What if plants were animals like any other?(booksandideas.net)
booksandideas.net
What if plants were animals like any other?
https://booksandideas.net/Are-Plants-Animals-Like-Any-Other.html
72 comments
Personally debates like these make my head hurt, but I am grateful for philosophers and others who mine these topics and proffer summaries. I do think they are important topics [for some people] to think about.
> Life involves suffering of some kind for every living thing on this planet. It's another one of those inescapable facts.
So when plants consciously grow edible parts to themselves in exchange for seed dispersal, are they suffering? Do they suffer when they drop leaves every autumn?
So when plants consciously grow edible parts to themselves in exchange for seed dispersal, are they suffering? Do they suffer when they drop leaves every autumn?
>So when plants consciously grow edible parts to themselves in exchange for seed dispersal,
Depends on the plant and the kind of life cycle they have, in some cases, yes they slowly die after.
Even if they don't, think of human pregnancy and childbirth. Human mothers suffer a fair amount even during pregnancy as their nutrients are shared between their young and they grow inside them.
When plants produce fruits and seeds, they stop vegetative growth for the duration of this, the send any available nutrients to the seeds and fruit, thereby depriving the rest of the plant of needed nutrients. Post fruit production, it typically takes at least a season before vegetative growth begins.
>Do they suffer when they drop leaves every autumn?
Yes, they go dormant and can't feed themselves or grow. Sometimes overwintering trees or plants will die from the stress.
When I say suffering, I mostly mean, show visible signs of either stress or delayed growth, or other things plants typically 'suffer' from when mistreated or grown in poor conditions.
Whether it's the same as an animal suffering, I don't know and I doubt anyone could know or if it even matters. Animals and plants are fundamentally different, the way they display their 'suffering' is not really comparable. What we see as suffering in animals comes from our own experiences with suffering. We have no possible way to empathize or experience plant suffering so we have no actual way to ever truly understand how they may or may not 'feel' the same way we ever will with animals.
Depends on the plant and the kind of life cycle they have, in some cases, yes they slowly die after.
Even if they don't, think of human pregnancy and childbirth. Human mothers suffer a fair amount even during pregnancy as their nutrients are shared between their young and they grow inside them.
When plants produce fruits and seeds, they stop vegetative growth for the duration of this, the send any available nutrients to the seeds and fruit, thereby depriving the rest of the plant of needed nutrients. Post fruit production, it typically takes at least a season before vegetative growth begins.
>Do they suffer when they drop leaves every autumn?
Yes, they go dormant and can't feed themselves or grow. Sometimes overwintering trees or plants will die from the stress.
When I say suffering, I mostly mean, show visible signs of either stress or delayed growth, or other things plants typically 'suffer' from when mistreated or grown in poor conditions.
Whether it's the same as an animal suffering, I don't know and I doubt anyone could know or if it even matters. Animals and plants are fundamentally different, the way they display their 'suffering' is not really comparable. What we see as suffering in animals comes from our own experiences with suffering. We have no possible way to empathize or experience plant suffering so we have no actual way to ever truly understand how they may or may not 'feel' the same way we ever will with animals.
the cells that makeup those structures suffer the consequences of being sacrificed but the genes of that being have "decided" that the cost is worthwhile.
Fair. In the end, we'll find "well, _everything_ is suffering!" and be forced to just embrace it or pretend we never asked.
However, I do see the unpacking/evaluation of assumptions inherent in the debate as valuable … "why is ending a life that can experience suffering the way humans do more ethical than a life that doesn't?" and "what does it say about us that we want to prevent animals from suffering?" and so on …
However, I do see the unpacking/evaluation of assumptions inherent in the debate as valuable … "why is ending a life that can experience suffering the way humans do more ethical than a life that doesn't?" and "what does it say about us that we want to prevent animals from suffering?" and so on …
Absolutely, I still think it's important to deeply meditate on suffering and to ask ethical questions like the ones you've pointed out. The alternative is to be sort of nihilistic, shrugging the creation of suffering off as inevitable and to keep on causing unnecessary harm.
I mean, an entire religion was formed around insights around suffering, so clearly people have been thinking about this for a long time!
I mean, an entire religion was formed around insights around suffering, so clearly people have been thinking about this for a long time!
