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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   25097 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 25, 2023

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Hey actually, to all animals you’re more evil than Hitler. Animal lives matter. Have you considered being not animal Uber-Hitler?

I mean there is a smuggled premise that animals have something like moral equivalence to humans. It's a kind of hack of empathy and personification that we don't like admitting that animals just don't have moral equivalence. It's the same instinct that makes you cringe when a doll's head is ripped off. Hitler was killing people who have moral equivalence to humans, the argument is much simpler.

Isn’t animals not having moral equivalence just another axiomatic assumption you can make? How would you prove that someone is in the wrong for assigning moral equivalence to chickens?

And supposing you value humans more due to our intelligence, does that mean it is more ethical to make unintelligent humans suffer than intelligent ones? You can substitute any other attribute other than intelligence here.

If instead you go the route of saying “I am arbitrarily drawing the line at humans because I am speciesist, but all other animals are fair game,” can’t someone else arbitrarily tighten that circle further and say “I am arbitrarily drawing the line at whites because I am racist, but all other humans and animals are fair game”?

Is there an argument that both allows you to ethically kill or factory farm animals for food, without also allowing someone else to ethically kill or factory farm animals for food? (Disregard how inefficient and pointless factory farming humans for meat would be, this is just a question about the ethics of it.)

How would you prove that someone is in the wrong for assigning moral equivalence to chickens?

I wouldn't, it's none of my business what weird other people value unless they make it my business by attempting to impose their beliefs on me.

And supposing you value humans more due to our intelligence

Intelligence is an important but not the only reason I place moral weight on human life.

does that mean it is more ethical to make unintelligent humans suffer than intelligent ones

Marginally yes. And yes, as I know where you intend to go with this if you find a human with pig level intelligence then I'd barely consider them human and my opposition to their subjugation would primarily be aesthetic. A disgust of the type that causes me to oppose incest or bestialities that have been philosophically spherical cowed to cause no harm.

If instead you go the route of saying “I am arbitrarily drawing the line at humans because I am speciesist, but all other animals are fair game,” can’t someone else arbitrarily tighten that circle further and say “I am arbitrarily drawing the line at whites because I am racist, but all other humans and animals are fair game”?

People already do that with race and I oppose it. The arguments over what moral line we draw is a live debate and I don't find this line of reasoning any more convincing from vegans trying to get me to include nonhumans than from racists trying to get me to exclude Laotians or whomever.

Is there an argument that both allows you to ethically kill or factory farm animals for food, without also allowing someone else to ethically kill or factory farm animals for food?

I presume you meant one of these to say humans. And yes, the argument is that humans are not morally fungible with animals. Not one chicken, not ten chickens, not infinity chickens.

the argument is that humans are not morally fungible with animals. Not one chicken, not ten chickens, not infinity chickens.

And we’re back to the starting point, aren’t we?

What arguments do you present for drawing such a moral line between humans and animals?

You're the one including the premise in your argument, it's on you to prove this, not me to prove the negative.

  • There is a moral difference between hurting humans and hurting animals
  • There is a moral equivalence between hurting humans and hurting animals

I don’t see how one side is inherently more of a “positive” claim than the other. Regardless, if you take the position of moral difference by default, how do you respond to the Nazi who says “There is a moral difference between gassing Aryans and gassing Jews”?

Hey actually, to all animals you’re more evil than Hitler. Animal lives matter. Have you considered being not animal Uber-Hitler?

I flagged the premise as being smuggled in here and lodged my disagreement. I know it wasn't you who did it but that's the point where it needed to be proved.

Regardless, if you take the position of moral difference by default, how do you respond to the Nazi who says “There is a moral difference between gassing Aryans and gassing Jews”?

I would disagree with them on the basis that Jews and Aryans are both human and that human life is sacred. If I needed to ground out that human life is sacred I would say that I and all my loved ones are humans and I have a vested interest in their lives not being forfeit. If they were in power and planned on gassing Jews I would shoot them if able.

I flagged the premise as being smuggled in here and lodged my disagreement.

