Are we vegetarians hypocrites?

[Nikhar]

Hi,
Firstly, I'd like to state that I'm a vegetarian and proud to be one. I sometimes talk to people about being non-veg (I usually refrain from doing so though since arguments tend to get heated). To which one reply I would invariably get is how on earth is it ok to kill plants and not ok to kill animals for food? One reply that I have read on this forum is that plants do not have feelings. But is that really true? And even if it is, is it justified? Killing someone who doesn't have feelings? Going by that argument, it should be correct to kill people in vegetative state (again a very debatable topic).

So, basically what I'm asking is if you are a vegetarian, how do you counter this question? You might say that you do not preach people about vegetarianism in the first place. But that is not what I mean. You are vegetarian for a reason. You do not wish to kill animals. But how do you feel about killing plants?

In this regard, it would seem that Jains are the only people who are not hypocrites. They don't eat anything that would kill plants (underground growing vegetables).

[kev67]

I think there's more of a problem if you're a vegetarian but not a vegan. Male calves and chicks are the unwanted byproduct of the dairy and egg industry. Chicks are killed by hypoxia, which is the probably the least painful way to go. The calves are no doubt slaughtered humanely, but it causes their mothers distress when they are taken away.

[Nikhar]

@kev
I live in India. I'm sure that cows aren't slaughtered here (not counting some weird cult maybe). Anyways, the milk we drink here comes directly from the farm, we don't drink packaged milk. And I don't eat eggs.
I have also decided that I won't be using leather products anymore.
Anyways, even if I was a vegan my question would still apply. Even vegans eat plants.

P.S.:- I love cows.. I think they are awesome. The affecftion cows have for their calves is something I have always found to be very heartwarming. :)

[YesNo]

Based on what I have heard from dairy farmers, cows seem to understand what is going on when the truck to take them away pulls up and one of them is led to it. It means that cow is being sent away permanently. Perhaps they even know it will be slaughtered. The mooing sound of the other cows seem to be a sort of goodbye. At least that is what I heard one dairy farmer tell me.

I think plants are sentient as well. Even the apple that the tree seems to want us to eat so that the seeds are dispersed may not be the way the microbial life in that apple wants to be treated. It may want to continue being an apple.

I don't think vegetarians are hypocrites. Being compassionate, however, should be for its own sake, not to try to make the world morally better. One isn't going to eliminate suffering by being a vegetarian. I don't think it is even good to have as a goal the complete elimination of suffering.

[Emil Miller]

One reply that I have read on this forum is that plants do not have feelings. But is that really true?

Plants are said not have a central nervous system and, if this is so, are most likely to be non-sentient.


Based on what I have heard from dairy farmers, cows seem to understand what is going on when the truck to take them away pulls up and one of them is led to it. It means that cow is being sent away permanently. Perhaps they even know it will be slaughtered. The mooing sound of the other cows seem to be a sort of goodbye. At least that is what I heard one dairy farmer tell me.

I don't know about cows mooing goodbye but it is certainly true that they sense that they are going to be slaughtered. I've witnessed this myself.

[Scheherazade]

Hi,
Firstly, I'd like to state that I'm a vegetarian and proud to be one. Can you explain why you are proud?

I am not a vegetarian but would never consider myself "proud" to be a "carnivore".

[Madhuri]

@kev
I live in India. I'm sure that cows aren't slaughtered here (not counting some weird cult maybe). Anyways, the milk we drink here comes directly from the farm, we don't drink packaged milk. And I don't eat eggs.
I have also decided that I won't be using leather products anymore.
Anyways, even if I was a vegan my question would still apply. Even vegans eat plants.

P.S.:- I love cows.. I think they are awesome. The affecftion cows have for their calves is something I have always found to be very heartwarming. :)

Cow slaughter is illegal depending on the state (some are lenient and some are very strict like Gujarat) that you live in. It happens legally too (nothing to do with any cult), especially where the non-veg eating population is more, eg. Kerala (they really eat anything and everything) and some other southern states.

I have often come across the same question as you, and I really don't know what to say as a counter argument. Maybe because plants can't move and don't posses other senses it seems ok and animals can feel and humans can witness their pain, that it makes it difficult for vegetarians to eat animals.

However, in India, in general , being a vegetarian starts because of the religion and it is practiced so much so that it becomes a way of life and eventually a choice.

[Emil Miller]

I am not vegetarian and, although I do eat pâté and fish, I don't eat meat and will only eat duck as poultry and then only in restaurants. I don't make a fetish of food and look upon cooking and eating as an intrusion on my time. Apart from grilled fish twice a week for breakfast, I'm content to butter a piece of toast and my evening meal usually consists of a plate of noodles or beans on toast. I also eat salad twice weekly and although I don't care for fruit, I eat a small amount each week. Generally I find the whole cooking/eating thing a bore and food a necessity rather than a pleasure. I seldom feel hungry and, although it's only a personal perception, I'm sure that it's possible for people to do away with meat completely. I don't like the fact that animals are killed for their flesh ( it smacks of canabalism) but on the other other hand, if dairy cows are left out of the equation, those cattle that are bred for their meat would not exist at all if everyone were vegetarian.

[Nikhar]

Based on what I have heard from dairy farmers, cows seem to understand what is going on when the truck to take them away pulls up and one of them is led to it. It means that cow is being sent away permanently. Perhaps they even know it will be slaughtered. The mooing sound of the other cows seem to be a sort of goodbye. At least that is what I heard one dairy farmer tell me.

Oh yes, I'm sure they understand it. I mean, I don't know why some people consider them so dumb. I have seen how they get restless if someone takes their child or even comes near them sometimes.



Can you explain why you are proud?

I guess that would be because I am a very strict vegetarian. Sometimes I feel that I border onto insanity in this regard. I do not give into temptations.


Cow slaughter is illegal depending on the state (some are lenient and some are very strict like Gujarat) that you live in. It happens legally too (nothing to do with any cult), especially where the non-veg eating population is more, eg. Kerala (they really eat anything and everything) and some other southern states.

I have often come across the same question as you, and I really don't know what to say as a counter argument. Maybe because plants can't move and don't posses other senses it seems ok and animals can feel and humans can witness their pain, that it makes it difficult for vegetarians to eat animals.

However, in India, in general , being a vegetarian starts because of the religion and it is practiced so much so that it becomes a way of life and eventually a choice.

Oh yeah... had heard about Kerala. And true about vegetarian beginnig because of religion. I was brought up as a vegetarian and now I'm vegetarian by choice. Maybe thats why I am proud.


I don't like the fact that animals are killed for their flesh ( it smacks of canabalism) .

I often ask my non vegetarian friends how non-vegetarianism is unlike cannibalism. To which they'd laugh and say that they wouldn't mind eating humans either. I guess they say that 'cause they don't have an answer and they laugh it off.

Regarding the food thing, I love food. :P

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

How is it not unlike cannibalism? Do you guys know how to use a dictionary?

[YesNo]

Oh yes, I'm sure they understand it. I mean, I don't know why some people consider them so dumb. I have seen how they get restless if someone takes their child or even comes near them sometimes.

That is true of the swans the town home association brings in to the artificial pond to keep the geese away. When they have their chicks, I usually detour my walk around them. There is no point in tempting their defensiveness.

If "sentient" means having a central nervous system, as Emil Miller suggests, then plants aren't sentient, but who knows? Vines seem to "know" where there is something to wrap themselves around so they seem to have some sort of brainless brain. Looking at the dozen or so plants in the room I am in now, they don't look all that smart. No doubt their opinion of me isn't any better.

I was surprised to hear that Kerala in southern India had a population that wasn't strictly vegetarian. On a business trip I went to a restaurant which featured the food of southern India. It was all vegetarian (so the menu said) and tasted great. Unfortunately, such restaurants aren't common where I live. Although I'm not a vegetarian, since I eat whatever is served, generally I don't eat meat if I have a choice in the matter and I could probably live quite happily eating just that southern Indian food.

[OrphanPip]

If "sentient" means having a central nervous system, as Emil Miller suggests, then plants aren't sentient, but who knows? Vines seem to "know" where there is something to wrap themselves around so they seem to have some sort of brainless brain. Looking at the dozen or so plants in the room I am in now, they don't look all that smart. No doubt their opinion of me isn't any better.


You don't need a nervous system to direct movement, bacteria can find food in fluids just by a rough taxis system that makes them tumble/swim more often when a certain chemical is more/less concentrated. They are only capable of two kinds of movement, but because of the way it works they can tend towards things that are good for them and away from toxins. And it's entirely mechanical.

Anyway, we know animals suffer, we are reasonably sure plants don't suffer (in terms of pain), so there's no reason to think they are equivalent. Also, basic chemistry and biology will tell you that more plants have to die to get the same amount of energy out of a cow than to get the energy out of the plants. This is because the cow uses the energy from their food for living and not simply adding edible bits to itself, so energy is ultimately loss from the food chain in the form of heat. So, it is technically impossible to kill less plants by eating meat, even if plants feel pain you kill less of them (in terms of mass) by being a vegetarian.