I think you and the parent poster missed the intention behind what I was saying. Not that we should have a nihilistic approach, but that the baseline for these conversations should be to assume suffering is a universal part of life and we should be focussing on how to minimize the amount of direct suffering each of us cause in our day to day life, rather than worrying about which suffers more, plants or animals.
It's not comparable, they're two entirely different forms of life, suffice to say, they both suffer, discussions around how people can directly if not reduce suffering mitigate it.
Telling people to only eat vegetables because suffering animals or it's cool eat meat because suffering plants is an utterly pointless topic of debate.
A more useful topic for debate if we're going to talk about such things would be maybe something like mitigating the suffering on both plants and animals through industrialized agriculture by returning to small scale production of both. Or something like that anyway.
The article as framed just didn't really talk in any useful way about the issue.
Which, if you are serious about ending suffering, a plant or animal grown in a small scale way where it can be looked after properly is going to suffer significantly less, even if it inevitably will die to feed somebody.
It's not comparable, they're two entirely different forms of life, suffice to say, they both suffer, discussions around how people can directly if not reduce suffering mitigate it.
Telling people to only eat vegetables because suffering animals or it's cool eat meat because suffering plants is an utterly pointless topic of debate.
A more useful topic for debate if we're going to talk about such things would be maybe something like mitigating the suffering on both plants and animals through industrialized agriculture by returning to small scale production of both. Or something like that anyway.
The article as framed just didn't really talk in any useful way about the issue.
Which, if you are serious about ending suffering, a plant or animal grown in a small scale way where it can be looked after properly is going to suffer significantly less, even if it inevitably will die to feed somebody.
I definitely agree that we should focus on how to minimize the amount of direct suffering each of us causes. And yeah, of course, there are more productive ways to focus on these questions rather than "plants suffer too".
Personally, I'm a vegetarian because I find it unethical to eat animals for many reasons. Their individual suffering, the environment, my personal health. Of course even within that you have to be careful, because going vegetarian but only eating food flown in from around the world isn't too great either.
Personally, I'm a vegetarian because I find it unethical to eat animals for many reasons. Their individual suffering, the environment, my personal health. Of course even within that you have to be careful, because going vegetarian but only eating food flown in from around the world isn't too great either.
> Trying to pretend we can erase any and all suffering we may cause ever is a fruitless effort.
I wouldn't be so sure. Eduard Hartmann came up with a solution in the 19th century.
https://theconversation.com/solve-suffering-by-blowing-up-th...
I wouldn't be so sure. Eduard Hartmann came up with a solution in the 19th century.
https://theconversation.com/solve-suffering-by-blowing-up-th...
This is a common feature of critiques of Schopenhaur; Philipp Mainländer advanced the position that God created the universe to end its atemporal suffering, exploding and binding itself temporally in order that its suffering should eventually cease.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_is_dead#Role_in_the_philos...
It's frustrating that your article brushes off the philosophy as "unimaginably wrong" so easily with some hand wave of techno-utopian "genetic engineering". Benatar's writing takes pains to address why the situation cannot fundamentally be solved, especially via naive scientism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_is_dead#Role_in_the_philos...
It's frustrating that your article brushes off the philosophy as "unimaginably wrong" so easily with some hand wave of techno-utopian "genetic engineering". Benatar's writing takes pains to address why the situation cannot fundamentally be solved, especially via naive scientism.
The article suggests that eliminating suffering rather than sufferers is the common sense way to go.
Is that any better? That sort of thing makes me think first of the horrifying disorder where people are unable to feel pain.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congenital_insensitivity_to_pa...
And Jack Williamson's "With Folded Hands" which is sort of a story of another kind of paperclip maximization.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/With_Folded_Hands
Is that any better? That sort of thing makes me think first of the horrifying disorder where people are unable to feel pain.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congenital_insensitivity_to_pa...
And Jack Williamson's "With Folded Hands" which is sort of a story of another kind of paperclip maximization.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/With_Folded_Hands
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This seems like a rabbit whole, at some point there's no objective ethics, you pick your line. Are you going to include bacteria, yeast, common viruses, dust mites, there's plenty to choose from.
