

Indeed. We should minimise sufferring. And we can take a major step in that direction by becoming vegetarians. Eating meat is not a necessity for us. It is a luxury.

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CSflim

Eating meat most certainly was ncecessary for humans in the past. My point is that it is no longer necessary.

Indeed a line must be drawn somewhere. What I am challenging is where the line currently rests. My proposed criteria is that we should minimise the sufferring in the world. Many animals show obvious signs of sufferring, so we should avoid eating them. Plants do not suffer so there is no reason not to eat them.
There will always be borderline cases. I accept that. (e.g. is killing insects ok? maybe, maybe not). But the point is that cows, chickens, pigs and sheep are not borderline cases.

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CSflim

My argument does not rest on killing. It rests on sufferring and pain. "baby trees" have no ability to suffer or feel pain.

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CSflim

Yes. Not all animals feel the same amount of pain given the same stimulus. But that does not change the fact that they do feel pain, and as such we should not mistreat them.
To use the racism analogy once more; if some particular race were shown to process pain in a somewhat less severe manner than others, would that justify putting them into slavery, and mistreating them in whatever manner we choose?


But the point is that we are now in a possition to abandon meat eating. We have vitamin supplements and the like, and so we should use them.

Most animals would survive just fine in an environment without humans. There are plenty of other "natural" predators around for an equilibrium to be found.

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CSflim

I already addressed the point that "we evolved to eat meat, therefore eating meat is morally right". Are you really suggesting that we should look to evolution (arguably the most wasteful, cruel, entriely amoral process on the planet) for moral guidance?

The analogy with breathing is not a useful one:
We must breathe in order to survive. We have no choice in the matter. We do not have to eat meat. There are alternatives.

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CSflim

In that case we should all become vegans and take vitamins and mineral suppliments.

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Robaggio

I see your connection between racism and 'specisim', however, I don't think it applies to this situation: "These cruel practices must end if we are to be able to condemn racism (among other things) without being morally inconsistent."

Humans arn't entitled to any rights. Neither are animals entitled to any rights. Morals are based on the notion that living things are entitled to things in the first place. Given this, how can there be any inconsistencies with treatment of anything vs. another?

Robaggio

"Indeed a line must be drawn somewhere. What I am challenging is where the line currently rests. My proposed criteria is that we should minimise the sufferring in the world. Many animals show obvious signs of sufferring, so we should avoid eating them. Plants do not suffer so there is no reason not to eat them.
There will always be borderline cases. I accept that. (e.g. is killing insects ok? maybe, maybe not). But the point is that cows, chickens, pigs and sheep are not borderline cases."

I believe there is a classification error here though. You're assuming that the only manifestation of "suffering" is that of pain. However, the term "suffer" is also used to describe a sustained loss or injury. Plants do get injured, plants do suffer- but only to the point where they are forced to endure a situation that they have no control over. Eating plants causes them to suffer, as they have sustained a physical loss, which by definition, is suffering.

Why do you consider plants incapable of suffering? Or is it that plants don't suffer in a conventional way? Is it suffer the verb or suffer the noun?

CSflim

We would feel no guilt at smashing up rocks or concrete with a sledge hammer (yet this could be considered 'a sustained loss or injury'). This is because rocks and concrete are not sentient and cannot feel pain. Feeling pain (either physical or psychological) is how I would describe suffering in this situation.
The word 'suffer' can be used in another manner as you point out: E.g. an economy can "suffer". This is however not the manner in which I use the word. Plants 'suffer' in the same way that an economy 'suffers'. Animals suffer in the same way that humans suffer.

(see the fallacy of equivocation)

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CSflim

Of course you can apply moral subjectivism to justify anything that you so wish (including racism).

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iamnormal

http://www.buffalo.edu/reporter/vol26/vol26n19/2.txt

Humans are omnivorous. Humans are not carnivores or herbivores.
Until soylent green is available animales will have to do.

martinguerre

cs...the whole reason why we confront racism is that it is in fact not true that one race is supirior to another as social, spiritual, moral beings.

