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Debate 11: Whether eating meat is moral

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Debate 11: Whether eating meat is moral
Paul
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Posted 07/19/07 - 08:14 AM:
Subject: Debate 11: Whether eating meat is moral 		quote post
#1
In this debate Mr.Anonymous argues that it's morally justified to consume meat, while pwrong counters that eating meat is wrong in most cases, though not in all.

Discussion thread here.

Number of Rounds: 5
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Mr.Anonymous
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Posted 07/19/07 - 08:16 AM:
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#2
I will start this by thanking Pwrong to be my opponent, and Philosophy Forums for hosting this debate.

The modern age is characterized now by the Green Movement (which I like to also refer to as the Eco-Socialist Movement). This movement consists of the notion that humanity's actions (Industry) are harmful to the Ecosphere that we are part of and that the Ecosphere is more important than humanity's desires. One of the philosophies that belongs to this movement is the idea that eating meat is morally unjustified and that vegatarianism is a life style that human beings should follow in order to live with a clean conscience. In this debate, I will challenge this notion and, with logic and reason, show that meat-eating is moral justified.

I start with the subject of the natural order. Many animals consume other animals (i.e. they eat meat). They also benefit from this, and don't give it a second thought. Therefore, the act of meat-eating is part of the natural order. Often, the individuals I debate with on the subject of meat-eating don't denounce animals for eating meat (are actually perfectly fine with it), yet will complain about humans consuming animals. Would this not be a hypocritical position? When I enquired further, I was given two reasons:

1) Human beings have a moral capacity, while animals do not. Since meat-eating is immoral because it causes suffering, only human beings have a moral obligation to stop.

2) The way that human beings collect meat for consumption, known as factory farming, is an inhumane industry that performs numerous acts of animal abuse.

There is also a third reason I discovered on my own that is psycological in nature, but we shall look into that further on in this post. Let us analyze the first two reasons:

1) This argument has two assumtions: a) Something that has no moral capacity can be excused for an immoral act. b) The act of inducing suffering is inexcusable and immoral. "a" can be dismissed since a child with no understanding of the law can still steal a chocolate bar from store and it will still be wrong despite that child does not have an understanding of right and wrong. "b" is refuted since the suffering is part of the natural order. Since the idea of stopping meat-eating is derived from the notion of preserving and following the natural order, the position proves hypocritical as stated earlier.

2) Here is something that I will not dispute. Indeed, many groups belonging to the factory farming industry are responsible for foul treatment. Indeed, this part of the error within the ideology of the factory farming industry is two raise the fattest creatures (for more meat to put on the market) rather than the healthiest creatures. However, the fact that the means of obtaining meat for humankind's consumption is flawed does not make the act of eating meat immoral itself, it simply means that our obligation is not to force the world into a vegetarian ideology, but rather to correct the factory farming system via a series of laws that will not only reduce abuse greatly, but will benefit the consumer, the producer, and the investor through the existance of better quality meat that comes from healthier animals, which will still have plenty of substance for consumption to spare yet.

And now, having address the two reasons given to me, I will reveal the reason I discovered. As mentioned earlier it is psycological, and I know it now to be the result of popular entertainment, suprisingly enough. Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy, Pluto the Dog, Care Bears, Dark-Wing Duck...the list of cartoon characters goes on and on. Fact is, many of these characters are animals with humaniod appearence and personality, and are meant to embody the more positive aspects of our own species. We were raised with these characters as little children (at our most easily influenced state) since Walt Disney invented Mickey Mouse and put him on TV. This propaganda (not at all meant to be propaganada, but still is) is installed into our minds at an early age, and when we grow up we have an unnecessary sympathy towards furry non-sapients. Combined with the foolish need to start revolutions when-ever and where-ever, groups like PETA (which incidently is responsible for animal abuses itself) and the Animal Liberation Front (responsible for numerous acts of vandalism and terrorism towards scientific institutions) form and people start marching along streets like Nazis even though they often label animal shelters and disease research centers as Nazis themselves.

That concludes the first part of my argument. I will be very interested in how my opponent goes about this debate.

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Posted 07/19/07 - 08:17 AM:
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#3
My argument is mainly based on the arguments of Peter Singer. The only book I’ve read on the subject is Singer’s “Writings On An Ethical Life”. It’s basically a collection of articles and chapters from his other books.

