French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers • Hacker News Board

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#61

Post by africanboy » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 5:51 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #56

bobthechef wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't enslave an animal that lacks free will and intellect by nature. Whether such farming practices are cruel is dependent on the particular practices. Obviously, one ought not be cruel to animals whether they lack free will and intellect or not. However, much of the woolly and sentimental "animal rights" polemic is grounded in gross misapprehension and anthropomorphization of animals other than us. It is terrib…

> You can't enslave an animal that lacks free will and intellect by nature. I challenge you to define “free will” in a way which is simultaneously testable, and also something humans have and other animals lack. I have yet to hear a single definition which is all three at the same time, despite my A-level in philosophy — every testable definition I’ve encountered has either been something animals and humans both have…

> I challenge you to define “free will” in a way which is simultaneously testable, and also something humans have and other animals lack

every animal, except humans, lack the neurological structures to process the concept of "free will" which is entirely a human construct.

If they had free will, they would fight for it or at least some of them would.

One could argue that we still don't know the human brain, so how can we exclude that animals haven't what it takes to understand free will?

But it's the same thing of saying that God exists because we can't disprove it.

And if we assume that cows understand it, why exclude other animals, like fish, or some plant or fungi?

We assume they don't have it because they never showed to care about it.

Cattle can be incredibly aggressive too.

it is proven that regardless of age and environmental conditions, some individuals remain more aggressive than others. Aggression in cattle can arise from both genetic and environmental factors.

Aggression between cows is worse than that between bulls. Bulls with horns will bunt (push or strike with the horns) in which can cause more damage overall

interesting read from Dennet

https://lafavephilosophy.x10host.com/dennett_anim_csness.htm...

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#62

Post by africanboy » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 6:04 PM UTC

uppe wrote: post #17

HDMI_Cable wrote: post #2

> “We tried explaining to our 75 cows that they needed to produce less milk but they don’t seem to have understood,” I don't know why, but this is the funniest thing I've read in a while. I can just imagine the monk explaining COVID to these cows, and just getting a "Moo" in return.

Maybe don't impregnate them then. Cows don't magically produce milk, they are mammals and lactate because they had babies. They actually forcibly impregnate them and kill their babies if it's a male (veal) and keeps the loop going until the mother can't produce more babies and thus becomes unprofitable. That's funny to you? Sounds like torture and slavery to me. edit: wow, what a surprise, downvoted to the bottom. I…

> Maybe don't impregnate them then

> That's funny to you?

It happens every year to wild cows too that are impregnated by males because that's what bovines do.

they don't plan on parenting

Also calf mortality is correlated with the body weight of the mother when they are born, domesticates cows have almost zero calf mortality rate, contrary to what happens to wild cows.

They will also die due to predators, weaknesses, attacked by a bull or older males or for other natural causes, that they don't encounter when living in a farm

It's perfectly natural for a cow to see her calves die, it's part of their biological destiny.

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#63

Post by 1MachineElf » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 6:08 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #45

1MachineElf wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slightly related to the original post here, if you ever wondered how monks ended up in posession of 75 cows and farming land, Max Miller did an interesting and funny explanation of it on his Tasting History YT channel: https://youtu.be/zz0y1d6IIpY

> if you ever wondered how monks ended up in posession of 75 cows and farming land Did it sound strange to you? Farming and crafts are a core part of many monasteries, and many famous foods and drinks have been invented or refined by monks. Everything from Champagne and Buckfast. They have to do something simple to earn money and keep busy. And they’re usually in the countryside so have farm land by default. What do…

Indeed, and it wasn't always so. The video discusses the two skinny/pious/austere monk vs. the fat/drunken/jolly monk stereotypes, and the history of how the transition between the two came to be.

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#64

Post by novok » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 6:11 PM UTC

seanwilson wrote: post #55

jiofih wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We kill the male calves May have been true a few decades ago, but currently the farmers will buy “sexed” sperm (selected for females). I’ve never seen a male calf being killed for that reason.

Either way, a typical female dairy cow during its lifetime is made to give birth about 4 times (they don't give milk otherwise), each time its baby is taken away so maximum milk can be harvested and then the mother is killed about 5 years into its 20 year lifespan when it stops producing as much milk. This is the reality of profitable dairy farming and people don't like to be told about it or think about it. If you t…

Most of them are not farmed in a sustainable cycle that prevents those animals from become endangered species? Or they think of the animals as pet animals.

As for fur, I'm guessing it's because a moral panic happened in the 80s and nobody really cared that much about fur, since it was a luxury item for a few, while meat, milk and leather somewhat is something that everyone pretty much still uses today worldwide.

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#65

Post by bluefirebrand » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 6:11 PM UTC

seanwilson wrote: post #55

jiofih wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We kill the male calves May have been true a few decades ago, but currently the farmers will buy “sexed” sperm (selected for females). I’ve never seen a male calf being killed for that reason.

Either way, a typical female dairy cow during its lifetime is made to give birth about 4 times (they don't give milk otherwise), each time its baby is taken away so maximum milk can be harvested and then the mother is killed about 5 years into its 20 year lifespan when it stops producing as much milk. This is the reality of profitable dairy farming and people don't like to be told about it or think about it. If you t…

You've convinced me. I no longer care that some countries kill dolphins or whales or cats or whatever for food and foxes for fur.

