Food ethics: How do you choose what species are morally wrong to eat?

No disagreement.

Or do I. I'm not at your point, Thomas, re never eating a chicken. I've seen a lot a small places with a few chickens, and I suppose I could scare up some of my photos.

So, you are taking chickens as slaves?

OOOh this topic again.

Whenever we consume a species (no matter which one) to the extent that we reduce its viability to breed in a wild condition, then we are ( by good reason)obligated to stop killing it. Its a simple natural law . We have no "laws based upon morality" to exclude the killing of same except for an agreed upon designation of an animal as "endangered" / threatened.
Id like to extend the endangered condition to compare it to the intended policy that would place polar bears on the ESL. Polar Bears are actually UP in their population. Yet, we are predicting that, through global warming, this population will crash due to simple predictive biology. I propose that the same logic be extended to such species as minke whales, where the whaling nations seem to try to conviince others that they are not harming thenviability of that species.
WE seem to argue issues with different sets of logic for every special condition that we can ignore.
Since RG introduced the word "morality" I suppose it can work as some kind of imperative. Id prefer the logic of good science to prevail.
Cattle (All cattle including bunny rabbits) are raised in totally artificial means to overproduce. WE breed and back breed closely related stock in order to "Improve the breed by artificial selection" that is illogical wrt genetic viability anf hybrid vigor. Yet, it produces some very usable hybrids which can be exploited. We also over breed or artificially breed others to produce a proclivity for frcundity. Weve taken the several breeds of sheep to maximize production of multiple birth, so that specific breeds , like FinnLAndrace, actually produce "litters". This wouldnt hold in nature because the lambs would starve without intervention. WE do this because we can. Thats the only reason.
WE produce chickens industrially. WE gather up fertilized eggs and incubate them in indutrial surroundings. Then we shove the chikens into vast herds of growers so that they are fed with hemcally laced feed that causes them to expand in a manner that is wholly "unnatural"
Ive no real moral argument against industrial farming other than the fact that it is resource intense and produces a race of "CAvendish Banana" species that cannot, should all systems fail, reproduce and be viable on their own. Native , self reproducing chickens are actually a "rare bird" in first world nations. Same thing for cattle. Weve actually bred big bulls with little cows and have created species and varieties that would have trouble on their own in the wild .
SO, thats all a business, a business of meat production. HOwever, comparing that to wild populations is, IMHO, an invalid comparison. WE are removing species based upon reducing their freely breeding populations, yet we are not intervening to cause these same animals to become industrial products. SO if were not gonna intervene to prevent looss of species, we shouldnt be decimating herds by short sighted industrial hunting and "gathering".

Its not really a moral issue, its just business and good stewardship of our environment.

Both THomas and RG are injecting positions based on silly human comparisons that dont pertain to either science or stewardship.
We practice eugenics in anilam husbandry every day before lunch. Yet we are having moral arguments about it for humans. We inject poisons into breeding stock to improve their short term fecundity, and e use chemicals that we know (like steroids) will reduce the animals lifespan. WE feed posions to animals to improve muscle conversion. Human polulations that proposed that were called NAzis and we wiped them out for moral reasons.

We crowd animals into spaces that cause them to bwe ctrazy enough to pick each other to death, so inorder to prevent that, we shave their Beaks into a blunt tip. Human populations that practiced such things on the bases of morlity or beauty, have been "civilized" and prevented from engaging in these practices.

SO animals and humans, merely argumentation tricks in order to raise some rabble among us subjects.

Sorry I'm so very late in answering, but to the original question, my answer would start with Genesis 9.

What do you mean by "we"?

I won't eat animals that have had that done to them.

One thing on this thought process - it wouldn't take as many larger animals to feed people - you would have to kill alot more smaller animals to feed the same amount as one large animal. Makes it necessary to have alot more smaller animals.

Hey William, I have a question about this:



You express reservations about eating other animals, but are they all on the basis of utility to humans? I imagine they have use for their lives that we might not.

I've given up meat, eggs and dairy. I struggle with only with eating aquaculture (fish, shellfish, scallops, etc). I don't eat these animals with the exception of very special occasions. My weakness in this is due to a cultural and emotional attachment.

I have discovered soy shrimp, which were alarmingly accurate in texture and flavor. I think I may yet be able to adapt a fully vegan diet, but I have not committed to that currently.

My choice not to eat came less from the idea that it was immoral to eat them, and more from the knowledge that I had no necessity to eat them and that eating them came with a large economic and ecological price tag. There is no steak that I desire to eat so badly that is worth the food that 8-10 humans could eat in place of the feed it took to raise the livestock.