My position is not that eating meat is always wrong, or that animals should be treated equally to humans. I don't even claim that killing an animal is ever wrong (suffering is the issue). I merely claim that the current treatment of animals is immoral, and in today’s situation, it is better to be a vegetarian than not. First of all, I’m assuming that morality exists (in some sense), is consistent, not arbitrary, and doesn’t come from anything supernatural. I’d rather not try to defend these as that takes a long time; they appear self evident to me and it’s hard to make any kind of argument without these assumptions. Note that I do not rely on the principle of utilitarianism.

I do rely on two premises which can be backed up by observation of the world around us.

1. Animals are capable of suffering in most of the ways humans can suffer. This includes pain, discomfort, boredom, the distress of losing a loved one, and so forth. Animals can be even diagnosed with many of the same psychological disorders as humans (that’s why they can test antidepressants on rats, for example). Obviously humans are more sensitive to some of these, like boredom. However generally, the same things that cause an emotion in a human will cause the same emotion in an animal. This can all be backed up with scientific evidence. Furthermore if it wasn’t true, animal testing wouldn’t be much use.

2. In our world, when a large population of humans eats a lot of meat, this causes a huge amount of suffering to an enormous number of animals. This suffering is comparable with torture. You can reduce this suffering by eating less meat. It is possible to reduce the suffering of all animals by changing the law, but this would raise the price of meat to the extent that people would rarely be able to eat it. This would certainly be a good thing. However it’s much more difficult to try to change the law than it is to go vegetarian. Furthermore, if you try and protest against factory farming without going vegetarian first, you’ll be called a hypocrite. So my premise is: animals suffer when we eat meat and the best way to stop it is to stop eating meat.

Finally, I will take a premise from Peter Singer. This is paraphrased from a quote about killing, but I’ve extended it to any kind of treatment (which Singer wouldn't disagree with):
When we consider our treatment of a being, we should look, not at the race, sex, or species to which the being belongs, but at the characteristics of the individual. This implies that a human with the body and mind of a rabbit is morally equivalent to a rabbit. Singer uses the term "speciesism", an anologue of racism and sexism, to describe giving preferential treatment to someone based on their species rather than their individual merits. To reject this premise, you have to do more than show that humans are superior to animals. You'd probably have to prove that humans didn't evolve from other animals, or that only humans have a soul.

My main argument is simply this: There is no difference between animals and all humans, which is morally relevant to farming and eating them. Therefore, if it is wrong to cause humans to suffer the way animals do in the meat industry, then it is also wrong (although not as bad) to subject animals to the meat industry. I'm sure you'd agree that we shouldn't breed any kind of humans in tiny cages, crowd them together in trucks, slaughter them (humanely or otherwise), or mutilate them (without anaesthetics) to stop them from hurting each other. Therefore we shouldn't breed animals the way we do. And as explained above, the easiest way to stop this is to be vegetarian.

Now, it’s up to you to suggest possible morally relevant differences. Examples are intelligence, an ability to understand morality, acceptance by society. However, the difference has to apply to all humans. There are many humans who are less intelligent than animals, and we would never eat them. There are many humans who are intelligent, but have no understanding of morality. We may put them in jail if they do something illegal; maybe even kill them if they kill another person. However even serial killers have the right not to be tortured, and there is no reason not to extend this to animals. Finally, acceptance by society is a very arbitrary idea. It’s difficult to find an exception these days, but only a hundred years ago every black person in America would be an exception. However we now agree that it is not right to force a person into slavery, and furthermore it has never been right. There are plenty of other differences, but my claim is that none of them are both morally relevant and applicable to every human.

There are also sound arguments based on environmental effects of eating meat, and the wasted food that domestic animals are forced to eat. However they don't relate to animal rights, so I won’t bother with them unless I need them as a counterargument.
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Posted 07/21/07 - 01:20 PM:
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#4
Thank you, Pwrong.