[YesNo]

Good point about plants, OrphanPip. If they suffer, you make more of them suffer by eating meat than by eating the plants directly. Personally, I think they also taste better as plants than as meat. In spite of all that, I still eat meat when it is served.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I've never found vegetarians to be huge hypocrites. I mean. I'd call one that if I saw them wearing leather or something. Some of them can be obnoxious, though, getting all high and mighty and looking down on people who eat meat.

[Delta40]

Well vegetarians all have something in common with Hitler...

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Ohhhhhh, snap! No you di'int!

[cacian]

Well vegetarians all have something in common with Hitler...

one very good reason not to be vegetarian then yuk!!

[Alexander III]

Well vegetarians all have something in common with Hitler...

Every time someone doesn't smoke a cigarette, they say yes to Hitler. I have said no to Hitler 20 times today, how about you? Lucky Strike, because if you are not smoking our cigarettes every day, you're a Nazi. And no one likes Nazis.

[Helga]

Well vegetarians all have something in common with Hitler...

Hitler had a dog too, I guess I'm in double trouble

[Scheherazade]

Well, Hitler was a man.

*says no more*

[Nikhar]

@Mutatis
cannibals - humans who eat human flesh
non vegetarians - humans who eat animal flesh
humans - feel pain, show love and other emotions
animals - feel pain, show love and a lot of other emotions
and also humans are mammals, a subdivision in classification of animals

@YesNo
Were you under the impression that states in India were strictly vegetarian? :O

@OrphanPip
Wow, an awesome point that you made there. Now at least I have an answer to those arguments. Thanks. :)

P.S. - typing on a cell is a real pain.

[Scheherazade]

I think a more accurate definition of 'cannibal' is 'the one who eats its own kind'.

Eating animals does not make humans ''cannibals' but 'carnivores', which I am neither proud nor ashamed to be.

[cacian]

Every time someone doesn't smoke a cigarette, they say yes to Hitler. I have said no to Hitler 20 times today, how about you? Lucky Strike, because if you are not smoking our cigarettes every day, you're a Nazi. And no one likes Nazis.

what about lighting a match does that count too?

[Emil Miller]

Well vegetarians all have something in common with Hitler...

So do non-smokers and teetotalers.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I think a more accurate definition of 'cannibal' is 'the one who eats its own kind'.

Eating animals does not make humans ''cannibals' but 'carnivores', which I am neither proud nor ashamed to be.

Exactly. That's a big part of the definition, eating one's own kind. At least to me. I don't get how eating cow or pig or chicken in any way comes close to cannabilism, because it just doesn't. That's why we have the word "cannibal" and the word "carnivore," each of which has different meanings.. Still, I consider myself an omnivore; I still eat plenty of non-meat things.

[The Comedian]

How would I counter the argument that vegetarians are hypocrites?

I'd say this "no more than you or anyone else. We're all hypocrites -- you, me, that guy over there buying shoes, the kid on the play ground. . . all of us. So cheers to the brotherhood of hypocrisy! Now get the hell outa here!" ;)

[YesNo]

@YesNo
Were you under the impression that states in India were strictly vegetarian?

Actually, I'm pretty ignorant about India. I did have that impression.

The only people from India that I can recall reading were Eknath Easwaran (who made a translation of the Bhagavad Gita that one can usually find in bookstores here) and Deepak Chopra who is also popular here. I didn't even know where Kerala was until I heard that Easwaran was from there and looked it up on a map. Indian food is excellent. At least, what I have had in the US.

[Dodo25]

I don't think vegetarians are necessarily hypocrites, but it is the case that all the good arguments for not eating meat also apply to other animal products. So self-righteous vegetarians do seem hypocritical to me. Not because of the plants they eat, but because they fund a system that systematically exploits and causes pain to sentient beings.

Dairy cows are impregnated each year, so that they give a large amount of milk. They don't just give the milk anyway, even if you feed them hormones, they need to be impregnated every year or year and a half. Many people aren't even aware of that, I was quite surprised when I found this out myself. And when the cows give birth, the calves are usually taken away, put in confinement (where they develop behavioral problems due to lack of space and social environment), and eventually they end up slaughtered for veal. The industries are interconnected, dairy supports veal, and vice-versa.
The milk cows are overbred, they give absurd amounts of milk. Even on the nice organic farms, 30% of the milk cows suffer from mastitis sometime in their life (chronic udder inflammation from all the milking). A dairy cow's natural life expectancy is 20 years, however, in milk production they end up exhausted after 4-5 years already. And then they're slaughtered like normal meat cows. They're transported in trucks, not a pleasant experience for the already exhausted cows. Sometimes these transports are half a dozen hours or longer. And then comes the slaughterhouse. As with meat cows, if even 1% of the killing bolt shots go wrong (some figures suggest it's much higher than that), a significant number of cows have their throats slit while conscious. Why risk it that this happens if there is a tasty, healthy alternative?

As for eggs: An "ancient" chicken produced 5-10 eggs before chickens had been bred towards maximum efficiency. Today's breeds lay up to 300 or more eggs. If it didn't hurt the animals, I wouldn't see anything wrong with it just because it's "unnatural", but the problem is that it does hurt the animals. They need a large amount of calcium for egg shells, and even though they get supplements, they can't get enough for their bones. This leads to chronic pains, deformed bones and fractures. Of course this is worst in factory farm conditions where it becomes horrible beyond imagining, but also on "nice" farms, the amount of eggs laid are not good for animal well-being.
Virtually each egg laying hen has, on average (since half the chicks are male), a male brother that was ground up or gassed right after hatching. Because male chicks are of no use in the egg industry, and they're not of the meat breed so they'd gain weight too slowly for industry standards. Hundreds of millions of male chicks are killed after hatching because they are of no use to us. Buying eggs supports this insanity.

(I hate when this subject comes up, but since it might come up anyway, some words about honey: Most vegans don't eat honey, and "officially", honey is considered "not vegan". But there's no vegan Bible for vegans to follow. Some vegans do eat honey. It depends on the exact reasons for veganism. If you think it likely enough that bees aren't sentient, then eating honey would be unproblematic, like eating oysters. Or if you think they aren't harmed the way honey is produced, then that might be okay too. Not all vegans consider it wrong to "steal" animal products. That seems like an irrational position to me, if a chicken doesn't miss her eggs when I take them away, I wouldn't have a problem with "stealing" them. Having said that, from the limited amount of things I've read about honey production, it does seem that bees are "hurt" (I put this in quotation marks because bees might not be sentient, and if they aren't, I'd argue that they can't be "hurt" in the same way a sentient being can be hurt) by it, and even though I highly doubt they're sentient, I couldn't assign a lower than 1% probability to this. So personally I give bees the benefit of the doubt, also because I really don't miss anything by not eating honey, but I think it's ridiculous how much attention and ridicule the issue brings for veganism and I'm happy if people stop eating other animal products without bothering about stuff like honey. This is really a side-issue.)

From an anti-speciesist perspective, I'd argue that non vegan practices are not ethically defensible (with the exception of important medical testing and research, where much more suffering is prevented than generated). That's why I do think that overly self-righteous vegetarians are a bit hypocritical. [For an explanation and arguments against speciesism, see this essay by Peter Singer: http://www.animal-rights-library.com/texts-m/singer02.htm
Basically, speciesism is giving a being less ethical consideration solely because it belongs to the "wrong" species.]

But for some veganism may seem like too big of a step (even though it really is easier than one might think), and then it's not the end of the world to e.g. eat animal products on the weekends, being a part-time vegan. Vegetarianism can also be a valuable step into the right direction, even though I'm a bit concerned about it creating an image of "dairy and eggs being a different matter", which they really aren't. Giving up eggs, chicken and farmed fish might actually prevent much more animal suffering than going ovo-lacto vegetarian, see: http://www.utilitarian-essays.com/suffering-per-kg.html
and
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2011/08/11/want-to-kill-fewer-animals-give-up-eggs-not-meat/

To stop harming animals through the things one buys is one way help make the world a better place, but imo it's not the most important aspect. In that, my opinion differs from the opinion of a lot of vegans who consider veganism the "moral baseline". I think that's nonsense. I don't care about personal purity, instead I care about efficiency, about the consequences of actions. Donating to efficient animal charities like Vegan Outreach or The Humane Leagure can prevent several years of factory farm suffering per dollar donated. A non vegan who donates regularly probably does more good for animals than a vegan who doesn't. Even though doing both would be even better, of course.

