Should We Be Vegetarian?

[Shams al-Ma'rifa]

I'm not sure... I just watched a cow getting killed and I've been wondering. On one hand, cows serve no purpose on this Earth other than food and fuel (manure)... On the other hand, how would you feel if aliens fed on humans for breakfast...

There's a problem with vegetarianism however. How do we know plants are comfortable being eaten... I mean the central argument I'm hearing is: "plants don't have a central nervous system, therefore they cannot feel pain" but that's just induction that is bound to be proven false in the future...

Hell it took us a while to agree on what life is and even now I think that definition is ... How the hell are viruses considered non-living...

Anyways I'm going on a rant here. Just explain why you think we should or should not be vegetarians but just remember this, how would you feel if you were a food source?

[Hiero of Syracuse]

How would I feel if an Alien ate me, I guess I'd be dead so I wouldn't feel anything.
We shouldn't be vegetarians because we have no need to, it should not be a matter of morality, because everything serves a purpose and currently we are the masters of this planet, if we were let's say in the same state we were 10,000 years ago, than I wouldn't have any objections to being eaten because, it's survival of the fitest.

[Shams al-Ma'rifa]

How would I feel if an Alien ate me, I guess I'd be dead so I wouldn't feel anything.

Keep it real man... Seriously? I hate political correct answers to wrongly defend a point...

if we were let's say in the same state we were 10,000 years ago, than I wouldn't have any objections to being eaten because, it's survival of the fitest.

awesome but most humans do not enjoy being eaten...

[Hiero of Syracuse]

Well I was being serious, it would be like saying how would you feel like if you were never born, my answer is I guess I wouldn't know because, well I don't exist....you see my point?

[Shams al-Ma'rifa]

Well I was being serious, it would be like saying how would you feel like if you were never born, my answer is I guess I wouldn't know because, well I don't exist....you see my point?

Well you do exist but with the constant fear of being eaten...

If animals weren't meant to be eaten, why are they made of meat?

That's a ridiculous argument... So are humans...

If meat wasn't meant to be eaten, why do we have canines?

Well we're talking about the ethics of it, appealing to nature won't work.

Hey if you want to chew on grass for the rest of your life sure go ahead. More meat for me and my brothers.

That's just missing the point...

As far as the, it kills animals part, that's usually how you get food. You kill plants when you eat them too you know. Also don't get me wrong, I want the animal to die as quickly and painlessly as possible, but being killed and then eaten is a part of life. Bears don't think "Hmm this human is alive so therefore should I eat it?", he goes "ROAR NOM NOM" and that's it.

Bears don't have the same degree of moral conscience as humans do... You can't appeal to nature as argument...

I already am a food source for multiple living organisms such as mites, spiders, mosquitoes, bacteria, worms, bears, dogs, big cats, varieties of fish among many other things, and when they are around me with the intent of harvesting it does scare me a bit. Yet just because I stop eating meat won't stop them from nibbling on me, and so I feast.

Bears, dogs, and big cats don't usually attack you do they?

I'm playing devil's advocate btw... I like meat, I don't like how the animals feel pain or stress...

[KingDave]

Bears don't have the same degree of moral conscience as humans do... You can't appeal to nature as argument...

Studies have been unable to effectively proof animals experience emotion. So saying animals can somehow have a moral concisions is just ridiculous.

[Shams al-Ma'rifa]

Studies have been unable to effectively proof animals experience emotion. So saying animals can somehow have a moral concisions is just ridiculous.

Lack of proof is not proof of lack... You clearly don't own a pet...

And no: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion_in_animals

[KingDave]

Lack of proof is not proof of lack... You clearly don't own a pet...

And no: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion_in_animals

Trust me. I'm well versed in the study of emotion in animals. Most studies on animal emotion are highly debatable for one simple reason. We hardly have a clue about how to define emotion in humans! Furthermore, without subjective analysis by the participants (ie the animals) we really cannot possibly come to any conclusions about what they are experiencing.

In conclusion, no research has yet proven that animals experience emotions. Indeed its a topic that is greatly avoided by any psychologist with half a brain, for obvious reasons. Is this irrefutable proof? Maybe, maybe not. Lack of proof is a good start though.

I own one cat and used to own a dog, but he recently passed away.

[Copperknickers II]

Studies have been unable to effectively proof animals experience emotion. So saying animals can somehow have a moral concisions is just ridiculous.

Incorrect, they have shown exactly the opposite, animals do have emotions. It declines from great apes, to lesser mammals, to birds and reptiles, to fish, and then to invertebrates which can feel pain and little else.

Study.

[KingDave]

Incorrect, they have shown exactly the opposite, animals do have emotions. It declines from great apes, to lesser mammals, to birds and reptiles, to fish, and then to invertebrates which can feel pain and little else.

Study.

The New York Times is an unacceptable source. Please try again. Any crack pot can talk to a reporter.

[Sir Winston Churchill]

If animals weren't meant to be eaten, why are they made of meat?

If meat wasn't meant to be eaten, why do we have canines?

Hey if you want to chew on grass for the rest of your life sure go ahead. More meat for me and my brothers.

As far as the, it kills animals part, that's usually how you get food. You kill plants when you eat them too you know. Also don't get me wrong, I want the animal to die as quickly and painlessly as possible, but being killed and then eaten is a part of life. Bears don't think "Hmm this human is alive so therefore should I eat it?", he goes "ROAR NOM NOM" and that's it.

how would you feel if you were a food source?