I think one thing that seems relevant to humans, is we seem to be bothered only once we can relate to the other being in a more explicit way. This is true even between our peers. Maybe as we understand more and more of other creatures so will our empathy.
I think one thing that seems relevant to humans, is we seem to be bothered only once we can relate to the other being in a more explicit way. This is true even between our peers. Maybe as we understand more and more of other creatures so will our empathy.
Jainism takes this pretty far, I've been learning a bit about it recently and it's pretty interesting as far as ancient religions go:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jainism
Particularly good if you're interested in diving in more: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c33XPyljUiw
Particularly good if you're interested in diving in more: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c33XPyljUiw
Thanks for sharing, I'm in the same boat. I love the logical consistency of Jainism, as I've always found vegans drawing the line at animals but not plants to be a bit arbitrary. Setting the goal as avoiding harming all life and then getting as close to that as you can without just starving to death is something I deeply admire. Not to mention the attention to microscopic life is particularly impressive and science-aware imo.
I would just like to point out that the existence of (what I assume you mean when you say) "objective ethics" isn't a sure thing. I don't mean to imply that ethical nihilism (basically saying ethics aren't "a thing") is the only way forward though. We can probably assign ethical value to human action even (some would say especially) if "objective ethics" don't exist.
Speaking of yeasts, I guess it's not something that's on everyone's minds, but the reason bread rises is because yeasts die in the heat of the oven and, reacting to the deadly environmental conditions, radically increase their rate of fermentation of the carbohydrates in the dough thus releasing abnormally large amounts of CO2 in a very short time.
Essentially, bread rises because of the the death throes of tiny, microscopic unicellular fungi.
Essentially, bread rises because of the the death throes of tiny, microscopic unicellular fungi.
No? They produce alcohol and CO2 during rising/proofing, and that gas has nowhere to go: it's trapped in the dough. Once heated, that trapped gas then expands during baking. The yeast dies, yes, but bread doesn't rise "because of the death throes of [yeast]", it rises because heating a gas increases in pressure, and the dough expands because of that pressure. Yes, the heat also kills the yeast, but that has nothing to do with oven spring.
(And of course, the spring only "sticks" if the dough is both elastic enough to permit that expansion -for example because it has a gluten network- and developed enough that, in that expanded state, the dough can set well enough to support its own shape, rather than deflating once we remove the heat, and the high pressure gasses cool down and contract, pull the now baked bread in on itself)
(And of course, the spring only "sticks" if the dough is both elastic enough to permit that expansion -for example because it has a gluten network- and developed enough that, in that expanded state, the dough can set well enough to support its own shape, rather than deflating once we remove the heat, and the high pressure gasses cool down and contract, pull the now baked bread in on itself)
Are you sure about that?
My impression was that fermentation outside the oven causes most of the rising, with a bit of "oven spring" from the vaporization of water in the dough.
The yeast obviously die in the oven, but I don't think the death per se is critical for the leavening.
My impression was that fermentation outside the oven causes most of the rising, with a bit of "oven spring" from the vaporization of water in the dough.
The yeast obviously die in the oven, but I don't think the death per se is critical for the leavening.
Are you sure? I think the yeast produces CO2 before cooking and during the initial part of the cooking (while the drought temperature is below 40°C(???)). Most enzymes a cells have a temperature where they have an optimal efficiency, so I expect the yeast not to be so efficient when the drought is too hot.
But when the drought get hot the tiny bubbles of CO2 expand and when it's too hot and the drought get cooked and the structure around the bubbles is fixed like in a sponge.
But when the drought get hot the tiny bubbles of CO2 expand and when it's too hot and the drought get cooked and the structure around the bubbles is fixed like in a sponge.
Replying to all sibling comments: oh, well. Maybe I know that wrong. I'll have to go back to find the source where I took this. I don't remember what that source was.
