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Other Discussion Boards => Philosophy, Religion & Society => Topic started by: Roundy on September 08, 2021, 02:11:46 PM

Title: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Roundy on September 08, 2021, 02:11:46 PM
"It is meat eaters – not vegans – who are the preachy ones | The Independent" https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/vegan-meat-veganism-stigma-principles-b1913217.html?amp

I mean, you might think a journalist trying to make a point about others being preachy might minimize her own level of preachiness in order to avoid undermining her own point, but not this one. This woman just can't help but pepper her article about the preachiness of non-vegans with constant reminders that meat is murder and eating meat is evil (or immoral, at the very least).

She points out that many more people say they care about animals, yet a very small percentage of them actually avoid meat, suggesting that all those people who say they care about animals but still eat meat must be doing so because society pressures them. It's much more nuanced than that.

I care about animal welfare. I think something needs to be done about the deplorable conditions animals kept for meat currently suffer through.

At the same time, I love eating meat, and have no plans to ever stop eating meat, and I feel no shame about either.

The argument that we should stop eating meat altogether if we love animals is nonsensical. We don't need to undo millions of years of evolution to demonstrate that we care about animals.

To put it in perspective: Is it immoral to feed mice to snakes, or worms to fish? We would consider it immoral to try to force a vegetarian diet on a naturally carnivorous animal. Why isn't it immoral for snakes to eat mice?

The law of the jungle. Some animals naturally eat other animals. And humans are among them.

So if you want to be a vegan, and are willing to not be preachy about it (this journalist clearly isn't, despite the holier-than-thou attitude of her premise), go for it. Modern society actually makes it easier than ever to do so; nowadays you can even buy disgusting, super-processed plant-based food and pretend you're eating a real hamburger! But don't try to equate eating meat with hating animals, or even caving to society's pressure to eat meat. You are making an extremely nuanced issue straight black and white by doing so.

And if you're gonna call out others for being preachy... ehh... maybe think about minimizing your own preachiness while doing so. Otherwise you just look like a hypocrite, like this journalist!
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 08, 2021, 03:40:19 PM
I know a fairly preachy vegan. She's not too bad, but she doesn't believe what she says she does.
She put something on FB which I responded to and during the conversation she said that she thought human and animal life had equal value.
Which is bullshit. No-one thinks that.
So I asked her if a house was burning down and a child and pet were in the house who would she ask the firemen to rescue first and she dodged the question. Because of course she did. Obviously she values the human life greater than the animal. Everyone does.
Which isn't to say that farming techniques don't cause animals to suffer unnecessarily because they do. And I don't think they should.
But...sausages and burgers are bloody lovely. Which makes me a bit of a hypocrite but at least I own up to it.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 08, 2021, 05:48:23 PM
She put something on FB which I responded to and during the conversation she said that she thought human and animal life had equal value.
Which is bullshit. No-one thinks that.
So I asked her if a house was burning down and a child and pet were in the house who would she ask the firemen to rescue first and she dodged the question. Because of course she did. Obviously she values the human life greater than the animal. Everyone does.
Your logic doesn't quite follow. The fact that a person may have a preference towards saving a child over saving a pet does not mean that one is intrinsically more valuable than the other. This remains the case even if most or all people shared that preference. People make terrible value judgements all the time.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 08, 2021, 06:18:03 PM
You surely save the thing which you perceive to be of most value, if you can only choose to save one thing.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: xasop on September 08, 2021, 08:18:20 PM
I care about animal welfare. I think something needs to be done about the deplorable conditions animals kept for meat currently suffer through.

At the same time, I love eating meat, and have no plans to ever stop eating meat, and I feel no shame about either.

The argument that we should stop eating meat altogether if we love animals is nonsensical. We don't need to undo millions of years of evolution to demonstrate that we care about animals.
I would go further than this and say that the best way to improve livestock conditions isn't to stop eating meat, but to support meat suppliers who treat their animals well. If everyone who cares about animal welfare gives up meat, then the only people buying meat are those who don't care, and they will just buy whatever is cheapest.

So if animal welfare is the goal, being vegan is actually counterproductive. Of course, there are other potentially valid reasons to be vegan.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 08, 2021, 08:55:39 PM
You surely save the thing which you perceive to be of most value, if you can only choose to save one thing.
Of course, but that's where your logic falls apart. The valuation process doesn't just consider the value of the being's life, but also other innumerable factors.

Would I choose to save you or my mother? I'd choose my mother, she's kinda cool and you've irked me every now and then. Does that mean that I consider your life less valuable than that of my mum? Absolutely not - both your lives are "sacred" (for lack of a better word). There are simply other factors at play which guide my decision.

And, for a more extreme example: would you rather save Thork or a cute kitten?
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 08, 2021, 09:24:26 PM
This is why in my hypothetical I made a point of not saying "would you save your child" (she has one, handily) or a family pet.
I specifically said a child or an animal.
She didn't answer. Because we all know the answer.
She'd choose the child. Because at some level she knows that human life is more valuable than animal life.

PS: The kitten, obvs.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 08, 2021, 11:16:54 PM
I specifically said a child or an animal.
This changes nothing. As I said, the factors here are innumerable. The fact that you tried to prevent a tiny subset of them doesn't make your logic any less flawed; at best, it introduces an element of "gotcha"-ism. You have to ask yourself whether your interest was to establish the truth, or whether it was to t0tally pwn the veggies with FAX and LOGICKS. Or, in other words, epistemology vs rhetoric.

She didn't answer. Because we all know the answer.
She'd choose the child.
This continues to be true, and restating it won't strengthen your argument. We agree on this part.

Because at some level she knows that human life is more valuable than animal life.
This continues to be nonsense for the reasons outlined above, and restating it won't strengthen your argument.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Lord Dave on September 09, 2021, 06:07:26 AM
Species bias.
We all do it.  Most animals probably do it too.  Value is not really the best word because two objects of equal value but you can only have one... Doesn't mean you get both anyway or choose neither.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 09, 2021, 07:37:37 AM
I specifically said a child or an animal.
This changes nothing. As I said, the factors here are innumerable.
The only other "factor" you have mentioned is the fact you apparently like your mum more than me :(
The only thing innumerable here is the number of times you'll argue the toss about something when you basically agree with me.

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You have to ask yourself whether your interest was to establish the truth, or whether it was to t0tally pwn the veggies with FAX and LOGICKS.
My interest was to test her assertion that she values human and animal life equally.
My thought experiment is a riff on a common one - there's a fire in the middle of the night, you can escape and save one thing from your house, what do you choose?
The entire intent of that experiment it to get someone to think about what thing - it's usually an object - they value most.
My variation of that was to test her assertion that she values human and animal life equally. Which is why I didn't specify which human or animal it was. That eliminates the factors of what you feel about that specific person or how cute you deem that species to be. An arbitrary animal and an arbitrary human. Which do you choose?
The fact she dodged the question is telling. She could have gone into a spiel about "factors" I guess, but she didn't. Because we both know which she would choose and why.

IF she is a vegan because she thinks animal cruelty is a bad thing and we should be kinder to other species then great, I agree with her. I eat meat because it's lovely and I slightly hypocritically overlook the farming practices which allow me to do so. And because God said we could, if you want to go down that road. Or to take a secular view, we are evolved to eat meat. So I think there are good arguments to eat meat. And I think there are good arguments to not do so because of the way we get meat which indisputably causes animals unnecessary suffering.
Just don't give me this guff about how you value animal and human life equally. Because you don't.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 09, 2021, 08:24:25 AM
Value is not really the best word because two objects of equal value but you can only have one... Doesn't mean you get both anyway or choose neither.
Ding ding ding!

She could have gone into a spiel about "factors" I guess, but she didn't. Because we both know which she would choose and why.
This is why I asked whether you were motivated by epistemology or rhetoric. You decided to mansplain some lady's morality to her. She either gave up on trying to reason with you, fell for the same logical trap as you, or maybe you're just a persuasive speaker. None of that makes you right - it just means you "won" (ick) the argument.

The only other "factor" you have mentioned is the fact you apparently like your mum more than me :(
Indeed, I only mentioned one, because that already resolves my decision. Would you prefer a pointlessly longer list?

