Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

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Gambit37
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Gambit37 »

If you want to derail a serious conversation, showing a fruity bikini will do the trick.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Jan »

Hehe! And what about you? The only thing you are wearing is a shield - and it's in a position not hiding anything! Which brings us back to the topic of this conversation - sexuality.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Gambit37 »

You'd be surprised how close my avatar is to how I really look!
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Zyx »

Hello Sealtiel,
I cannot elaborate now on the dozen of interesting things mentioned in this thread but I hope to be able to do so soon.
However, since you seem to be in search for an absolute, could I pinpoint an apparent contradiction in your thoughts?
I'm not trying to trick you but I can't make a long text. You'll have to think.

Consider this:
You say that humans are mere animals, nothing more, nothing less. You say also that animals are innocent and kind of harmless. Yet you say that humans are guilty, stupid and destructive.
So it seems that humans are, after all, different.
Could it be that you expect something from them, from this difference, and being disappointed from this expectation, you condemn them?

Consider also this:
Since you're a human too, you have also this difference. Do you find yourself also stupid and guilty of it?

Consider also this:
Humans are animals and they're part of Nature. In very general terms, you could say that Nature (in a godly or evolutionary sense, as you choose to believe, this is not the point), took an animal species and make it a human species by giving it specific traits. Or they gained this traits through natural or divine means, it doesn't matter. What does matters is that humans, like any other animal, are just another experiment of Nature, so they're not directly responsible of their nature. If they're destructive it's because Nature made them so. Nature made them agressive, dominant and powerful, a probably lethal combination.
Yet some humans are slowly understanding their condition - and their probable fate. The question is, what can you do about this understanding, this condition and this fate? Hate the haters? Kill the killers? Be as stupid as they are? Condescend the arrogants?
The answer may not be about what the others are doing, but about you: what are you doing about what they're doing? what are you doing about what YOU're doing?

Thank you for your consideration. Just an opinion now:
Humans are a species given a huge, blind power of thought, but luckily thoughts can become self-conscious so there is a small chance for each of us to realise what we're doing, to change it and to start building in a better direction.
Maybe we are some kind of mistake of Nature, doomed to destroy everything and then itself, and through time maybe any rising overdominant species already met this fate and will again.
But this current mistake named humanity is slightly self-conscious, and from this emerging consciousness new possibilities open, like wisdom.
Wisdom is very scarce among humanity but doesn't exist anywhere else, so we have to R&D it.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Sealtiel »

Wow Zyx, that's a really well thought out reply. I appreciate you taking some time to do that. I'll try to get to work answering as best I can.

For starters, I do believe that humans are animals & nothing more or less. I don't remember saying that "animals are harmless & innocent". If I implied this somewhere, then I mislead you; and I apologize for that. Of course that's not true, animals aren't innocent at all; but for the most part they're not malicious just for it's own sake. (Except in a few rare cases, such as the orca whale that Sophia mentioned. I didn't even know about that until she mentioned it, so thank you Sophia for teaching me something!)

Now, as a human; I do find fault within myself. That said, nothing in nature is perfect; that's just how it goes. I'm guilty of some things that I wish I weren't, but that's part of what it is to be human. I can't honestly say if I condemn myself (or others) for it or not, because the truth is that I just don't know. I don't think it's possible for someone to have every one of their thoughts & opinions organized & accessible at the drop of a hat; as handy as that would be. So I'm sorry but I can't offer an answer, per se, as much as I would like.

You raise a really good point about "hating the haters". It's something that's not brought up very often, and I'm glad you brought it to light. I'm afraid that I am guilty of this, even though I'm aware it makes me no better. But again, that's just a flaw of human nature; and I can't be perfect enough to get past that.

Now, about what I'm doing. As I said, I do not consume animal products. I don't wear leather (even my shoes), I don't eat meat, and I avoid anything with animal parts and/or tested on animals. While this may sound ridiculous to some, it's my choice; and yes I really do take the time to find out this stuff. I'm weird like that.

The problem is that I'm not sure if I like to think of myself as "better" (per se) than other people who don't do this. I guess my instinct wants to think that way, even though it's totally not true in the least. Frankly, it bothers me that those thoughts even enter my mind; but a person can't stop their mind from working. I just try my best to educate people on what they're doing and it's effects. Some people change their ways and some don't, and either way is fine; really. Live your life however you're comfortable with it, but there's no harm in being educated & sharing opinions. I can't stand people who won't even give you the time of day if you bring up something that might change their blissful little daily routine.

I hope I answered some of your concerns, and I'm sure I probably raised even more question. So please, keep asking. I'd like to thank everyone who is along for this ride. It's forcing me to think and re-evaluate a lot of things, so you can all think of yourself as my shrinks. Thanks everyone, but I'm not paying an hourly fee for your services; helpful though they are.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by T0Mi »

a little late maybe, but: wow, great discussion! :-)
I couldn't do much more than to add my thoughts to some of the points already made.

[human over-population]
Maybe we'll be able to built a society that produces 1.3 children per couple not just because having kids means not to be able to park a new c-class in front of the house.


[non-humans vs. non-non-humans]
Personally I think the mere fact, that we (humans) are always eager to point out the differences between 'us' and 'them' is kind of unmasking.
Book-shelfs can be filled with the common ground we share, but there is -very- little left, we can claim to be unique to our species.
Self-awareness and cognitive thinking, a domain of mankind for the longest time, has been found in several other species.
We shouldn't be too proud of all the shiny technology, space-travel, computers, art, architecture, etc. or at least not much more than a beaver, who may feel superior to a blackbird because of it's nice tail with which he builts his dam.

(afaik) In California chimpanzees have gained special rights because of their ability to be self-aware. What's the minimum requirement for a species to receive the pleasure of being protected by law? Right now this seems to be a central nervous system.
Not long ago we killed, enslaved and tortured other members of our own species (and still do in some parts of the world), mostly because of the "they have no soul" reason.
And I fear, this is still the main reason why we do what we do to other species.