I've yet to get a satisfying answer to why it matters - life is suffering. Is there any organism that can survive without the expense of something else?
construction kills animals, eating animals kills animals, using computers promotes industry which kills animals. what activity can a human participate in that doesn't kill animals?
of course, one can say fewer animals could be killed by doing [other things], but that's besides the point. I'm not sure you can win, nature will always find an equilibrium that will result in the same amount of death - you save the goats and they'll ruin the land and eventually all die. you kill the predators and overpopulation of the prey will run rampant resulting in eventual famine, etc.
and of course, if you're lucky things are in a stable state until something evolves and figures out efficient ways to wipe everything out - I suppose that's where we come in.
construction kills animals, eating animals kills animals, using computers promotes industry which kills animals. what activity can a human participate in that doesn't kill animals?
of course, one can say fewer animals could be killed by doing [other things], but that's besides the point. I'm not sure you can win, nature will always find an equilibrium that will result in the same amount of death - you save the goats and they'll ruin the land and eventually all die. you kill the predators and overpopulation of the prey will run rampant resulting in eventual famine, etc.
and of course, if you're lucky things are in a stable state until something evolves and figures out efficient ways to wipe everything out - I suppose that's where we come in.
> life is suffering
Not sure why I'm sharing this, but I saw a hawk kill a squirrel yesterday. It was standing on top of the squirrel (still alive) on my neighbor's lawn.
Three other squirrels were screeching and they made futile charges at the hawk to try to free the other squirrel.
The amount of distress / suffering / chaos was far more disturbing than I would have expected to see on a suburban lawn. I even considered intervening and trying to scare the hawk away.
But the hawk's gotta eat, too.
Plus, it probably would've kicked my ass.
*edits for better phrasing.
Not sure why I'm sharing this, but I saw a hawk kill a squirrel yesterday. It was standing on top of the squirrel (still alive) on my neighbor's lawn.
Three other squirrels were screeching and they made futile charges at the hawk to try to free the other squirrel.
The amount of distress / suffering / chaos was far more disturbing than I would have expected to see on a suburban lawn. I even considered intervening and trying to scare the hawk away.
But the hawk's gotta eat, too.
Plus, it probably would've kicked my ass.
*edits for better phrasing.
There's a video I saw on youtube of a bear eating a deer alive in someone's backyard. The video is filmed from behind a sliding glass door or something, basically front row seats. It's quite horrifying; the deer screams and sounds just like a human screaming. I've gotta say, one thing I'll say about hunting is there's almost no way the animal will suffer as much from being shot as they would if they were eaten by bears or wolves instead.
My fun anecdote: I watched a hawk swoop down and land about 5 feet from a squirrel in my yard a few weeks ago. I thought to myself, "That squirrel is toast." The hawk just sat there and the squirrel charged it _and chased it off_. First time I've ever see that in my life. I'm assuming the hawk wasn't hungry or was ill, so the squirrel got lucky.
In theory wouldn't that cover any organism that subsists directly on a non-living energy source (forgot if there's a word for that). Plants with the sun, deep-sea life with thermal vents. If you go full sci-fi, I imagine a human could survive without the expense of another living thing if we could synthesize all the nutrients etc that a human needs.
As to why it matters in a philosophical sense, I'd say it doesn't. Everything's just matter and energy. But it matters to some people so they try to reduce their impact, just like violence matters to most people so most people try to avoid injuring or maiming people, even if it doesn't matter in the end.
As to why it matters in a philosophical sense, I'd say it doesn't. Everything's just matter and energy. But it matters to some people so they try to reduce their impact, just like violence matters to most people so most people try to avoid injuring or maiming people, even if it doesn't matter in the end.
> Is there any organism that can survive without the expense of something else?
Things that photosynthesize, before some resource limit is reached.
Things that photosynthesize, before some resource limit is reached.
If you spend enough time watching nature videos like I do, you will notice that the vast majority of animals are eaten alive by their predators. It's slow, and exceedingly painful and it is ubiquitous. So even if plants were conscious, I honestly don't care. A bear would eat me alive in the most painful way possible and they wouldn't even think a second about it. Neither will I.
That's not a very clever argument. Animals also routinely rape each other, fight and sometimes kill rivals, engage in cannibalism, etc.; that doesn't excuse humans committing murder and sexual assault anymore than natural predation excuses factory farming.
I mean sure it's perfectly natural, sure, whatever, it's also perfectly natural if the rest of us decide to ostracize and/or throw you in jail for it.
I mean sure it's perfectly natural, sure, whatever, it's also perfectly natural if the rest of us decide to ostracize and/or throw you in jail for it.