The only thing innumerable here is the number of times you'll argue the toss about something when you basically agree with me.
I don't agree with you at all, the core premise of your argument is complete nonsense, and the half-truths you used to try and substantiate it are irrelevant - you are trying to make an "obvious", "common sense" argument, but the conclusions you draw from it are bunk.

My thought experiment is a riff on a common one - there's a fire in the middle of the night, you can escape and save one thing from your house, what do you choose?
I really don't think you need to explain yourself. I understood you, it just so happens that you're wrong.

Let's try another example and see if it clicks. Let's go with a scenario in which the valuation has already been done for us, and use that to illustrate the fact that other factors prevail:

You have £5 on you, and all your other payment methods are literally frozen - you left them at home, in the freezer. You're feeling a bit hungry. For some reason, you decide to walk into Pete's Wacky Store of Mystery and Mischief - a mistake that will soon cost you dearly. Two products are offerred to you:
Each of these products has been valued at exactly £5 (how convenient!), and the price doesn't strike you as particularly unreasonable - it's an ok-sized personal pizza, and the bucket of nails is appropriately nice and large to possibly cost that. You have to choose one item - which will it be?

Now, your answer to this question doesn't really matter - you might choose the pizza because you're hungry and don't have immediate uses for a huge bucket of nails, or you might choose the bucket of nails because you're a crazed DIY fanatic, or because you want to make a point. The important element here is that, regardless of the items having equal value, you most likely found it very easy to choose your preferred product. It wasn't a roll of the dice, and you didn't need much time to think about it, either. Imagine how mind-bogglingly stupid it would be if some monocle-and-fedora-clad chap waltzed in and shouted "AHA! This clearly means you consider [pizza] more valuable than [nails]!" It just doesn't hold - the value of the objects is roughly the same, and that's not what guides your decision.

My variation of that was to test her assertion that she values human and animal life equally. Which is why I didn't specify which human or animal it was. That eliminates the factors of what you feel about that specific person or how cute you deem that species to be. An arbitrary animal and an arbitrary human. Which do you choose?
Honestly, I might choose the animal. Fuck humans. They're all coarse, and rough, and irritating, and they get everywhere.

Just don't give me this guff about how you value animal and human life equally. Because you don't.
Well, I do, and it's perfectly consistent with me being able to make a choice in your discount rehash of the trolley problem. It's also perfectly consistent with me not being vegan. Those choices are just unrelated to my assesment of their value.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 09, 2021, 09:29:25 AM
You decided to mansplain some lady's morality to her.
No. I asked her a simple question to get her to think about whether her morality is really what she claims.
(Although she is also a feminist so would enjoy your use of the word "mansplain")

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Would you prefer a pointlessly longer list?
No, but some other examples would be good. Your ones so far are not relevant to my thought experiment.
You gave one example of your particular attachment to one human over another.
I'm still a little hurt you like your mum more than me, but you're comparing two humans who you know which is a completely different thought experiment. The fact you know who the two humans are is a factor in your decision. If it's two strangers who you know nothing about then I'd suggest it's flip a coin (assuming the two people are equally easy to save). I wouldn't value any one human life over another if I knew nothing else about the two humans.
And your other example invokes the fact that kittens are cute and Thork is not. But, again, that's a different thought experiment.
I am talking about an arbitrary animal vs an arbitrary human. Which life is more valuable?

Maybe valuable is the wrong word - your example about pizzas and nails is a false equivalence for 2 reasons. Firstly you are talking about monetary value, I am not. Secondly you are creating a scenario in which a big factor is your decision is your immediate need - you set up the thought that I'm hungry. So yeah, I'll pick the pizza. If I'd just had a big meal and had some DIY to finish then I'd pick the nails. My needs are clearly a big factor in my decision. That is not the case in my thought experiment either.

So yeah, you change the thought experiment then the decision becomes different.

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Honestly, I might choose the animal. Fuck humans. They're all coarse, and rough, and irritating, and they get everywhere.
A fairly reasonable position, to be fair.
But, in real life, that is not a common view. Cannibalism is frowned upon, eating meat is not.
Killing humans is illegal, killing animals...well, I think you can be done for animal cruelty, but you're not going to be in prison for as long, it at all, for killing a cute kitten than if you killed Thork. The law is an ass. But the reason is that in law animals and humans are not thought to be equivalent. Because, in general, most people don't regard human and animal life as equivalent.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 09, 2021, 09:49:14 AM
I am talking about an arbitrary animal vs an arbitrary human. Which life is more valuable?
I can either call this question unanswerable or say "neither".

Firstly you are talking about monetary value, I am not.
Yes, you are talking about value as a more abstract concept. Monetary value is a convenient device for it, because it eliminates the valuation process from the example and allows you to focus on other factors. As evidenced in the rest of your response, this was successful.

Secondly you are creating a scenario in which a big factor is your decision is your immediate need - you set up the thought that I'm hungry. So yeah, I'll pick the pizza. If I'd just had a big meal and had some DIY to finish then I'd pick the nails.
As I just finished saying, your actual answer doesn't matter - merely the factors which are entirely external to the items' respective values, and the fact that you found the decision easy despite the values being equal.

My needs are clearly a big factor in my decision.
Congratulations - you stated my point, except you're acting as if it was some grand objection.

That is not the case in my thought experiment either.
How do you know what factors do and do not come into your friend's decision process? It sounds to me like your analysis lacked nuance, and that you would choose the human because you value them more. How do you go from that to asserting that this is a common belief? Or to declaring that your friend must believe the same? The word "mansplaining" is becoming more and more relevant here.

But, in real life, that is not a common view. Cannibalism is frowned upon, eating meat is not.
Killing humans is illegal, killing animals...well, I think you can be done for animal cruelty, but you're not going to be in prison for as long, it at all, for killing a cute kitten than if you killed Thork. The law is an ass.
You're right up until this point. Our society is dominated by humans (duh), and those who create laws usually create them in their own interest. This is also why the law overwhelmingly favours the wealthy and powerful, pretty much across all nations. Does that mean that lives of the rich are inherently more valuable than those of the poor? Personally, I'd say "no, of course not". As with your previous attempts, the human decision-making process is not intrinsically linked to the perception of value. A decision factor which better explains the discrepancy is trivial to find.

But the reason is that in law animals and humans are not thought to be equivalent. Because, in general, most people don't regard human and animal life as equivalent.
You have yet to demonstrate that link. So far, you pointed out that humans are biased towards protecting other humans. You then make a massive unexplained leap to say "ergo, human life is more valuable".
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 09, 2021, 10:19:17 AM
I am talking about an arbitrary animal vs an arbitrary human. Which life is more valuable?
I can either call this question unanswerable or say "neither".
OK, fine. So maybe you really do regard human and animal life as equivalent in value then. I don't, I'd save the human.
My assertion is that most people would do the same.

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My needs are clearly a big factor in my decision.
Congratulations - you stated my point, except you're acting as if it was some grand objection.
The objection is you are creating a different scenario where need is a factor. In my scenario it is not.

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How do you know what factors do and do not come into your friend's decision process?
I don't, because she declined to answer.

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It sounds to me like your analysis lacked nuance, and that you would choose the human because you value them more.
Yes.

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How do you go from that to asserting that this is a common belief?
Because we (mostly) eat meat and wear leather and eat eggs and keep animals as pets.
Geronimo the alpaca was famously (why the hell is this headline news?!) put down recently because of the perceived threat of him spreading Bovine TB or something. We don't "put down" humans. Dignitas is now a thing but even then it has to be clear that it's the person's choice and it's still highly controversial. Because most people regard human and animal life differently.
Just generally pretty much everyone has a hierarchy of value they place on different species, with us at the top. Ants are a nuisance and I will happily kill them. Spiders I will generally release in to the wild if I can. We had mice in our place one time and while I wanted them gone I would have been deeply squeamish about dealing with them myself. I don't go out of my way to kill other creatures (apart from ants - seriously, fuck those guys), but if it's an animal vs a child then it's really no contest in terms of who I'd save.