[extremism]
PETA had a campain some years ago. The main title was "the holocaust on your table". As expected (or intended) this caused much controversy.
The Federal Constitutional Court stopped the campain, strangly feeding the Neonazis with a welcome "All people are equal, only jews are more equal".
Still, the jewish author and Nobel laureate Isaac Bashevis Singer said: "For animals every day is Auschwitz".

To some extrend I think it is needed to have extremists. Democracy is a hotbed of extremism. And what today is normal by any means, was extrem in the past.
In 2002 the animal protection act became part of the Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany.
From a jurical point, every slaughter house should have been closed the next day.


hail humans!
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Bit »

Having enough stressfull situations with young people each night, I haven't much hope left that this generation can manage any upcoming crisis in the future. As aggressive and disrespectful as they are, they don't even care for other humans (especially not for older ones) - how should they have any sense left for animals (except pet rats or such...). With each politician getting reasonable, we got thousands of new idiots...
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Gambit37 »

Sealtiel wrote:I do believe that humans are animals & nothing more or less.
Sealtiel wrote:As a human; I do find fault within myself. That said, nothing in nature is perfect; that's just how it goes. I'm guilty of some things that I wish I weren't, but that's part of what it is to be human.
There seems to be quite a contradiction here. You say humans are animals and nothing more, then cite an example of why humans are different.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by linflas »

he probably must be a Cylon, but he doesn't know it yet... :roll:
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Giradius »

ooooh serious conversation, I hope its OK if i join in (and in a single post destroy my reputation before i have one).

I don't think humanity itself as a species is particularly cruel or destructive, if this were the case EVERY human with few exceptions would be cruel and destructive, this talk of the evil ape is missing a hugely important feature...culture.

It is not homo sapiens that are destructive as such, it is subpopulations who adhere to certain cultural ideologies (and while cultures are created by humans, humanity is in no way culturally homogenous), it is not "humanity" that destroys the rainforest to build hotels or grow coffee beans, it is capitalist humans.

Animals (or non humans if you prefer :p) are capable of cognitive function and emotion, any pet owner will verify that, and any zoologist will confirm it, some species form complex social structures such as certain insects, wolves, apes etc.
Altruistic behavior is not even unique to humanity, some animals will risk their own lives to save offspring (this has evolutionary merit) and even charity exists in the animal world, well fed vampire bats will allow hungry vampire bats to feed on them, if this behavior is adopted by most of the population, then the entire population benefits.

however there is another side to this, in the same way that self sacrifice,emotion,charity,altruism exist in the animal kingdom, cruelty and even nationalism (of a sort) exist as well, cats are cruel animals, their natural diet includes rodents, which given their greater size and formidable weaponry they can kill quite quickly, however they toy with a trapped rat or mouse, they play with them before killing them.
I was sat in an inner city park once, and watched a hilarious spectacle of crows bullying a rat, the rat was surrounded by a circle of about 8 or 9 crows, one of the crows would peck the rat in the back and when the rat turned around another would peck it in the back again, I watched this for about 10 minutes, never once did the birds seriously attack the rat (they also could have killed it quickly) this event stands out in my mind.

As for animal nationalism, this is seen in territorial animals where like species of different populations intrude on land "claimed" by one population, when your dog barks at the window when he sees another dog walk past your garden, you are seeing animal nationalism, that dog is saying "this is my territory, the natural resources here are mine, the prey here is mine, the humans here are mine, if you don't leave we will fight" this is NO different to human nationalism.

I remember reading that even Bees do this, and it has been known for hives to attack each other, and if a stray bee goes to the wrong hive, the bees kill it.

Humanity has been civilized for less than 10,000 years we have not evolved much in that time, and as Desmond Morris says, we are just naked apes.

I make no value judgements with that statement, humans are animals is not an insult to humans, merely a statement of fact, intelligence is a tricky thing to define but I think it can be said that humanity is the most intelligent species (in that it has a greater capacity to control its environment,due to a greater understanding of the universe it lives in) however getting into a discussion about what is fair or what species is more deserving is pointless, because in the game of life there are no rules, no referee, and the only scores are dead or alive.
Humans are still animals, still have animal drives and instincts, however people seem to be under the impression that humans are more than that, when in reality we just have more acute or sophisticated ways of expressing them.
When i see a funeral or a an elephant wailing because its offspring is dead, i see the same thing in each case, there is a lot of talk about emotions separating human and animal, but aside from the fact that animals possess emotions anyway, the sort of people who say that, have not thought about what emotions actually are, the sensations of reaction to stimulus and the minds way of communicating with itself, happiness is your unconscious minds way of saying "things are going quite well, keep it up", anger is a motivational force (in that it encourages action, although not always the most reasonable action).

I tend to be somewhat nihilistic at times (as an amoral materialistic atheist) and the idea of saying humans/animals better or worse seems illogical to me, and nothing but subjective opinion, which is not a good basis for understanding the world.

However despite that, I am a vegetarian anyway, and my girlfriend is a vegan, to me its not a matter of cruelty, but of necessary and unnecessary suffering, and in the industrialized western nation that I live in, I can adopt a meat free diet quite easily (and at 6 ft 2 and 17 stone, I can hardly be accused of the veggie stereotype of a pale and unhealthy looking waif) however this diet is a matter of convenience, I CAN survive comfortably without meat, and so I do, the second it becomes unfeasible, i will adopt the most rational diet.

Despite my lack of belief in objective morality, I cannot understand how people who claim to be well balanced or that they like animals, can eat meat, the question to me seems to be one of "why would you choose to eat food that screams, when you can do just fine without it?" even I can answer that one.

It can also be said that there is no such thing as a meat eating environmentalist, because meat production generates a huge amount of the carbon emissions that could potentially spell the end of human life on this planet, vegetarianism just seems like the most rational option to me, eating meat has so many cases against it, there is the suffering argument, the environmental damage, the health risks, the fact that its not especially good for you anyway, and the realization you putting decomposing corpse into your mouth.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Jan »

Heh, welcome to that relatively serious conservation... I mean conversation :)

I just have two remarks:

Firstly - I think most of the bad things done by humans were done unintentionally. I mean - only a very small portion of humans do intend to do bad things (like someone who kills for a pure joy etc.), but many things we were talking about (like global climate change, no animal rights etc.) are just "side-effects" of other things we do with more or less good intentions. And I just think we should be aware of these "side-effects" and we should try to get rid of them.