To apply the same reasoning to beings that cannot possibly understand nor recriprocate the favor...is to demean the very impetus that lead to anti-racist movements.

aslo...what the hell are you going to do with all these animals? they aren't natural at all...and turning them loose would be an act of mass cruelty. The final chapter of animal captivity would have to be a mass slaughter, and probably the elimination of some species that could not live in the wild.

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Bossnass

I have to admit that I am a specisist. There is simply not enough evidence to treat other species with more "equality". One of your preemptive arguments relies on intelligence and the ability to reason, based on the statement that infants aren't intelligent. However, intelligence is the capacity to acquire and apply knowledge, which human infants have in great amounts. There is no evidence that any of the food staple species are actually intelligent. While animals may be sentient, there is also no evidence of a conscience or any real self awareness.

Further, regarding the mentally retarded. The fact that we, as a society, show a social conscience strong enough to support people with disablities proves that there are real distictions between humans and other species. I am not claiming that humans have never committed acts contrary to our current social conscience, but I am arguing that our food source speicies have never shown the capacity to do so. Having a social conscience is a result of having an individual conscience, which is in turn the result of being intelligent. Thus, this species distinction is not arbitrary. Further, it has been stated that other animals, such as lions, are not capable of morality. It follows that species incapable of morality should be distingished from those that are moral, as illustrated by the penal system. I am not proposing we eat or test on criminals, I am suggesting that the ability to have morals is another real distinction between humans and other species.

To extrapolate this into another current issue: I support to same sex marriage, I support differnt sex marriage, I support inter-faith marriage, and I support inter-racial marriage. However, I don't support inter-special marriage. Based on the initial 'in-group, out-group' argument, do you propose that we should someday accept inter-special unions?


On an unrelated note, I would suffer, as would many others, if society imposed a meat ban. While I don't presume to be able to quantify 'suffering', I would on a personal (and nutritional) level suffer. Millions of people involved in the food industry would lose their livelyhood. All the current 'meat' animals would need to be culled... there is no reason to keep them around other then consumption. The transition to a meatless society would create a great deal of human suffering.

Yakk

She's displaying severly aberrant behaviour. And what do you mean by 'real moral behaviour' -- I wasn't talking about law, I was talking about taboos and morals. A moral system that doesn't take into account practicality is functionally bankrupt.

And, as I mentioned, there are other reasons. They include the intense emotional response of other people, the continuity of the child into the person, etc. I am just claiming that the practical taboo reason is sufficient, not the only reason.

I was describing a class, I wasn't justifying the class. Many of our close relatives are damn smart cookies.

On some level, yes. Of course, on that level, the valueing life more than non-life is arbitrary, or animals vs non-animals.

Hell, you seem to be implying that pain is bad -- yet another arbitrary choice. Pain is just another sensation -- many people enjoy non-damaging pain (be they people who like to exercise, or BDSM-aficionados, or just people who like being nibbled on).

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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.

Suave

Well killing them isn't the problem as far as pain goes. It's just their living conditions.

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"Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions." - Albert Einstein

"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something." - Plato

1010011010

I think saying people cringe at Us v. Them justification is incorrect.

Depriving criminals of their rights is fundamentally an Us v Them justification, but I don't think pointing out that forcing someone to live in a tiny room for 30 years isn't very nice will garner much sympathy for Free the Murders. Because people feel that the division between The Law Abiding v. The Criminal is a valid one, and so much treatment that would be protested if applied to Us is acceptable when used on Them.

People cringe at the Us v Them justification for racism because many people don't accept race alone as a sufficient justification for different treatment, or find claims of racial superiority/inferiority to be invalid. It's not the type or structure of argument, it's the quality of the argument as presented.

I think most people will readily agree that species is sufficient and valid justification for how we treat an organism. So Racism Bad, Speciesism Good.

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shakran

So you're arguing one of two things.

Most likely you're arguing that we should eat plants instead of animals, but then your logic breaks down because we are now putting plants in the "out-group." After your passioned argument about how animals can feel pain (I agree, they can), you surely aren't going to sit there and tell me that plants absolutely cannot feel pain even though you have no evidence to back up that proposition. Therefore, if you're willing to put plants in the out-group, you're no better than the rest of us.

