Attack my argument: morality of eating meat

@L1n1o,

L1n1o wrote:

So from the short argument you stated, a valid question to ask would be why should only rational beings have rights, why not animals? why not plants?

Putting my Utilitarian hat on, I think of moral rights as practical, cultural tools for increasing the total surplus of happiness over suffering in this world. Plants can't experience either, so from my perspective they ought not have rights. Nonhuman animals can experience both to various degrees. For some animals, like sponges, this capability is near-zero. For others, like the Great Apes, it is near-human. Accordingly, animals should have rights of various extent, proportioned to their capability to experience pleasure or pain.

Humans, as a rule, merit an even more extensive set of rights than nonhuman animals, because humans are rational. This justifies extended rights because rationality decreases the transaction costs around our rights, and greatly increases their benefits.

Rationality decreases the transaction cost of enforcing human rights, because human individuals can usually enforce their own rights in a straightforward manner. Nonhuman animals, by contrast, must depend on lopsided, expensive methods involving humans. In addition, rationality and self-awareness increase the benefits of rights: Unlike nonhuman animals, we routinely experience happiness and suffering second-hand by empathizing with others and by imagining our own futures.

With all this in mind, I agree with the original post that humans should have more extensive rights than other animals, but disagree that animals have no moral rights at all.

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@Cyracuz,

compassion for an organism and prevention of cruelty against it does not presume "rights" of that organism.
Its customary to eat meat in most communities from time waay back. I think that I need no further justification for my diestary choices.
I raise livestock and most of it goes to the butchers. I see that my job as a steward of the living animals is to provide them with a cmfortsble existence and ration while they are under my care.

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@Thomas,

Quote:

Putting my Utilitarian hat on, I think of moral rights as practical, cultural tools for increasing the total surplus of happiness over suffering in this world. Plants can't experience either, so from my perspective they ought not have rights.

You know this, as an indisputable fact, how?

Quote:

Nonhuman animals can experience both to various degrees. For some animals, like sponges, this capability is near-zero. For others, like the Great Apes, it is near-human.

Again, you know this how?

Quote:

Accordingly, animals should have rights of various extent, proportioned to their capability to experience pleasure or pain.

What utility derives from this?

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

You know this, as an indisputable fact, how?

I didn't say it's indisputable. But it's my best estimate, which I'm fairly confident in. It derives from the neurophysiology of perceiving pain, and on the absence of neurons in plants. (And in sponges, to answer your next question.)

Setanta wrote:

Thomas wrote:
Accordingly, animals should have rights of various extent, proportioned to their capability to experience pleasure or pain.

What utility derives from this?

The utility, for example, of not getting your throat slit open while you're fully conscious, hanging from a rope upside-down. It's a pain that I'm sure cows and pigs feel acutely. They have a right not to go through this. Sea sponges, on the other hand, have no consciousness anyway. A right like this would do nothing for them. That's why I'm saying that the extend of an organism's right should be proportioned to its capacity to suffer (or feel happiness).

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@Thomas,

You can make a case by analogy (perhaps) from sponges, but the general principle of a hierarchy of perception i deny. Single cell organisms, possessing no neurons, still reliably exhibit avoidance behavior in response to heat, cold (the latter two being relative statements) or chemical stimuli. The presence of neurons cannot axiomatically be taken to be indicative of the ability to perceive. For example, trees respond to changes in the polarization of ambient gases in the atmosphere by reducing capillary pressure. Which is to say, trees sense the approach of stoms and respond by reducing the water pressure in their branches, making them less likely to be damaged by high winds. This interesting document purports to show that riparian trees in desert environments can sense ground water levels and respond appropriately, including responses to the possible effect on seedlings. Trees ain't got no damned neurons. Can you sense local atmospheric polarization, or ground water levels beneath your feet?

OK, you're saying that animals should not suffer pain if it can be avoided (most cattle and swine are not slaughtered by being strung up to have their throats cut). That's not a utilitarian principle, though, it's a moral one.

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By the way, i have had hunters tell me that it is better to shoot a deer standing rather than on the run. They claim that if the deer is "spooked" and begins to run, they pump adrenalin into their bodies, which spoils the taste of the meat. Someone who is a good shot with a rifle or a bow can hit the animal in the spinal column hump right behind the base of the neck, dropping the animal where they stand. I have no source to confirm this, i acknowledge. However, it serves as an example of the application of a untilitarian principle which is only incidentally more humane, and therefore also fulfills a moral principle.