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Or to declaring that your friend must believe the same?
She declined to answer my question, I am inferring from that non-response that at some level she believes the same.
I'd be interested to explore the topic more with her if she wanted to at some point.

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Our society is dominated by humans (duh), and those who create laws usually create them in their own interest. This is also why the law overwhelmingly favours the wealthy and powerful, pretty much across all nations.
Is that true about the wealthy and powerful? Aren't they subject to the same laws? They might be able to afford better lawyers to get around them.
A factor here is that in the West at least our laws are heavily influenced by the Judeo-Christian worldview. And in that we are given "dominion" over the animals and told we can eat them.
Which is a factor in my belief that human life is more valuable than animal life.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 09, 2021, 10:47:45 AM
OK, fine. So maybe you really do regard human and animal life as equivalent in value then. I don't, I'd save the human.
My assertion is that most people would do the same.
My assertion is that many, if not most, people would save the human despite viewing the two lives as equally valuable. You propose that this is a contradiction. I'm currently explaining to you why it isn't. You restating the parts you managed not to get wrong is just gonna have us running in circles.

The objection is you are creating a different scenario where need is a factor. In my scenario it is not.
Once again - the actual factor doesn't matter. The existence of it is what does. It is possible, and indeed likely, to devise a situation in which two things have the same value, and yet one is reliably chosen.

I don't, because she declined to answer.
Rightly so, judging by how resistant you are to any thinking other than "AATW right because obviously duuuuh". She probably knew how you'd react and chose to spare herself the experience.

We don't "put down" humans.
Many societies still kill humans they perceive as a threat to society at large, and most did until relatively recently.

Dignitas is now a thing but even then it has to be clear that it's the person's choice and it's still highly controversial. Because most people regard human and animal life differently.
The reasons Dignitas is controversial are extremely well-documented, and you haven't read them. One of the obvious ones is the fear of unscrupulous people pressuring the elderly and vulnerable into committing suicide. In other words, the controversy mostly surrounds the concept of consent, and not the value of life. You'd know that if you had any interest in the truth of the matter, but you're just looking for arguments to make yourself right.

Just generally pretty much everyone has a hierarchy of value they place on different species, with us at the top.
You have yet to demonstrate that.

She declined to answer my question, I am inferring from that non-response that at some level she believes the same.
A simpler alternative exists. She knew what your argument would go like (as did I when I started it, but I find this shit entertaining; I suspect I'm in the minority there) and most likely wanted to spare herself the headache of someone restating the same non-point over and over while ignoring all arguments against his pre-conceived conclusion.

Also, interestingly: I just told you that I view the question as unanswerable, and you inferred something else entirely from it.

Is that true about the wealthy and powerful? Aren't they subject to the same laws?
*giggle*

If you read the news, you won't go a day without reading several stories about the wealthy/powerful egregiously ignoring laws and sufferring little to no consequences.

A factor here is that in the West at least our laws are heavily influenced by the Judeo-Christian worldview.
Yes, the same worldview that had us "putting down" humans until quite recently. A system designed around controlling uneducated masses by kings, "nobles", and the clergy, which eventually managed to evolve out of some of its most egregious ugliness. It's also why we're rapidly moving away from Christians dominating the West - just look at the numbers among young people. This process is still ongoing - that's why the death penalty is now controversial, and why we're discussing things like assisted suicide and animal welfare. The world will continue to change - whether you choose to join it is up to you, but that will require opening your mind a little bit.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 09, 2021, 01:13:36 PM
My assertion is that many, if not most, people would save the human despite viewing the two lives as equally valuable. You propose that this is a contradiction. I'm currently explaining to you why it isn't.
Yes, but your mansplanation involves changing my thought experiment to one where other factors exist.
Choose between your mum or someone who irritates you.
Choose between someone terrible (he is) and a cute kitten.
You could do that endlessly. Do you save a child or an elderly person who has had a long and rich life?
Do you save Jimmy Saville or Lassie?
Do you save an ant or a dog?

My thought experiment was deliberately intended to strip away all that and get my friend to think about whether they really view human and animal life as equivalent.

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It is possible, and indeed likely, to devise a situation in which two things have the same value, and yet one is reliably chosen.
Yes. But as I've said you were talking about monetary value, which is a fairly reasonable approximation for value of objects, I guess. Valuation of life is more abstract. And you deliberately set up the situation where my need for one of those things was greater than the other. Again, I want to strip away all that.

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Many societies still kill humans they perceive as a threat to society at large, and most did until relatively recently.
In very extreme circumstances and after a due process. We don't just put them down because they're ill or kill them because we want to eat them.

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The reasons Dignitas is controversial are extremely well-documented, and you haven't read them. One of the obvious ones is the fear of unscrupulous people pressuring the elderly and vulnerable into committing suicide. In other words, the controversy mostly surrounds the concept of consent, and not the value of life.
There is something in that, but the value of human life is a factor too. There's debate about whether someone should have the right to even decide this. Probably because of us being a Christian country back in the day, I'm pretty sure suicide was illegal at one point because the view was that human life was sacred and shouldn't be extinguished, even by your own hand.
Because we are no longer a Christian country in any meaningful sense the attitudes are changing about whether we should have the right to decide this (I can see arguments both ways, this is another one of those subjects which people on both sides pretend is simple when I actually think it's really complex)

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Just generally pretty much everyone has a hierarchy of value they place on different species, with us at the top.
You have yet to demonstrate that.
I don't know how to "demonstrate" it. Can you demonstrate that most people view human and animal life of equal value as you have asserted?
I infer my view from my experience of life. As I said, I'll kill ants with impunity. Bastard things. "Higher" life forms I would be less willing to kill even if they were pests who I didn't want in my house. I'm talking there about my attitudes. But while his is not a topic I discuss regularly with people, I've not done a survey, I don't remember anyone calling me a monster for killing ants. I do see people who are cruel to dogs or cats vilified - remember that cat bin lady. Sheesh, she didn't even really hurt the cat but that was headline news. I Googled it and she was fined £250, had she assaulted a human she would have been charged with a more serious offence.
There are certain Buddhist monks who I think believe that all life is equivalent and don't kill ants, outside of that most people don't regard all life as equivalent.

EDIT: Found this:
https://www.psychnewsdaily.com/children-value-100-dogs-more-than-one-human-adults-value-1-human-more-than-100-dogs-suggesting-our-speciesism-is-learned/

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I suspect I'm in the minority there) and most likely wanted to spare herself the headache of someone restating the same non-point over and over while ignoring all arguments against his pre-conceived conclusion.
I'm not ignoring you, I wouldn't have ignored her. I've responded to your points

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Also, interestingly: I just told you that I view the question as unanswerable, and you inferred something else entirely from it.
I took that to mean you couldn't choose. You have stated you view animal and human life as equivalent. I took that answer as an affirmation of that. If I'm misunderstood then you're free to clarify.

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If you read the news, you won't go a day without reading several stories about the wealthy/powerful egregiously ignoring laws and sufferring little to no consequences.
They may be more immune to the consequences because of their wealth and power, but that doesn't mean they're not subject to the same laws.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 09, 2021, 01:38:57 PM
Yes, but your mansplanation involves changing my thought experiment to one where other factors exist.
Other factors always exist - they must, by definition, for a person who believes that human and animal lives are of equal value. The change wasn't there for you to whinge about, but to offer you an example in which this is easier to see, since you found your own example unintuitive.

My thought experiment was deliberately intended to strip away all that and get my friend to think about whether they really view human and animal life as equivalent.
And it failed spectacularly to achieve that. It introduced needless ambiguity, did not control for external factors, and you chose to interpret the lack of a response as a result you've found convenient.

Again, I want to strip away all that.
Then you have a lot of work before you're remotely close to achieving that. "An arbitrary person/animal" does not eliminate these factors - it just leaves the reader to fill in the gaps with their own guesses. You personally filled them in in a way that matches the outcome you wanted to reach. When I encouraged you to fill the same gaps differently, the result unsurprisingly flipped. In other words, your thought experiment is not exclusively tied to the value of life.

In very extreme circumstances and after a due process.
Thanks to thousands of years of progress away from Judeo-Christian values, yes.

We don't just put them down because they're ill
Thanks to hundreds of years of progress away from Judeo-Christian values, yes.