And finally, regarding plants: First of all, I find it irritating how lots of people suddenly think they're experts on biology and philosophy of mind when it comes to plants. I keep hearing people say that they know plants are sentient, and when I ask them about philosophy of mind or simple stuff about evolution and biology, they have no clue. Why can't they just leave it to the actual experts instead of making absurd claims with a conviction that resembles religious faith? [/rant]
I've spent a lot of time researching philosophy of mind and animal nociception responses because I was curious whether fish, shrimps or insects can suffer (yes; likely yes; probably no but maybe). Plants are very, very, very unlikely to be sentient. Yes, I know they can "communicate" with each other, and I know they can show some interesting responses to chemicals, but seriously, it needs more than that for consciousness.
I think a lot of people worrying about plants don't even bother whether plants are sentient, they seem to think that killing is killing, whether it's killing sentient life or just vegetable-life. My ethical view is so much centered on avoiding suffering that I have a hard time even imagining that point of view. It irritates me that someone can seriously think putting animal suffering and killing (which can and should be viewed by everyone online in videos like "Earthlings") on the same level with destroying plants. Meat eaters like to joke "do you hear the carrots screaming", but would they say that while watching a documentary on factory farms? I'd bet that this would be too macabre even for those types of meat eaters who make jokes about vegetarians all the time.
Actually, I personally don't even mind killing animals if it were done painlessly. It's really the suffering I find wrong.

But enough of that, let's suppose for the sake of the argument that plants are in fact conscious. What would that mean? As OrphanPip already pointed out, it wouldn't make vegetarians or vegans hypocrites. Since an animal eats a lot of plants in its life and since the process is rather inefficient, a vegan "kills" much less plants than a meat eater. It takes 7-16 pounds of soy or crops to get one pound of beef, for instance!

Since this post is already way too long, one more thing to add: Some might say vegans are hypocrites because animal farming kills rodents and other small animals, and that these small creatures suffer from it. Well yeah, this does happen for sure. But since veganism is a more efficient way of food production, this tends to happen less than it happens for other diets. (There are some exceptions here but they're rare enough to be worth ignoring.) Besides, perfection is unattainable, it makes most sense to avoid what's practically avoidable and spend the rest of one's efforts on activism, instead of going into the woods alone living as a Jain. Some parts of my laptop were probably produced by child labor, and since humans are animals too, that definitely wouldn't be vegan. But sometimes I do stuff with my laptop that helps animals (including human animals) and I couldn't do that if I lived like an eremite without technology. My mantra, as a vegan, is that I prefer pragmatism to personal purity.

[OrphanPip]

I had an entomology prof. once who, despite being an expert on biological pesticides, was fairly indignant about the fact that no ethical advisory board oversaw experiments on insects. He thought it was wrong that bugs were treated differently than mice.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Are insects sentient?

[YesNo]

When I sprayed ant killer on some ants in the house they did seem to writhe as if they were in pain. I now set out these ant traps which allow them to take the poison back to their nests so they can die out of sight out of mind.

If it makes one feel better, aka suffer less, one can always pretend that their dying was a simple mechanical motion of an insentient object.

All of that makes me think that the suffering some vegetarians or vegans are trying to eliminate is their own. However, I don't want that comment to belittle the honest compassion that many vegetarians feel and that motivates their choices.

[Dodo25]

All of that makes me think that the suffering some vegetarians or vegans are trying to eliminate is their own. However, I don't want that comment to belittle the honest compassion that many vegetarians feel and that motivates their choices.

Have you watched some factory farm documentaries?

It may be true that for a lot of people, being veg*an is more about how they themselves feel. Just like donating to charities can be that. But animal suffering does happen on a massive scale, and single people can and do make a difference.

Regarding insects:
They're a pretty diverse bunch, some almost certainly aren't sentient as I see it, for instance, totally rigid behavior like that: http://www.personalityresearch.org/evolutionary/sphexishness.html
Leaves no room for consciousness as an adaptive (or by-product) feature.

As for cockroaches or bees, I wouldn't completely rule out that they're sentient, but I still consider it unlikely. I usually just kill insects or spiders quickly when they're inside, I try not to kill them in ways that could be painful. I've made a bad experience trying to kill a cockroach in Egypt that way, these things are indestructible, so from now on when I see a monster like that, I just try to put it outside. Even though it will likely die a painful death eventually anyway.

[YesNo]

As for cockroaches or bees, I wouldn't completely rule out that they're sentient, but I still consider it unlikely. I usually just kill insects or spiders quickly when they're inside, I try not to kill them in ways that could be painful. I've made a bad experience trying to kill a cockroach in Egypt that way, these things are indestructible, so from now on when I see a monster like that, I just try to put it outside. Even though it will likely die a painful death eventually anyway.
If it will likely die a "painful death", doesn't that sort of make the cockroach "sentient"?

I recently finished reading Sam Harris' essay, "Free Will". He argues that we don't have any. It is all an illusion. It puzzles me how someone can argue that we don't have free will and then propose that we treat criminals differently than we do. I mean, didn't he just say we have no free will?

Anyway, I know you have a different worldview than others who are vegetarians. Many of these people I assume have a religious background and vegetarianism is part of a broader ethical or spiritual practice.

In your case, I see vegetarianism as a way to make a blind, random, godless world good by reducing suffering. I admire this. Don't get me wrong. However, I wonder to what extent you agree with Harris about free will. Are humans free enough in your worldview to even choose to become vegetarians?

[Dodo25]

If it will likely die a "painful death", doesn't that sort of make the cockroach "sentient"?

Yeah, what I meant was that cockroaches die in ways that would be painful if they are sentient.



However, I wonder to what extent you agree with Harris about free will. Are humans free enough in your worldview to even choose to become vegetarians?

I haven't read Harris' essay, but I probably agree with most of it.
I don't think free will in the traditional sense exist. The concept doesn't even make sense to me, if decisions aren't determined (by things like "reasons"), then what we do would be random, and that wouldn't be "will" anymore. I don't think the traditional concept of free will is even worth wanting. I like the compatibilist view Dennett presents in this paper: http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/papers/freewillforbaerfinal.pdf

He redefines free will to something he thinks people care about but fail to articulate properly. "Free will, if we have it, is whatever gives us moral responsibility". This means that, if treating people as if they are in fact responsible for their actions will lead to them behaving better, then that's what we should do, and "free will" would then be the extent to which people can plan for long-term goals. Long-term goals are the things you want to do "for your own reasons". In that sense, I think yes, people can choose to be vegetarians and they can follow through with it. (Maybe some people don't have the impulse control for it, but even they can reduce the amount of animal products they eat. I have terrible impulse control, but since I do ethics practically for a living, I have enough to motivate myself for things.)

But as I said, that's a completely different definition and I don't believe in free will in the usual sense. I don't think the notion of "deserving something" makes sense. I'd be in favor of sending even the worst criminals to happy island if there was a way of doing so without the rest of society noticing it. If we send all criminals to happy island then everyone would become a criminal, so that doesn't work. I'm in favor of punishment to the extent it acts as a deterrent, but other than that, I don't think it makes any sense to punish people for their past experiences and the way their brain is wired. It's those things that determine our actions after all.



Anyway, I know you have a different worldview than others who are vegetarians. Many of these people I assume have a religious background and vegetarianism is part of a broader ethical or spiritual practice.

Even though the Christian paradise was vegan, I don't know many religious vegans. Out of the maybe fifty vegans I've met, only a small minority is religious. Maybe 10-20%. A lot of vegans (but not the majority, fortunately) have some esoteric views, they're often into alternative medicine and similar stuff, which is unfortunate because people might then be tempted to think that veganism is similar to that.

[YesNo]

Yeah, what I meant was that cockroaches die in ways that would be painful if they are sentient.

I assume that cockroaches as well as all the insect pests that we try to prevent from getting into our homes are sentient. They certainly act sentient when we try to step on them. Because of that I see no reason to deny they are sentient.

Perhaps, considering insects rather than plants is where a non-vegetarian could claim that vegetarians are "hypocrites". The vegetarian wants to avoid causing suffering to those cute animal species, like cows, pigs and chickens, that carnivores love to eat, but has no problem causing suffering to bugs like ants, cockroaches, mosquitoes and flies.



I haven't read Harris' essay, but I probably agree with most of it.
I don't think free will in the traditional sense exist. ... I like the compatibilist view Dennett presents in this paper: http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/papers/freewillforbaerfinal.pdf

Harris claims that Dennett does not agree with him, but Dennett's position seems trivial to me. As you mention, he claims the following is true:


If we ever have it, free will is whatever it is that gives us moral responsibility.

I think most people would agree with that statement. What people want to know is whether he believes the "If we ever have it" part is true or not. Harris is courageous enough to say that we don't have it.

Given Harris' worldview, I think he comes to a correct conclusion. However, that does not mean that we are not free, but that there is something wrong with the worldview from which he is starting.

[Dodo25]

Perhaps, considering insects rather than plants is where a non-vegetarian could claim that vegetarians are "hypocrites". The vegetarian wants to avoid causing suffering to those cute animal species, like cows, pigs and chickens, that carnivores love to eat, but has no problem causing suffering to bugs like ants, cockroaches, mosquitoes and flies.

Yes, I think that can be a valid criticism for some veg*ans. But if the reason for not caring about insects is that people think they're not sentient, then that's not hypocricy. Instead, it would be a disagreement on a difficult empirical issue.

