Oh silly Vrael, you fell for his ploys.

He was intentionally calling me out, but looks like he got you instead. I've already had this pain discussion before. It comes down to the fact you need consciousness to experience pain, and plants aren't conscious-- at least, in my philosophical world framework their consciousness is so low it isn't significantly different than zero. Pain is the experience of a particular sense by a consciousness.

Don't let him fool you. While there are very incredible studies showing the equivalent of a PNS in plants and extracellular communication, don't start thinking that this is anything near human level sophistication. By contrast it's quite primitive.

It's one thing to claim that plants may have a primitive and rudimentary CNS. It's another thing entirely to claim that they experience pain. If you can find me a peer-reviewed paper that concludes plants experience pain, I would give the argument weight. But so far all I see is research that only at best suggests that plants have something that could be like a CNS.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Apr 7 2012, 4:58 am by Sacrieur.

I can't go back to puss and blood filled factory milk after trying organic milk. Totally worth the extra dollar.

Did a fair amount of research and failed to locate New Testament passages pertaining to specifics of animal treatment; any laws that Christians would feign interest in would most likely fall under Kashrut or "kosher" laws, which are roughly a collection of most Old Testament/Torah passages on Animal Treatment and food preparation.


As long as religion has made it's entry (and I do think it's important that we analyse several moral viewpoints if we're going to make real progress) I think Dr. Craig makes some fair points on how Christians have a unique moral obligation towards animals Animal Pain and the Ethical Treatment of Animals in contrast to naturalists

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Apr 7 2012, 6:18 am by jjf28.

Welp, feel like posting again. Don't know why. Here goes.

Vrael:
Wow. It took way too long for it to click in my head that your complaint was an interpretation of my post as "things can't be proven".
I stated what the missing measure for proving something was, and then pointed out that that measure is lacking. This implies that I am talking from a point of view that things can be meaningfully proven - but that in this case, so far as I know, we currently have no good means to.
And the rest of my post was an explanation of why, despite its unproveability, I come to the particular, quite realist conclusion that I do ("eating meat is generally bad"). Ultimately, both of our posts there could have been summarized as "I think/don't think animals' suffering matters; here's some rambling and directionless outpour of words that my brain happens to come up with when thinking about the subject which don't really form arguments of any sort."

That deontology is crazy and everyone should follow consequentialist utilitarianism.
Unless you're talking from a "Humans are designed to eat meat, therefore the expected outcome is superior to not eating meat", in which case that's a nutritional argument, not ethics (the latter being the thread subject, the former not. Not that I get why people have a problem with changing debate subjects when it's directly relevant to concluding the original), in which case I would just like to say that I'm pretty sure we have enough statistical data by now to do better in determining an appropriate diet for a human than following generalized rules on the basis of how intuitively appealing they are.

To Whom it may concern,

Everything dies, and the dead do not last forever. Decomposition is a natural process, and should be thought of as a renewal of life, as it allows for millions of new organisms to thrive. However, the basic idea is that everything that dies is eaten. Not always by people, but always by something else. Asking whether or not it is moral for us to eat meat, simply becomes a comparison with whether it is any less ethical for something else to eat it. Considering the utilitarian ideal of the greatest "happiness" for the greatest number, it would seem more ethical to let the smallest animals eat their fill. (Assuming that eating and happiness are proportional.) However, we must also keep in mind that when we die, such smaller organisms will still be around to decay our own carcass. So in fact, your own death will suffice as food enough for an equally large quantity of bacteria. The net result of eating meat is that you stave off the other animals from eating the meat, but have placed yourself in it's place. It is not taking away from the cycle of death and birth, but simply playing your part as another link in the chain.

IT'S THE CIRCLE OF LIFE
AND IT MOVES US ALL

whatever.

Relevant to the religious issue of eating factory farmed meat:
1 Corinthians 10
So as far as I can see there is nothing wrong with eating any food, regardless of source, unless someone tells you "this is meat from cruelly treated animals", in which case if you think that by eating it you are causing the other person to think less of you as a Christian, then you should not eat it.

All of nature revolves around the strong praying on the weak. Many kill to survive, the only things that don't are the plants that feed off the sun...

It is the height of hubris to think we are above this.

Sure, but you're just dodging the ethical question about whether it's ok to raise animals purely to kill them and eat them, and if it is ethical to raise them in the ways that we do - factory farmed chickens, turkeys and pigs being the worst offenders.

I'll note that no other species has set up such intensive ways to use other species for their own benefit.

An animal in the wild has to fear for predators, has to constantly search for food. For the most part living in terror, or starvation, often both. Their deaths are often slow and painful.

In the factory farms there is no threat of predators, they are constantly fed, and when we kill them - it is done as quickly and painlessly as possible. (Yes, there are dodgy places, but this is the exception not the rule).


So really, I think we are doing them a favour.

... and pray I shall for you that you won't fall prey to someone stronger than you.

... one pair of hands at work does more than a thousand clasped in prayer.

I have so many things I want to comment on, sadly phones suck for typing.

Oh_man, he was poking fun that you said that the strong "pray" on the weak rather than prey.

I mean, coming from a devout atheist it's a tad ironic.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Apr 8 2012, 7:14 pm by TiKels.

Oh.

Suppose these super smart children were more ethical than us. Could they really deem it ethical to kill us inferior humans?

And for the christian thing going on. Why does "thou shall not kill" apply to humans but not animals?

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Apr 10 2012, 7:35 am by MasterJohnny.

Because God said it's okay to kill animals.

That was easy.

When you read it in context it is clear it was meant 'thou shall not kill those of your own tribe'.

The Bible is full of murder, some condoned by God, and even more committed by God. Obviously such a statement is contradictory to all this.

Where in the bible does it say such a general statement like "it's okay to kill animals"?
I know that in Leviticus, it says that we can eat certain animals but others we can't
But it does not say specifically that we can hunt for these animals.
For all I know, god intended us to find these animals dead, and then we eat them.

Quite a few places.


No, that's not the case.

I don't know all the books in which it's referenced off the top of my head, nor am I going to Google it, as this is readily available information you should look up if you're interested in the subject. There are a number of places where God specifically states that men should not kill other men, and other places where he says it's okay to kill animals for food, sacrifice, etc.

There are whole chapters dedicated to the specifics of sacrificing animals. Shall I quote the passages?

There's a difference between murder and justified killing. Yes the Old Testament is full of the latter but never the former. See here for more details.

http://www.cgg.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Library.sr/CT/BQA/k/66/Does-God-Allow-Hunting-Killing-of-Animals.htm