There is something in that, but the value of human life is a factor too.
Of course it's a factor. It's just a minor factor, massively overshadowed by the ones that are actually important. Exactly the same as all your other attempts at generating an example.

I'm pretty sure suicide was illegal at one point because the view was that human life was sacred and shouldn't be extinguished, even by your own hand.
Yes, suicide is a sin, and thanks to Judeo-Christian values, we further destroyed the lives of those who felt they had already lost everything by throwing them in jail. Luckily, we no longer do that thanks to decades of evolving away from Judeo-Christian values. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-14374296

I don't know how to "demonstrate" it.
And I don't know how to help you, because it defies all logic, and because when people tell you they believe otherwise, you tell them that they're lying.

Can you demonstrate that most people view human and animal life of equal value as you have asserted?
I said "many, if not most", and I'd argue that their first-hand testimony should count, but none of that is important. Your suggestion was that this belief is not only unpopular, but that it's complete tosh that nobody actually holds. That myth is what I'm really focusing on here, and I have demonstrated the contrary several times now.

I Googled it and she was fined £250, had she assaulted a human she would have been charged with a more serious offence.
We already discussed the fact that equivalence in law is not the same as lives having equal values. I have nothing to add on this.

There are certain Buddhist monks who I think believe that all life is equivalent and don't kill ants, outside of that most people don't regard all life as equivalent.
An alternative thought: people value life equally, but that value is overall pretty low, in isolation. That's why other factors take precedence without fail, as you've already observed in almost every example.

I took that to mean you couldn't choose. You have stated you view animal and human life as equivalent. I took that answer as an affirmation of that. If I'm misunderstood then you're free to clarify.
No, that's exactly it. I refused to answer and you chose to believe me on my worldview. She refused to answer, so you decided that she holds the same beliefs as you, but wouldn't admit it.

They may be more immune to the consequences because of their wealth and power, but that doesn't mean they're not subject to the same laws.
And the loopholes they use are not closed, despite being obvious. If anything, the loopholes are carefully crafted to make sure proles like you and I can't make use of them. "Being subject to the same laws" is not the same as "being treated equally by the law".
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 09, 2021, 02:24:25 PM
Other factors always exist - they must, by definition, for a person who believes that human and animal lives are of equal value.
In real life they do, obviously. The point of a thought experiment is to make you think and examine your views.
You walk past a burning building, you know there's a human and an animal inside but you can only save one.
Which do you choose?
If you truly believe animal and human life is equivalent then it's flip a coin, or as you said it's unanswerable.
Or you might think "well if it's a human and and ant then clearly the human"
Or "Well if it's <pick human here> and a <pick species here> then..." - like all thought experiments you get to fill in the blanks a bit.
Your criticisms of the thought experiment are the exact point of it.

Quote
you chose to interpret the lack of a response as a result you've found convenient.
I thought it was interesting that she didn't answer. You answered.
And you did so in a way which makes me think you do believe what you claim.
She didn't. I haven't explored that further with her, it feels like more of a longer face to face conversation and I don't see her often.

Quote
Yes, suicide is a sin, and thanks to Judeo-Christian values, we further destroyed the lives of those who felt they had already lost everything by throwing them in jail.
I'd slightly dispute that a Christian would advocate suicide attempt being punishable by jail time, or punishable at all actually.
Lots of things are sinful but not illegal.

Quote
when people tell you they believe otherwise, you tell them that they're lying.
??? What? I haven't told anyone that. You are the second person who responded to my thought experiment, I've responded by saying that your response checks out with your claimed beliefs. My friend didn't answer and I didn't tell her anything. I have privately inferred the reason why she didn't answer but I certainly haven't called her a liar and if the chase arose I'd be willing to explore the whole topic with her further.

Quote
Your suggestion was that this belief is not only unpopular, but that it's complete tosh that nobody actually holds.
I'd suggest that few people hold that belief, I provided a link above (in an edit, so you may have missed it) which backs that up. And actually suggests that it's a learned attitude. But even if that's true, that research shows that it is the prevailing view amongst adults.

Quote
An alternative thought: people value life equally, but that value is overall pretty low, in isolation. That's why other factors take precedence without fail

I don't think that's what the research I've linked to indicates.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 09, 2021, 04:03:17 PM
The point of a thought experiment is to make you think and examine your views.
Please stop trying to act like I'm not understanding you. I know what a thought experiment is, yours is just not very good from a data gathering point, because it leaves an unreasonable amount of uncontrolled factors which can completely overturn the result. Nobody is robotic enough to imagine a completely generic human and unspecified animal without assigning some values and characteristics to both of them.

Your criticisms of the thought experiment are the exact point of it.
So the very point of your experiment is to be so flawed that no data can be meaningfully gleaned from it.

I'd slightly dispute that a Christian would advocate suicide attempt being punishable by jail time, or punishable at all actually.
Lots of things are sinful but not illegal.
Spoken like a true Anglican/Protestant. It's a much less vile form of Christianity, granted, but that's exactly the kind of the evolution I'm talking about.

My friend didn't answer and I didn't tell her anything. I have privately inferred the reason why she didn't answer but I certainly haven't called her a liar
I'm glad you didn't say that to her face, but you were pretty clear earlier in this thread. You said that her claims are "bullshit", and that she "obviously" believes something else than what she had claimed:

Which is bullshit. No-one thinks that.
she dodged the question. Because of course she did. Obviously she values the human life greater than the animal. Everyone does.

I'd suggest that few people hold that belief, I provided a link above (in an edit, so you may have missed it) which backs that up. And actually suggests that it's a learned attitude. But even if that's true, that research shows that it is the prevailing view amongst adults.
[...]
I don't think that's what the research I've linked to indicates.
It's an interesting article, but it makes the same error as you have - it asserts without evidence that the choices people make are directly linked to how much they value the lives of each species, even when it outright explains the external factors that actually determined the decision.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Lord Dave on September 09, 2021, 04:29:32 PM
Why is this hard for you to understand, AllAround?

Here try this: you can save only one of your two children.  Who are 5 year old twins.
Does making a choice mean you valued one over the other?  Fuck no!  Means you had to choose.  Period.  Done.  End of fucking definition.  Whatever metric brought you to the choice is irrelevant.  They are both of equal value to you, but uou still chose one over the other.

And in the case of animals or humans, well, if you gotta pick one, you pick based on whatever pre-engrained preferences are in your head.  Especially in a high stress situation.  And in the case of humans vs non-humans, humans vs other humans, or humans vs self... Its all about preference and emotional attachment.  And you are always more emotionally attached to your own species, children, and self than a dog.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 09, 2021, 06:08:56 PM
Here try this: you can save only one of your two children.  Who are 5 year old twins.
Does making a choice mean you valued one over the other?  Fuck no!  Means you had to choose.  Period.  Done.  End of fucking definition.
So all you’ve done there is created a completely different scenario where yeah, it’s a coin flip. Your decision is nothing to do with how much you value their lives.

Quote
And in the case of animals or humans, well, if you gotta pick one, you pick based on whatever pre-engrained preferences are in your head.
Well, yeah.
And basically everyone picks the human.
You can debate whether that’s ingrained or learned - the article above suggests the latter - but when a fire crew arrives they are looking to save human life first. Any pets are an afterthought. And possessions don’t get a look in. The fire crew aren’t emotionally attached to either, but pretty much no one really regards human and animal life as equivalent.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 09, 2021, 06:20:46 PM
We're running in circles.

We're saying: "Yes, most people will pick X over Y, but that doesn't mean they consider X more valuable than Y."
You're replying: "Nuh, uh, they'll pick X over Y."

This is pointless. If you're not going to start responding to the argument, we should just drop it.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: AATW on September 09, 2021, 06:30:45 PM
Fine, and I think the sticking point here is the word “value”. That was identified quite early in this exchange, but I don’t know what other word to use.
Is it fair to say that most people don’t regard animal and human life as equivalent? So during a marriage course I wowed the crowd by saying that I didn’t regard men and women as equal. I did go on to elaborate that equal means “the same”. So sure, men and women are of equal value but they’re not equal in all ways.
So if we agree that most people will choose X over Y (where X is a human and Y is not) but you don’t think it’s because they value X over Y then why would you say it is?
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 09, 2021, 06:54:36 PM
Is it fair to say that most people don’t regard animal and human life as equivalent?
I dunno, even that is a tough sell. How about: In most situations, people will prioritise the well-being of a human over that of an animal? I feel like that covers the sentiment you're looking for, and it avoids the complicated subject of "value" entirely.