Secondly:
Giradius wrote:It is capitalist humans.
Are you serious?

I mean, do you think that systems like feudalism (or even communism) were better in that? We just control more power now than ever before (one very heavy tractor possesses more power than all the slaves working on a pyramid at one time). Nothing else.

I'm looking forward to more comments! :)
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Sophia »

Giradius wrote:it is not "humanity" that destroys the rainforest to build hotels or grow coffee beans, it is capitalist humans.
What Jan said. Destroying the environment in the name of "progress" is hardly unique to capitalism.
Giradius wrote:Humanity has been civilized for less than 10,000 years we have not evolved much in that time
Physically, no. Socially, I'd say a great deal.

Your talk of "animal nationalism" is valid, but it neglects the matter of scale. No animals consciously organize on the level that humans do, or have anything resembling the degree of mass communication we do. This wasn't always the case-- originally, humans were organized in little villages and nobody trusted the village a few miles away. It seems the group of people we consider "our own" is growing wider and broader, ever so slowly (first a village, then a tribe, then a nation, and so on), and this is a good thing, as the more people we can get along with, the less stupid fighting there is.
Giradius wrote:Humans are still animals, still have animal drives and instincts, however people seem to be under the impression that humans are more than that, when in reality we just have more acute or sophisticated ways of expressing them.
What "sophisticated instinct" governs art, science, exploration, and so on? What other animal seeks to so fully understand and control its environment? You can try to reduce this to some animal instinct, but then, you can reduce this all to an argument that it's all just neurons firing in brains (or whatever passes for them in lower animals), and from there, you can reduce life itself to something not that special by looking at it all as a chemical process. To do so misses the point entirely.
Giradius wrote:nothing but subjective opinion
True, but most of this thread is that. :P
Giradius wrote:However despite that, I am a vegetarian anyway, and my girlfriend is a vegan
Giradius wrote:I cannot understand how people who claim to be well balanced or that they like animals, can eat meat, the question to me seems to be one of "why would you choose to eat food that screams, when you can do just fine without it?"
What's the distinction? You also consume milk, eggs, and whatnot? If so, you should probably look into the vegan propaganda about what abuses go on at many dairy and egg farms, before pointing such a stern finger of condemnation. Either that, or make an actual case rather than rely on pompous bombast.
Giradius wrote:It can also be said that there is no such thing as a meat eating environmentalist, because meat production generates a huge amount of the carbon emissions that could potentially spell the end of human life on this planet
While I'm not jumping onto the global warming alarmism bandwagon, I'll agree that modern meat production is not particularly environmentally sound. I'll add, though, that modern agriculture in general-- what with the slash and burning, fertilizers, pesticides, and whatnot-- is pretty rough on the environment.
Giradius wrote:the health risks, the fact that its not especially good for you anyway
What "health risks"? Where is the proof of this "fact"? Why has the eating of meat by early humans been so intimately linked with the evolution of intelligence in the first place? The problem isn't meat inherently-- it's that there's a McDonald's on every corner and those animal instincts of ours are strong toward getting food whenever we can. Don't confuse obesity-related health problems with the problems related to eating any particular type of food, though.
Giradius wrote:the realization you putting decomposing corpse into your mouth.
This is just a visceral image designed to provoke a negative reaction without really making an intellectual argument-- like when anti-abortionists show gruesome pictures of dead babies rather than make an actual argument.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Giradius »

Hello again

Jan:
Giradius wrote:
It is capitalist humans.
Are you serious?

I mean, do you think that systems like feudalism (or even communism) were better in that? We just control more power now than ever before (one very heavy tractor possesses more power than all the slaves working on a pyramid at one time). Nothing else.
WOAH there tiger!
I merely stated that the biggest culprits right now are capitalist humans, there was no value statement or implication that capitalism is the only ecology wrecking ideology.
I was worried that statement would be interpreted as some sort of anti-capitalist socialist dig, it was not as one.

Had the Nazis (I invoke godwins law at this point) won world war 2, I would have made the same statement as before only replacing the word capitalist with fascist.

The point I was trying to make was not the rather common and immature "capitalism is bad, down with the N.W.O" type of comment that 14 year old emo kids post on forums, my point was that you cannot really talk about acts of humanity collectively, because due to humanities tribalism, we don't live in a collective yet.

You cannot hold the whole of humanity accountable for the actions of a particular nation or culture, if you said that humanity was a monstrous genocidal species, you would have to include all humans past, present and future, and the fact of the matter is that not every culture has engaged in genocidal behavior.

you cannot talk about humanity as a single collective in terms of actions, it is not, because humanity has the ability to rewrite its own behavioral protocols in accordance with outside circumstance (this is what culture basically is), and as such different subpopulations behave differently, have different value systems, different language, etc.

Humanity did not walk on the moon, I had no part in it, many millions of others had no part in it either directly or indirectly, and so it is fair to say that it was Americans who first walked on the moon!

Just to make extra sure, i would like to reiterate that i am NOT a socialist, a communist or any derivative of the aforesaid ideologies.

Sophia:

Well, what can I say, MIAOW.

I will address each of your points (if they can be called that) in turn.
Destroying the environment in the name of "progress" is hardly unique to capitalism.
I never said that it was.
I merely pointed out who the current perpetrators of such acts are, I understand that my point would have looked anti-capitalist (especially as none of you know me yet), it was not meant to be, i expanded on this point above.
I am not an anti-capitalist, because I am not 14 years old, I am also well aware that if it were not for capitalism, consumerism, and the economic forces they entail I would not be able to afford the computer that I am writing this post on.
Your talk of "animal nationalism" is valid, but it neglects the matter of scale.
I thought it was pretty clear that the point i was making was that many aspects of human behavior are not unique to humanity!
Scale is irrelevant, even if a single animal displays human traits, it can be said without fear of contradiction that such a trait is not unique to humanity, by definition.
No animals consciously organize on the level that humans do,
This contradicts something you say later on, and besides, the honey bee lives in hives of upto 40,000 members, you also quite wrong.