And most veg*ans do care about insect suffering if they think insects to be sentient, even though their real-life actions would then certainly lead to a lot of insect suffering (all the insects killed in agriculture, or when you drive a car, or when you let hot lights burn at night that attract stupid insects so they get grilled). Is that hypocricy? I don't think so, for reasons well explained in this short video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4O46T7GyE4Y



Harris claims that Dennett does not agree with him, but Dennett's position seems trivial to me.

I think Harris and Dennett differ on their definitions for free will and much less on the actual content of the discussion. I'm pretty sure that Dennett doesn't think people have the kind of free will Harris is talking about.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Sentient or not, I usually feel bad when I squash an ant or swat a fly.

[Nikhar]

humans - feel pain, show love and other emotions
animals - feel pain, show love and a lot of other emotions
and also humans are mammals, a subdivision in classification of animals



Exactly. That's a big part of the definition, eating one's own kind. At least to me. I don't get how eating cow or pig or chicken in any way comes close to cannabilism, because it just doesn't. That's why we have the word "cannibal" and the word "carnivore," each of which has different meanings.. Still, I consider myself an omnivore; I still eat plenty of non-meat things.

Only if the world lived on what dictionary meanings had to say. And how do you define 'one's own kind' anyways. Why don't you extend the definition to all mammals or contract it to say, men and women? Why does one kind have to mean humans? Because it's convenient?
Also, I guess you missed the analogy that I provided.


humans - feel pain, show love and other emotions
animals - feel pain, show love and a lot of other emotions
and also humans are mammals, a subdivision in classification of animals


What I am asking is if animals and humans both feel pain and are capable of showing all those emotions, how do you justify eating one of them and not others? Do you not eat them because you can? Because they're weak and helpless and probably because animals don't have laws forbidding you from eating them.

If your response is anything like, 'coz we are the dominant species and we can do what we like and other species are not as useful or important as we are' (an argument I have heard so many times), would you mind eating people who are permanently in vegetative state or who are in mental asylums without a hope of recovering? And anyways, if a person wouldn't mind eating humans as well along with other animals, I could understand it.


Don't get me wrong... I do not intend to question your eating habits. This is one question that I usually ask of non-vegetarians. Maybe there's a valid line of thinking that I am missing. It's a genuine query that I have. Once I get an answer that satisfies me, I'll stop asking the question.


How would I counter the argument that vegetarians are hypocrites?

I'd say this "no more than you or anyone else. We're all hypocrites -- you, me, that guy over there buying shoes, the kid on the play ground. . . all of us. So cheers to the brotherhood of hypocrisy! Now get the hell outa here!" ;)

Haha.. :D But if we are hypocrites, why would we admit to being one? :P


Actually, I'm pretty ignorant about India. I did have that impression.

The only people from India that I can recall reading were Eknath Easwaran (who made a translation of the Bhagavad Gita that one can usually find in bookstores here) and Deepak Chopra who is also popular here. I didn't even know where Kerala was until I heard that Easwaran was from there and looked it up on a map. Indian food is excellent. At least, what I have had in the US.

It is excellent here in India too. :D Didn't you find it too spicy? :P



Dairy cows are impregnated each year, so that they give a large amount of milk. They don't just give the milk anyway, even if you feed them hormones, they need to be impregnated every year or year and a half. Many people aren't even aware of that, I was quite surprised when I found this out myself. And when the cows give birth, the calves are usually taken away, put in confinement (where they develop behavioral problems due to lack of space and social environment), and eventually they end up slaughtered for veal. The industries are interconnected, dairy supports veal, and vice-versa.
The milk cows are overbred, they give absurd amounts of milk. Even on the nice organic farms, 30% of the milk cows suffer from mastitis sometime in their life (chronic udder inflammation from all the milking). A dairy cow's natural life expectancy is 20 years, however, in milk production they end up exhausted after 4-5 years already. And then they're slaughtered like normal meat cows. They're transported in trucks, not a pleasant experience for the already exhausted cows. Sometimes these transports are half a dozen hours or longer. And then comes the slaughterhouse. As with meat cows, if even 1% of the killing bolt shots go wrong (some figures suggest it's much higher than that), a significant number of cows have their throats slit while conscious. Why risk it that this happens if there is a tasty, healthy alternative?

As I said, fortunately I come from place where the major population is Hindu and cows are treated with a lot of care and it's a big crime (a verrryyyyyy big one) to kill them. So, as long as I live here, I guess I don't have to worry about giving up dairy products (sine we don't use packaged dairy product anyways that we might have to worry about industrial misuse of animals).



And finally, regarding plants: First of all, I find it irritating how lots of people suddenly think they're experts on biology and philosophy of mind when it comes to plants. I keep hearing people say that they know plants are sentient, and when I ask them about philosophy of mind or simple stuff about evolution and biology, they have no clue. Why can't they just leave it to the actual experts instead of making absurd claims with a conviction that resembles religious faith? [/rant]
I've spent a lot of time researching philosophy of mind and animal nociception responses because I was curious whether fish, shrimps or insects can suffer (yes; likely yes; probably no but maybe). Plants are very, very, very unlikely to be sentient. Yes, I know they can "communicate" with each other, and I know they can show some interesting responses to chemicals, but seriously, it needs more than that for consciousness.
I think a lot of people worrying about plants don't even bother whether plants are sentient, they seem to think that killing is killing, whether it's killing sentient life or just vegetable-life. My ethical view is so much centered on avoiding suffering that I have a hard time even imagining that point of view. It irritates me that someone can seriously think putting animal suffering and killing (which can and should be viewed by everyone online in videos like "Earthlings") on the same level with destroying plants. Meat eaters like to joke "do you hear the carrots screaming", but would they say that while watching a documentary on factory farms? I'd bet that this would be too macabre even for those types of meat eaters who make jokes about vegetarians all the time.
Actually, I personally don't even mind killing animals if it were done painlessly. It's really the suffering I find wrong.

But enough of that, let's suppose for the sake of the argument that plants are in fact conscious. What would that mean? As OrphanPip already pointed out, it wouldn't make vegetarians or vegans hypocrites. Since an animal eats a lot of plants in its life and since the process is rather inefficient, a vegan "kills" much less plants than a meat eater. It takes 7-16 pounds of soy or crops to get one pound of beef, for instance!

This is what one of the people on my college mailing lists had to say in this regard. Since, I have no clue about the biology of plants, I did not have an asnwer.


As for your point of plants not feeling any pain because of the absence of an elaborate nervous system, I would like to ask you if you would consider it okay to kill a lobotomised animal for food because it can feel no pain ? I would like to present the following facts about plants:
3.1 When one tree is attacked by pests, it emits chemical signals to nieghbouring trees, encouraging them to produce chemical deterrents to that pest, ensuring their own safety.
3.2 the level of sophistication in this process is made all the more remarkable by the fact that the these ‘signals’ encourage production of substances tailored to specific pests!
3.3 An example of this would be the lima bean. When attacked by spider mites, the plant releases a chemical attractant for other types of mite, which prey on the attackers. Some plants help others, as in the case of cabbages, which release foul smelling isothiocyanates, discouraging aphids from attacking neighbouring plants like broad beans.
3.4 Research has also shown that plants actually ‘time’ the release of defensive chemicals, to correspond with the hours of the day when predators are most active
3.5 Sensitive to "touch" - Research has shown that in 17 different families of plant, over 1,000 varieties are very sensitive to touch – possibly an ancient inheritance from bacteria, which are known to be the ancestors of all plant life, responding to stimuli with minute electrical impulses.
3.6 The most amazing thing about plants is their ability to ‘see’. So sensitive to light are they that even the colour of their surroundings can affect their growth and taste!
The bottom-line is, plants are not as "without-feelings" as many of us believe. They are far more alive and so "see", "feel", "taste" things in their own way. In that case, cutting off fruits or taking out the whole plant does constitute an act of violence in my opinion and is morally as unacceptable to me as killing an animal.




Since this post is already way too long, one more thing to add: Some might say vegans are hypocrites because animal farming kills rodents and other small animals, and that these small creatures suffer from it. Well yeah, this does happen for sure. But since veganism is a more efficient way of food production, this tends to happen less than it happens for other diets. (There are some exceptions here but they're rare enough to be worth ignoring.) Besides, perfection is unattainable, it makes most sense to avoid what's practically avoidable and spend the rest of one's efforts on activism, instead of going into the woods alone living as a Jain. Some parts of my laptop were probably produced by child labor, and since humans are animals too, that definitely wouldn't be vegan. But sometimes I do stuff with my laptop that helps animals (including human animals) and I couldn't do that if I lived like an eremite without technology. My mantra, as a vegan, is that I prefer pragmatism to personal purity.

Yes, I guess thats the whole point aboit being a vegetarian by choice. It is that we wish to minimize suffering as much as we can. A lot of people here are vegetarian earlier on in their lives because it is forced upon them and they give it up as soon as they taste freedom.

Btw, Jains (not a majority of them anyways) don't live in the woods. They live in perfect houses and have excellent social lives.