So during a marriage course I wowed the crowd by saying that I didn’t regard men and women as equal. I did go on to elaborate that equal means “the same”. So sure, men and women are of equal value but they’re not equal in all ways.
I'm sure that went down a treat.

So if we agree that most people will choose X over Y (where X is a human and Y is not) but you don’t think it’s because they value X over Y then why would you say it is?
Because the hypothetical question is vague (and I completely understand why it is, don't worry), I can only offer a vague answer: factors other than value. For some people it might be that they find it more intuitive to protect beings which are most similar to them. Maybe some people would choose to save a person of one gender over the other, maybe some people will prefer animals over people, etc. Others might imagine a particularly attractive X and a particularly unattractive Y. However, it is possible to make that decision without believing that one is strictly less valuable than the other, or that one is inherently inferior to the other. They're separate categories. You can actively choose a less valuable thing, and you can make a choice between two things of the same value.

In short: when a vegan tells you that they believe all life is equally valuable, they probably mean it. They want society to see killing cows for food to be as reprehensible as killing humans for food would be. There is some merit to it. The obvious difference, and the main "excuse" for killing cows for food is that they're nowhere near as advanced or intelligent as we are, but somehow I doubt the idea of killing mentally stunted people for food would be popular. But just like I'd choose to save my mum over saving you (despite genuinely thinking both of your lives are equally valuable and knowing that my priorities are selfishly motivated), one may choose to save a human over a cow - both lives are equally "sacred", but in a pinch we can make a call based on other factors (more meaningful gratitude, emotional attachment, contractual obligation in case of firefighters, etc.).
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Lord Dave on September 09, 2021, 09:17:15 PM
Emotional attachment!
Value is a poor word, use emotional attachment.  Humans are emotionally attached more to other humans.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: xasop on September 11, 2021, 01:50:24 PM
Thanks to thousands of years of progress away from Judeo-Christian values, yes.
I don't think blaming Judeo-Christian values for this is at all justified, for several reasons. One, Christianisation in Europe generally supplanted pagan customs with even less regard for human life. Indeed, the Old Testament, in which murder is only bad if you murder someone in the in-group, is a prime example of the sort of thing Christianity tried to fix. Early Christians made sure to maintain a record of that. Even if we accept that Judeo-Christian values are inherently bad (which I don't), it's more accurate to say that they were a step in moving away from primitive customs, not that they were the primitive customs.

Two, the values exemplified by mediaeval Christianity were those of the Roman Empire (and later the Latin Church), which adopted Christianity as a tool to pursue its political agenda. Any religion can be misused in this way, especially if the population is too illiterate to study the religious texts for themselves. If the practices under discussion were truly based on Christian values, every modern church would still be advocating for them.

Three, there is an argument to be made that without the technology and social structures to properly support people with serious illnesses, putting them out of their misery was the best available option. In that case, it is not changing values that ended such practices, but an improved understanding of biology, psychology and sociology. It was notably Christian society that produced the conditions that allowed modern science to flourish.

Finally, I don't agree that we are moving away from Judeo-Christian values. It is true that there are fewer and fewer practising Christians today, but the values of Western secular society are based on the same core values as those of early Christians 2000 years ago. If you confuse those values with political agendas or social customs that were pursued by specific churches in the intervening period, I can certainly see how it might appear otherwise.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 12, 2021, 09:07:22 AM
I don't think blaming Judeo-Christian values for this is at all justified, for several reasons.
I'm not blaming Judeo-Christian values for it, I'm praising our ongoing process of abandoning Judeo-Christian values for fixing it, even if indirectly. You could say that the move towards Judeo-Christian values was an earlier step in the same process, fair enough, but to me the fact that previous systems were more contemptible doesn't absolve Judeo-Christian values of my distaste.

Two, the values exemplified by mediaeval Christianity were those of the Roman Empire (and later the Latin Church), which adopted Christianity as a tool to pursue its political agenda. Any religion can be misused in this way, especially if the population is too illiterate to study the religious texts for themselves.
Sure, and "real communism" has never been tried. Personally, I'm more interested in the real outcomes than whether something better was written down on a piece of paper nobody followed.

Religions and worldviews get warped and perverted all the time. Unfortunately, there is no undoing of thousands of years of Christianity, and it will always stand for its history. Some splinter movements may have some legitimacy in claiming to be separate, but that doesn't apply to any church with prominence in the UK.

If you confuse those values with political agendas or social customs that were pursued by specific churches in the intervening period, I can certainly see how it might appear otherwise.
You claim I'm "confusing" them. In turn, I argue that your separation is very artificial. The theory of what Judeo-Christian values could be if everyone followed a document to the letter has little bearing on what is/was in people's actual minds. This is especially true for the time period in which, as you rightly pointed out, most people who held Judeo-Christian values couldn't even read that document. At its core, it seems that we disagree on what "Judeo-Christian values" are. You seem to imply something adjacent to strict adherence to the Bible, whereas I'm aiming for [my perception of] the values that people lived by.

[edit: I realise that I basically made the same argument three times in this post. I should have made it more compact in retrospect, but hopefully my position is at least clear enough to follow.]

It was notably Christian society that produced the conditions that allowed modern science to flourish.
This is a controversial claim at the best of times. The contributions of the Islamic world which "we" shamelessly stole when [re-]claiming Iberia are much closer to the actual source of modern science. Before the Reconquista, "we" had an ugly Judeo-Christian habit of burning the scientifically inclined for the crimes of heresy, magick, and witchcraft. If anything, the fact that this eventually stopped is yet another welcome move away from Judeo-Christian values, even if you take the biblical literalist view on what those are.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Shifter on September 12, 2021, 08:46:13 PM
Full disclosure - I eat meat and consume lots of dairy. Definitely not a sucky vegan

What do you guys think about farming dogs and eating those? Cool? Maybe our culture finds that abhorrent. Other cultures finds eating cows or pigs to be bastardry

Pigs have demonstrated to have intelligence on par with a human toddler, empathy, facial recognition etc not unlike a dog. Why is it OK to eat them but not a dog?

When I visited Korea I did try dog stew by the way  8) I was told it was not someones pet  :)

I think humanity does need to change how it operates in this field though. Leaving ethics aside, the way we utilize animals for food is not sustainable, has a lot of wastage and is not healthy in the amounts many of us consume.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Roundy on September 12, 2021, 10:08:51 PM
Full disclosure - I eat meat and consume lots of dairy. Definitely not a sucky vegan

What do you guys think about farming dogs and eating those? Cool? Maybe our culture finds that abhorrent. Other cultures finds eating cows or pigs to be bastardry

Pigs have demonstrated to have intelligence on par with a human toddler, empathy, facial recognition etc not unlike a dog. Why is it OK to eat them but not a dog?

When I visited Korea I did try dog stew by the way  8) I was told it was not someones pet  :)

I think humanity does need to change how it operates in this field though. Leaving ethics aside, the way we utilize animals for food is not sustainable, has a lot of wastage and is not healthy in the amounts many of us consume.

Apart maybe for the fact that (in our culture anyway) one is bred for companionship and one for food, I don't really see any ethical difference between eating dog and eating pig, it is a matter of personal preference. I will die before willingly giving up my bacon and pork chops; enjoy your dog stew if you'd like, we live in a free society.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: xasop on September 13, 2021, 07:07:41 AM
Personally, I'm more interested in the real outcomes than whether something better was written down on a piece of paper nobody followed.
How have you isolated the "real outcomes" of Judeo-Christian values as compared with the other influences on Western society?