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@farmerman,

Quote:

compassion for an organism and prevention of cruelty against it does not presume "rights" of that organism.

That is true whether the organism in question is a lab mouse or a human being. The rights of any organism is a matter of social agreement. Some species are close to becoming extinct, and measures are taken to preserve those species.
There are few snakes native to Norway, and those we do have are preserved. That means that hunting and killing them is against the law, and carries with it legal consequences. What do those laws serve to protect if not the animals themselves?

That is not to say that killing animals for food is morally wrong. Many claim it is the way of the world, and I am not one to argue. But I have to say that the modern mass production of meat by breeding millions of animals destined to be butchered is difficult to reconcile with. I have to admit a bit of hypocrisy on my part here. I do not like the way cows and sheep are mass slaughtered, but I still eat the meat.

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

OK, you're saying that animals should not suffer pain if it can be avoided (most cattle and swine are not slaughtered by being strung up to have their throats cut).

Indeed they aren't---because law and custom in our society grant them a limited amount of rights. Other societies don't accord any rights to animals, and so these practices do happen there. Indeed, they are mandatory under traditional Jewish and Islamic law.

Setanta wrote:

That's not a utilitarian principle, though, it's a moral one.

I fail to see how a principle could be utilitarian and not moral. Since the dawn of Utilitarian philosophy, Utilitarian principles have been "principles of morals and legislation" (Bentham 1785).

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@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

joefromchicago wrote:
Easy. That's not a syllogism.

Why not?

You missed a necessary link in your argument. It's step 2 in my syllogism.

Thomas wrote:

And regardless of whether you call it a syllogism or some other word, how do you respond to its content?

It all depends on how you define "rational being." If you define it as "someone who is rational," then you've identified a real problem. If, on the other hand, you define it as "someone who is a member of the class of things that are capable of rationality," then there's no problem at all.

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@Cyracuz,

Cyracuz wrote:

I don't know how it is where you live, but here in Norway, abusing animals is a criminal offense.

It's the same here, but that's not because animals have rights, it's because humans have voluntarily limited their own rights with regard to certain relations they may have with animals.

Cyracuz wrote:

That humans are the least rational beings is just an opinion, of course. But there are many documented cases of animals exhibiting reasoning skills, using human language and solving problems that require thought.

No doubt animals possess problem-solving skills. Whether that constitutes "rationality" is debatable, but that's largely a definitional problem. There is, however, no conclusive evidence of any non-human animal using human language (and that includes apes who appear to use human sign language). Nevertheless, if you limit rights to those animals who can comprehend the concept of rights, you're left only with humans.

Cyracuz wrote:

The notion that we as humans don't have to respect the other life forms on this planet is not rational.

Why not?

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@Thomas,

I just lost an enormous post about the battle of Azincourt in 1415. I'll summarize, although the force of the argument is lost without the details. A Franco-Burgundian army of 25,000 to 30,000 men attacked the little army of Henry V, of no more than 7,000 men. Because of the muddy condition of the field and the lethality of his 5000 or more archers, the slaughter was horrible. The French were set up in three "battles," each larger than Henry's entire army. The first two battles had been seen off with horrible casualties, leaving more than 2000 prisoners behind. At that point, the third battle began to mount up, and the Sire d'Azincourt lead a body of about 40 horsemen to attack the English baggage train. That was located behind Henry's line, and down the slope of a hill. Henry could hear the fight but he couldn't see it. He had about twice as many prisoners behind his line as he had men at arms, while his archers had had fired away 700,000 or more arrows, and had none left.

So Henry ordered the archers to kill the prisoners. I don't know how many were killed, but soon Henry found out that the attack behind him had just been a raid. Then he saw that the third battle had thought better of it, and had turned to ride away. So he stopped the slaughter. However, from Henry's point of view (one which, by the way, the French agreed with) he did not dare leave more than twice as many prisoners behind his line while he was assailed, possibly in front and rear. As soon as the danger was obviously passed he stopped the killing--many archers and men at arms had actually protected their prisoners, whose ransoms would make them rich.

Henry's decision to order the killing of the prisoners was certainly not moral, but it was highly utilitarian.

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@joefromchicago,

joefromchicago wrote:

It all depends on how you define "rational being." If you define it as "someone who is rational," then you've identified a real problem. If, on the other hand, you define it as "someone who is a member of the class of things that are capable of rationality," then there's no problem at all.

