Live data from Hacker News

World's first no-kill eggs go on sale in Berlin (2018)

theguardian.com

251–260 of 427 posts

Re: World's first no-kill eggs go on sale in Berlin (2018)

#251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plants are not beings under any standard usage of the word. While plants certainly communicate and show some level of computational processing, there is no evidence they have subjective experiences. There is a very clearly line to be drawn between plants and animals. And if that's not a compelling enough counterargument, there are two additional issues with trying to conflate plants and animals in this context. First…

People made this exact same "no evidence" argument about animals for years, and many still believe it. The fact is we don't know enough about how plants or animals experience life to be sure of anything.

People made the claim _while_ ignoring the evidence. And as I went on to argue, if you really want to play it safe and assume plant sentience, you would still adopt a plant-based diet.

Re: World's first no-kill eggs go on sale in Berlin (2018)

#252
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Empathy is great, but unfortunately it's not a fix. There's only so much empathy we can have for the environment around us without giving away everything and getting nothing in return. Having empathy for the needs of your fellow human beings is still empathy, even if it comes at the cost of empathy for animals. Empathy for animals at the cost of empathy for your fellow humans is no more a solution than the other way…

Typically, people who have a higher-than-average concern for the welfare of animals also have a higher-than-average concern for welfare of people. Compassion and empathy seems to grow for both, not be a trade-off. Compare an analogous concern to the one you raise: "what if caring about people of color comes at the cost of empathy for your fellow whites?"

I walk past PETA’s west coast headquarters in Los Angeles every week, and they have inset windows behind a small ledge that’s raised from the street and protected from the weather [1]. They have the raised metal studs near the edge of the ledge, which are called “skateboard deterrents” [2], but given that the ledge is a couple inches high and unsuitable for any sort of grind trick, the purpose is clearly to prevent the homeless from sleeping on the ledge comfortably. My take on the vegan debate is that people who do it are making a good choice both practically and morally, and I wish I had the willpower to make it, and I also understand that PETA represents a very specific brand of veganism and animal welfare, but I always feel pretty sad when I see that PETA building and its unethical treatment of humans.

[1] https://goo.gl/maps/iDZ2TZV4o12DiKtL8

[2] https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/06/how-cit...

Re: World's first no-kill eggs go on sale in Berlin (2018)

#253
post #33
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Capon is considered animal cruelty in many countries, so availability is an issue here. Aside from that I'm not sure how you imagine not killing the birds by eating them?

I'm simply stating that raising them to eat is better than just gassing them immediately. If you're against eating meat as a principle then it's probably pretty useless. But eating the less wanted meat or produce really helps preventing pollution through overproduction of food that is never eaten. There are many people that think it's more ethical to kill a cow just for it's meat than to eat the meat of a horse, whic…

> I'm simply stating that raising them to eat is better than just gassing them immediately.

On what basis, though? From a humane perspective, the quicker you kill a chicken the less suffering it does, and it's not like the culled chicks are ultimately wasted.

Re: World's first no-kill eggs go on sale in Berlin (2018)

#256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a false dichotomy. Who's advocating for less empathy for humans?

Nobody's advocating less empathy for humans, what I'm suggesting is that according to spoon theory, there's only so much in a day you can give a shit about before you burn out [YMMV]. I'm suggesting that when you put all your empathy into caring for one thing at the cost of another, typically yourself, it's a hard path to walk. Empathy as a fix all, isn't. There needs to be balance between what's reasonable, feasible…

The spoon theory definitely applies as you change your behavior but once you’ve made new habits, it’s not the same. Spoons aren’t used up by category of empathy, if you heard detailed life stories of those dying of war or COVID it would be equally as taxing. I care about animal welfare and changed my habits to reflect that (when I felt I could, slowly over years) but like everyone, there is a line where there additional changes are “too much”. Eg, I’m not going to live without electricity or live purely offgrid, to me this is not practical and the positive impact that may have doesn’t outweigh the negative impact to my life.

If you have a lot of pressures in your life, adding a diet change to that is not realistic. Pushing for meat alternatives in convenient places and making it easy for large groups of people to have small cognitive load (low cost of spoons) to go without meat for a meal is far more impactful than trying to convince everyone to go “full vegan or you are a monster”. If you have the time to consider your options and make a change to your habits that match your values, great, otherwise power to those trying to make those choices easier for everyone. Don’t let it weigh on you, take care of yourself and create space to make the changes you want to see in yourself.

Re: World's first no-kill eggs go on sale in Berlin (2018)

#257
post #16

I am by far not an animal rights activst and enjoy my daily portion of meat and dairy, but shreddering millions of male chicks always struck me als plain wrong, even by my carnivorian standards. This is progress that I fully support and I would not mind paying a little(!) extra to make sure that for my scrambled eggs no male chicken are shreddered.

This strikes me as an extremely weird attitude. The chicken you're eating lived for generally seven to nine weeks, probably with limited or no access to the outdoors and likely in a small cage. It was then transported a fairly long distance with no food or water on a lorry, then killed by either being hung upside down on a conveyor and dragged through electrified water, or gassed (usually with CO2, which is not painless).

This all sounds much, much worse than a fairly instant death almost immediately out of coming out of the egg, to me...

I suppose it's kind of _unaesthetic_, and maybe people have unrealistic impressions of what the lives of the chickens that don't get shredded are like, but I think this is all mostly a perception issue.

Re: World's first no-kill eggs go on sale in Berlin (2018)

#258
This is cool, but doesn't seem like it would scale. When I say scale, I mean farms with a few hundred to a few thousand bird operation, good luck affording this machine. When the article says scale, they mean being able to do this with millions of eggs on an industrial feedlot. Trying to make industrial farming ethical is like trying to make fossil fuels not harmful to the environment.

Re: World's first no-kill eggs go on sale in Berlin (2018)

#259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a real vegan (not a meme about vegans that you saw from meat eaters) I can confidently tell you that "animals are alive and they have feelings and senses, we abuse them for food" is not my biggest line of defense. My biggest lines of defense are: * Dr. Kim Williams, former president of the American College of Cardiology, said "there are two kinds of cardiologists, vegans, and those who haven't read the data" * Ani…

meat only provides 18% of our calories But what percentage of our protein?

Americans consume protein like its the only nutrient that matters and that not getting the maximum amount possible will make you lose all of your muscle and become emaciated. Frankly, this is certainly helped by general marketing campaigns from the meat and dairy industry where they basically claim that protein makes you stronger.

The truth is pretty far from that and most people with a regular omnivore diet get enough protein just through the plants they eat without even considering the meat. The human body burns protein and most excess protein just ends up getting burned along with carbs and fat.

So while animals may take up a large percentage of protein intake, our irrationally high collective protein intake is hardly a good reason to chose meat over plants. Eating meat is really all about calorie density.

Re: World's first no-kill eggs go on sale in Berlin (2018)

#260
>Male chicks don’t grow fast enough to justify the cost of feeding them up for meat.

Why is this? Logically that would mean that either 1) females grow faster than males, or 2) all chickens that are used for meat are first used for laying eggs, because that's the only economic way. I'm fairly sure that neither is the case.

Post reply on HN