Religions and worldviews get warped and perverted all the time. Unfortunately, there is no undoing of thousands of years of Christianity, and it will always stand for its history. Some splinter movements may have some legitimacy in claiming to be separate, but that doesn't apply to any church with prominence in the UK.
I simply don't agree that the history of Christianity is as damning as you seem to think it is. It is very easy to find examples of atrocities committed in the name of any ideology that has stood for 2000 years, but there are also many positive aspects to Christianity's history that are often overlooked.

For example, it gave the continent of Europe (and later, many other parts of the world) a common moral guide for the first time in history. Despite its perversions for political reasons, this laid the foundation for the common European values we still hold today and is what makes it possible for an Italian to visit Norway without having to worry about having her hand cut off or being imprisoned for life because she was unaware of the local customs.

This strength is perhaps even more visible in the colonial world. In South Africa, one of the few things the many native tribes have in common is the Christian faith. Without it, they may well have been too busy fighting one another to be able to stand up against their European oppressors and win their country back.

So, if the history of Christianity is mixed with examples of good and evil, it cannot stand by itself as an example of how very very bad Judeo-Christian values are.

At its core, it seems that we disagree on what "Judeo-Christian values" are. You seem to imply something adjacent to strict adherence to the Bible, whereas I'm aiming for [my perception of] the values that people lived by.
That approach is only valid if you can demonstrate that the values people lived by were influenced by Christianity and absolutely nothing else. I assert that this is patently false, but it is difficult to study the influence of Christianity in isolation from the fourth century AD onwards due to its increasing politicisation by Roman emperors and bishops.

That is why I brought up early Christians, who — prior to the conversion of Constantine — were persecuted for their faith wherever they went. They aimed to imitate the life of Jesus, which included being generous to the poor, healing the sick and forgiving the sins of others. All of these values are foundational to modern Western civilisation and its welfare state, as is the belief that our way is the right way and must be spread to the less enlightened parts of the world (see also: Afghanistan). We simply don't call it a religion anymore.

What is significant to me is not what things were done in the name of Christianity, but whether those things were done because of Christianity. I don't think the absence of Christianity would have made Rome any less willing to give up its position of power in mediæval Europe, though it may well have made it more difficult not to.

This is a controversial claim at the best of times. The contributions of the Islamic world which "we" shamelessly stole when [re-]claiming Iberia are much closer to the actual source of modern science. Before the Reconquista, "we" had an ugly Judeo-Christian habit of burning the scientifically inclined for the crimes of heresy, magick, and witchcraft.
The Reconquista happened half a millennium before some of the most important advances in modern science, especially those relevant to helping the sick and disabled to lead fulfilling lives. Vaccination was unknown until the late 18th century, modern psychology was born in the 19th century, and many ideas in political science fundamental to the welfare state were only realised in the 20th century.

At best, you are saying that Christians didn't put a stop to the scientific practices of the Islamic world, which is incongruent with the idea that Christian values stand in opposition to social progress.

If anything, the fact that this eventually stopped is yet another welcome move away from Judeo-Christian values, even if you take the biblical literalist view on what those are.
You just got done telling me that you prefer to look at the values people actually lived by, and now you're telling me that the values some Christians before the Reconquista lived by are more reliable than those other, later Christians lived by. Is this a no true Scotsman fallacy I see?
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 13, 2021, 03:39:42 PM
How have you isolated the "real outcomes" of Judeo-Christian values as compared with the other influences on Western society?
Extremely subjectively and unreliably.

So, if the history of Christianity is mixed with examples of good and evil, it cannot stand by itself as an example of how very very bad Judeo-Christian values are.
I disagree. Taking this logic to the extreme, we cannot call Nazi values bad, because the NSDAP had some poilicies which were very beneficial to Germany and Europe, and which still benefit it to this day. The fact that Christianity had some good aspects does not overturn its overall terrible track record.

That approach is only valid if you can demonstrate that the values people lived by were influenced by Christianity and absolutely nothing else.
Nonsense. Your objection would only work if you were to demonstrate that it's possible that those people's values were entirely unaffected by Christianity. Otherwise, you tacitly acknowledge that it was a factor, and you're left with the option of arguing that it's a lesser one than I'm claiming (but still a net negative one).

The Reconquista happened half a millennium before some of the most important advances in modern science, especially those relevant to helping the sick and disabled to lead fulfilling lives.
Irrelevant. You claim that Christianity created the conditions for this progress to flourish. It did not. That was the Islamic world, whose ideas were assimilated by Christians after the Reconquista. Those conditions then remained in place for centuries, allowing us to make the progress we have. This is despite the strong opposition of the Judeo-Christian value enjoyers - yet another excellent example of how moving away from those has benefitted us.

At best, you are saying that Christians didn't put a stop to the scientific practices of the Islamic world
Failed to put a stop*, in spite of earnest attempts. Those were unsuccessful because, even then, our great march away from Judeo-Christian values was ongoing. Therein lies the point.

You just got done telling me that you prefer to look at the values people actually lived by, and now you're telling me that the values some Christians before the Reconquista lived by are more reliable than those other, later Christians lived by. Is this a no true Scotsman fallacy I see?
I have no idea what you're implying, but I'm pretty confident that I can just say "lol, no." The only biblical literalist I've referred to in this conversation is yourself, and I'm reliably informed you did not live before the Reconquista. So, yes, you are no true pre-Reconquista Christian, and there isn't much of a fallacy behind stating that fact.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Dr David Thork on September 13, 2021, 03:52:33 PM
Which isn't to say that farming techniques don't cause animals to suffer unnecessarily because they do. And I don't think they should.
But...sausages and burgers are bloody lovely. Which makes me a bit of a hypocrite but at least I own up to it.

I am someone who eats meat and I do it because I love animals.

Last night I went to a restaurant and ordered a lamb shank roast dinner. It was delicious. Now sure ... a lamb died in order I could eat it. But that lamb at least existed and had likely a reasonably nice life plodding around fields eating with its friends until its demise. Vegans are trying to push extinction.

Imagine everyone bought into 'meat is murder'. Then who farms sheep? You can't make money from the wool (you get 65p per fleece in the UK and it costs £1.65 per sheep to get them shawn. In other words it costs a farmer £1 every time a sheep is shawn and they do it for the animal's welfare, not profit). So if farming sheep becomes unviable because no one is eating meat ... sheep become extinct. No one can afford to keep them. They can't survive in the wild ... they are domesticated animals.

Vegans have a wicked agenda. They are trying to remove all kinds of species of animal from the planet. Cows, pigs, chickens, etc. I am keeping those animals alive with my purchasing choices. I ensure those animals are preserved for the next generation by putting a viable business model underneath them. Vegans will cry about a decline in a penguin population and then push the extinction of farm animals because they are too dumb to see the bigger picture.

If you love animals ... tuck into one for dinner tonight. Its for their own good.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Shifter on September 13, 2021, 03:57:35 PM
Which isn't to say that farming techniques don't cause animals to suffer unnecessarily because they do. And I don't think they should.
But...sausages and burgers are bloody lovely. Which makes me a bit of a hypocrite but at least I own up to it.

I am someone who eats meat and I do it because I love animals.

Last night I went to a restaurant and ordered a lamb shank roast dinner. It was delicious. Now sure ... a lamb died in order I could eat it. But that lamb at least existed and had likely a reasonably nice life plodding around fields eating with its friends until its demise. Vegans are trying to push extinction.

Imagine everyone bought into 'meat is murder'. Then who farms sheep? You can't make money from the wool (you get 65p per fleece in the UK and it costs £1.65 per sheep to get them shawn. In other words it costs a farmer £1 every time a sheep is shawn and they do it for the animal's welfare, not profit). So if farming sheep becomes unviable because no one is eating meat ... sheep become extinct. No one can afford to keep them. They can't survive in the wild ... they are domesticated animals.

Vegans have a wicked agenda. They are trying to remove all kinds of species of animal from the planet. Cows, pigs, chickens, etc. I am keeping those animals alive with my purchasing choices. I ensure those animals are preserved for the next generation by putting a viable business model underneath them. Vegans will cry about a decline in a penguin population and then push the extinction of farm animals because they are too dumb to see the bigger picture.

If you love animals ... tuck into one for dinner tonight. Its for their own good.