I would like to contest this point, however, that one would be hypocritical for proposing better factory conditions without going vegetarian. True, if one was proposing only for the sake of the animals without taking a complete stance against animal suffering, then it would be hypocritical. But here, I am partially thinking of the comsumed animals, but I am also speaking for the consumer. The conditions of factory farms lead to only one desirable condition in the meat: substance (a.k.a. fat). The unfortunate factor behind factory farming is that they do raise their animals to be strong and healthier, which results in low quality meat and sometimes food-diseases.

The solution is to use the principle of natural selection so that each succeeding generation is healthier. Granted, this will cost the corporations a good amount of profits, and as a capitalist (one who thinks profit before welfare) I can completely understand why they would be anxious to do this. But in the end, the consumers will be grateful, since the corporations with the better meat at the same price as those with lesser meat will be bathing in profit and will also be more respected by organizations that don't need their respect (PETA and the Animal Liberation Front).

Further more, there is evidence that cages are not a necessary factor for the factory farms: I happen to consume it often. Eggs from open-range chickens are far healthier than their counterparts, and the chickens are also being raised in more humane conditions.

Secondly, I would like to point out that there is a good reason why we eat meat: like any source of nutrition, it's good for us. Meat is full of useful nutrition that helps us grow and develop our bodies. Indeed, the fact that we learned how to cook meat is why we are here today, as it was a vital step in our evolution. The large amounts of released nutrition from the cooked meat caused our brains to grow more than any common ape.

Third, I wish to question part of my opponent's logic. He claimed in the beginning of his first post that killing animals is not a wrong action, yet latter he claims that the only right way to reduce animal suffering is to adopt a lifestyle/ideology in which killing and consuming an animal is wrong. Perhaps my opponent would be happy to explain how this is not contradictory in his next post.

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Posted 07/23/07 - 04:27 AM:
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Thanks Mr Anonymous. In your first post, you seemed to admit that current methods of farming are inhumane and abusive towards animals. You then suggested ways to rectify this problem without being vegetarian. I’m not certain if this was a hypothetical suggestion, i.e. “If animal cruelty is wrong, then here’s my suggestions” or an actual suggestion, “Animal cruelty is wrong, so here’s my alternative solution to the problem”. I’ll assume the latter, and if you disagree I’ll justify my ideas further in my next post.

As I see it, there are about three ways to reduce the suffering caused by intensive farming. I'm talking about what we can do as individuals, not society as a whole.
1. Eat less meat, or become a vegetarian or a vegan. This reduces demand for meat and thus the number of animals in farms. It also decreases profits from factory farms, but not from humane farms (since most people will buy from the cheaper factory farms by default).
2. Protest factory farms, or write letters to farms and the government. This can be very effective, possibly more effective than being vegetarian. However if you do this without also boycotting the product, you run the risk of being labeled a hypocrite by both sides and not being taken seriously. I’m not saying it’s necessarily hypocritical.
3. Only buy food from humane sources. This generally means you can’t buy meat from the supermarket, eat fast food, or eat meat at restaurants as there’s no way to find out where the meat really comes from. In many cases, labels like "free-range" actually have no legal definition. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_range#Definitio... (if the link doesn't work, just go to the article on free range, and click on definition). This option is ethically the same as being vegetarian; the only difference is you're likely to make a mistake. You do increase profits for humane farms, but that just increases the number of relatively happy animals, it doesn't help the suffering animals any more than being vegetarian.

All three options are effective, and it's plausible that the 2nd is better than the 1st. However, my objective is to show that eating meat is morally wrong i.e that we should not eat it. To do this, I don’t have to show that option 1 is the best way to reduce suffering. I believe it is, but that’s not the point. All I need to prove is that option 1 is morally a good thing, and I believe I did so in my first post.

It still remains to address your concerns about health, your point about the effect of cartoon animals, and your question about suffering versus killing. It's well known that vegetarianism is a healthy diet, certainly much healthier than the average American or Australian diet (although that's not saying much). Meat does not contain anything useful that you can't find in plants. It just has a bit more protein and a lot more fat. Here's a paper in the journal of the American Dietetic Association that backs me up:
www.adajournal.org/article/PIIS0002822303002943/fulltext
Unfortunately there are few statistics on vegans, but it's generally accepted that a properly planned vegan diet can be very healthy.