I think it's more sensible to define it the first way. The second is arbitrary in practice, because philosophers get to define class membership at will.

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@Thomas,

Oh Hell, philosophers do that with everything.

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

Henry's decision to order the killing of the prisoners was certainly not moral, but it was highly utilitarian.

I think what we have here is a difference in the usage of word "utilitarian". You are using it in the sense of "practical as opposed to ornamental". I am using it in the sense of "pertaining to the philosophy known as utilitarianism".

By both usages of the word, however, Henry's slaughter of the prisoners was a utilitarian gain only to himself. It was a huge utilitarian loss to the prisoners, and to a lesser extent, their guards. The overall consequences of Henry's act still amount to a sizable loss. It is this balance of consequences for everyone by which utilitarians judge the morality of actions. They would have no trouble condemning Henry's act as evil --- on utilitarian grounds.

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@Thomas,

It was of a huge utilitarian value to the thousands of men in Henry's army, had the French attempted to drive home the final attack. You're selecting your judgment just to sustain your argument.

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@Setanta,

So, break it down for me. How many prisoners did Henry kill, and how many of his own men did he save?

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@Thomas,

I don't know how many were killed, nor does anyone else as far as i know. I do know that the archers sent to do the killing were those who had been stationed with the men at arms, so at least 200. Therefore, arguably, at least hundreds of the prisoners were killed. Henry's army suffered relatively light casualties, so he was saving about 6000 or 7000 lives, from his point of view, for as much as he knew at the time, for as much as any of the English knew at that time.

That's why i say the force of the argument was vitiated when i lost the long, detailed post i had made. It explained why the French and Burgundians suffered so badly, but it also showed how Henry's bolt was shot after four hours of battle. Had that final French battle attacked, especially on horseback, the English could not have stopped them as they had the first two battles. At that juncture, his archers had no arrows, or only what they could pick up on the battlefield. The remaining French battle was larger than Henry's entire army had been before the battle began, and it included the crossbowmen, the Beauvais archers and the French artillery. From the English point of view, they were still doomed. In fact, being as objective as possible, even had they killed all the prisoners, if the final French battle had attacked with the support of their archers and artillery, the English were probably doomed. It was one of those eyeball to eyeball situations, and the French blinked.

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

I don't know how many were killed, nor does anyone else as far as i know. I do know that the archers sent to do the killing were those who had been stationed with the men at arms, so at least 200. Therefore, arguably, at least hundreds of the prisoners were killed. Henry's army suffered relatively light casualties, so he was saving about 6000 or 7000 lives, from his point of view, for as much as he knew at the time, for as much as any of the English knew at that time.

On these presumed facts, I stipulate that the King's decision was not immoral. To the contrary, it was the morally-best act he could perform. He is not responsible for the fact that he had no morally-better options available.

In your opinion, what decision, if any, would have been the moral one for Henry to make?

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@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

I think it's more sensible to define it the first way. The second is arbitrary in practice, because philosophers get to define class membership at will.

The second definition is no more arbitrary than the first. The first depends on what one would accept as "rational," the second merely depends on what one would accept as "human." The second is far easier to define.

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@Thomas,

Well, apparently, y0u're defining morality and utility identically--i'm no respecter of Bentham, and in fact am contemptuous of him. Henry was an intensely religious man, and had taken his little army in harm's way on the dubious assumption that his cause was just in the eyes of god, who would not let him lose. We know from other incidents in his life that he likely would have seen his act as murder, but would have taken it (and the burden of guilt) for sake of his men. Incidentally, the rest of Europe agreed that god must have been on Henry's side. A little over a year before, the French had taken the city of Soissons away from the Burgundians, who had taken and occupied the city (family quarrel, they had kissed and made up later). Although the people of Soissons were French, and had remained loyal to mad King Charles, the city was given over to the sack, to three days of plunder, murder and rape. They even hauled priests from their alters and monks from their monestaries to murder them. They hauled nuns out of their convents and raped and then murdered them.

Europe considered that god had punished the French for Soissons in 1414 with the battle of Azicourt in 1415. They were less impressed with Henry's claim, and considered the killing of the prisoners to have been murder. Henry seems to have agreed--he used a good deal of the money he got from ransoms (the king always gets a cut) to pay for perpetual masses for the victims, and endowed chantries, convents and monestaries to pray perpetually for the victims.

I can find no good reason to equate utility and morality, nor does it seem that either Henry in particular nor Europe in general did, either, in 1415.

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Attack my argument: morality of eating meat

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