Although most ant nests are aggressive to each other, some ants display a behavior called unicoloniality, when the worker ants of several colonies freely intermingle with each other, in fact unicolonial ant populations are the most extensive cooperative units known in nature with population extending to many MILLIONS.

be sure of your "facts"
This wasn't always the case-- originally, humans were organized in little villages and nobody trusted the village a few miles away.
This statement contradicts your previous statement of...

"No animals consciously organize on the level that humans do,"

there are animal communities that are equal in size to early human collectives, your point only makes sense if you are saying that early humans were not in fact human at all.
It seems the group of people we consider "our own" is growing wider and broader, ever so slowly (first a village, then a tribe, then a nation, and so on), and this is a good thing, as the more people we can get along with, the less stupid fighting there is.
I am glad we can agree on something.
What "sophisticated instinct" governs art, science, exploration, and so on?
That's an easy one,

Curiosity (which is a motivator for exploration and science), group reinforcement (which is a social instinct, and governs many things under the term "cultural activities").
Your list of human activities are simply the result of greater intellect applies to instinctive problems, science is the application of intelligence to perception, motivated by human desires.

When the caveman noticed that certain animals are nocturnal, and so hunted them at night instead of during the day, the caveman has spotted a pattern in nature, based on empirical evidence (he only sees the animal at night) he applies his intellect and assumes that the animal will come out tonight (despite having no current sense data to go on) in short the caveman has formulated a hypothesis on animal behavior, based on observed evidence!

this is by all accounts, science.

Its not all test tubes and old men in white coats.

I would also like to point out that science (as a means of developing more efficient ways of doing things) is also not unique to humans, chimps make use of tools in the wild, this behavior is well known and has been the subject of study.
The various techniques used by chimps to open tough nutshells varies from population to population (within the species), it is also a LEARNED behavior, rather than a purely mechanical instinctive one, in short some chimps experimented on how to open a tough nut, they found a way to do it, and taught this technology (because that's what it is) to their offspring.
What other animal seeks to so fully understand and control its environment?
Any animal that makes a nest!

It is trying to modify its environment, termite towers are complex artificial structures, that are built in strategic locations, the hexagonal cells of a bee hive are the most efficient shape for their job.

When my cat spends half an hour kicking cat litter over its excrement to cover it, the cat is trying to control or modify its environment.

scale is irrelevant, we are talking about what is unique.
If Billy draws a better picture than Mandy, would you say that Mandy is incapable of drawing? would you say that drawing is unique to Billy?
You can try to reduce this to some animal instinct, but then, you can reduce this all to an argument that it's all just neurons firing in brains (or whatever passes for them in lower animals), and from there, you can reduce life itself to something not that special by looking at it all as a chemical process. To do so misses the point entirely.
I don't think so, life IS just a chemical process, it is one that has some amazing emergent properties (like consciousness) which is why when we call somebody dead when metabolism stops.
What's the distinction? You also consume milk, eggs, and whatnot?
Do I?
My girlfriend is a vegan, we don't have milk or eggs in the house and so they don't constitute a major part of my diet, I might overlook it if something i buy has milk protein on the list of ingredients.
I don't see this a hypocritical because I have already said that I am primarily a vegetarian for CONVENIENCE! my girlfriend is a vegan, and that limits what we can have in the house (although she never makes demands on me, I simply see no need to buy cows milk, when soya milk is just as nice (if not nicer).
If so, you should probably look into the vegan propaganda about what abuses go on at many dairy and egg farms, before pointing such a stern finger of condemnation.
Propaganda?
I know a Finnish guy, who was raised on a dairy farm, he confirms that cows milk does contain a quantity of puss, because many dairy cows are also suffer from urinary infections, any hygiene issues are dealt with by the pasteurization process, however the unpleasantness remains.

I have also seen a video of male chicks being fed into a giant mincing machine ALIVE! this is because male chicks are of no use at an egg farm, have a look at the compassion in world farming website.
Either that, or make an actual case rather than rely on pompous bombast.
Did you read my post?

I"t can also be said that there is no such thing as a meat eating environmentalist, because meat production generates a huge amount of the carbon emissions that could potentially spell the end of human life on this planet,"

"eating meat has so many cases against it, there is the suffering argument, the environmental damage, the health risks, the fact that its not especially good for you anyway."

Let me expand on this

1) Eating meat, is eating animals, animals have things called pain receptors, they also think and feel.
Plants (as far as we know) do NOT have pain receptors, do not think, and do not feel.
Which diet do you think results in less suffering?

2) Eating meat, requires intensive meat farming which is an inefficient use of land and water.
Every kilogram of meat protein produced requires 6 kilograms of plant protein, and require two thirds more land, it also results in the deforestation and desertification of a lot land as well as water pollution.
The U.N Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that forest loss for grazing space in the 1990s amounted to an area larger than Venezuela, I'm sure i don't need to tell you that trees are an important part of the carbon cycle.

3)Plant foods require less energy and has a smaller carbon footprint than animal-based foods.

4) Vegetarian diets are well known to be lower in saturated fat and cholesterol, higher in fibre, vitamin C, foliate and carotenoids.
Vegetarians are also less likely to suffer from a heart attack, a stroke, have lower chances of suffering from a variety of cancers, and have lower blood pressure.