I assume that cockroaches as well as all the insect pests that we try to prevent from getting into our homes are sentient. They certainly act sentient when we try to step on them. Because of that I see no reason to deny they are sentient.

Perhaps, considering insects rather than plants is where a non-vegetarian could claim that vegetarians are "hypocrites". The vegetarian wants to avoid causing suffering to those cute animal species, like cows, pigs and chickens, that carnivores love to eat, but has no problem causing suffering to bugs like ants, cockroaches, mosquitoes and flies.


But that would not be true for all vegetarians and vegans. I, for example, take extreme precaution wherever possible to not step on them and whenever I see a cockroach or some other insect writhing on its back, I make sure that I get them up on their legs again. I don't even kill mosquitoes. Though I remember this one time, it was my first night at hostel. I had let the windows open at night. It became impossible to sleep. Unfortunately I had to kill a few of them. I still regret it to the day. And it makes me wonder if I would not kill other animals if led to desperation. I wish to god that's not the case.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Only if the world lived on what dictionary meanings had to say. And how do you define 'one's own kind' anyways. Why don't you extend the definition to all mammals or contract it to say, men and women? Why does one kind have to mean humans? Because it's convenient?
Also, I guess you missed the analogy that I provided.

No, I saw it. I get what you're trying to say, but it doesn't work, because cannabilism is quite clearly defined. It's not really a word with an arguable definition. Cannabilism means eating one of one's own species, not one of "its own kind." Cow, bird, pig, and fish are not the same species. Actually, the first definition that comes up when one looks up cannibalism goes along the lines of "a human that eats the flesh of another human." Suggesting eating an animal in any way equals, or resembles, cannibalism is just a weak attempt at a sensationalist argument. One can easily argue that eating meat is immoral, inhumane, even barbaric. But cannibalistic? No.

I eat meat because it tastes really good.

[OrphanPip]

Those points about plants are silly though, reacting to external stimuli is not evidence of sentience. No one would dispute that plants are highly evolved and complex organisms, they've been evolving for just as long as any other living things. That doesn't mean they feel, in the sense of pain/desire, or that they think. Such an extraordinary claim would require extraordinary evidence to support it. As is all those examples are easily explainable as mechanistic traits that were propagated through natural selection.

Also, one should clarify what ethical argument one is actually trying to use. If it is wrong to kill an already lobotomized animal, then it must be because there is something intrinsically valuable in the animal's life. In which case, it would be irrelevant to argue that the plants feel, because one is already assuming life has intrinsic value.

I don't see why it would be wrong to put down an animal that has no brain function (they couldn't live at that point anyway). The question of whether it is right or wrong to give the animal a lobotomy in the first place is a completely different ethical question. Yet, something which does not feel, and is not aware of its surroundings, is not really harmed unless you think the mechanistic continuation of life has intrinsic good.

[Pierre Menard]

What I am asking is if animals and humans both feel pain and are capable of showing all those emotions, how do you justify eating one of them and not others? Do you not eat them because you can? Because they're weak and helpless and probably because animals don't have laws forbidding you from eating them.




You make it sound like meat-eaters have to justify it. I mean, I certainly don't have to justify it to the animals, I highly doubt they'd comprehend any justification and I don't have to justify it to vegetarians/vegans; who are they to me and why would I have justify anything to them?

[Alexander III]

Only if the world lived on what dictionary meanings had to say. And how do you define 'one's own kind' anyways. Why don't you extend the definition to all mammals or contract it to say, men and women? Why does one kind have to mean humans? Because it's convenient?
Also, I guess you missed the analogy that I provided.

Basically, Cannibalism means eating ones own species, not species similar to ones own, or species somewhat like one's own, but eating ones own species. Much like patricide means killing ones own father, not a man who looks like your father, nor even you uncle, for it to be patricide it must be your father.

Now Father is easier to define than species, but in essence with my limited biological erudition, I can deduce that two creatures are of the same species if they can do the bing-boom-bang, and as a result of said action produce children. Or to create a simple guideline, if society say's it's ok to **** it, it's not okay to eat it; if society say's its ok to eat it, it is not ok to **** it.

Sure there are exceptions to the guideline, but on the whole when in doubt, the guideline is always useful to clarify said doubt.


What I am asking is if animals and humans both feel pain and are capable of showing all those emotions, how do you justify eating one of them and not others? Do you not eat them because you can? Because they're weak and helpless and probably because animals don't have laws forbidding you from eating them.

1) If what you are saying is that you are unable to recognize any real or major difference between a man eating a chicken thigh or another man eating a human thigh...well I have some bad news for you.

2) Besides men are animals, we need no more justify eating the cow than the lion needs to justify eating the Zebra. As a race our Morality is far more similar to that of Nature than any idealized notion of morality. Sure it could be argued that there have been outstanding individuals. But the majority of humanity has throughout history been on a very basic moral level; and herein lies The Earl of Rochester's delightful paradox, If you acknowledge that human morality is highly evolved based on examinations of individuals rather than the majority of humanity, you must concede that "man differs more from man, than man from beast"

3) I am not trying to say that vegetarianism is bad, it is in fact a morally just and good practice. And I applaud individuals who can do it. But to expect the same level of moral standards by all humanity is like expecting a cow to start talking.

If you will excuse a small digression on my part, I trust that this story will be found entertaining and rewarding in equal measure as it helps further illustrate what I am trying to say.

I take you to 1825, to the decadent and corrupt papal States, to the center of corruption, to wit, Rome. The carbonari were a famous revolutionary group who were attempting to end the tyranny of the church and create a Roman Republic by the people and for the people, to end the oppression of the clergy and give basic human rights to the citizens, to the people. It was a revolutionary group like many of that time, fighting and dying for Liberty and Justice. Two members of the Carbonari, Angelo Targhini and Leonida Montanari (both wellborn and of good families), at the age of 25 were captured, charged with treason for conspiring against the pope, and sentenced to be guillotined, They did not cry nor did they regret their fate; the opposite in fact was true, they were content to die on the Guillotine, for they knew that their deaths would galvanize the people of Rome to throw off their shackles and fight for their freedom. The day before their execution, there suddenly was a huge riot amongst the polis who had come to see the execution, gunshots were in the air and they broke into Castel Sant'Angelo were the two revolutionaries were being kept. The two youths were convinced that the people of Rome had finally risen to overthrow their tyrants and claim their republic. Unfortunately the truth was different. The Polis did in fact storm the prison to Liberate the two prisoners, but liberating them only so that they could be taken to the guillotine at once and the show man finally commence. For the Polis had come form all over the Roman country side to enjoy the spectacle of a fine execution, and they came leaving their farms and trades for a few days. However, the execution did not occur when planned for the Convicts would not repent their sins before God and make peace with him, the continued to renounce God and not repent their actions, and thus the clergy was delaying the execution as they detested executing men whom had not repented as it would mean their souls would be damned to hell. The great people of Rome form whom these two 25 year olds had sacrificed their lives, needed to return to their trades and farms and cared far less about the spiritual safety of these mens souls, than about having a good show and going back home. The morning after, on the 23d of November, the great riot of the people of Rome, the two carbonaris were executed. They died stoically like honorable men, both of them smiling, content to die for Liberty. The People of Rome applauded and enjoyed their shows and finally returned to their farms and trades.



Haha.. :D But if we are hypocrites, why would we admit to being one? :P

Is that not exactly why we are all hypocrites, because none of us would understand why another would admit it.




As I said, fortunately I come from place where the major population is Hindu and cows are treated with a lot of care and it's a big crime (a verrryyyyyy big one) to kill them. So, as long as I live here, I guess I don't have to worry about giving up dairy products (sine we don't use packaged dairy product anyways that we might have to worry about industrial misuse of animals).

I suppose being born a cow in India, or a Pig in Isreal or a Muslim nation is like winning the lottery of life for an animal. And being born a cow or pig in America is the worst outcome, like being born a human in africa.




I suppose the point I am trying to make in all of this, is that one should always try to do what is just and honorable, and being a vegetarian is in most ways just and honorable, but expecting the majority of people to understand let alone appreciate what and why one does what he thinks is just; is naive.

[Dodo25]

This is what one of the people on my college mailing lists had to say in this regard. Since, I have no clue about the biology of plants, I did not have an asnwer.

Some robots can do these things too, even with the current level of technology. Is it wrong to turn them off? Just because something can do fancy stuff doesn't mean it's sentient.



Btw, Jains (not a majority of them anyways) don't live in the woods. They live in perfect houses and have excellent social lives.


Ha, sorry about that! My point with the woods was that, if you live in normal houses, the building of it, and the infrastructure to keep it in shape, leads to insect deaths and mutilation. I'm not criticizing Jains for that, I think it's silly to expect perfection and I do admire the great lengths they go to not cause harm to any living creature. While I find that admirable, I don't fully agree with their ethics. I think they place too much weight on not personally killing, and too little on activism and donations, which could reduce the overall amount of animals harmed by much more than one's personal actions.


