301–310 of 319 posts
Is this any weirder than how a lot of companies let employees charge their personal electric vehicles for free, but won't let you expense personal gasoline?
If a company I worked for introduced that I think my response would be subterfuge. "Hey buddy, I'll have the steak but can you do me a favour and put 2 beetroot and feta tarts on the bill instead."
Gotcha. By "subterfuge", I assume you meant "risk my employment by committing reimbursement fraud".
lol, nobody takes reimbursements this seriously
Meat has an horrific environmental impact, so i can see why a socially conscious company would not want to associate itself to that. Notice that employees are still free to eat whatever they want, its just that the company will not pay for ecologically unsustainable meals. So the freedeom of choice of the employees is unchanged, they can still go out and grab a burguer but its out of their own pocket.
Of course this affects employee choices, to think otherwise is obtuse.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Gotcha. By "subterfuge", I assume you meant "risk my employment by committing reimbursement fraud".
> committing reimbursement fraud lol, nobody takes reimbursements this seriously
> In an email to employees this week outlining the new policy, co-founder Miguel McKelvey said the firm’s upcoming internal "Summer Camp" retreat would offer no meat options for attendees. Unlike some commenters, I'm okay with this! But the carbon cost of flying thousands of their employees on transatlantic return flights to the UK for this Summer Camp will be orders of magnitude greater than the carbon cost of any f…
You can't fix everything at once. Whataboutism, etc.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’m genuinely curious: you ask if one has any problem. Do you mean to imply that you have zero problem with this? When you watch a big cat torture and eat a prey animal, do you not have any sense at all that maybe the prey would prefer that not to happen? Or that, all else being equal, if the tiger could eat something that doesn’t seem to mind being eaten, that would be at least as good for everyone? Like, obviously…
> Do you mean to imply that you have zero problem with this? I really do have zero problem with animals killing and consuming other animals. > When you watch a big cat torture and eat a prey animal, I don't think it's fair to say that a big cat 'tortures' a prey animal. I suspect it's practice. Torture to me requires intent that I don't think the big cat has. > do you not have any sense at all that maybe the prey wou…
> I really do have zero problem with animals killing and consuming other animals.
> If the world could exist in a different state that had less suffering, that might be good. Not sure what it would cost though.
The first sounds like you agree with my posit “I sincerely don’t care.” The second sounds like you agree with my posit “I care a small amount, but not enough to make the unworkable solutions attractive.” The rest of your comment makes the latter seem more likely, and I’m inclined to believe that since it seems like a more coherent and defensible ethical framework.
If that’s the case, I think we’re basically in agreement: there is some problem with wild animals eating other wild animals. Terminology aside, predation clearly involves unnecessary suffering. (Not only on the prey, but on sick or injured predators, who painfully starve for want of prey!)
All else being equal, it would be preferable for that suffering not to happen, but since we can’t make it any better, we tacitly consent to the current state of affairs.
The only part I find curious is that where I would call that “a slight moral force”, you would call it “morally neutral”. Why is that? Why does the question “do you have any problem with this” make sense to you, when it sounds like you agree there is a self-evident — though nuanced, and relatively minor — problem?
I hope this doesn’t sound like I’m arguing with you. In fact, to reinforce our agreement:
> If you killed an animal painlessly, would there be any moral problem in consuming animals?
Speaking for myself, I certainly do have far less issue with eating an animal that I can be personally assured has only had “one bad day”. I don’t think animals care that they live in a cage, iff the cage is big enough; in fact, they probably prefer it. This opinion is overwhelmingly common among the other vegetarians I know. Those who dissent are generally worrying about other less-humane-seeming things such as premature separation of young from parents— and those concerns are always tempered with the acknowledgement that it’s still far more humane than the common practice.
(Primary reasons such people still do not eat meat: One, this type of meat is prohibitively expensive in most urban areas, and would be very infrequent; two, eating meat that infrequently has a tendency to make folks feel ill.)
Again, I’m mostly curious why you would have expected any other answer, since it seems like it’s the answer you believe is reasonable. Why do you expect us to disagree, here?
Digressing, I’ve noticed something curious about the cultural perception of vegetarians, in these comments and elsewhere. Folks like yourself, who have clearly thought quite a bit about the ethics of your practice, I think see vegetarians basically eye-to-eye, and we can agree to disagree about exactly where to draw the line personally.
But think about your typical suburban meat eater who deliberately avoids learning more about how livestock is raised or slaughtered, since that makes them feel uncomfortable about eating meat. I think that person is genuinely a bit concerned that if they thought too hard about it, they would realize that it’s wrong in their own moral code to thoughtlessly consume factory-farmed meat, and then they’d have to change their lifestyle in an unpleasant way.
So maybe it’s soothing for that person to believe that all vegetarians are pursuing some radical or fallacious reasoning to an absurd conclusion. But the thing is... we’re really just not.