I already am a food source for multiple living organisms such as mites, spiders, mosquitoes, bacteria, worms, bears, dogs, big cats, varieties of fish among many other things, and when they are around me with the intent of harvesting it does scare me a bit. Yet just because I stop eating meat won't stop them from nibbling on me, and so I feast.

[Bovril]

There's a problem with vegetarianism however. How do we know plants are comfortable being eaten... I mean the central argument I'm hearing is: "plants don't have a central nervous system, therefore they cannot feel pain" but that's just induction that is bound to be proven false in the future...

That's quite some claim. Why would you think that plants can feel pain? Saying that scientific theories are almost always revised, and therefore the idea that plants don't feel pain will be revised both misunderstands the meaning of change in scientific theories and is based on induction.

Hell it took us a while to agree on what life is and even now I think that definition is ... How the hell are viruses considered non-living...

No respectable biologist would put things that simply. The point is that viruses are qualitatively different from other organisms.

Anyways I'm going on a rant here. Just explain why you think we should or should not be vegetarians but just remember this, how would you feel if you were a food source?

Other animals don't have the same mental life as humans, so its meaningless to impute our feelings about the prospect of being eaten onto them. Animals may have an instinctive aversion to danger and death, but they can't conceptualise these things as humans do. The questions are completely different.

[Chlodwig I.]

No because Human is a omnivore

[Bovril]

No because Human is a omnivore

Hunas 'naturally' eat meat, but then again humans 'naturally' have massive child mortality rates, die of easily preventable dieases, use stone tools and so on. One of the nice things about being human is that we don't have to act 'naturally'. Which is not an argument for vegitarianism, but a warning against the naturalistic fallacy.

[iudas]

Hunas 'naturally' eat meat, but then again humans 'naturally' have massive child mortality rates, die of easily preventable dieases, use stone tools and so on. One of the nice things about being human is that we don't have to act 'naturally'. Which is not an argument for vegitarianism, but a warning against the naturalistic fallacy.

You are making an error. Evolution made humans omnivores, but evolution does not dictate that we have high child mortality rates, diseases etc. On the contrary...

[Hax]

There's a problem with vegetarianism however. How do we know plants are comfortable being eaten... I mean the central argument I'm hearing is: "plants don't have a central nervous system, therefore they cannot feel pain" but that's just induction that is bound to be proven false in the future...

Well, there's something we often forget and that's the fact that plants like to be eaten; it's one of their ways of reproduction. Also, raw meat is dangerous. Most raw plants aren't.


To answer your question: No, we don't all have to become a vegetarian. It's a personal choice. Coming from a vegetarian.

Other animals eat each other, prehistoric man hunted for food
this is our place on the food chain so we're entitled to eat animals below us

Argumentum ad antiquitatem, much?

It's really the same as saying "In the fifties blacks were lynched in the United States; we should lynch blacks".

Don't forget that meat was, in the earliest societies, something for the elite population.

====================

To illustrate my reasons for being a vegetarian, it's not the eating of meat per se. The thing is really that the way how animals are killed (not how they live, although that is an important thing to stress as well) is something that I really disagree with.

[Tacitursa]

Wasnt it because of meat that we became what we are? Im talking way back when were just gatherers. Once we started hunting and eating meat we got alot more protein and developed more.

Im pretty i heard that somewhere before. Dont vegitarians have to take suppliments and minerals in non-food form to make up for there lack of meat aswell?

[Bovril]

You are making an error. Evolution made humans omnivores, but evolution does not dictate that we have high child mortality rates, diseases etc. On the contrary...

Evolution didn't make us omnivores. Evolution made us capable of a set of behaviours including meat eating. It also gave us the ability to engage in the behaviour we generally call making moral choices. My moral choice is to eat moderate amounts of meat. But that is not set in stone. A good illustration of this point is in chimps. In some chimp groups, omniverous behavior is fairly common, in others not present at all. Evolution doesn't force chimps to eat or not eat meat. It depends on circumstances, just as it does for us.
Evolution was far less prescriptive on meat eating than on, for example diseases. Bacteria and viruses voevolving with humans and causing disease are something we still can't eliminate. Ouside of late industrialised societies humans allways have relitively high infant mortality rates. This is far more consistent than meat eating. Unless you think modern medicine was evolved then high infant mortality rates are the evolved state of humans.

Defering choices by appealing to evolutionary conditions is an opt-out that no one does consistently and is a poor substitute for reasoned argument.

Trust me. I'm well versed in the study of emotion in animals. Most studies on animal emotion are highly debatable for one simple reason. We hardly have a clue about how to define emotion in humans! Furthermore, without subjective analysis by the participants (ie the animals) we really cannot possibly come to any conclusions about what they are experiencing.

In conclusion, no research has yet proven that animals experience emotions. Indeed its a topic that is greatly avoided by any psychologist with half a brain, for obvious reasons. Is this irrefutable proof? Maybe, maybe not. Lack of proof is a good start though.

Whilst I agree with most of what your saying, I would moderate it some what. We can identify brain regions corresponding to emotional experience in humans, and to an extent tranfer that information over to other mamals. But as you say, how animals subjetively experience that brain activity is unknowable.

[iudas]

Defering choices by appealing to evolutionary conditions is an opt-out that no one does consistently and is a poor substitute for reasoned argument.

Then what do you base these choices on?

[MaximiIian]

If someone wants to be a vegetarian, that's fine by me.
But I enjoy eating meat; I like it, and I don't want to give that up.

There's no reason that all people must be either/or.