You make it sound like meat-eaters have to justify it. I mean, I certainly don't have to justify it to the animals, I highly doubt they'd comprehend any justification and I don't have to justify it to vegetarians/vegans; who are they to me and why would I have justify anything to them?

No you're not obliged to justify it publically. But insert "slave owners" for "meat-eaters" and "abolitionists" for "vegetarians/vegans", and ask yourself whether you'd still agree with the sentiment in the above post. And before anyone gets upset that I compare eating animals to slavery, please look up the meaning of "comparison" or "analogy". It's not the same as equivocation. (Having said that, I don't think the difference is all that big.)



1) If what you are saying is that you are unable to recognize any real or major difference between a man eating a chicken thigh or another man eating a human thigh...well I have some bad news for you.

How about eating a newborn infant, or a late-stage Alzheimer patient? Assuming no family members are sad because of their deaths, and the rest of society will not hear about the incident and get upset; is there any intrinsic reason why it's worse to eat them instead of a chicken? Chickens have around the same level of awareness as human newborns, or late-stage Alzheimer patients. Why treat them differently? Just because they look differently, or because they have the "wrong" DNA? Isn't that just as bad as a racist who thinks all the other "races" are "wrong"?



2) Besides men are animals, we need no more justify eating the cow than the lion needs to justify eating the Zebra. As a race our Morality is far more similar to that of Nature than any idealized notion of morality. Sure it could be argued that there have been outstanding individuals. But the majority of humanity has throughout history been on a very basic moral level; and herein lies The Earl of Rochester's delightful paradox, If you acknowledge that human morality is highly evolved based on examinations of individuals rather than the majority of humanity, you must concede that "man differs more from man, than man from beast"

And do men also need no more justifcation to rape women than chimps need to rape chimp females?

I don't deny that adult humans differ from nonhuman animals in remarkable ways. But what about marginal case humans? How are we to treat them? Like we treat animals currently? That would be horrible!



3) I am not trying to say that vegetarianism is bad, it is in fact a morally just and good practice. And I applaud individuals who can do it. But to expect the same level of moral standards by all humanity is like expecting a cow to start talking.

Sure, that's why we need things like cultured meat to encourage a global transition. Cultured meat will be cheaper, healthier, better for the environment, and most importantly: produced without suffering.

[Nikhar]

No, I saw it. I get what you're trying to say, but it doesn't work, because cannabilism is quite clearly defined. It's not really a word with an arguable definition. Cannabilism means eating one of one's own species, not one of "its own kind." Cow, bird, pig, and fish are not the same species. Actually, the first definition that comes up when one looks up cannibalism goes along the lines of "a human that eats the flesh of another human." Suggesting eating an animal in any way equals, or resembles, cannibalism is just a weak attempt at a sensationalist argument. One can easily argue that eating meat is immoral, inhumane, even barbaric. But cannibalistic? No.

I eat meat because it tastes really good.

Okay I get what you mean. I'll rephrase my question. Would you mind eating humans if need arises? If yes, why? If no, I understand.


Those points about plants are silly though, reacting to external stimuli is not evidence of sentience. No one would dispute that plants are highly evolved and complex organisms, they've been evolving for just as long as any other living things. That doesn't mean they feel, in the sense of pain/desire, or that they think. Such an extraordinary claim would require extraordinary evidence to support it. As is all those examples are easily explainable as mechanistic traits that were propagated through natural selection.



Do we then have evidence that plants are not sentient? Is lack of nervous system a sufficient evidence? Is sentience not possible by means other than the nervous system as we know it. (Pardon me if my questions sound outright silly. I only studied biology till 10th standard :P)


You make it sound like meat-eaters have to justify it. I mean, I certainly don't have to justify it to the animals, I highly doubt they'd comprehend any justification and I don't have to justify it to vegetarians/vegans; who are they to me and why would I have justify anything to them?

I guess you missed the statement I made later on. I'll quote it again.


Don't get me wrong... I do not intend to question your eating habits. This is one question that I usually ask of non-vegetarians. Maybe there's a valid line of thinking that I am missing. It's a genuine query that I have. Once I get an answer that satisfies me, I'll stop asking the question.

I do not intend to question your morals or ethics. In fact, you missed my question altogether. To put it in simpler, non-offensive words, I'll ask you the same question I asked earlier in the post.

Would you mind eating humans if need arises? If yes, why? If no, I understand.





1) If what you are saying is that you are unable to recognize any real or major difference between a man eating a chicken thigh or another man eating a human thigh...well I have some bad news for you.

Well, actually I am unable to understand the difference. As I have already stated so many times, humans and animals alike feel pain and show a lot of other emotions, what according to you is different? Enlighten me.



2) Besides men are animals, we need no more justify eating the cow than the lion needs to justify eating the Zebra. As a race our Morality is far more similar to that of Nature than any idealized notion of morality. Sure it could be argued that there have been outstanding individuals. But the majority of humanity has throughout history been on a very basic moral level; and herein lies The Earl of Rochester's delightful paradox, If you acknowledge that human morality is highly evolved based on examinations of individuals rather than the majority of humanity, you must concede that "man differs more from man, than man from beast"

3) I am not trying to say that vegetarianism is bad, it is in fact a morally just and good practice. And I applaud individuals who can do it. But to expect the same level of moral standards by all humanity is like expecting a cow to start talking.

Maybe I used the wrong words since everybody seems to understand that I am questioning non-vegetarians' morality. All I had asked was why is cannibalism the most heinous of crimes whereas non-vegetarianism is just fine. And as possible answers to this question, I had put forth the arguments like animals being weak and all.
I also said that maybe I am missing the very obvious answer to the question.
No one has ever given me a satisfactory answer and that's why I continue to ask the question.



If you will excuse a small digression on my part, I trust that this story will be found entertaining and rewarding in equal measure as it helps further illustrate what I am trying to say.

I take you to 1825, to the decadent and corrupt papal States, to the center of corruption, to wit, Rome. The carbonari were a famous revolutionary group who were attempting to end the tyranny of the church and create a Roman Republic by the people and for the people, to end the oppression of the clergy and give basic human rights to the citizens, to the people. It was a revolutionary group like many of that time, fighting and dying for Liberty and Justice. Two members of the Carbonari, Angelo Targhini and Leonida Montanari (both wellborn and of good families), at the age of 25 were captured, charged with treason for conspiring against the pope, and sentenced to be guillotined, They did not cry nor did they regret their fate; the opposite in fact was true, they were content to die on the Guillotine, for they knew that their deaths would galvanize the people of Rome to throw off their shackles and fight for their freedom. The day before their execution, there suddenly was a huge riot amongst the polis who had come to see the execution, gunshots were in the air and they broke into Castel Sant'Angelo were the two revolutionaries were being kept. The two youths were convinced that the people of Rome had finally risen to overthrow their tyrants and claim their republic. Unfortunately the truth was different. The Polis did in fact storm the prison to Liberate the two prisoners, but liberating them only so that they could be taken to the guillotine at once and the show man finally commence. For the Polis had come form all over the Roman country side to enjoy the spectacle of a fine execution, and they came leaving their farms and trades for a few days. However, the execution did not occur when planned for the Convicts would not repent their sins before God and make peace with him, the continued to renounce God and not repent their actions, and thus the clergy was delaying the execution as they detested executing men whom had not repented as it would mean their souls would be damned to hell. The great people of Rome form whom these two 25 year olds had sacrificed their lives, needed to return to their trades and farms and cared far less about the spiritual safety of these mens souls, than about having a good show and going back home. The morning after, on the 23d of November, the great riot of the people of Rome, the two carbonaris were executed. They died stoically like honorable men, both of them smiling, content to die for Liberty. The People of Rome applauded and enjoyed their shows and finally returned to their farms and trades.

I suppose the point I am trying to make in all of this, is that one should always try to do what is just and honorable, and being a vegetarian is in most ways just and honorable, but expecting the majority of people to understand let alone appreciate what and why one does what he thinks is just; is naive.

I see the point that you made there. And no, I don't intend to turn the complete world vegetarian. Even if I did, I wouldn't be able to.

The purpose of this whole thread was not to challenge non-vegetarians' eating habits. The initial query was 'Are vegetarians hypocrites?' to which I have had a few very satisfactory answers. Then the thread turned into 'non vegetarianism and cannibalism' which was my fault since apparently I phrased my query in a wrong manner. But through umpteen repetitions throughout the post, I guess I have made my query clear.

[YesNo]

... reacting to external stimuli is not evidence of sentience.
I would think that seeing a plant or insect respond to external stimuli IS evidence of sentience.

If one doesn't like that evidence because one wants to feel it is OK to eat them or kill them, then one would have to define "sentience" in such a way that it excludes plants or insects and add a theory that dismisses the contrary evidence of their response to external stimuli. One would then claim that the experience we have of them is only an illusion that plants and insects are sentient.

After reading Harris' Free Will, he does the same thing for humans. He claims that we only have the illusion of free will. Forget any experience you might have to the contrary. It would be, by his theory, an illusion.