Now who is the pompous bombast?
You simply took objection to what you saw as "another veggie kicking off and preaching trying to change my habits"!
I am not a post modernist, I DONT think every viewpoint is valid! I DONT think every opinion is worthy of equal consideration! some people can be simply WRONG!
The facts support my position, not yours!
While I'm not jumping onto the global warming alarmism bandwagon,
Ha-ha are you a holocaust denier as well?
Global warming is a scientific fact, i have seen the data with my own eyes! anybody with intellectual integrity who knows anything about chemistry can confirm that CO2 is a green house gas, methane is a greenhouse gas, water vapor is a greenhouse gas.
Glaciers are made of ice, ice is made of water, glaciers also cover large quantities of methane gas (there is a glacier in Siberia that is sitting on massive amounts of methane, and methane produces four times the greenhouse effect of CO2).

the threat of global warming is not that CO2 will cause the extinction of life, but that it will melt the ice that currently prevents large quantities of the earths water from becoming water vapor, it is the water vapor that will kill us.
the loss of ice also lowers the planets Albedo (which effects how much solar radiation is reflected back into space), this also has the effect of increasing the amount of thermal energy held by atmospheric gases.
I'll add, though, that modern agriculture in general-- what with the slash and burning, fertilizers, pesticides, and whatnot-- is pretty rough on the environment.
Agreed, but it seems that intensive farming is here to stay and will get worse, the planet is already overpopulated, and the rate of growth for the worlds population is unsustainable, however you will find few people willing to admit what needs to be done about this.
What "health risks"? Where is the proof of this "fact"?
Are you serious?
Let me ask you, have you ever heard of mad carrot disease? I suspect not.
What about A.I.D.S? the current thinking is that the virus was transmitted from apes to humans due to humans eating infected monkey meat.
This combined with the fat and cholesterol is what constitutes a health risk.
Why has the eating of meat by early humans been so intimately linked with the evolution of intelligence in the first place?
Why do you consider the actions of proto humans to be relevant to the actions of modern industrialized homo sapiens?
This point is irrelevant, unless you are proposing meat eating as some form of eugenics (there are better ways) you invoking of a historical consumption of meat is not relevant to the modern world.
The early human, the hunter gatherer, had little choice in what he ate.
There were no dieticians back then, no knowledge of vitamins and calories, that cannot be said of the modern world, you can have a completely healthy diet without eating meat AT ALL, the same could not be said of early man.

Your point is actually a non point because it is like saying "historically man has driven steam engines, therfore steam engines are preferable and should still be used".
The problem isn't meat inherently-- it's that there's a McDonald's on every corner and those animal instincts of ours are strong toward getting food whenever we can.
Er, no, it is meat i'm afraid, simply virtue of its chemical makeup and manufacturing processes.

Even when I did eat meat, i could resist the lure of McDonalds, I also mentioned that I am 17 stone, which hardly suggests a weakness finding food.
Don't confuse obesity-related health problems with the problems related to eating any particular type of food, though.
I think its fairly well known that the effect of diet on health is based mainly on WHAT you eat, not HOW MUCH, in fact i can eat a ton of celery every day and actually lose weight (because celery contains less calories than it uses to digest), one of the reasons meat is unhealthy is BECAUSE it is fatty and supports obesity.

Although in all fairness, obesity is largely due to an imbalance in the amount you consume and the amount you use through exercise.
Giradius wrote:
the realization you putting decomposing corpse into your mouth.
This is just a visceral image designed to provoke a negative reaction without really making an intellectual argument-- like when anti-abortionists show gruesome pictures of dead babies rather than make an actual argument.
Nonsense! it is a statement of fact!
The bacteria that cause decomposition exist within you right now, the only reason you are not sat at your computer rotting, is that you have an immune system that fights the bacteria off, the same cannot be said of carrion (which is what meat is).
You simply don't like an unpleasant truth being pointed out you, meat IS rotting flesh, it is biological matter that is being consumed by bacteria!
The point is visceral because it was meant to be, I find the idea of putting putrescent flesh into my mouth to be distasteful, you on the other hand clearly don't, to each their own, it was not meant to be an intellectual argument (I already gave those earlier on) i was merely stating my personal distaste at the act of eating meat.

Now as a newcomer i must apologies for the bluntness of my post, you maybe accept it from more veteran members of the community whom you know better, however there was something in the language of Sophia's post that prompted this reaction from me.
I don't find phrases like pompous bombast, and the accusation that my points lack intelligence to be especially pleasing on my first posts, however i will try and refrain from making snap judgements until i know people a little better.

I enjoy vigorous debate, I don't mind bluntness, I don't even mind insults (when they are accurate) but I can give as good as I get, and my temper has been know to bypass my restraint and manners on occasion (when prompted).
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Sophia »

Giradius wrote:This contradicts something you say later on, and besides, the honey bee lives in hives of upto 40,000 members, you also quite wrong.
That's why I said "consciously." Honey bees, etc. organize on this level, but it's instinctual. There is no clear social evolution, except of course the evolution of their hive structure that goes with the whole other evolutionary process. They haven't put aside their differences and built great honey bee nation-states within the past 4000 years or so. I tried to choose my words carefully, stated "consciously," because I was aware of the situation with bees and ants and I think there's a difference between a conscious effort to build social groups and an instinctual "hive" mentality.

However... apparently not carefully enough...
Giradius wrote:This statement contradicts your previous statement of...
"No animals consciously organize on the level that humans do,"
Perhaps I should say "No animals consciously organize on the level that humans do NOW."