Spot on. Hell, some of us are probably only alive today because our ancestors needed a farm hand to help around the farm or increase their chance of survival by breeding cannon fodder

If the world turned vegan, a lot of animals would never see the gift of life and the awesomeness and wonders of the universe. To hell with vegans. They are anti life
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: xasop on September 13, 2021, 04:21:32 PM
I disagree. Taking this logic to the extreme, we cannot call Nazi values bad, because the NSDAP had some poilicies which were very beneficial to Germany and Europe, and which still benefit it to this day. The fact that Christianity had some good aspects does not overturn its overall terrible track record.
I simply disagree that its track record is overall terrible. The issue is far too multifaceted for any such simplification to be valid, but if I had to make one, I'd say it has been overall neutral.

Nonsense. Your objection would only work if you were to demonstrate that it's possible that those people's values were entirely unaffected by Christianity. Otherwise, you tacitly acknowledge that it was a factor, and you're left with the option of arguing that it's a lesser one than I'm claiming (but still a net negative one).
No, there is the option that things would have been even worse without Christianity, in which case it was a positive influence that was, for some periods in history, outweighed by larger negative influences.

Irrelevant. You claim that Christianity created the conditions for this progress to flourish. It did not. That was the Islamic world, whose ideas were assimilated by Christians after the Reconquista.
You are picking on a specific choice of words, interpreting them in the way you want (and one that doesn't make a whole lot of sense), and then asserting that must have been what I meant. This is a very common tactic of yours, and it isn't going to advance the discussion.

The fact remains that science flourished in the Christian world, and far outside the boundaries under former Islamic control. To say that the Christian world didn't produce the conditions — however much they might have been inspired by prior art — in which Kepler, Newton, Euler and Freud worked strains credibility.

Those conditions then remained in place for centuries, allowing us to make the progress we have. This is despite the strong opposition of the Judeo-Christian value enjoyers - yet another excellent example of how moving away from those has benefitted us.
You are once again characterising people you disagree with as "Judeo-Christian" and just asserting that anyone you do agree with must not be following Judeo-Christian values. Have you considered that using "Judeo-Christian" as a synonym for "bad" might constitute circular reasoning in this discussion?

Failed to put a stop*, in spite of earnest attempts. Those were unsuccessful because, even then, our great march away from Judeo-Christian values was ongoing. Therein lies the point.
You might have a point, if you could demonstrate that Galileo Galilei was any less sincere in his faith than Urban VIII. Instead you keep asserting that only the bad guys followed Judeo-Christian values, and then concluding that Judeo-Christian values must be bad. Do you see the flaw yet?

I have no idea what you're implying, but I'm pretty confident that I can just say "lol, no."
What I'm saying is that, in claiming that all progress in a time long before Christianity in Europe began its decline is based on departure from Judeo-Christian values, you are implicitly defining Judeo-Christian values as those of people you don't agree with. That is neither accurate nor productive.

The only biblical literalist I've referred to in this conversation is yourself, and I'm reliably informed you did not live before the Reconquista. So, yes, you are no true pre-Reconquista Christian, and there isn't much of a fallacy behind stating that fact.
I'm not a Biblical literalist, incidentally. The Bible is a product of its time and must be read in that context. So, for example, when the New Testament talks about slavery, the values it is expressing have nothing to do with slavery. That was simply common practice at the time which the authors of the Bible couldn't change, so they did the next best thing and tried to minimise the damage, much like socialist activists of today who campaign for better working conditions under capitalism.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 13, 2021, 04:45:52 PM
No, there is the option that things would have been even worse without Christianity, in which case it was a positive influence that was, for some periods in history, outweighed by larger negative influences.
Hypothetically, yes, but I have yet to be made aware of any tangible reason to entertain this possibility.

You are picking on a specific choice of words, interpreting them in the way you want (and one that doesn't make a whole lot of sense), and then asserting that must have been what I meant. This is a very common tactic of yours, and it isn't going to advance the discussion.
Your accusation is needlessly generous. There is no tactical approach behind my argument, nor is there any strong intent. I respond to your words as I understood them, and I do not see room for alternative interpretations. This could be because you made yourself clear and are now trying to weasel out of what you said, or I could have misunderstood you. If you want to be interpreted differently, clarify or alter your claims. Attacking my character is extremely unlikely to convince me of whatever point you're trying to make, and only serves to weaken your credibility.

You are once again characterising people you disagree with as "Judeo-Christian" and just asserting that anyone you do agree with must not be following Judeo-Christian values.
Well, naturally. In order to decide whether or not people are moving away from Judeo-Christian values, we have to assume a consistent definition of what those are. If every time we move away from Judeo-Christian values we describe that as those values changing, then there is no possible way to move away from them. A set of values that's constantly redefined every time it's convenient for your argument is no set of values at all - it's a meaningless label.

In my description, Judeo-Christian values are vehemently anti-science, but eventually cease to be influential enough to continue suppressing people's minds. We therefore moves away from Judeo-Christian values, and I am happy about it.

In your description [as best as I understand it, before you once again accuse me of playing 4D chess by simply reading what you had written], Judeo-Christian values were vehemently anti-science, except then they started being pro-science, and therefore they're to be credited with their contributions to science. I find that to be a desperate attempt at shifting the goalposts.

You might have a point, if you could demonstrate that Galileo Galilei was any less sincere in his faith than Urban VIII. Instead you keep asserting that only the bad guys followed Judeo-Christian values, and then concluding that Judeo-Christian values must be bad. Do you see the flaw yet?
Of course. The flaw is that you conflate faith with the values it created, represented, and entrenched. I reject this conflation, and, consequently, the argument that stems from within.

When we stick to the subject of this conversation - values - it is evident that Galileo did not share Judeo-Christian values. He frequently found himself questioning these values, and speaking out in opposition of them in spite of his faith.

Quote from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5871402/
Galileo suffered through the humiliation of having to deny his theories in order to save his life. He was Catholic, believed in God, but, on the other hand, he was a great believer in the role of science and the fascinating beauty of God’s creation.

After Galileo heard the sentence of condemnation, he had a final conversation with his supporter and friend, Malvasi:

Malvasi: God helps and blesses you, Maestro.
Galileo: What are you saying, God blesses me, a scientist?
Malvasi: God is nearer to you than to many others, you have encountered God today.
Galileo: In the humiliation, in the annihilation?
Malvasi: In the emptiness... Look for him and forget yourself. You will find him in the deep of your heart.

In fact, I'd be quicker to say that Galileo's faith was likely more sincere than that of Urban VIII. After all, as you rightly pointed out, the clergy is first and foremost a political entity, with religion playing a fairly minor role in their lives. Christian organisations are even worse than Christian values.

Also, there is something quite insidious going on with your choice of words - you declare that people who follow Judeo-Christian values are bad people, and you want for me to tacitly accept this. I wholeheartedly reject this suggestion. They hold values which are dramatically opposed to my idea of progress, but I do not believe they're bad people. Again, I am very glad that the world is progressing in a different direction, but Christians by and large meant no harm. They are simply sticking to what they consider to be the right way of doing things, which just happens to include things that are nowadays unpalatable.

you are implicitly defining Judeo-Christian values as those of people you don't agree with
I'm not the one who proposed this definition - AATW was. Nonetheless, that is a very accurate definition - I named many examples of Judeo-Christian values I disagree with, and expressed my delight at us abandoning them. This is indeed not productive, insofar that saying "I am happy that <XYZ>" does not produce anything utilitarian.

So, for example, when the New Testament talks about slavery, the values it is expressing have nothing to do with slavery. That was simply common practice at the time which the authors of the Bible couldn't change, so they did the next best thing and tried to minimise the damage
That is indeed a common argument amongst Christian apologetics, but it falls flat when contrasted with how much worse Christians made slavery in the name of Christianity. Remember, I don't care about what was described in the Bible as a work of fiction (deplorable as it may be), merely in how it affected the real world. No, there was no "minimisation" of the damage. On the contrary, the self-declared superiority of Christians and their "values" was a convenient excuse for centuries of oppression and injustice from which we're still recovering. Because, luckily, Judeo-Christian values are in decline, slow as it may be.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Shifter on September 13, 2021, 04:56:52 PM
We're still talking about how much vegans suck right? What's all this religious nonsense?