If Harris follows Blackmore, there would be some set of selfish, unconscious, mindless meme-replicants that are stimulating the brain to generate our illusions. This is a short step from saying that humans aren't even sentient. Any experience of free will, suffering or joy is an illusion which can be ignored.

So I guess we can eat anything. Suffering is just an illusion.

[Madhuri]

As I said, fortunately I come from place where the major population is Hindu and cows are treated with a lot of care and it's a big crime (a verrryyyyyy big one) to kill them. So, as long as I live here, I guess I don't have to worry about giving up dairy products (sine we don't use packaged dairy product anyways that we might have to worry about industrial misuse of animals).


If you look around, you'll find a lot of street animals, cows included. No one kills those cows but no one cares about them. These animal eat filth from the garbage, polythene full of junk and other harmful things.

Not all buy from the cattle owners, and you can't be sure if they haven't mixed anything artificial or added more water. I tried this but I couldn't manage it as I don't own a fridge, so now I buy milk from the super market available as tetra-paks, which can last for over a month. There are companies like Amul, Mother Dairy, Nandini, etc., that procure milk from farmers, process it and sell variety of dairy products, like milk with different fat levels, ghee, paneer, butter, curd and so on. These work on cooperative structure and also provide additional support services like artificial insemination, cattle-feed, etc. The cattle-owners are doing a business so one can never be sure if the cows/buffalos are treated well. I think, they won't be killing it but they make sure that it produces more than enough milk, and I am not sure what they do after it dries up. Maybe they sell it to a butcher or let loose like a street animal as maintaining cows past that stage would just add to their expense. So, a cow is a sacred animal but it is a part of a business too.

[OrphanPip]

I would think that seeing a plant or insect respond to external stimuli IS evidence of sentience.

If one doesn't like that evidence because one wants to feel it is OK to eat them or kill them, then one would have to define "sentience" in such a way that it excludes plants or insects and add a theory that dismisses the contrary evidence of their response to external stimuli. One would then claim that the experience we have of them is only an illusion that plants and insects are sentient.


Not quite, all sorts of machines react to external input in complex ways. Sentience is certainly difficult to define, but we know just from relatedness that most other chordates have brains sufficiently like ours that they probably have the same basic feelings of pain and fear. Plants lack the actual organs involved in sense. What good would it do for a plant to feel anyway: they can't move away from what is hurting them, they can't fight back, they can't perceive their environment to any great extent. Plants not only lack the sensory organs that would explain how they would feel, they lack the impetus to evolve such a response.

Insects are more problematic because they are more similar to chordates than plants, but it is difficult to say for sure how their brains function.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Okay I get what you mean. I'll rephrase my question. Would you mind eating humans if need arises? If yes, why? If no, I understand.

Well, if the need arose, I wouldn't have that many reservations--I mean, if it's like one of those trapped on a mountain scenarios where it's eat or die, I'd eat. I wouldn't eat other people just for the heck of it, though. I'd do it on a dare, maybe, if I knew how the meat was obtained and what-not, but it'd be too creepy just to go to a store and buy some human ribs.

[Delta40]

I didn't quite make it to the Vietnamese Dog Market where I could buy all sorts of cuts but I would have quite happily tried a dog steak, merely out of curiosity. Meat is meat and I can cross the borders of cultural tastes. Eating humans would certainly be a curious experience indeed but I would need to know how they landed on my plate first...

[Dodo25]

I would think that seeing a plant or insect respond to external stimuli IS evidence of sentience.


Does that mean you think that robots and machines, as OrphanPip pointed out, are sentient?


I didn't quite make it to the Vietnamese Dog Market where I could buy all sorts of cuts but I would have quite happily tried a dog steak, merely out of curiosity. Meat is meat and I can cross the borders of cultural tastes. Eating humans would certainly be a curious experience indeed but I would need to know how they landed on my plate first...
[My emphasis]

That's my view as well, the mere act of eating dead flesh isn't problematic because it's dead, no one gets hurt anymore. It depends on how it got there, and whether eating it encourages more of the "how it got there" happening in the future.

What I can't understand is the double standard, why not have qualms about trying dog meat from a Vietnamese dog market? How do you think that meat got there? It's a Vietnamese dog market, for Dog's sake! (Not trying to be racist, American and European factory farms are just as bad.)

[Delta40]

I guess I don't feel all that inclined to question the livelihood of the poor.

[YesNo]

Not quite, all sorts of machines react to external input in complex ways. Sentience is certainly difficult to define, but we know just from relatedness that most other chordates have brains sufficiently like ours that they probably have the same basic feelings of pain and fear. Plants lack the actual organs involved in sense. What good would it do for a plant to feel anyway: they can't move away from what is hurting them, they can't fight back, they can't perceive their environment to any great extent. Plants not only lack the sensory organs that would explain how they would feel, they lack the impetus to evolve such a response.

Insects are more problematic because they are more similar to chordates than plants, but it is difficult to say for sure how their brains function.
Regarding machines, they are not alive. I know that might come as a shock to people hoping Kurzweil's "singularity" will save them, but let's stay with reality for a moment. Since machines are not alive, that means they are not sentient. As far as this discussion of vegetarianism goes, you are free to eat them.

The fact that living things respond to stimuli is evidence that they may be sentient. For some definitions of sentience, that is all the evidence that is required. For others, one might have to look further.

I think one could say that plants probably have a more refined sense of sunlight than we do. Just because they don't sense things the way we do doesn't mean they don't sense things at all. So their sensing sunlight is further evidence of sentience. Some plants react when you touch them. Again, this is further evidence of sentience. As far as an "impetus to evolve such a response", I can see how sensing light and touch would likely be very useful to plants.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I didn't quite make it to the Vietnamese Dog Market where I could buy all sorts of cuts but I would have quite happily tried a dog steak, merely out of curiosity. Meat is meat and I can cross the borders of cultural tastes. Eating humans would certainly be a curious experience indeed but I would need to know how they landed on my plate first...

I think I'd eat human before I eat dog. I love dogs more than humans. Like, of a dog dies in a movie, I'll feel way sadder than if any of the human characters. It doesn't even have to be main character, it can just be some random dog. It can even be a mean dog and I'll still feel bad, like when the dog gets shot in No Country for Old Men.

[Basil]

I'd eat human, but only if I could taunt them about it while they were still alive:

"Hey Joe, guess what I'm having for supper tomorrow night?"
"Aww, shut up!"

[Paulclem]

This is an oddly anxt ridden thread. Starvation has little to do with the choice of vegetarianism that we are lucky enough to have in richer countries.

In a survival situation - we are unlikely to know or appreciate what we would do, though the examples of cannibalism we have such as in famines, mean that people can be driven to it. In that crash in the Andes, they had to eat the dead, and why wouldn't they? It seems logical to me, though no doubt hard to execute.

[PoeticPassions]

I'm not a vegetarian, but I do support animals being treated well and killed humanely (if killing can be humane in the first place). Like Mutatis, I feel bad if I kill an insect, even a cockroach, but generally I will only kill insects if they are causing a havoc (cockoroach infestation means you can't leave any food out... mosquitoes carry diseases and I get soooo many bites every summer it is almost unbearable, etc). I try not to kill even any insects on purpose and will often 'save' drowning spiders, bugs, etc and take them outside, rather than squashing them. So I suppose I might be a reverse hypocrite... I eat meat (though not that often, and I try to eat from local farms and all that), but I find the killing of animals still quite awful...

But reading these posts about cows, I wanted to mention the claim that methane from decomposing cow dung accounts for 16 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions (about five tons of CO2 per cow per year). So it makes me wonder whether all those cows wandering around in India really are rather harmful... what do people think about this??

Another note, it is custom in Islam for during the Eid-al-Adha (the 'Festival of Sacrifice') an animal is sacrificed and slaightered (usually a Ram) and the meat is divided: the family keeps one third; another third is given to relatives, friends and neighbors; and the other third is given to the poor and needy (though with my friends and family, generally they give all of it to the needy). Rams can definitely sense that they will be slaughtered, as they get very anxious and nervous... One time I saw one being slaughtered, and I am still traumatized to this day... but on the other hand, I do see the benefit in it, and the fact that there is a humanitarian and charitable aspect to it helps...

I don't even have any clear arguments or opinions here... just writing. :)

[YesNo]

But reading these posts about cows, I wanted to mention the claim that methane from decomposing cow dung accounts for 16 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions (about five tons of CO2 per cow per year). So it makes me wonder whether all those cows wandering around in India really are rather harmful... what do people think about this??

I've heard of that also. I didn't know it was such a large percentage of the greenhouse gas. If the cow is kept in a more mechanized barn, is the methane able to be harvested as well or does it contribute less to greenhouse gas emissions?

I suppose if most of us became vegetarians, the number of animals on the earth would decrease and the number of humans could increase. We may also live healthier lives by cooperating less with other animal species.