There are potentially interesting questions here about The Limits of Obligation.[0] If killing animals is wrong, do humans have a moral duty to bring about the extinction (or at least genetic engineering) of all carnivorous animals?
Probably not, but that begs the question: is killing animals wrong (given that it would continue to occur at roughly the same rate even if there were no humans in the world)?
One way to approach questions of moral obligation is to consider the actions of the median person. As an example, we could simplistically say that someone who emits more than the median amount of CO2 is responsible for anthropogenic climate change, whereas someone who emits less is not responsible for it.
In the case of animals and humans eating each other, though, the set of agents being considered might have to be the set of all animals on Earth. Under that analysis, since there are apparently 21 quadrillion spiders alive on the Earth today[1], the vast majority of which are exclusively carnivorous, any human who obtains some of their calorie intake from plants is less carnivorous than the median animal.
[0] https://www.jstor.org/stable/2215174
[1] https://www.allthingsnature.org/how-many-spiders-are-there-i...
Probably not, but that begs the question: is killing animals wrong (given that it would continue to occur at roughly the same rate even if there were no humans in the world)?
One way to approach questions of moral obligation is to consider the actions of the median person. As an example, we could simplistically say that someone who emits more than the median amount of CO2 is responsible for anthropogenic climate change, whereas someone who emits less is not responsible for it.
In the case of animals and humans eating each other, though, the set of agents being considered might have to be the set of all animals on Earth. Under that analysis, since there are apparently 21 quadrillion spiders alive on the Earth today[1], the vast majority of which are exclusively carnivorous, any human who obtains some of their calorie intake from plants is less carnivorous than the median animal.
[0] https://www.jstor.org/stable/2215174
[1] https://www.allthingsnature.org/how-many-spiders-are-there-i...
> killing animals... would continue to occur at roughly the same rate even if there were no humans in the world
Would it? Maybe in absolute terms when you include insects, but it's less clear if you talk about specific taxa. >50e9 chickens per year are slaughtered (and most don't have great lives before that), which is comparable to low-end estimates of the total number of wild birds on the planet (https://www.dw.com/en/50-billion-birds-live-on-earth-new-stu...). It seems likely that humans kill more chickens pa than non-humans kill all other birds combined.
Would it? Maybe in absolute terms when you include insects, but it's less clear if you talk about specific taxa. >50e9 chickens per year are slaughtered (and most don't have great lives before that), which is comparable to low-end estimates of the total number of wild birds on the planet (https://www.dw.com/en/50-billion-birds-live-on-earth-new-stu...). It seems likely that humans kill more chickens pa than non-humans kill all other birds combined.
If there were no humans, other animals would take over where humans are now. There would be more prolonged dying at the very least.
It's true that nature is pretty red in tooth and claw, and very, very cruel.
But nature documentaries aren't really the best way to learn about it. They're designed to entertain rather than inform. They show an exceedingly skewed view of nature.
They're also not a great source of morality. You're not a bear. In particular, you don't live among bears. You have a sense of conscience that's different from a bear's, as a consequence (both nature and nurture) of living a very different life from a bear.
But nature documentaries aren't really the best way to learn about it. They're designed to entertain rather than inform. They show an exceedingly skewed view of nature.
They're also not a great source of morality. You're not a bear. In particular, you don't live among bears. You have a sense of conscience that's different from a bear's, as a consequence (both nature and nurture) of living a very different life from a bear.
It goes all the way down... even the simplest animals (and where it becomes questionable as to what is an animal).
Journey to the Microcosmos - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBbnbBWJtwsf0jLGUwX5Q3g
For example - a Paramecium hunter - https://youtu.be/yXiJ__5-tI8
Journey to the Microcosmos - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBbnbBWJtwsf0jLGUwX5Q3g
For example - a Paramecium hunter - https://youtu.be/yXiJ__5-tI8
"you will notice that the vast majority of animals are eaten alive by their predators"
Technically the truth, because insects and fish are mostly eaten alive. But mammal predators generally kill their prey before they start eating it.
Technically the truth, because insects and fish are mostly eaten alive. But mammal predators generally kill their prey before they start eating it.
I knew exactly whete this eould go after reading that opening line. You just don't care.
I don't care either, I draw the line between human and non-human. Anything you do on non-human is fair game to me.