Proto-humans were fairly disorganized. Village-dwelling early humans were a little more organized. However, during this time, ants and bees stayed pretty much the same. My point was simply that humans have expanded the level they're (we're?) able to organize on, showing, to me, a clear social evolution.
Giradius wrote:chimps make use of tools in the wild, this behavior is well known and has been the subject of study.
Tens of thousands of years ago, humans and chimps were both fishing bugs out of trees with sticks. Now humans are building great cities and going to the moon. Chimps are still fishing bugs out of trees with sticks. It doesn't take much to see a difference.
Giradius wrote:Any animal that makes a nest!
The animal that builds the nest only cares about shelter. It doesn't want to get rained on; but it doesn't ask why it rains, or wonder if it can predict when it's going to rain tomorrow, or dream up a god that is deciding whether or not it rains, or thinks about maybe someday even building a machine capable of doing that very thing-- controlling whether it rains or not.
Giradius wrote:If Billy draws a better picture than Mandy, would you say that Mandy is incapable of drawing? would you say that drawing is unique to Billy?
Like I said, when you reduce everything to such simple terms and make coarse distinctions like this you can whitewash right over what makes humans special in the first place.
Giradius wrote:Do I?
My point was that I was aware of the sorts of the things that go on (such as the ones you cited), and if you're going to make the moral argument, then there's a certain amount of hypocrisy in also consuming milk and eggs. I never assumed you did, that's why I asked-- some people who are "vegetarian" but not "vegan" do, but not all, so I was inquiring.
Giradius wrote:Now who is the pompous bombast?
I was actually referring to one thing, specifically. I'll explain that later on.
Still, if you want pompous bombast...
Giradius wrote:Ha-ha are you a holocaust denier as well?
I mean, come on. Seriously.

Anyway, I don't want to get too deep into global warming stuff not because it isn't interesting or because I don't have points to make but because my views on it are complicated and this thread is already full of contention and controversy, and these replies are long enough. ;)
Giradius wrote:you can have a completely healthy diet without eating meat AT ALL
That's just it. I'm not sure you can. I'm not saying you can't, but I don't know. I'd actually be really interested in this, because it's such an ideologically loaded issue (obviously!), and as such, each side has plenty of scientific evidence of dubious veracity to throw around, and does... it makes me want to figure out what the truth is.
Giradius wrote:I also mentioned that I am 17 stone, which hardly suggests a weakness finding food.
Sorry, I'm American, that number is meaningless to me-- we have enough trouble with logical units like kilograms, forget crazy ones like stone.
Giradius wrote:one of the reasons meat is unhealthy is BECAUSE it is fatty and supports obesity.
Sure. But you can eat potatoes deep fried in vegetable oil and get fat, too. Or drink gallons of high fructose corn syrup. Or, well... you get the idea.

Don't you think it's fair to say vegetarians tend to be healthier because to make that choice implies a certain degree of diet-consciousness which would then carry over into all food choices?
Giradius wrote:Nonsense! it is a statement of fact!
It's a statement of fact that is utterly irrelevant. Plant matter decomposes, too. Nothing you said was wrong, but everything we eat is slowly rotting. Slowly enough that we don't get sick if we eat it promptly, but the fact remains. Meat rots, plants rot too. All it's designed to do, like I said, is create a visceral image without really making any intellectual argument, because it applies to everything.
Giradius wrote:I don't find phrases like pompous bombast, and the accusation that my points lack intelligence to be especially pleasing on my first posts, however i will try and refrain from making snap judgements until i know people a little better.
You read far too much into it because I was making reference to very specific things. To me, a phrase like "why would you choose to eat food that screams" is nothing but pompous bombast. A statement like "putting decomposing corpse in your mouth" is a visceral image, not an intellectual argument. You seem to have taken it as a general attack on your post and you personally and upped the vitriol accordingly, but it wasn't meant that way at all-- let's keep things at least moderately civil, please.

That said...
Giradius wrote:I enjoy vigorous debate, I don't mind bluntness
I do know what you mean, I got my label of "concise and honest" for a reason, too. :shock:
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Paul Stevens »

I think I better shut up.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by ian_scho »

Paul Stevens wrote:I think I better shut up.
But we WILL quote you on that.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Jan »

Paul Stevens wrote:I think I better shut up.
Yeah, me too. :D
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Gambit37 »

Giradius, please stick to the facts and refrain from reactionary personal attacks. Sophia's original arguments to your first response were, in the main, measured and civil. Some of yours on the other hand are outright insulting and will not be tolerated here. If you continue to throw unfounded insults at people, your posting priveleges will be rescinded.

Discussions like these are always interesting, but let's remember that opinions are like assholes: everyone has one and they usually stink.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Giradius »

Giradius, please stick to the facts and refrain from reactionary personal attacks.
I did stick to the facts!
After reading my post back to myself, I was unable to find a personal attack on Sophia.

Which attack are you referring to?
Sophia's original arguments to your first response were, in the main, measured and civil.
If I found Sophia's reply measured and civil, do you think I would have replied in the way that I did?
If you continue to throw unfounded insults at people, your posting priveleges will be rescinded
Where was the insult? I genuinely did not see a single one.
I admitted I was blunt, I was a little harsh in my choice of language, but throwing of unfounded personal insults, I cannot see what you are referring to specifically.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Giradius »

Sophia:

After a quick read through your reply, I can see that you have made an effort to appear less confrontational, and that you perhaps wished to ease tempers, I acknowledge your sentiment and gladly reciprocate in kind.
It is not my intention to use personal insults, and I dont think i did, I find ad-hominem attacks to be the mark of a poor debater, however as Gambit has posted above, he clearly thinks I have.
With that said, if you feel I have made any personal attacks, I apologise.

now for some replies.
That's why I said "consciously." Honey bees, etc. organize on this level, but it's instinctual.
I had noticed the "consciously" part, however this does prompt me to ask why you consider society building as a learned behavior to be preferential to instinctive society building?

Also, do you not think that perhaps the desire to live among others is an instinctive drive to encourage us to form societies, because there is survival merit in it?.

Society building in humans is equally driven by instinct as that of social insects, the only difference is the society created by humans tends to be more sophisticated, however the urge to form collectives IS instinctual.

Maybe bees and ants would form republics and dictatorships and all other manner of other societies IF every member of the hive had a level of human intelligence, although the fact that they are a different species may make such concepts strange to them.

I would not expect an intelligent alien species to behave just like humans, so why would expect other terrestrial species to do so (intelligent or not)
There is no clear social evolution, except of course the evolution of their hive structure that goes with the whole other evolutionary process.
I don't think humanity is any different, mankind is placed firmly on the same phylogenetic branch as the other great apes, our social systems are more complex and sophisticated, but essentially the same basic phenomenon are observed, protectiveness of offspring, reciprocal altruism, and like I posted before even charity and nationalism have their parallels elsewhere in the animal kingdom, there are even animals that practice commerce AND prostitution.