[PoeticPassions]

I've heard of that also. I didn't know it was such a large percentage of the greenhouse gas. If the cow is kept in a more mechanized barn, is the methane able to be harvested as well or does it contribute less to greenhouse gas emissions?

I'm supposing you could use the dung for fertilizer, and maybe even harvest it in some way to use it as energy (bah, I'm not well informed on the science behind this, but just using common sense). But this is where the problem in India is-- it seems as though, largely, the cows are uncontrolled and free to roam. A lot of them are starving, so they scavenge for food and mix in with humans in markets, stores, garbage heaps etc. causing another kind of social and health problem... I'm just wondering if maybe there is a reason humans eat meat and that there should be some way to balance things out. We should protect endangered species, but at the same time perhaps allow some kind of natural cycle in which predators eat prey and all that... I don't know. Animals eat each other. It would be better if we hunted though instead of mistreated animals as we do now in these mass production farms and slaughterhouses. It pains me when I see the way that the animals are kept and treated and fed just so that they can be food for humans. It seems really quite unfair.

[YesNo]

A lot of them are starving, so they scavenge for food and mix in with humans in markets, stores, garbage heaps etc. causing another kind of social and health problem...

It makes me wonder if modern dairy farming is not better than what is done in India for both humans and cattle.

[JuniperWoolf]

Well, if the need arose, I wouldn't have that many reservations--I mean, if it's like one of those trapped on a mountain scenarios where it's eat or die, I'd eat.

Not me, I'd suicide (why isn't "suicide" a verb?). I decided a long time ago that that's my exit strategy if I ever found myself in a seriously horrible situation eg. stranded in the frozen woods surrounded by my family's corpses faced with the prospect of eating them, chained up in some monster's rape dungeon, &c.


I think I'd eat human before I eat dog.

I could eat dog, no problem. Actually, when I see a dog that's in particularly good shape or who looks nice and plump, I sometimes think "that would be good eating if we were ever lost in the mountains or something." My friend Steve has a delicious looking dog. His name is even "Porky."

http://i426.photobucket.com/albums/pp349/cellar_door17/th_12398_380175992208_517382208_5309152_3370031_n. jpg (http://s426.photobucket.com/albums/pp349/cellar_door17/?action=view&current=12398_380175992208_517382208_5309152_33700 31_n.jpg)

Lookit him, he's shaped like a ham. His eyes always look like he knows I'm thinking of eating him, though.

[Darcy88]

Not me, I'd suicide (why isn't "suicide" a verb?). I decided a long time ago that that's my exit strategy if I ever found myself in a seriously horrible situation eg. stranded in the frozen woods surrounded by my family's corpses faced with the prospect of eating them, chained up in some monster's rape dungeon, &c.



I could eat dog, no problem. Actually, when I see a dog that's in particularly good shape or who looks nice and plump, I sometimes think "that would be good eating if we were ever lost in the mountains or something." My friend Steve has a delicious looking dog. His name is even "Porky."

http://i426.photobucket.com/albums/pp349/cellar_door17/th_12398_380175992208_517382208_5309152_3370031_n. jpg (http://s426.photobucket.com/albums/pp349/cellar_door17/?action=view&current=12398_380175992208_517382208_5309152_33700 31_n.jpg)

Lookit him, he's shaped like a ham. His eyes always look like he knows I'm thinking of eating him, though.

Here here! Hahahaha. All you say here is both funny and true. Common sense. I also would sooner die than become a cannibal. I'm a pretty crazy survivalist at times...but even I posit boundaries and eating a person is definitely one of them. I would way way way rather die than do that. This seems like basic reason to me.

[Nikhar]

I just posted this on Quora which I think might also be relevant to this thread. --

I'll add my two bits here. As a lot of the other guys who have answered here, I grew up in a vegetarian house so initially in a way I was forced to be a vegetarian. But I'm 20 now and I still do not eat meat and it is my choice.

Most of my reasons have already been covered in other posts here.

Also, I just can't imagine, let alone actually do it, the thought of eating an animal that once lived, breathed, had emotions, felt pain and was also capable of showing love. As an example, I have seen many people saying that cows are so dumb. I wonder how many of these people have had a chance to observe one in close proximity. The love one cow shows for her calf is immense. I have seen so many instances where a cow grows very anxious if she thinks there is a danger to her child. They protect their child much like a human mother would. There are these two particular incidences that come to my mind.

There were these two guys on a scooter and the person on the backseat was holding a young calf on his legs. They were riding pretty slowly and the reason I guess was the cow who followed the scooter religiously (presumable the calf's mother). She was sprinting as fast as a cow could, not willing to let her child out of sight for a moment.

My mother told me about this other incident as she had seen it from her own eyes through the window. We have this kind of backyard (I say kind of because it isnt exactly a backyard and it doesn't belong to us but I do not know it's English term ) at our house. A cow had just given birth to her child over there. The calf was covered in blood. The cow actually licked the blood off her child. When I later on saw the cow and calf, remembering the story did not gross me out but instead filled me with that emotion that makes you giddy with warmth and happiness, something that you feel when you see love in its purest form.

Also, it might interest some of you to visit the following website and watch the video.

MeatVideo.com

Her's the answer on Quora. (http://www.quora.com/Vegetarianism/Why-did-you-choose-to-be-a-vegetarian/answer/Nikhar-Agrawal/quote/227554)

[YesNo]

I agree with you about cows. We have more in common emotionally with other species than we realize.

Recently, I finished reading Larry Young and Brian Alexander's The Chemistry Between Us. They described how the more or less monogamous prairie vole was used to identify the chemicals that form a basis for love in both our species. These chemicals don't determine love, but they make it possible, like an eye makes it possible to see.

[ennison]

I'm omnivorous. I eat when I'm hungry and drink when I'm dry. When I lose my teeth I may have to live on brochan tana lom but now I can rip and tear and chew like any beast.

[Nikhar]

Today while discussing vegetarianism with a friend, I got the weirdest (and something that just feels outright stupid) counter argument. I'll just quote the communication as is. Pardon the grammar since these are snippets from a facebook conversation.

me:

again... my argument of eating plants has never been that they feel less pain... it's that it's inevitable...plants being the only organisms that can manufacture their own food... for any organisms survival it has to sit atop plants in the food chain... not the case with animals... you can live an equally, if not better, healthy life by not killing animals. I would be totally fine with people eating animals if it came to their survival. Right now the argument to eat animals more seems like we eat them because we can

her:

but the basic point which I want to raise is why we at all need to survive ...if we are some much into caring attitude then either we should kill ourself and let plants and other living forms survive or else we should find some new entity which is not living being for our food..but again the question is why do we need to survive..why is it at all important ?

Now this argument just seems absolutely ridiculous to me. But I didn't have any other response to it. However stupid it was, I was stumped by it. The only response I could think of was


there's a difference between being practical and being stupid

What would have been your response in this case?

[YesNo]

We are here so we survive until we are no longer able or willing to survive. I suppose eating plants would be better for our survival and the quality of life.

I assume that our being here is good and that the universe is good. But those are just assumptions.

[Ecurb]

P1: "Vegetarians" refers to humans who eat no meat.
P2: All humans are hypocrites.
Conclusion: All vegetarians are hypocrites.

[Paulclem]

We are here so we survive until we are no longer able or willing to survive. I suppose eating plants would be better for our survival and the quality of life.

I assume that our being here is good and that the universe is good. But those are just assumptions.

I don't see the choice of being a veggie as a survival choice - it's just a choice that is available where it wasn't before. That's my personal situation.

It may be that the bigger picture - the choice of meat rather than crops could be cited as a survival choice due to the dedication of land to livestock rather than plants. Politically the richer nations can make that choice, but this may be at the expense of world food stocks and reduced food production leading to starvation in certain countries. Of course this is a very simple view - the market structure of trade means it would be no simple thing to distribute food.

[YesNo]

I don't consider vegetarianism as reducible to a survival choice either. I was trying to make sense out of the survival idea that someone arguing with Nikhar made.

[Sancho]

I agree, Nikhar. She made a silly argument. I doubt we could collectively, as a species, decide not to survive. Individually, of course, people do it all the time, (suicide) but it doesn't have much effect on the overall ecosphere. This is a circular argument, but we survive because we are survivors. We are who we are because we evolved to this point largely out of an intense survival instinct. Other species no longer exist because they were not as good at it as we were.

To your earlier post, I agree again. Cows are good mamas. And I'm here to tell Ya that a mama cow will lick more than blood off of her calf. My neighbor has 20 or 30 Black Angus and I like to watch them. So I noticed one day that one of the little cows was brown not black. I took a closer look and determined that the little cow was actually black, but he just looked brown because he was covered in poop. For some strange reason the other cows liked to back up and poop on him. Go figure. Anyway, mama cow was dutifully licking the poop off of little cow, making him black again. True story, I sh*t you not.

[Paulclem]

I don't consider vegetarianism as reducible to a survival choice either. I was trying to make sense out of the survival idea that someone arguing with Nikhar made.

Apologies Yesno. I should have looked back.

I agree that survival should come first before the choice.