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World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

reuters.com

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Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#51

Post by MathCodeLove »

causasui wrote: post #23
nefitty wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I commend you for your decision. I want to add that framing my ideas about animal suffering in an elastic way makes it easier for me to make incremental changes. An animal is either alive or dead. Maybe eating vegetarian once a week will save a life down the line. I urge everyone to resist the all-or-nothing approach, especially on such an important aspect of our ethical choices. No one's perfect, not even the vegan…

> I urge everyone to resist the all-or-nothing approach There is no other moral stance where someone could reasonably say this. Veganism is a moral stance the same way as "racism is bad" and "abusing my spouse is bad" is a moral stance. No one would ever say "I'm trying to limit kicking dogs to just Tuesday-Sunday". > vegan straight edge kids on Instagram who sneak a chicken nugget when no one's looking. You're proje…

I disagree and your comparisons aren't accurate. A more accurate comparison would he to say its like "I'm going to ride my bike to work once a week" or "I'll pick up trash at the local park once a week".

I don't have to view eating meat or driving my car an inherently immoral in order to recognize the objective negative ecological impact that those actions have, and to therefore want to engage in some form of harm reduction from time to time.

Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#52

Post by p1necone »

vmception wrote: post #33

It was always possible for me to perceive sentience, feelings and emotions from a variety of beings, I don't understand why grown adults are just reaching a cognitive maturity to notice that and making that a line in the sand on whether they will farm/consume a being based on that. These seem to be two separate things to me? Can someone shed light on both: a) why these are related concepts b) your journey to cognitiv…

I'm often confused by this as well, it's always been fairly obvious to me that other animals are sentient just like us (why wouldn't they be, their physiology is similar, they're descended from common ancestors).

Modern factory farming doesn't sit well with me, but I still fairly comfortably eat higher welfare (free range, from reputable brands) or self-caught/hunted meat.

It bewilders me that someone would eat meat their whole life without ever thinking about this, and then one day suddenly go "ohhh, maybe this is bad".

Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#53

Post by joe5150 »

undersuit wrote: post #44
karpierz wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Of course, we can't stop eating every animal Why? There are plenty of people who do.

There are plenty of people who strive for some kind of vegetarian or vegan diet, but they aren't not eating animals unless they are inspecting every food item they consume for all the microscopic animals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micro-animal

I think it's well understood that when vegans or vegetarians say they don't eat "animals" they are generally talking about, at minimum, macrobiota and not tardigrades, etc.

Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#54

Post by rectang »

vmception wrote: post #33

It was always possible for me to perceive sentience, feelings and emotions from a variety of beings, I don't understand why grown adults are just reaching a cognitive maturity to notice that and making that a line in the sand on whether they will farm/consume a being based on that. These seem to be two separate things to me? Can someone shed light on both: a) why these are related concepts b) your journey to cognitiv…

One perspective: The universe is indifferent to your ethics and whether they are self-consistent or inconsistent. Choices "matter" insofar as they have observable effects that somebody cares about, but ultimately all morality is constructed.

And so, why not a draw a line here, or over there, or instead way out there?

Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#55

Post by pempem »

awb wrote: post #47
vmception wrote: post #33

It was always possible for me to perceive sentience, feelings and emotions from a variety of beings, I don't understand why grown adults are just reaching a cognitive maturity to notice that and making that a line in the sand on whether they will farm/consume a being based on that. These seem to be two separate things to me? Can someone shed light on both: a) why these are related concepts b) your journey to cognitiv…

It wasn't until someone mentioned that many animals (and all mammals) talk to their babies just like we do that it rung home for me.

Its unclear to me. Some variants of hinduism have embraced this for ages.

The underlying belief of vegetarianism in this culture is that animals are kin and eaten only when survival is on the line. When there is choice (and there almost always is) you choose not to eat meat.