The desire to live communally is instinctive, and although we lack clear instinctive protocols on HOW to do this, we have the ability through our advanced intelligence to create our own cultures.
They haven't put aside their differences and built great honey bee nation-states within the past 4000 years or so.
That's true, but why would you expect them to?
This a very humanocentric viewpoint, it sounds like you are saying that the only demonstrable intelligence must result in human behavior.
Would you expect bee's to stop making hives and start making spiderwebs instead?
Would expect humans to walk on four legs, and live in packs?

And anyway, ants have, its called unicoloniality, multiple ant colonies merging to form a larger colony yet retaining their "family" groups.

There was also a time when the construction technology of social insects was far more advanced than that of humans, would you have said at that time that humans were less intelligent than the insects.

Imagine a hypothetical insect, that creates a simple solar heating unit for its nurseries, the physics involved in this heater are every bit as complex as a heater built by humans, why does the fact that the insect know how to build this structure instinctively make it less of an achievement?

Humans still indulge in the hunt, just like the wolf and the tiger, the only difference is that man puts a suit on and hunts in the office.

There is also the fact that humanity may simply be the first animal on this planet to have evolved the capacity for sophisticated culture building.
I tried to choose my words carefully, stated "consciously," because I was aware of the situation with bees and ants and I think there's a difference between a conscious effort to build social groups and an instinctual "hive" mentality.
I disagree, social insects simply have precise instructions on what kind of society to build, this society seems to have served them perfectly well over the years, the same cannot be said of humanity.
However, my point is that despite lack of specific instructions on what societies to build, the DESIRE to build societies in the first place IS instinctual, this is why loneliness exists and why we find unpleasant rather than pleasant.

Don't mistake mankinds sophisticated and advanced forms of behavior as being different from the the more basic behavior of other animals, mankind is the probably the most intelligent animal to emerge so far, however it still possesses and is driven by instinct, we simply do things a bit differently.

I can whole heartedly recommend the books by Desmond Morris, the naked ape, and the human zoo are fascinating reads (if you are into zoology and anthropology).
"No animals consciously organize on the level that humans do,"
Perhaps I should say "No animals consciously organize on the level that humans do NOW."
But this fails to address the possibility that mankind may simply be the first species to develop sufficient intelligence to do so, and also places a bias on conscious behavior over unconscious, it also ignores the fact that humans have not always consciously organized on the level that we do now.

Some might argue we probably shouldn't boast about it either, as it doesn't seem to be doing us much good, the world population is WAY too high, and its growth rate is unsustainable, I doubt that bee societies have as many problems as human societies do.
Proto-humans were fairly disorganized. Village-dwelling early humans were a little more organized. However, during this time, ants and bees stayed pretty much the same. My point was simply that humans have expanded the level they're (we're?) able to organize on, showing, to me, a clear social evolution.
Agreed, but i would not expect to see social evolution in a species that knows instinctively how to organise itself, there is simply no evolutionary pressure to drive such adaptation, if the hive structure works well for the bee, and there is no evolutionary pressure against it, then there is nothing for evolution to work on.
The reason the crocodile has changed so little over millions of years is that it is already pretty damn good at what it does, evolutionary pressure must be applied to a trait in order to force evolutionary change.
Giradius wrote:
chimps make use of tools in the wild, this behavior is well known and has been the subject of study.
Tens of thousands of years ago, humans and chimps were both fishing bugs out of trees with sticks.
Now humans are building great cities and going to the moon.
And a chimp would be justified to think "what's the point of that? are there bananas on the moon?":P

there is no evolutionary pressure to travel to celestial bodies, and the only reason we did it, is because we reached the technological stage where we could do so, and all the previous technological steps that were taken, the bronze age, the iron age, the renaissance, the industrial revolution, were all driven by quite practical needs.

In short, the technology for such endeavors exists because it can be based on technology that we have already created for more practical needs.
Chimps are still fishing bugs out of trees with sticks. It doesn't take much to see a difference.
And also bashing open nuts with rocks (which they were not doing before) and what's more, different groups of chimps are bashing open nuts in different ways, they are each arriving at their various methods independently of each other.

This is an emerging technology, as the behavior is learned and not instinctive.
Giradius wrote:
Any animal that makes a nest!
The animal that builds the nest only cares about shelter.
which was the same reason that proto-humans built dwellings! again it may simply be that we are the first species to master construction, and besides, some of the feats of animal engineering are on a par with our own, bees were using hexagonal cells while we were still using round barrels, spider silk has amazing tensile strength, and the dams built by beavers are impressive.
It doesn't want to get rained on; but it doesn't ask why it rains,
what would be the point? could it stop the rain if it knew? is there a selection pressure that prompts the development of meteorology in the animal kingdom?.
or wonder if it can predict when it's going to rain tomorrow,
Some animals actually CAN predict rain. Cows I think, and some species of birds.
or dream up a god that is deciding whether or not it rains,
That is a actually an argument in favour of animals, I can think of fewer developments in human history, more damaging than the invention of religion.

Anyway religion has its origins in instinct, I read that it probably occurred due to mankinds instinctive tendency to try and spot intention, this has survival value.

how many times have you stubbed your toe and kicked what ever you stubbed it on (as if to punish it), people shout at their cars when they don't start, despite knowing the car cannot hear them.
It is a similar phenomenon to seeing faces in the bark of trees and shapes in clouds, by spotting intention, you increase reaction time and thus increase chance of survival.

for example

caveman walks into a cave and see's sabre tooth tiger, it looks at him, licks its lips, bares its teeth and advances, mankind looks for intention and suspects "the animal looks hungry, it probably wants to eat me" and runs away.
another caveman (lacking the tendency to spot intention) sees the same saber-toothed tiger, it bares its teeth and advances "what's that? its quite big, it has big teeth, i wonder what they are for? its claws are quite big as well, Its coming closer, I had better figure out what it is, I wonder if.....AIIGHHGGHHG!"