The only reason I may care about animal suffering is because the other human can get angry can cause me trouble.
The only reason I may care about animal suffering is because the other human can get angry can cause me trouble.
> Anything you do on non-human is fair game to me.
It might be wise to moderate that position by also objecting to people taking pleasure in seeing/causing the suffering of animals. You may not care about the experience of those animals, but you should still care what effect it has on the human who indulges that side of themselves.
Similarly you should also care that humans are not excessively exposed to scenes of "necessary" animal suffering, whether that be abattoir workers or veterinarians. Having psychological counselling mandated and freely available for these professions would be an ethical improvement for the world even if it didn't reduce the amount of animal suffering at all.
It might be wise to moderate that position by also objecting to people taking pleasure in seeing/causing the suffering of animals. You may not care about the experience of those animals, but you should still care what effect it has on the human who indulges that side of themselves.
Similarly you should also care that humans are not excessively exposed to scenes of "necessary" animal suffering, whether that be abattoir workers or veterinarians. Having psychological counselling mandated and freely available for these professions would be an ethical improvement for the world even if it didn't reduce the amount of animal suffering at all.
>It might be wise to moderate that position by also objecting to people taking pleasure in seeing/causing the suffering of animals. You may not care about the experience of those animals, but you should still care what effect it has on the human who indulges that side of themselves.
I wouldn't object to people taking pleasure in seeing/causing the suffering of animals, as long as its only limited to animals (does not harm other human).
I wouldn't object to people taking pleasure in seeing/causing the suffering of animals, as long as its only limited to animals (does not harm other human).
> Worse, the production of one animal protein requires 7 to 10 plant proteins. The argument is a strictly accounting one. Even if plant suffering were of the same intensity as animal suffering, omnivores would produce seven to ten times more suffering than plant lovers alone.
So, seven proteins make seven ... sufferings? Proteins are a measure of suffering?
So, seven proteins make seven ... sufferings? Proteins are a measure of suffering?
No, the point is that the process of generating meat requires the animal eat plants. So even if plants suffer, eating animals is still worse, since the animal suffers along with 7-10x the number of plants.
OK, so 1 animal suffering = 7 to 10 plant sufferings, yes?
There's a quantification of suffering according to which the suffering of one animal is equal to the suffering of 7-10 plants, correct?
There's a quantification of suffering according to which the suffering of one animal is equal to the suffering of 7-10 plants, correct?
No, it's not comparing the suffering of plants and animals. It's only pointing out that by virtue of feeding an animal, you necessarily kill plants. So when you raise an animal to eat, you're killing both the animal as well as the plants it consumed. The 7-10x number is relative to the number of plants you'd have killed if you instead ate plants directly.
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The quote says:
"Even if plant suffering were of the same intensity as animal suffering, omnivores would produce seven to ten times more suffering than plant lovers alone."
Note the word "suffering". The quote is comparins suffering, not killing.
> The 7-10x number is relative to the number of plants you'd have killed if you instead ate plants directly.
The quote says:
"Worse, the production of one animal protein requires 7 to 10 plant proteins."
So the quote is counting proteins, not animals or plants.
"Even if plant suffering were of the same intensity as animal suffering, omnivores would produce seven to ten times more suffering than plant lovers alone."
Note the word "suffering". The quote is comparins suffering, not killing.
> The 7-10x number is relative to the number of plants you'd have killed if you instead ate plants directly.
The quote says:
"Worse, the production of one animal protein requires 7 to 10 plant proteins."
So the quote is counting proteins, not animals or plants.
I'm not sure what you're contradicting?
In order to get 1 calorie of meat, you need to use 7-10 calories of plants. So by necessity, if you eat 1 calorie of meat, you are producing (at least) 7-10x the suffering relative to eating 1 calorie of plants, since 7-10x as much plant mass (and hence plants) needed to suffer to create the meat.
I'm going to stop responding at this point because I'm not sure how else I can explain this.
In order to get 1 calorie of meat, you need to use 7-10 calories of plants. So by necessity, if you eat 1 calorie of meat, you are producing (at least) 7-10x the suffering relative to eating 1 calorie of plants, since 7-10x as much plant mass (and hence plants) needed to suffer to create the meat.
I'm going to stop responding at this point because I'm not sure how else I can explain this.