As for your argument about evolution, I've heard this before but I've never seen any evidence, and the idea doesn't make any sense to me. It seems to presuppose Lamarckian evolution rather than Darwinian evolution. A species evolves a new trait because the trait is useful, not because they eat differently.
Your ad hominem point about cartoons didn't sound too plausible either. Many of these cartoon animals are subjected to extreme violence, with no consequences. Surely this would desensitise children to animal (and human) abuse rather than encourage them to think about animal rights. If you're right, and cartoons really do cause people to have more sympathy for animals, is that really a bad thing? Surely it can only be right to feel sympathy for something when it feels pain.

Finally, you asked me to explain why it's ok to kill animals, but not ok to make them suffer. First of I'd like to point out that I never mentioned a lifestyle in which killing an animal is inherently wrong. Vegetarianism itself is not an ethical theory, it's just a means to an end (obviously, people go vegetarian for many different reasons). So there's no contradiction. My overall argument doesn't strictly depend on the idea that killing an animal is acceptable, in fact many vegetarians would disagree with me. I say it because I'm a preference utilitarian, and also because it answers your question "is it wrong for an animal to kill another animal" with a resounding "no". Like most of my argument, this is all based on Peter Singer. Preference utilitarianism states that we should maximise the satisfaction of preferences. Both humans and animals prefer not to suffer. However, Singer argues that only people (he distinguishes "person" from "human") understand that they exist over time and are capable of having a preference for not being killed. This leads us to the following claims:

1. It is wrong to cause any person to suffer
2. It is wrong to cause any animal to suffer
3. It is usually wrong to kill a person (if they don't want to die)
4. It is not wrong to kill an animal (if one can do so without causing more suffering)



Edited by Pwrong on 07/23/07 - 04:32 AM
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Posted 07/24/07 - 10:09 AM:
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While you have listed several options, Pwrong, on how to significantly reduce animal suffering or eliminate it altogether, there is a fourth option:

4. Promote the redesign of factory farms, as to significantly reduce unnecessary and innefficient suffering of consumed animals, by calling for new laws and regulations.

In terms of the evolution aspect, the cosuming of cooked meat results in a new and useful trait, and those with the trait are healthier (also able to breed more) than those without it. The number of those without the trait gradullaly disappear in favor of the new trait.

With the cartoon animal violence, they show the cartoon animals recovering from this extreme violence due to the "magical" properties of the show. Further more, the violence is being done by one animal to another, and has comedic aspect to it. The audience knows this. However, I've often seen cases within the show in which the villians are usually outright humans, and the animal characters only recover at the last minute due to extreme levels of "magic".

But yes, this is a bad thing, as this can cause too much sympathy to a point where a human is willing to kill another human or destroy scientific research facilities for the sake of a few members of lesser species (note that the scientific research benefits humans and animals alike). In fact, I happened to be watching CNBC when they had a story about a minor Eco-Terrorist attack. They mentioned a mental condition (alas, the name escapes my memory) in which the inflicted individual has an exteme concern about the environment (a person who went to see a therapist about this claimed to have wept uncontrollably about a story reporting the death of a few whales). Symptoms also include high levels of stress and a supposed buzzing noise. After hearing about this, I am sure that the accidental cartoon propaganda is one of several factors responsible. Yes, one should feel a little upset about the death of our furry little friends, but there is a point where we place more importance over lesser species then our own.

As for diets, I will not dispute that Americans do not eat healthy in general. However, note that humans are neither carnivors or herbivors, we are omnivors. Eating either meat only or plant-life only is not the healthiest diet possible. I happen to have known several individuals who've had vegetarian diets and from my observations, they aren't living a very healthy lifestyle (indeed, one of them faints very often).

Finally, I would like to ask you this: Where do your moral claims about eating meat come from, apart from the wisdom of this Peter Singer? I believe that I have explained that mine have come from the natural order so far.

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Posted 07/25/07 - 04:50 AM:
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I believe your fourth option is pretty similar to the second option I gave. If not, then it's still irrelevent for the reasons I gave in my last post. It's not enough to suggest an alternative to being vegetarian, even if your suggestion is morally better than going vegetarian. That doesn't change the moral status of being a vegetarian. I have shown that being vegetarian is a good thing, your goal is to show that it isn't, not that there's something better. So technically the rest of my post is unnecessary, I've already shown that it's wrong to eat meat.

