Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by John Major on May 18, 2012 at 2:35pm

There is no good evidence plants suffer. Animals are raised eating plants anyway!

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Permalink Reply by Natarajan Shanker on April 22, 2011 at 2:05am

By that definition, avoiding eating human flesh is also just being picky.

 

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Permalink Reply by Akshay Bist on April 22, 2011 at 2:09am

guess we're all picky eaters then, huh? Except for cannibals ofc.

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Permalink Reply by Heather Spoonheim on April 22, 2011 at 2:12am

Well even cannibals think that clowns taste funny.

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Permalink Reply by Heather Spoonheim on April 22, 2011 at 10:09pm

LOL, thanks.  I just read it again and laughed too.  Very old joke.

Permalink Reply by Arcus on April 23, 2011 at 3:05am

And they hate coming home to a cold shoulder. :)

Permalink Reply by Arcus on April 22, 2011 at 5:07pm

Including humans is a bit outside the scope of the discussion. I doubt too many would disagree to the fact that there is a difference between hearding humans vs animals for their meat. This, for me, becomes an overextention of the argument, essentially a reductio ad absurdum.

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Permalink Reply by Heather Spoonheim on April 22, 2011 at 5:14pm

I think it's fair to ask why meat eaters would abstain from particular types of flesh - it does make one think about the issue. Obviously we don't select what we eat solely from nutritional/flavour evaluations. I've eaten dog, but I would be uncomfortable eating a dog that I knew as a pet, after playing fetch with it and stuff, and I don't think that is hypocritical at all. I don't think eating humans is a good idea because I value humans for more than just their flesh - and I don't think that is hypocritical. As far as eating human who have already died, well I would tend to avoid that because it would be an affront to the emotional sensibilities of their family, because I would be concerned about eating them if they died of disease that might taint the flesh, because humans have a disgusting diet and I believe this might make the flesh toxic in some ways, because I think humans might have a flavour that I would find unusual and difficult to adjust to. I don't think this is being picky or hypocritical.

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Permalink Reply by Arcus on April 22, 2011 at 5:34pm

I think there are two parts to the argument:

1. What is considered edible as percieved by our senses and scientifically measurable (i.e. that we have taste receptors for i.e. proteins/amino acids and sucroses (umami and sweet)).

2. What we percieve as tasting 'good; which is more a socially conditioned thing (i.e. hindi not eating beef, jews not eating pork, vegeterians not eating meat, etc).

The argument is, of course, much more extensive, but I trust you to have the intellect to fill in the blanks and I don't need to type up a complete argument. That we don't eat something we may scientifically not dislike is by definition caused by other than scientific factors which rely on argumentation which can be either weak (easily challenged) or strong. Not eating humans has strong arguments behind it (as you just pointed out), but I do not percieve most strict vegeterian arguments to be very strong.

Side note: It should be noted that I believe humanity would do well in substantially reducing their meat consumption, and a strong argument (among a number) would be environmental concerns.

Permalink Reply by T A A on April 22, 2011 at 1:05am

Not at all, my 10 years of being vegetarian were DESPITE my loving meat and nearly all its flavour variants. This has been true of 95% of the vegetarians I've known.

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Permalink Reply by Arcus on April 22, 2011 at 5:09pm

Then why?

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Permalink Reply by T A A on April 22, 2011 at 6:43pm

As I previously mentioned... :)

The argumentation that swayed me to become vegetarian for 10 years were my health, environmental health, domestic animal welfare. When I became lactose intolerant, my personal condition overcame my politics. So now I only eat meat infrequently. Truth be told, after those 10 years my health had not generally improved, but would it have declined more had I not been vegetarian? Impossible to say without testing. Which is the challenge with all studies claiming vegetarians are healthier, those are epidemiological studies with which much can be faulted.

From those three arguments, fake meat would only alleviate domestic animal suffering, but to think it would have any other positive effect, I'd be much surprised.

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