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#66

Post by lucianbr » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 6:12 PM UTC

africanboy wrote: post #61

ben_w wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can't enslave an animal that lacks free will and intellect by nature. I challenge you to define “free will” in a way which is simultaneously testable, and also something humans have and other animals lack. I have yet to hear a single definition which is all three at the same time, despite my A-level in philosophy — every testable definition I’ve encountered has either been something animals and humans both have…

> I challenge you to define “free will” in a way which is simultaneously testable, and also something humans have and other animals lack every animal, except humans, lack the neurological structures to process the concept of "free will" which is entirely a human construct. If they had free will, they would fight for it or at least some of them would. One could argue that we still don't know the human brain, so how ca…

How is it possible to know that animals have or do not have "the required neurological structures to process the concept of free will", without a definition of free will?

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#67

Post by throw0101a » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 6:12 PM UTC

HDMI_Cable wrote: post #2

> “We tried explaining to our 75 cows that they needed to produce less milk but they don’t seem to have understood,” I don't know why, but this is the funniest thing I've read in a while. I can just imagine the monk explaining COVID to these cows, and just getting a "Moo" in return.

> I can just imagine the monk explaining COVID to these cows, and just getting a "Moo" in return.

They need Ein from Cowboy Bebop. See specifically episode/session seventeen, "Mushroom Samba".

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#68

Post by tsimionescu » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 6:14 PM UTC

uppe wrote: post #17

HDMI_Cable wrote: post #2

> “We tried explaining to our 75 cows that they needed to produce less milk but they don’t seem to have understood,” I don't know why, but this is the funniest thing I've read in a while. I can just imagine the monk explaining COVID to these cows, and just getting a "Moo" in return.

Maybe don't impregnate them then. Cows don't magically produce milk, they are mammals and lactate because they had babies. They actually forcibly impregnate them and kill their babies if it's a male (veal) and keeps the loop going until the mother can't produce more babies and thus becomes unprofitable. That's funny to you? Sounds like torture and slavery to me. edit: wow, what a surprise, downvoted to the bottom. I…

With the exception of industrial farming, everything that humans normally do to animals is much nicer than the way wild animals live and end their lives. So as long as you make sure to get your milk and meat from traditional farming, you're supporting practices that are much kinder to the animals then nature would be.

Animals in nature inevitably die violent or painful deaths, often being eaten alive by other animals while they slowly starve. They often live lives of subsistence, with periodic times where they are near starvation or freezing and barely survive. They are often in ruthless competition for food and mates with their own species. They will sometimes eat their own young when conditions are especially bad, or eat the young of others to improve their own chance at reproduction.

If we're talking in pre-industrial times, if I had to choose between the life of a Buffalo or a domestic cow, I would take my chances as the cow.

Now, industrial practices like factory farming are truly horrifying and on that side I agree that they should be stopped, despite the increase in cost that will represent to animal products.

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#69

Post by africanboy » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 6:15 PM UTC

lucianbr wrote: post #66

africanboy wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I challenge you to define “free will” in a way which is simultaneously testable, and also something humans have and other animals lack every animal, except humans, lack the neurological structures to process the concept of "free will" which is entirely a human construct. If they had free will, they would fight for it or at least some of them would. One could argue that we still don't know the human brain, so how ca…

How is it possible to know that animals have or do not have "the required neurological structures to process the concept of free will", without a definition of free will?

because if you scan the brain of a cow with an MRI and start talking about free will to it, nothing lights up.

they respond to food, loud noises, other physical stimuli, but not to philosophy.

Also, if you open the gates of a farm, cows don't run.

Quoting Dennet

Let us return to our vultures. Consider the hypothesis that for all I could ever know, rotting chicken carcass smells to a turkey vulture exactly the way roast turkey smells to me. Can science shed any light, pro or con, on this hypothesis? Yes, it can almost effortlessly refute it: since how roast turkey tastes to me is composed (and exhausted) by the huge set of reactive dispositions, memory effects, and so on, and so forth, that are detectable in principle in my brain and behavior, and since many of these are utterly beyond the machinery of any vulture's brain, it is flat impossible that anything could smell to a vulture the way roast turkey smells to me.

but let's suppose cows have some sort of free will concept.

if they can't explain it to us, how will we ever understand it? (because it's impossible they have the same free will concept we have)

and if we project our roast turkey smell (free will) concept to cows, how can we be sure that it's what they need or want, if they can't even communicate a yes/no to us?

All our philosophical concepts are based on millennia of history that's been transmitted to future generations that built new concepts on the old ones

They are not "natural"

if you take a child to a remote location and abandon him/her there they wouldn't even know about death or illness, let alone laws or rules or free will. Because nobody thaught them.

We are basically still stuck in a Solaris situation.

but the question still stands, so I propose another one: how do we know that dogs want to live in our homes?

modern neuroscience can explain a lot of things that philosophy still consider questions.

Re: French monks locked down with 2.8 tonnes of cheese pray for buyers

#70

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Mar 27, 2021, 6:23 PM UTC

bluefirebrand wrote: post #65

seanwilson wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Either way, a typical female dairy cow during its lifetime is made to give birth about 4 times (they don't give milk otherwise), each time its baby is taken away so maximum milk can be harvested and then the mother is killed about 5 years into its 20 year lifespan when it stops producing as much milk. This is the reality of profitable dairy farming and people don't like to be told about it or think about it. If you t…

You've convinced me. I no longer care that some countries kill dolphins or whales or cats or whatever for food and foxes for fur.

[deleted]