Your evolution argument still doesn't work. You may acquire a trait from eating cooked meat, but it's an acquired trait and not a genetic trait. You can't pass it on to your children. You could conceivably pass on some gene that makes you more likely to cook meat, if there was such a gene. However it's more likely that cooking was just like any invention. We started cooking meat because we realised it tastes better than raw meat, and later generations copied this. Besides, I haven't seen any evidence that cooked meat is good for the brain at all.

Your cartoon argument seems to be more of an ad hominem attack on people who sympathise with animals than anything else. It's not strictly relevent to those who are vegetarian for based on a logical, ethical argument. It certainly isn't relevent to me, since apart from not eating meat I tend to show less sympathy for animals in everyday life than most people. I can't stand the activists who think it's ok to terrorize scientists who use animals for research. Research is absolutely the least important form of animal exploitation. I got a myspace bulletin recently from a militant vegan organisation, praising someone who set fire to a vivisectionist's car. I naturally explained to them that this was reprehensible behaviour, and deleted them from my friends list. These people don't understand the theory behind animal rights anymore than that guy who blew up an abortion clinic understood the theory behind "do not kill". That doesn't mean the theory is wrong. As for this medical condition, which I've never heard of, it sounds like some kind of hyper-empathy. I doubt it has anything to do with animals specifically, he might have wept about someone pulling up a flower. I don't see how a cartoon can be responsible for stress and a buzzing noise.

Unfortunately, a lot of people think that to be vegetarian you just have to stop eating meat without changing anything else. A few people have told me that they went vegetarian once and got sick. When I ask them about it it usually turns out they were eating something like the equivalent of one meal a day. It's not the fact that they're vegetarian that's making them unhealthy, it's the fact that they're not eating enough food of any kind. There is an unnecessary correlation between vegetarianism and starving yourself. That doesn't mean you will be unhealthy if you go vegetarian, because being a relatively sensible person you would eat more plant food to make up for the lack of meat.

I'm not sure what your last question means. I don't believe moral claims can "come from" anything but a logical argument and a few basic axioms, and most of the logic behind my claims was popularised by Peter Singer. I first read the argument on the Vegan Outreach website. I didn't believe it just because they said it, I read the argument and realised it was sound. I suppose the reason I accepted it was that I didn't try to make up obscure ethical theories that arbitrarily insert a line between animals and humans. I didn't try to "blame" my sense of right and wrong on my genes or my upbringing, I just accepted that I should consistently try to do the right thing. If doing the right thing is against my nature, then my nature is wrong. To say your morals come from the natural order is ridiculous. Sanitation is unnatural, however it reduces the spread of disease and can only be a morally good thing. If you wear clothes and live in a house (or use a computer to post in forums), you're not being "natural". In fact, given that "natural" generally means the opposite of man made, everything you do is unnatural by definition.
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Posted 07/27/07 - 10:21 AM:
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First of all, there is a difference between the second option and the fourth option. The second is to protest the existance of factory farms, the fourth is to encourage reconfiguration within factory farms. And fact is, I don't see how you've proven that going vegetarian is good or beneficial. It is perfectly natural to eat meat; many animals do so themselves.

The cartoon argument is to show that the unnatural levels of sympathy in our society towards animals is not the result of any gradual enlightenment or ethical advancement, but propaganda that started accidental but I'm sure is now done purposefully. Perhaps you actually feel the way you do about this issue for good reasons (which is why I am debating you), but most people cry about the death of a few whales now because they have been raised to do so. And the theory could very well be wrong if people go around blowing up research buildings. Example: Nowadays we have radical Muslims suicide-bombing Israel because Mohammed said "Go and kill the infedel" even though the Jews cannot be the infedel because Jews and Christians are also "People of the Book". Does this mean that the ideals are wrong? Yes, because the idea does not tell the reader what would be the extreme of it.

And yes, I believe that hyper-empathy is the proper term, thank you.

As for the individual I mentioned who faints often, even when that person consumes a large quantity of plant-life, she'll still faint at events that involve large amounts of stress and focus while everyone else will only be a little sweaty. Whether or not she simply has bad composure, I know not. I'd ask her, but I know not where she at the time being.

