Thanks for this post, and the comments. Great to see the emotion taken out of the equation, and rational thought in its place. I fully agree that factory farming is an abomination. I’m open to vegetarianism and veganism, but not convinced they’re the most morally correct action. Or whether “morals” should play into it. I do respect people’s choice to look at it that way. This ties into an article of my own I’ve considered writing but have put off. I’m very interested in eastern philosophy. In which we accept the world as it is. Not that we don’t try to make it better, but that on a certain scale, things are the way they are. Longtermism aside, I see it like this: eventually, we lose our sun, and long before that, the earth is no longer inhabitable for humans or any complex life. A world of species rises, and falls, over and over again throughout this universe and others. All the drama, the handwringing over the “right” choices etc., fades into nothing and things move on, unaware.
The fact that, as longtermism assumes, humans on earth may well be the only species capable of appreciating the full nature of life, can be taken different ways. Maybe it’s just us who can appreciate the beauty of it all, and we can decide that’s an important thing to protect, or decide it’s an ok thing to let fade.
So...you look at nature. Killing to live. Only plants (most of them, anyway) don’t need to kill to live. If you can’t photosynthesize, you must kill to live. A Buddhist or Daoist (or most aboriginal groups) would see this, and conclude “this is the way of nature”. It’s accepted. But the fact that we must kill to eat (whether that’s killing an animal or plant) creates a very important responsibility to do so ethically. Vegetarianism and veganism seem to imply that there is no way to ethically kill an animal (to overgeneralize). Killing is, by definition, unethical.
Is this an enlightened viewpoint, or a viewpoint born of a separation from nature, a separation from seeing how the natural world works?
Animals kill to live. The closer you get to nature, the less you can ignore it.
Is it sheer hubris to think we as humans can contradict the natural way of things (understanding that “natural” is a tricky concept and we regularly get it wrong), turn carnivores into herbivores, muck around with natural systems? I don’t know. I know we have a terrible track record.
BUT, we as humans can think beyond all this, and there’s no doubt that death involves suffering. Suffering is a fact of life, no matter how hard we attempt to avoid it. But avoiding unnecessary suffering IS something we can aspire to. We, as humans, are the only species who can decide to reduce suffering. So I can’t discount vegetarianism or veganism.
To Drew’s point, genetics absolutely play a role in someone’s success with a certain diet. I’ve dug into health and nutrition deeply over the last few years, and what works for one person absolutely will not necessarily work for another. If I ate like Drew, I’d be pushing myself toward type II diabetes and have a ton of inflammation. But his biomarkers show above average health (though, especially in the West, “average” is a low bar). Clearly being vegan is working for him. I agree that with supplementation and very careful choices in diet, we can reduce suffering by not eating animals.
On a philosophical level, I’m not convinced we know what’s “right”. I think raising and slaughtering animals ethically is, if nothing else, the next step. Abolish factory farming (90% of my food choices (I hunt, I buy pasture raised)) align with this ideal. Whether or not it’s a step towards discontinuing animal consumption completely. To be sure, if our population growth continues (and I’m not an advocate for population control, at least in any form I’ve seen it proposed), “real” meat consumption can’t continue. It’ll have to be lab-grown. But I do long for, let’s say half our current world population, fed by local farms practicing regenerative agriculture. Without animals pooping on fields, crops need artificial fertilizer, and the type of giant monocropping necessary to feed giant human populations requires chemical fertilizer, chemical pesticide and insecticide, pushing us toward ecological collapse. I’m just not sure how this whole things plays out...
Thanks for this post, and the comments. Great to see the emotion taken out of the equation, and rational thought in its place. I fully agree that factory farming is an abomination. I’m open to vegetarianism and veganism, but not convinced they’re the most morally correct action. Or whether “morals” should play into it. I do respect people’s choice to look at it that way. This ties into an article of my own I’ve considered writing but have put off. I’m very interested in eastern philosophy. In which we accept the world as it is. Not that we don’t try to make it better, but that on a certain scale, things are the way they are. Longtermism aside, I see it like this: eventually, we lose our sun, and long before that, the earth is no longer inhabitable for humans or any complex life. A world of species rises, and falls, over and over again throughout this universe and others. All the drama, the handwringing over the “right” choices etc., fades into nothing and things move on, unaware.
The fact that, as longtermism assumes, humans on earth may well be the only species capable of appreciating the full nature of life, can be taken different ways. Maybe it’s just us who can appreciate the beauty of it all, and we can decide that’s an important thing to protect, or decide it’s an ok thing to let fade.
So...you look at nature. Killing to live. Only plants (most of them, anyway) don’t need to kill to live. If you can’t photosynthesize, you must kill to live. A Buddhist or Daoist (or most aboriginal groups) would see this, and conclude “this is the way of nature”. It’s accepted. But the fact that we must kill to eat (whether that’s killing an animal or plant) creates a very important responsibility to do so ethically. Vegetarianism and veganism seem to imply that there is no way to ethically kill an animal (to overgeneralize). Killing is, by definition, unethical.
Is this an enlightened viewpoint, or a viewpoint born of a separation from nature, a separation from seeing how the natural world works?
Animals kill to live. The closer you get to nature, the less you can ignore it.
Is it sheer hubris to think we as humans can contradict the natural way of things (understanding that “natural” is a tricky concept and we regularly get it wrong), turn carnivores into herbivores, muck around with natural systems? I don’t know. I know we have a terrible track record.
BUT, we as humans can think beyond all this, and there’s no doubt that death involves suffering. Suffering is a fact of life, no matter how hard we attempt to avoid it. But avoiding unnecessary suffering IS something we can aspire to. We, as humans, are the only species who can decide to reduce suffering. So I can’t discount vegetarianism or veganism.
To Drew’s point, genetics absolutely play a role in someone’s success with a certain diet. I’ve dug into health and nutrition deeply over the last few years, and what works for one person absolutely will not necessarily work for another. If I ate like Drew, I’d be pushing myself toward type II diabetes and have a ton of inflammation. But his biomarkers show above average health (though, especially in the West, “average” is a low bar). Clearly being vegan is working for him. I agree that with supplementation and very careful choices in diet, we can reduce suffering by not eating animals.
On a philosophical level, I’m not convinced we know what’s “right”. I think raising and slaughtering animals ethically is, if nothing else, the next step. Abolish factory farming (90% of my food choices (I hunt, I buy pasture raised)) align with this ideal. Whether or not it’s a step towards discontinuing animal consumption completely. To be sure, if our population growth continues (and I’m not an advocate for population control, at least in any form I’ve seen it proposed), “real” meat consumption can’t continue. It’ll have to be lab-grown. But I do long for, let’s say half our current world population, fed by local farms practicing regenerative agriculture. Without animals pooping on fields, crops need artificial fertilizer, and the type of giant monocropping necessary to feed giant human populations requires chemical fertilizer, chemical pesticide and insecticide, pushing us toward ecological collapse. I’m just not sure how this whole things plays out...