Ah gotcha, thanks for the clarification.

If I needed to ground out that human life is sacred I would say that I and all my loved ones are humans and I have a vested interest in their lives not being forfeit.

Fair enough! But surely the Nazi will also ground out their values in a similar manner: “Aryan lives are sacred because I and all my loved ones are Aryans. Non-Aryan lives though are not morally fungible with Aryan lives: not one, not ten, not infinity.”

What can you say to the Nazi that invalidates their argument, without also arguing on behalf of veganism?

Their Aryan loved ones have the same common humanity as the jews and the people of other nations. Maintaining the sacredness of humanity is a ward against other groups of people deciding to discount your people's humanity. It's a very strong schelling point.

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If instead you go the route of saying “I am arbitrarily drawing the line at humans because I am speciesist, but all other animals are fair game,” can’t someone else arbitrarily tighten that circle further and say “I am arbitrarily drawing the line at whites because I am racist, but all other humans and animals are fair game”?

Is there an argument that both allows you to ethically kill or factory farm animals for food, without also allowing someone else to ethically kill or factory farm animals for food? (Disregard how inefficient and pointless factory farming humans for meat would be, this is just a question about the ethics of it.)

Well if someone made the 'racist' argument I would tell them good luck with the law, which cares not about your bizarre dietary principles. But really my argument, which I think solves the dilemma in your second paragraph, is that I won't eat anything that can argue for its life. Humans are the only creatures that can do so to my knowledge, so I won't eat humans. If chickens or pigs developed that ability I don't think I'd be able to eat them either.

Well if someone made the 'racist' argument I would tell them good luck with the law, which cares not about your bizarre dietary principles.

Sure, but we’re not debating the law as it is, only theoretical morality. Veganism is not the law in most (or all?) places on earth, but that doesn’t stop some people from arguing for that.

I won't eat anything that can argue for its life

This sounds like a more refined version of “it’s okay to eat sufficiently unintelligent things.” Does this extend to human infants, non-verbal highly autistic adults, or anyone else whose intelligence falls below the threshold of arguing for their own existence?

I don't think you need full moral equivalence for vegan arguments to work. You just need a sufficient ratio. Even of chickens have only 1% of the moral value of humans the suffering we inflict upon them in factory farms is a great evil. On the other hand if chickens have 10^-100 times the moral value of humans its trivial. Unfortunately we are far from the point where we can actually compute such a ratio with any authority (though many have tried) so often the arguments fall back to intuition and emotion.

I reject even putting it on the same scale. It implies what you then go on to exploit, that they are at all fungible - this would require some kind of argumentation.

Even of chickens have only 1% of the moral value of humans

In practice, it's not even close to this.

Anyone who would direct a trolley problem trolley at one person to save 100 chickens is someone I would consider an aberrant moral monster.

Personally, I would be extremely suspicious of anyone who would save ANY number of chickens over a single human. But anyone who puts the number at anything less than 100,000 is actually mind-boggling to me.

You don’t have to go even that far. Eating a lot of meat is a luxury (I think some small amount is necessary for health) so given that the choice is wants vs morals, there’s no good moral reason to choose to eat large portions of meat.

I don’t think that requires the trolley directed at humans, and I wouldn’t do that.

There is. The moral reason is that I want to, and anything I want to do is more moral than anything I don't. I have an overwhelming moral responsibility to myself to maximise the enjoyment of the single, limited lifespan I have. A life un-lived is the most immoral thing imaginable; it is a waste of the single most precious gift any of us can ever receive.

Maybe I’m not understanding you but I’m not sure how not having meat as the main dish of your meal is that much of a diminished enjoyment. Most of the time, for me, I don’t miss it. I don’t say no entirely to meat, I’m just not making it the star of the meal.

I don't think there's a valuable moral lesson to be learned from me sending a trolley at 7.888 billion humans to divert it away from my children.

In a society where everyone was raised from birth to be vegan it’d be equally obvious a chicken is worth more than 0.1% of a human and anyone who said otherwise would be considered morally abhorrent.

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