Was Jesus a vegan?
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 13, 2021, 05:13:07 PM
We're still talking about how much vegans suck right? What's all this religious nonsense?
I'm sure you'll be able to keep up with the conversation if you try.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: xasop on September 14, 2021, 04:06:39 AM
Hypothetically, yes, but I have yet to be made aware of any tangible reason to entertain this possibility.
That is because you claim that all positive consequences of Judeo-Christian values are actually examples of moving away from those values. If your definition of Judeo-Christian values is "opposition to progress", then yes, your warped view of those values will be opposed to progress.

I respond to your words as I understood them
No, this is obviously false, since you claim I used the word "created" when I did no such thing. I used the word "produced". You invented something I did not say, so you can't have been responding to my words.

If you want to be interpreted differently, clarify or alter your claims.
I provided such clarification in the part of my previous post that you cut out of your quote.

In my description, Judeo-Christian values are vehemently anti-science, but eventually cease to be influential enough to continue suppressing people's minds. We therefore moves away from Judeo-Christian values, and I am happy about it.
I understand that that's your description. What I can't understand is where you are getting that idea from, given that you claimed you base your ideas on the values people lived by, and that science flourished in the Christian world for centuries. Those two things are inconsistent.

What source do you have for what Judeo-Christian values are that isn't the values observed by Christian society?

In your description [as best as I understand it, before you once again accuse me of playing 4D chess by simply reading what you had written], Judeo-Christian values were vehemently anti-science, except then they started being pro-science, and therefore they're to be credited with their contributions to science. I find that to be a desperate attempt at shifting the goalposts.
That's not at all what I'm saying. Indeed, I don't think Judeo-Christian values are either for or against science. That position is left up to individual rulers and their political whims. I'm simply using the spread of science in the Christian world as an example that Judeo-Christian values are not opposed to science.

Of course. The flaw is that you conflate faith with the values it created, represented, and entrenched. I reject this conflation, and, consequently, the argument that stems from within.
I'm not conflating those two, no. I am following the logical implications of your argument that the "real outcomes" are what matter. If you are picking and choosing which outcomes of Christian society matter to you, then you are basing that choice on some other source, and that is the real source for what you believe Judeo-Christian values are.

When we stick to the subject of this conversation - values - it is evident that Galileo did not share Judeo-Christian values. He frequently found himself questioning these values, and speaking out in opposition of them in spite of his faith.

Quote from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5871402/
Galileo suffered through the humiliation of having to deny his theories in order to save his life. He was Catholic, believed in God, but, on the other hand, he was a great believer in the role of science and the fascinating beauty of God’s creation.

After Galileo heard the sentence of condemnation, he had a final conversation with his supporter and friend, Malvasi:

Malvasi: God helps and blesses you, Maestro.
Galileo: What are you saying, God blesses me, a scientist?
Malvasi: God is nearer to you than to many others, you have encountered God today.
Galileo: In the humiliation, in the annihilation?
Malvasi: In the emptiness... Look for him and forget yourself. You will find him in the deep of your heart.
Can you explain what you think you are proving with this quote?

I'm not the one who proposed this definition - AATW was. Nonetheless, that is a very accurate definition - I named many examples of Judeo-Christian values I disagree with, and expressed my delight at us abandoning them.
I can agree that you asserted many things are Judeo-Christian values with no evidence, other than the fact that people who happened to be Christians instituted them. Yet for some reason, you stop following that line of reasoning when Christians do good things.

That is indeed a common argument amongst Christian apologetics, but it falls flat when contrasted with how much worse Christians made slavery in the name of Christianity. Remember, I don't care about what was described in the Bible as a work of fiction (deplorable as it may be), merely in how it affected the real world.
I will not be able to believe that until you address why the bad real-world impact of Christianity matters, but the good impact is just an example of not following Judeo-Christian values.

No, there was no "minimisation" of the damage. On the contrary, the self-declared superiority of Christians and their "values" was a convenient excuse for centuries of oppression and injustice from which we're still recovering. Because, luckily, Judeo-Christian values are in decline, slow as it may be.
I would turn this precisely the other way around and say that Judeo-Christian values are in recovery, following centuries of lies and abuse by the Latin Church and others. I suspect that we agree on which values are good and which are bad, and this is merely a question of nomenclature.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 14, 2021, 06:08:32 PM
That is because you claim that all positive consequences of Judeo-Christian values are actually examples of moving away from those values.
I'm doing no such thing - I have yet to see any positive consequences of Judeo-Christian values, alleged or actual.

If your definition of Judeo-Christian values is "opposition to progress", then yes
That is indeed one of many Judeo-Christian values, as expressly reinforced by the Bible, most churches in history, and those who adhered to the faith.

No, this is obviously false
Right. It is obviously false that I understood your words the way I did. If this is what your argumentation has devolved to, then I think it's time for me to walk away. I'll give your next few sentences a pop just in case you're about to tone down the ridiculous accusations, but I'm not holding my breath.

since you claim I used the word "created" when I did no such thing.
Do I? Would you mind showing me where I did that? I had a quick look through all the instances of the word "create" in this thread and found nothing of the sort.

I provided such clarification in the part of my previous post that you cut out of your quote.
Okay. Please feel free to point it out. I quote you on the parts I consider pertinent, and the specific parts I'm responding to. In other words, I don't "cut out" quotes - I add them to my posts. Once again, you resort to loud accusations instead of defending your position.

What I can't understand is where you are getting that idea from, given that you claimed you base your ideas on the values people lived by
Well, I'm not sure how to respond to that. You're asking me to defend a tautology.

and that science flourished in the Christian world for centuries. Those two things are inconsistent.
They're only inconsistent if you presuppose that science flourished (Did it? What are we comparing it to?), and that it did so because of Judeo-Christian values, rather than in spite of them (the latter being evidenced by how scientists were treated by Christians, and the correlation between Christianity's decline and scientific progress).

What source do you have for what Judeo-Christian values are that isn't the values observed by Christian society?
This is where you've crossed the line, and my willingness to reply ends. That is not at all what I'm claiming, and I'm taking you positing questions like that as a tacit admission that you've run out of arguments. You are welcome to demonstrate otherwise, but until then, my patience has run out. If you think you can get through a conversation by just gaslighting your opponents ("your points are a tactic!", "you obviously believe the opposite of what you just said!", "you said something stupid except you didn't!", "you omitted a crucial part of my post, but I won't tell you which one!"), then you're sorely mistaken.

The remainder of your post is going unread. Sorry if you've put some zingers in there, but you're obviously arguing in poor faith here. If you write a post that skips out on all the personal attacks and accusations, I'll be happy to read it.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: xasop on September 14, 2021, 06:13:27 PM
What source do you have for what Judeo-Christian values are that isn't the values observed by Christian society?
This is where you've crossed the line, and my willingness to reply ends. That is not at all what I'm claiming
Not word for word, no, but it is a logical implication of the things you've said. I don't feel the need to demonstrate anything otherwise because I don't consider that question unreasonable, given the things you have said.

If you want to walk away, fine by me, but don't pretend it's because I've "crossed a line".
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Pete Svarrior on September 14, 2021, 06:26:15 PM
If you want to walk away, fine by me, but don't pretend it's because I've "crossed a line".
Ah, again with the ugly accusations. Of course, it's impossible that I found your repeated and finely honed insults... well, insulting. I'm clearly just pretending.

Very well. I'm walking away. If you want to apologise and argue this like adults, you know where to find me.
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Action80 on September 14, 2021, 06:35:23 PM
The fact remains that science flourished in the Christian world, and far outside the boundaries under former Islamic control.
^This is just wrong as all get out.

No way, no how Christianity has contributed as much to scientific inquiry as Islam.

Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Action80 on September 14, 2021, 06:40:34 PM
murder is only bad
Do you know what murder is?
Title: Re: Holy shit, vegans suck
Post by: Action80 on September 14, 2021, 06:44:19 PM
the way we utilize animals for food is not sustainable
"We interrupt this thread to make the following special announcement! Despite thousands of years of real life evidence to the contrary, the ability to raise meat for human consumption will suddenly end because I want it to in my dreams!"