The part that I've found newly confounding is the 'thinking' of plants. Can't square that one. Thankfully there are a few studies debunking anything along the lines of sentience:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28875517/

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00709-020-01579-w

Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#56

Post by deutschewelle »

vmception wrote: post #33

It was always possible for me to perceive sentience, feelings and emotions from a variety of beings, I don't understand why grown adults are just reaching a cognitive maturity to notice that and making that a line in the sand on whether they will farm/consume a being based on that. These seem to be two separate things to me? Can someone shed light on both: a) why these are related concepts b) your journey to cognitiv…

In case it wasn't obvious the studies and this article is being written by people in the West who do not consume octopus. These articles almost always seem to derive to us-vs-them narrative, the idea that the West is somehow the forefront of moral novelty and the rest of the world is behind.

When the irony is that the same random argument applied towards Octopus can be done on just about any sentient beings like cow and pigs. As a german, my understanding of Western narratives are almost always aimed at patting themselves on the back.

I still remember Western media going in to overdrive to condemn masks during the onset of the pandemic, deriding Asian countries practice of wearing masks when you are sick as some sort of a backward psuedoscience.

Let's just call this article what it is: To reassure non-octopus eaters on their superior moral creed and a license to preach this narrative to people who consume octopus, namely Asian and European countries.

Already the comments on reddit are poking fun at Asian countries for eating octopus when in fact its Western Europe that consumes the largest amount. Octopus isn't just that delicious as a sashimi in large amounts.

Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#57

Post by Larrikin »

gerdesj wrote: post #3
miguel_rdp wrote: post #2

On a very lateral note, pulpo a la gallega is made with boiled, not seared, octopus

I shall instruct my octopodal mates to avoid hot baths and go for the incineration option instead. This is a tricky one. Where do you draw the line as an omnivore?

Anything tasty that won't make me sick

Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#58

Post by deutschewelle »

rectang wrote: post #54
vmception wrote: post #33

It was always possible for me to perceive sentience, feelings and emotions from a variety of beings, I don't understand why grown adults are just reaching a cognitive maturity to notice that and making that a line in the sand on whether they will farm/consume a being based on that. These seem to be two separate things to me? Can someone shed light on both: a) why these are related concepts b) your journey to cognitiv…

One perspective: The universe is indifferent to your ethics and whether they are self-consistent or inconsistent. Choices "matter" insofar as they have observable effects that somebody cares about, but ultimately all morality is constructed. And so, why not a draw a line here, or over there, or instead way out there?

It's similar to a lot of the ideological absurdities being unleashed by the political establishment in the West. Some of which are supported wholeheartedly by companies supported by YC so rather than risk getting banned for holding "dangerous" ideologies that run counter to that side of the spectrum, I will just chalk this under ephemeral arguments that will go nowhere

edit: as suspected it seems I am no longer able to comment freely on HN ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ after posting this, really bizarre experience

Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#59

Post by nefitty »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #29
nefitty wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Animals yes. Plants? I eat them without guilt. I wouldn't eat insects, not only because of my conditioned disgust, but now even moreso because crustaceans were found to be capable of suffering based on an 8-point scale. Bugs and crabs don't seem so far off to one another in my mind.

We as a society seem to have no problem killing millions of insects to make it easier to grow plants though. No matter what you eat, things are dying to supply your food. If you want to minimize the number of animals being killed, it’s probably best to eat the largest ones you have.

Sentience is a matter of degree. That's why people can compare the intelligence of a chimpanzee to the intelligence of a three year old human. Or why it's intuitive to prefer saving the life of a human to saving the life of a fish. That does not diminish the capability of suffering that the fish has, but merely comparing the objective complexity of a human's preferences vs a fish's.

Re: World’s first octopus farm stirs ethical debate

#60

Post by micromacrofoot »

vmception wrote: post #33

It was always possible for me to perceive sentience, feelings and emotions from a variety of beings, I don't understand why grown adults are just reaching a cognitive maturity to notice that and making that a line in the sand on whether they will farm/consume a being based on that. These seem to be two separate things to me? Can someone shed light on both: a) why these are related concepts b) your journey to cognitiv…

Humans project a lot of sentience when it isn't there, so I don't think it's so simple. There's certainly a cultural component too.
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