> In order to get 1 calorie of meat, you need to use 7-10 calories of plants.
But where does this counting of calories come from? The article is talking about proteins. It says "the production of one animal protein requires 7 to 10 plant proteins" (my underlining).
> So by necessity, if you eat 1 calorie of meat, you are producing (at least) 7-10x the suffering relative to eating 1 calorie of plants, since 7-10x as much plant mass (and hence plants) needed to suffer to create the meat.
So, when you say "7-10x as much plant mass (hence plants)", you mean that 1 unit of plant mass = 1 plant, or did I wilfully misunderstand you again?
> I'm going to stop responding at this point because I'm not sure how else I can explain this.
You can explain it if you get the units right. Are we talking of proteins, calories, or units of suffering? What are we counting exactly? Maybe try to explain that?
But where does this counting of calories come from? The article is talking about proteins. It says "the production of one animal protein requires 7 to 10 plant proteins" (my underlining).
> So by necessity, if you eat 1 calorie of meat, you are producing (at least) 7-10x the suffering relative to eating 1 calorie of plants, since 7-10x as much plant mass (and hence plants) needed to suffer to create the meat.
So, when you say "7-10x as much plant mass (hence plants)", you mean that 1 unit of plant mass = 1 plant, or did I wilfully misunderstand you again?
> I'm going to stop responding at this point because I'm not sure how else I can explain this.
You can explain it if you get the units right. Are we talking of proteins, calories, or units of suffering? What are we counting exactly? Maybe try to explain that?
Damnit, I'm all out of suffering points today. No meat for me!
It's a purely mathematical counter to the argument that if plants suffer, people (who consume a roughly fixed amount of protein) could just eat animals instead. That's a contradictory position, because animal protein comes from animals eating plants.
The article is a little vague on why killing plants is bad. Whether it's because you believe that destruction is intrinsically bad, because they have souls, because they feel suffering, or because there's some potential for growth that's aborted, the various reasons are harder for me at least to understand and to build a coherent argument around.
It's philosophically very obvious why killing people is bad, this is so self-evident it's almost nonsense to write it down and inadvertently equivocates it with killing plants: it's trivial to imagine oneself in the position of the victim, or to enumerate the harms being perpetrated, the goals and values being denied, and the rights being violated in the transaction, and conclude that it's wrong. No reasonable person can reach a different conclusion.
It's a little more difficult to extend this empathy towards an especially intelligent animal being killed; while humans have vastly richer communication and more advanced tool use, some animals can have mental and emotional processes not that much different than us. In that case, measuring suffering is more difficult and sometimes leads to surprising conclusions when you do the math. (I said a couple days ago [1] that a reasonable metric for suffering is the number of cortical neurons possessed by the victim, see also [2]). People can disagree about the scale of the suffering or what behaviors are appropriate in light of this problem, but it's easy enough to consider.
Of course, plants, lacking a brain or any neurons at all, are undefined by this criteria. And it's really difficult for me to anthropomorphize a carrot.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27492230 [2] https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/moral-costs-of-chicken...
The article is a little vague on why killing plants is bad. Whether it's because you believe that destruction is intrinsically bad, because they have souls, because they feel suffering, or because there's some potential for growth that's aborted, the various reasons are harder for me at least to understand and to build a coherent argument around.
It's philosophically very obvious why killing people is bad, this is so self-evident it's almost nonsense to write it down and inadvertently equivocates it with killing plants: it's trivial to imagine oneself in the position of the victim, or to enumerate the harms being perpetrated, the goals and values being denied, and the rights being violated in the transaction, and conclude that it's wrong. No reasonable person can reach a different conclusion.
It's a little more difficult to extend this empathy towards an especially intelligent animal being killed; while humans have vastly richer communication and more advanced tool use, some animals can have mental and emotional processes not that much different than us. In that case, measuring suffering is more difficult and sometimes leads to surprising conclusions when you do the math. (I said a couple days ago [1] that a reasonable metric for suffering is the number of cortical neurons possessed by the victim, see also [2]). People can disagree about the scale of the suffering or what behaviors are appropriate in light of this problem, but it's easy enough to consider.