What I was in the last paragraph asking you is what causes you to believe that being vegetarian is the best path/diet, apart from the teachings of this Peter Singer?

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Posted 07/29/07 - 05:58 AM:
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My argument that current methods of farming is bad is in my first post. You haven't yet made a single point against that, so I assumed you agree with it. If you don't, you've got one post left to argue against it. I later pointed out that being vegetarian reduces suffering, using supply and demand. The average person obtains meat from factory farms. Therefore if the average person went vegetarian, demand for meat from factory farms would decrease, thus decreasing the number of animals that suffer in factory farms. If being vegetarian is good, it follows that eating meat is bad. You haven't yet disagreed with any of these either.

You claim it would be better if we did other things, like encourage changes in farming methods. I don't necessarily disagree, but I've pointed out that my argument still holds regardless. You also claim that eating meat is natural, but this is a non sequitur, because you haven't yet argued that nature has any bearing on morality. Your cartoon argument is one I've never seen before. It's very interesting and almost plausible, but it would take a lot of evidence to show that cartoons of talking animals being repeatedly killed makes children more sympathetic towards real animals. Even if you're right, it doesn't mean animals don't deserve our sympathy.

Every idea has immoral extremes. The extreme usually contradicts the underlying assumptions of the idea itself. Like you said, blowing up a vivisectionists car (no animal rights activists have blown up a building yet as far as I know) is an immoral extreme of animal rights, and terrorism is often an extreme case of Islam. I agree that Islam is bad, but not simply because some muslims are terrorists. Islam is bad for the same reason that any religion is bad. However there are extreme versions of many obviously good ideas. Sanitation is a good thing, but constantly washing your hands is not. This doesn't make sanitation bad. You said the idea doesn't tell you what the extreme is. That's not entirely true of Islam, and its certainly not true of vegetarianism. I've already pointed out the problem with the extremes of vegetarianism, and Singer points it out in his book. I'd guess that most animal activists point these problems out sometime.

Thanks for explaining your question better, I'll try to answer it again. First of all, I object to the word "best". Vegetarianism isn't the best path or the best diet. The most ethical diet is probably a well planned vegan diet. Vegetarianism is just a lot better than nothing. Second, you make it sound as if I believe what Singer says just because he said it, and if anyone else said it I would ignore them. I have a lot of respect for the man, and I would take his claims more seriously than some philosophers. But this is only because I was impressed by the logic of his arguments (which I read on Vegan Outreach before I ever heard of him) in the first place. These arguments are the reason I think vegetarianism is good. I showed you similar arguments (obviously not as good as the original) in my first post. So the cause of my belief is that I found a sound argument supporting it, before I came to believe it. That's pretty much it. I'm very interested to see if you have any actual objections to my argument.


Edited by Pwrong on 07/29/07 - 06:17 AM
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Posted 08/11/07 - 09:57 PM:
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While I agree that if the majority of people went vegetarian animal suffering would be significantly reduced, I am still trying to show that adjustments in the factory farming industry would be more effective at reducing that suffering, would be more economically friendly, and would allow people to maintain their usual food preferences. In the end, both paths suggested reduce animal suffering, but the one I propose benefits more than just animal.

As for the "natural" argument, you have revealed the major falicy within this debate: On what basis do we decide what is or is not moral? Myself being a religious individual (pantheist actually), I would claim that since nature is of the design of whatever higher entity there is, surely some sort of moral "correctness" exists within nature then. However, I did not have this claim in mind when I was constructing my first post in this debate. My reason for bringing this point up is because of my observation that many supporters of the vegetarian movement happen to be supporters of the green movement (not that I am claiming this of you), and supporters of the green movement often make claims of following the "natural order". Naturally (no pun intended), I thought I'd add a counter argument to such a claim to this debate as a useful tool in case needed.

In terms of the cartoon argument, my point still stands. The evidence is apparent in the hyper-empathy that many common individuals exhibit. What is wrong about this kind of sympathy is while you may have the natural capacity to feel distraught about the abuse a few unheard-of rabbits, most individuals never had this sort of capacity, or inclination even, until they were "programmed" to have it. Therefore, it makes the such sympathy false, and also unnecessary as it has lead to vandalism at the greatest extreme. And while animals deserve a reasonable amount of sympathy, it is our own species that we should worry about the most. At least in my opinion.

