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That is true--some animals eat other animals. Cows don't eat other animals and dogs don't eat other animals.
Many animals are herbivores.
Factory farm cows eat a low of cheap S---t--like sawdust and stuff.
Plus, when animals kills they do it themselves and they do it fast. The animals in factory farms live long, tortured lives. For example, the chickens never go outside and are crowded together so that they can barely move. Calves used for veal are chained inside dark crates in which they can't stand and malnourished. They are not allowed to exercise so that the meat is tender. After a "life" inside a cramped crate they are finally led to slaughter. And many factory farm animals are tortured by underpaid frustrated workers. I've seen photographs of pigs with paint thrown on them, and screaming in horror as they see their babies being stomped on and abused.
Have you seen baby chicks being tossed onto conveyor belts? They are treated like dead objects instead of living beings. Go To PETA's website if you want to see some truly horrible cruelty.
Animals don't torture their food. Humans do.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Northern Maine Land Man
SEOWriter imagines:
"Animals don't torture their food. Humans do."
Apparently SEOWriter has never seen a cat with a mouse or a bird.
Yes, Maine Land Man, I was going to say exactly what you said!
Cats enjoy torturing their food. This last summer, I was outside with one of my cats who lives inside. She discovered a mouse in my front flower garden. She played with it for quite some time...not killing it, but not letting it go, either.
As far as dogs, sure, dogs eat other animals. Dogs will eat mice, rabbits, ducks, frogs, fish, etc. My dog once was surprised by a rabbit in some brush and instinctively snapped at it, breaking its neck and killing it. He sniffed at it, and then started to eat it until I stopped him.
True, but there is no such thing as a uniform morality among humans. Many humans feel eating meat is acceptable with their chosen morality.
You were making a moral argument. You said that because a certain behavior is found in nature that humans can do it -- at least that was the implication of your post. If that were true, rape and the whole list of other behaviors I mentioned are permissible. The fact that there's moral disagreement doesn't mean that nature is a good source of morality.
Quote:
Originally Posted by bpollen
A moral distinction is in the eye of the beholder.
To some, there is a great deal of moral distinction. To some, there is not.
For instance, humans are animals. To some there is a moral distinction between humans and other animals. To some there is not.
Fish are not "animals," scientifically speaking. They also don't have a nervous system. So fish really are different from cows, pigs, etc. Scientifically speaking.
As other posters have mentioned, your "scientifically speaking" points aren't actually scientific. Fish certainly are animals, and fish certainly do have nervous systems. There is very good evidence that fish are conscious and lead surprisingly complex emotional lives. They are not mammals, but that is not an important moral distinction.
Regarding morality: It is always interesting to me that this particular topic (eating meat) suddenly turns everyone into a moral anti-realist. I'm quite certain that, before you posted this, you would have stated with great certainty that torturing babies for no good reason is wrong. Yet, when the topic of eating meat comes up, suddenly there is no such thing as moral truth -- it is in the eye of the beholder. There are very strong arguments against eating meat, at least in our current system of production. To eat factory farmed meat violates numerous moral principles that we ordinarily hold strongly and act according to.
I'm certain there are people who think that humans have some special status in the animal kingdom that is a difference of kind rather than degree. There are also people who don't think we ever landed on the moon. The fact that people believe something isn't evidence that a belief is credible.
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Originally Posted by Linda_d
Culture has everything to do with morality since it determines what its members value. What's desirable in one culture may be reprehensible in another. For example, the ancient Egyptian pharoahs usually married their half sisters while in the Western world that has long been considered incest.
Someone of Chinese heritage raised in the US as an American is going to think like other Americans, and share with other Americans a general moral code. Someone of American heritage raised in China as Chinese is going to think like other Chinese and share with other Chinese a general moral code.
I think you are confusing the idea of explaining moral beliefs with an explanation of morality itself. I'm well aware that culture affects what people believe about morality. I do not, however, think that culture changes the truth value of moral proposition. In other words, to the extent that moral truth exists, it exists across cultural lines. If causing suffering for no good reason is wrong, then it is wrong even if it is practiced widely in a given culture.
A moral distinction is in the eye of the beholder.
To some, there is a great deal of moral distinction. To some, there is not.
For instance, humans are animals. To some there is a moral distinction between humans and other animals. To some there is not.
Fish are not "animals," scientifically speaking. They also don't have a nervous system. So fish really are different from cows, pigs, etc. Scientifically speaking.
Obviously fish are animals. Refer to science.
Obviously fish have a nervous system. Refer to science.
I do agree that they are different from cows and pigs, however. They live in water instead of on land.
I think the animal rights movement would prevent dogs or cats from becoming acceptable as food in the U.S. First of all, many places in Asia are moving away from the practice. Second of all, I believe science has increasingly been able to show how dogs at least are basically evolved to love and trust us. There are theories that their evolution is intertwined with ours. Dogs are like our partner species.
Don't get me wrong - I don't anthropomorphize (sp) my dogs. They're not people, and I'd choose a human life over my own dog's life any day. But they basically complete us, and every day more and more scientific discoveries add more arguments to that theory. It just seems really unnatural to eat a species so closely tied to your own.
I think the animal rights movement would prevent dogs or cats from becoming acceptable as food in the U.S. First of all, many places in Asia are moving away from the practice. Second of all, I believe science has increasingly been able to show how dogs at least are basically evolved to love and trust us. There are theories that their evolution is intertwined with ours. Dogs are like our partner species.
Don't get me wrong - I don't anthropomorphize (sp) my dogs. They're not people, and I'd choose a human life over my own dog's life any day. But they basically complete us, and every day more and more scientific discoveries add more arguments to that theory. It just seems really unnatural to eat a species so closely tied to your own.
They didn't evolve. We bred them to what they are today.
A dog is a dog and a cat is a cat. Great animals just like Cows and Chickens. I bet they taste great. I wouldn't eat a pet, of course.
Why not eat human body parts discarded from hospitals and abortion clinics? I don't know of any 1st world nation which eats dogs. I don't count China as 1st world.
Why not eat human body parts discarded from hospitals and abortion clinics? I don't know of any 1st world nation which eats dogs. I don't count China as 1st world.
If that's your thing you can join the cannibal club.
Why not eat human body parts discarded from hospitals and abortion clinics? I don't know of any 1st world nation which eats dogs. I don't count China as 1st world.
Well, aside from the obvious cultural taboos, the OP based his question on a diminishing supply of farmland (which itself ignores the fact that countries with a lot more people per acre of arable land than the U.S. are still able to feed themselves). Anyway, the amount of food supplied by the dead and aborted would be but a tiny fraction of the nutrition necessary to maintain the population.
This, as I previously indicated, is another problem with eating dogs and cats. As I noted, they're animals and they're carnivores. Raising meat is much less efficient than raising plants. And raising meat to feed to carnivores which will then be consumed by humans is just doubling down on that inefficiency. It's about the most nonsensical way of alleviating a food supply problem imaginable. Now, short-term - ie, a starvation event, like the siege of Leningrad or something similar - would undoubtedly see pets becoming dining options. But that's only a temporary stopgap measure of eating what is already available, not a plan for resolving the underlying issue.
The answer to this thread's question is 'No' for quite a long list of reasons.
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