I don't think people who eat meat are bad. I simply no longer wanted to eat meat.

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well fart, you are what you eat.

Hello Robert. Never in my life have I ever consider an animal my peer much less my superior. Here we must consider communicative skills. I can understand anthropomorphic renditions and that primitive reasoning as we tend to understand them more than we understand us. Many times I have offered "show me an ape that can build a kool-aid stand and I will consider that ape my ancestor but never my peer".

Having said that should we kill them simply because we are superior. No. As we learn what it is to feed each other rather than feeding off each other, then the animal we do not need will go by the way side due to an immaculate nature selection process. The only two that are still enigmatic to me are the porpoise and the whale. Both protected as I think they should be.

We have no clue as to what they are all about; and you mentioned that and I agree. Mammals that live in the water that breathe as we do that are absolutely no threat to us in any way what so ever, we don't kill them for any reason. When we consider their procreation and their numbers there is simply is no reason to. As to sharks, bring me a harpoon, ha! Possibly the most vicious predator that has ever lived on this planet. Never consider them an endangered species. If one ventures into shark infested waters I promise you they will be very thankful if a Orca or a porpoise is anywhere in that vicinity. They will come to the rescue every single time. How could anyone kill such a loving, caring creature?

At one time we needed their oil for our warmth. Now, no! The only reason we kill them is for the contents of there stomach and bowel. If we were more patient we would get that waste free and naturally. Ambergris per ounce in our stupid value structure is worth killing them for. Damn, what lengths we will go to insure that we don't stink. When in truth no one stinks. It is a by product of anothers greed and why some sweat and some don't.

If the greedy only knew all the ways they do sweat, perhaps they wouldn't be so greedy. They are the most afraid people in the world and why they need bodyguards and personal assistants. They have lost any sense of personal accomplishment and rely on others to do there labor and thinking for them. Ha, what price having more is, huh?

Sorry for going on so Robert. This is my position on animals. With my other comments I hope this helped. I don't have any pets; I'm still trying to tame people, ha!

William

I don't eat anything that has the potential to think "I don't want to be eaten" in whatever language it knows. I also don't eat other people's pets or the mentally disabled because it's unappetizing and it tends to freak people out.

I eat cows because they don't mind.

Lol!!!


How do you know the contents of a cow's mind? Or do you think their minds are empty?

I'm sure cows have experiences and therefore we should avoid causing them pain by cutting into them while they are alive like we would do a tree but cows don't have thoughts per se. They don't worry about death. They don't think to themselves "oh wouldn't it be awful if I didn't exist", not even in any crude non-lingual form, whatever that would be.

Cows like all animals will fight if under attack by aggressors. You don't fight back if you don't care if you die.

I believe you project incorrectly.

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Human meat on the table? Don't accept any more invitations from these people, please....

Dogs are considered edible in many societies, but cats have a foul taste, it is said.

Human blood makes the human gag reflex activate...so there are no vampires -- none. Of course those who eat human meat or drink human blood (or any blood) are considered psychotic in civilized society. But, there are probably drug compounds you could ingest to get past the gagging, if you need to have that experience out of curiosity.

I would say that morally speaking it is probably wrong to eat the meat of animals that have been tortured and abused before slaughter. Also, healthwise the higher cortisol levels in these mistreated animals would not benefit humans.

Like many other moral questions we need more understanding, research, debate and caring to get the right answers.

I love whale meat. Its yummy

Pigs are more intelligent than dogs and far more intelligent than cats, yet we have no qualms eating pigs, so it's only emotionally based hysteria that we won't eat dogs and cats.

Those animal we shouldn't eat is those who are endangerd, else we shoulnd't act like hysterical idiots.

Is food ethics only about the animal? What about the environment and resource management?

I think assuming that the only reason to adopt an abstemious dietary regimen is hysterical emotionalism is shallow criticism. There is plenty more to consider. Why assume that the issue hinges on the intelligence of the animal?

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Ok we can also preach animal wealfare, that it has to be "green" but even if these criteria isn't met, I wouldn't cry a river eating the meat.

I need you to retype that. I can't understand what you wrote.

What is animal wealfare (sic)?
What are you getting at RE: "green"?

I'm saying that the consumption of meat coms with it a ecological cost and one that is not only felt by other species. Resource intensive farming is hard on the land and in a world where we give cattle more water than the 3rd world, there exists a higher moral dilemma in what we eat.

In the simplest terms: It hurt humans to eat carelessly.

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