Of course, plants, lacking a brain or any neurons at all, are undefined by this criteria. And it's really difficult for me to anthropomorphize a carrot.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27492230 [2] https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/moral-costs-of-chicken...
For those who would like to read more about this, I enjoyed The Secret Life Of Plants by Thompkins and Bird https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/99442.The_Secret_Life_of...
This book changed how I viewed plants. I always thought of plants as seemingly inert matter until then. It is similar to how people who never owned pets or a farm or lived closely with animals changes their view on non-human intelligence when they adopt a dog or cat etc. The spectrum of life is infinite. Humans like categories to aid our understanding but we define the categories and are error prone.
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Vegans would be in trouble. I'm eating almost only fruits and legumes, but the "animal pain" argument is a bit ridiculous (there are way better arguments like health and environment) above all with this article. Plants also have senses like touch, they feel gravity (else they wouldn't grow vertically, even in the dark)
Watched a brillo doc by DW the other day, got me all full of chills around how crazy nature is and how we take for granted it's sentient qualities:
What can fungi teach us?- - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbcIQpmiZ3Y
What can fungi teach us?- - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbcIQpmiZ3Y
while I do agree that sometimes this seems a bit newagey or, to use an obvious word, "treehugger", I've grown to appreciate the insights from the true believers. I don't always go as far as they do, but I do find there are plenty of surprises with plants.
When researchers opened their eyes and looked, they could find concrete proof that plants often communicated and nurtured their young. They shared and built communities. They worked together to fight enemies. Sure, they don't use the same tactics as animals, but if you look at their progress in the abstract, it's easy to see how they're not sedentary or stupid.
When researchers opened their eyes and looked, they could find concrete proof that plants often communicated and nurtured their young. They shared and built communities. They worked together to fight enemies. Sure, they don't use the same tactics as animals, but if you look at their progress in the abstract, it's easy to see how they're not sedentary or stupid.
That's projection at its worst. Just because you can map some concept vaguely on behavior of some species, doesn't mean it is doing that, nor does it imply that it thus deserves to be treated as human.
> but if you look at their progress in the abstract
Good thing we don't eat abstract plants then.
> but if you look at their progress in the abstract
Good thing we don't eat abstract plants then.
It is not projection. When you ask the question in an abstract way, it opens you up to seeing in way that's not clouded by preconception (something you seem to be doing.)
Do trees pass sugars on to their offspring? Yes. Is that projection? It was validated with scientific methods that tracked deuterated hydrogen. But you can see it as some kind of wacko imagination if you want to be a science denier.
And if you go back, you'll see I didn't say that plants should be treated like humans. Maybe you're the one with an imagination?
Do trees pass sugars on to their offspring? Yes. Is that projection? It was validated with scientific methods that tracked deuterated hydrogen. But you can see it as some kind of wacko imagination if you want to be a science denier.
And if you go back, you'll see I didn't say that plants should be treated like humans. Maybe you're the one with an imagination?
I've played around with this topic before: https://every.sdf.org/.webshare/bon_appetit.txt
This is borderline insanity. What, you want life without side effects now? The only ethical way is death, since no humans means they don't affect ecosystem around them.
This is why we were supposed to eat the fruits, not the plants themselves.
Isn't that just eating the unborn children, then? Is that better than eating an adult? (tongue in cheek, obviously)
Seeds are evolved to survive being eaten and deposited with extra fertilizer some distance away.
Breeding sterile fruit for convenience might be considered bad form in the plant world.
Breeding sterile fruit for convenience might be considered bad form in the plant world.
I think it should be consensual. Let's just ask the plants. And we must remember that affirmative positive consent is the only sort that matters.
What a load of nonsense
But in the end, it's a basic biological fact, unless a form of life can photosynthesize, it likely consumes some form of matter that was likely from something living. Extremophiles that eat sulphur and minerals and such aside, the majority of non-photosynthesizing life consumes organic matter. Said matter was at one time from something that was alive.
In the end debates about whether plants or animals suffer the same or more seem sort of moot. Life involves suffering of some kind for every living thing on this planet. It's another one of those inescapable facts.
I agree we should all try and minimize the amount of suffering we directly cause, but every day something somewhere suffers because each of us exist. Trying to pretend we can erase any and all suffering we may cause ever is a fruitless effort.