The other possible argument you are making is that we not eat anything lest something be in an out-group. The obvious logical flaw in this concept is that by doing so we would starve ourselves, and therefore be putting ourselves in the out-group.


Fact is, the world's cruel. Some things must be eaten so that other things can live. Sucks, but until we come up with protein synthesis replicator systems a-la Star Trek, that's how it goes.

DasButch

Animals eat animals. We are animals. Nuff said. If anyone wants to make the choice not to, good for them. Don't tell those of us that do that we are wrong. It IS evolution and the food chain. Human+no advantage+big predator= human lunch. Something that honestly could, and finds humans to be tasty would not think twice.

1010011010

Define pain in an usefully observable way.

It's all well and good to look an the non-human analogue of pain receptors and observe how they respond to stimulation. But it does not follow that a more intense response in those neurons translates directly to a more intense sensation of pain in the animal's brain. Many anesthetics work by attenuating nerve signalling so that a pain signal fades out prior to reaching the brain. If we observe the nerves at the site of a surgery, it would look to be excruciatingly painful. But the signals never reach the brain to be converted into pain.

Aside: Formerly, anesthetics also functioned as paralytics. To decrease recovery time, and to lessen the dangers of anesthetic use, doses are decreased and more modern localized anesthetics are used. This has a problem in that signalling might not reach the brain to be percieved as pain, it may still be sufficent to trigger a reaction in local tissue or a spinal bounce reflex. So, often a paralytic is given in concert with a lowered anesthetic dose. Now, go read some of the stories about where they miscalculated the anesthetic dose, but got the paralytic dose correct.

If we define "experiencing pain" as aversive reaction to damaging stimuli, we have a pretty good fit for spotting painful things... though, technically, someone chemically paralyzed on an operating table with no anesthetics isn't expereincing any pain by this definition. Further, certain plants DO present aversive reaction to damaging stimuli... though on a predicably slow timescale.

Which leads us to another interesting question. Maybe cutting a flower is excruciating for a rosebush, but because we observe no physical reaction on an animal timescale we assume plants are insensate. A number of plant species are also known to release chemical signals in response to damage, infection, and/or infestation. Neighboring plants may then respond in way to reduce their own chances of being infected or infested or the severity of such an attack. Hmmm.

This is totally aside from the fact that many people simply don't care if it's painful for a cow to be made into tasty steaks.

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Simple Machines in Higher Dimensions

woOt?

It's one of the most essential aspects of survival: the idea of predator vs. prey. Sure, we humans took it a step further and applied the assembly line principles to it. Almost every creature in this world eats other creatures. It's just the way it is. Some people might think it's wrong because we have a conscious. Insects eat one another, aquatic species, mammals and even plants! Ever seen a venus fly trap eat a fly? It's fascinating. In those days during the last ice age, when there were no plants to eat. How were people supposed to survive? Don't get me wrong. I've had to go to a slaughter house once or twice for work. I think what we do to animals is horrible, but it is necessary for our survival.

Lak

"If a representative of any species can come to me and explain why thier species should not be killed and eaten by my species, then I will refrain from eating them forever, and I will advise my fellow humans to do the same."

I said that to a vegetarian after an extended argument in which neither of us were getting anywhere. I then stole his sandwich.

I'm a cunt

Anyway, to provide an actually useful answer, I think the reason humans generally accept the mass slaughter of food-animals to be acceptable is very similar to my bastard-response above. We may not admit it, or be able to defend the position, but I think humans generally look down on other species as inferior. If I worked in a slaughterhouse, and one day I was just about to kill a cow when it said "Excuse me, old chap, would mind... you know, not killing me? Ta." I would of course reconsider immediately.
Wouldnt you?

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Xell101

Perputation of the human species. Racism back in the day served a function, now it only creates internal strife we'd be better off without. With me, killing animals for food isn't morally inconsistent as you depicted. I don't care about a cow, or a chicken, I care about the ecosystems, life is good, but sometimes life eats life, we kill to live. I have no qualms with that, decimating ecosystems for the purpose of human advancement I have problems with.