Myself, and every (ethical) vegetarian I know, we’re using the same boring moral principle that applies to pre-verbal infants, PVS patients, chimps and dolphins, mammals culturally coded as pets, and so on: if it is not absolutely necessary to save another life, it is respectively [impermissible..very not-ok] to kill and eat that thing.
Yes, we expand the circle of concern by a single logical step. The rest is just... normal ethics. Whatever are the moral beliefs you think a reasonable person would consistently hold after taking that step, yeah, of course we hold those. Why on earth wouldn’t we?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Do you mean to imply that you have zero problem with this? I really do have zero problem with animals killing and consuming other animals. > When you watch a big cat torture and eat a prey animal, I don't think it's fair to say that a big cat 'tortures' a prey animal. I suspect it's practice. Torture to me requires intent that I don't think the big cat has. > do you not have any sense at all that maybe the prey wou…
Thank you for the candid response! I have to admit I’m a bit confused, though. In particular, these statements seem slightly at odds: > I really do have zero problem with animals killing and consuming other animals. > If the world could exist in a different state that had less suffering, that might be good. Not sure what it would cost though. The first sounds like you agree with my posit “I sincerely don’t care.” The…
I think your understanding of my reply is not correct. I have zero problem with animals killing other animals for food because it very typically is the only way they are able to eat and survive. I have read about (over the years, I don't have any sources) animals killing for "fun" or without eating their kill. I would have a problem with those cases.
> I think we’re basically in agreement: there is some problem with wild animals eating other wild animals.
We are not in agreement. I do not think there is any problem with wild animals eating other wild animals.
> Terminology aside, predation clearly involves unnecessary suffering.
I disagree with this. The suffering is necessary for wild animals. If lions could eat antelope without causing any fear or pain to the antelope, that would be nice - but these species have evolved in opposition to each other so there is no other way in nature for the lion to eat the antelope other than to catch it and kill it, which unfortunately causes suffering. As a human, I am more able to catch and kill my prey with minimal suffering, which is nice. I don't actually know if animals suffer for any length of time after being shot in the head, but if they do, it is reasonable to think that it is sub-second in duration. Sometimes things can go wrong, and suffering lasts longer. That is to be avoided.
> The only part I find curious is that where I would call that “a slight moral force”, you would call it “morally neutral”. Why is that? Why does the question “do you have any problem with this” make sense to you, when it sounds like you agree there is a self-evident — though nuanced, and relatively minor — problem?
I am not following you here I think. When I said "Killing animals for food I find morally neutral," I mean I have a right to eat and the animal has a right to survive. Those interests are in opposition. As far as hunting, given a fair chance - sometimes the animal will win and sometimes I will win. This is neutral to me. As far as farming there is an exchange - I provide food, shelter and protection for a short while, the animal provides me with nourishment. This is also neutral to me.
> Speaking for myself, I certainly do have far less issue with eating an animal that I can be personally assured has only had “one bad day”. I don’t think animals care that they live in a cage, iff the cage is big enough; in fact, they probably prefer it. This opinion is overwhelmingly common among the other vegetarians I know. Those who dissent are generally worrying about other less-humane-seeming things such as premature separation of young from parents— and those concerns are always tempered with the acknowledgement that it’s still far more humane than the common practice.
This sounds like you would not have a problem running your own farm and eating your own livestock. If you are able to take the enormous responsibility of animal husbandry seriously, it can be hugely rewarding and fulfilling.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you for the candid response! I have to admit I’m a bit confused, though. In particular, these statements seem slightly at odds: > I really do have zero problem with animals killing and consuming other animals. > If the world could exist in a different state that had less suffering, that might be good. Not sure what it would cost though. The first sounds like you agree with my posit “I sincerely don’t care.” The…
> The first sounds like you agree with my posit “I sincerely don’t care.” The second sounds like you agree with my posit “I care a small amount, but not enough to make the unworkable solutions attractive.” The rest of your comment makes the latter seem more likely, and I’m inclined to believe that since it seems like a more coherent and defensible ethical framework. I think your understanding of my reply is not corre…
That is, suppose A desires to kill B, and B desires to kill A, but neither A nor B desires to die. These interests are irreconcilable. “A and B kill each other with equal probability” is a potential resolution to the dilemma, but to my mind, that does not make it morally neutral. To wit, it is morally dispreferable to the universes where A and B resolve their differences, forget each other exists, hallucinate having succeeded in killing each other without actually doing so, and so on.
The preferred resolutions may be outlandishly infeasible to implement, but that won’t ever convince me that they are all morally equivalent.
Since we’re aligned on taking practical steps to minimize unnecessary suffering, we probably won’t gain anything from debating principles, but hopefully that helps you understand my surprise at your question.
I think it’s likely that you do apply my sort of reasoning in other situations, as I likely do yours. Something to muse on, maybe.
> This sounds like you would not have a problem running your own farm and eating your own livestock.
No substantial moral problem, no. On the other hand I also have no substantial moral reason to do so, and it would be an unpleasant change to my current lifestyle :)