When it comes to extremism argument, I actually think we are in agreement here overall. Still, I have seen little in the ways of attempt by vegetarian and animal-rights moderates to quell the extremists. Perhaps you could give me some examples that I (and whoever happens to be reading this post) may view for myself?

Finally, I believe I mislead you on my question. What I was asking is how much of your arguments are your own original, personal opinion. Still, I think you've answered it anyway. As to objections, I don't think we've had to much in the way of disagreement in this debate since the only general place we seem to split off is which is the best way to reduce the suffering caused by factory farming. Overall, this has been quite different from my previous debate with wander. Still, I enjoyed every statement from you and thank you for this intellectual experience, Pwrong.

Edited by Mr.Anonymous on 08/11/07 - 10:01 PM

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Joined: Nov 24, 2006
Location: Perth, Australia
Total Topics: 4
Total Posts: 251
Posted 09/13/07 - 06:57 AM:
quote post
#11
Sorry for the very late reply, here's my final post.

It's a shame that we haven't found much to disagree on, it's made this a quite disappointing debate. You've stated throughout that you believe animals should be treated well, at least to some extent. That's a good thing in itself. However you claim to have a better method of helping animals than mine. You haven't gone into much detail, and I suspect you haven't put any of your ideas into practice. I assume you don't own a factory farm and you don't have any political power, so you can't directly make adjustments to the factory farming industry. Surely then you should use your power as a consumer to make changes. However if you think you can do more good without being vegetarian and you are committed to doing so, then good on you, and good luck.

Your other points are mostly irrelevent. I'm certainly an environmentalist and a member of the green movement, but I don't think the "natural argument" is actually an argument as such. It's more of a slogan used by hippies. You can't say something is wrong just because it is natural or unnatural, that leads to absurd conclusions. You ask where morality comes from, but that's not relevent to my argument. All I assume is that some kind of morality exists, and that it's not completely arbitrary (i.e. it doesn't depend on labels like species). There are certain things that could change the moral status of animals (e.g. souls or a mechanism for plants to feel pain). However we should base our morality on things we know or are reasonably certain of. We can't say something is wrong because we imagine there might be some invisible dude telling us it's wrong. On a side note, pantheists are not religious and they don't believe that morality comes from God. Perhaps you're a panentheist or a pandeist or something?

Your cartoon argument is just an unsupported ad hominem attack. You haven't shown that there's any correlation between watching cartoons and caring about animals, except that they both became common roughly in the same century. We've been anthropomorphising animals in stories and pictures for thousands of years, and people have cared about animals for just as long. Surely the recent increase in the number of vegetarians is more closely related to say, the invention of factory farms? You claim that there are a few people who get unreasonably or unnecessarily upset when they see animals suffer or hear about it. You've exaggerated this substantially (you can't possibly be distraught about "unheard of" rabbits, because they're unheard of), but generally it doesn't surprise me that people can get upset by animal suffering. You've already admitted that you believe we should extend some sympathy to animals, so it's quite reasonable to be upset about someone in extreme pain. It doesn't take much sympathy to see someone suffering and think "this is wrong, I don't want to be a part of this, even if it benefits me in some way".

Now you asked me for an example of vegetarians attempting to quell extremists. I'm not altogether sure why it's our responsibility, unless I was a vegetarian policeman or something. However I already gave an example. I deleted a vegan organisation from my myspace because they were promoting illegal activities. Most of my arguments and ideas are indeed, not original. I wish I had come up with them. If I had, maybe I would be called the most influential philosopher alive, instead of Peter Singer. However that doesn't mean my arguments aren't my own personal opinion.

As for the disagreement, let me make this clear. You say we only disagree on the best way to reduce suffering. This is not at all true. I agree that there are better ways to reduce animal suffering than to go vegetarian. I don't know if you're actually doing anything to reduce suffering, since so far most of your ideas have been hypothetical. My claim is only that being vegetarian is a good thing, not the best thing. So far you've agreed with me, so it seems that I've successfully shown that eating meat (produced as it is today, in our society) is morally wrong.

Thanks for this debate Mr Anonymous, it's been very interesting, even if the outcome was a little disappointing.
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