However this can backfire where you see intention where there was none, and so when primitive man went about his daily life, he began to wonder about whose intention it was that the sun comes up everyday.
Giradius wrote:
If Billy draws a better picture than Mandy, would you say that Mandy is incapable of drawing? would you say that drawing is unique to Billy?
Like I said, when you reduce everything to such simple terms and make coarse distinctions like this you can whitewash right over what makes humans special in the first place.
But humans are not special, they are intelligent, and mighty, and wonderful in many ways, gifted yes, but unique? not really, we still do animal things, still indulge in animal behavior, we just do it better than many other animals.
Mankind has not transcended its own origins, it is still very much an animal, is still part of the animal kingdom, can still be understood from a zoological perspective, and like it or not, most of what we do, is motivated by animal instinct.
Giradius wrote:
Do I?
My point was that I was aware of the sorts of the things that go on (such as the ones you cited), and if you're going to make the moral argument, then there's a certain amount of hypocrisy in also consuming milk and eggs.
I wouldn't make a purely moral argument anyway, morality is subjective, and a subjective viewpoint is NOT a strong position for a debate.
I am vegetarian because it is more efficient, less damaging to the planet, my girlfriend is vegan and so convenient in terms of shopping and cooking, and eating meat is something i now find personally distasteful.

And if i can derive a smug, self righteous pleasure from being morally superior (me! HAHA) to somebody who chooses to eat food that suffers, then that's just a bonus :p
I never assumed you did, that's why I asked-- some people who are "vegetarian" but not "vegan" do, but not all, so I was inquiring.
No problem.
Ha-ha are you a holocaust denier as well?
I mean, come on. Seriously.
yeah seriously!
Global warming is a scientific fact (well, as close to facts as scientists like to get) in the same way that the holocaust is a historical fact, do you think that denial of scientific facts is more reasonable (or acceptable) than denial of historical ones?
Denial of evolution,gravity,germ theory, is in the same league as denial of the Roman empire, the holocaust, or the reformation.

You mentioned that you are from the USA, the USA are one of the least co-operative nations in terms of the problem of climate change, I think Dubya even refused to sign the Kyoto treaty.
I dont live in the US so i cant comment, but it appears there is a lot more controversy there, and more agendas (from big business, again, I am NOT anti-capitalist) being persued than many other countries when it comes to global warming.

I am not taking it on faith, i have seen the data for myself, and understood it, and studied the basic chemistry in order to understand how it works..
Anyway, I don't want to get too deep into global warming stuff not because it isn't interesting or because I don't have points to make but because my views on it are complicated and this thread is already full of contention and controversy, and these replies are long enough.
Maybe next time then eh, I missed the creationism Vs Evolution debate, that would have been fun.
Giradius wrote:
you can have a completely healthy diet without eating meat AT ALL
That's just it. I'm not sure you can. I'm not saying you can't, but I don't know.
Well I tell you what, lets ask somebody who knows, maybe a vegetarian.
Wow, what a coincidence there happens to be one here, I eat no animal flesh, no fish, no cows milk (very rarely milk proteins will be a listed ingredient) no actual eggs (again maybe egg protein or used as a glaze on something i buy) I am not malnourished, i have low blood pressure, I am not underweight, I am overweight but that is due to a sedatory lifestyle, lack of exercise and too much time in front of a PC.

I am doing it right now, as are many millions of other vegetarians.
I'd actually be really interested in this, because it's such an ideologically loaded issue (obviously!), and as such, each side has plenty of scientific evidence of dubious veracity to throw around, and does... it makes me want to figure out what the truth is.
Well my old professor once told me "People use statistics like a drunk uses a lamppost: for support rather than for illumination".

In my views, its a pretty open and close case, I am a vegetarian, i am in good health, the environmental benefits are well known, the moral issue is (for me) just a bonus.
Giradius wrote:
I also mentioned that I am 17 stone, which hardly suggests a weakness finding food.
Sorry, I'm American, that number is meaningless to me-- we have enough trouble with logical units like kilograms, forget crazy ones like stone.
Crazy...or just different?

err, actually I take it back, crazy :p

Yes, I forget things like that sometimes, its doubly a disgrace because i should be using SI units, however i was at school during the transition from imperial to metric system.

I still measure my show size in barleycorns :D.....seriously.
Giradius wrote:
one of the reasons meat is unhealthy is BECAUSE it is fatty and supports obesity.
Sure. But you can eat potatoes deep fried in vegetable oil and get fat, too. Or drink gallons of high fructose corn syrup. Or, well... you get the idea.

Don't you think it's fair to say vegetarians tend to be healthier because to make that choice implies a certain degree of diet-consciousness which would then carry over into all food choices?
That's a good point!
But doesn't this also suggest that vegetarianism is the choice made by people who actually think about what they eat?
Maybe i looked at your point from a different angle because rather than seeing the vegetarian thinking about what they are eating, i am seeing a meat eater, mindlessly tucking into his carrion burger without any thought at all about what he is eating, or thinking about it, but either doesnt care or is unwilling to change his habits.
Giradius wrote:
Nonsense! it is a statement of fact!
It's a statement of fact that is utterly irrelevant.
No its not, it was relevant because as i said previously all it served to do was highlight my own personal distaste at the thought of eating meat.

If its good enough for Leonardo deVinci its good enough for me! (and he was seriously sharp for a ninja turtle)
Plant matter decomposes, too. Nothing you said was wrong, but everything we eat is slowly rotting. Slowly enough that we don't get sick if we eat it promptly, but the fact remains.
Of course, but that doesn't bother me, as i said I never claimed plant matter didn't decay, merely that i found the idea of eating flesh unpleasant.

All it's designed to do, like I said, is create a visceral image without really making any intellectual argument, because it applies to everything.

No, it was designed to illustrate how I feel about eating meat, it was not an intellectual argument, it was a statement that evoked through words my distaste at the idea of eating meat again.

Your reaction illustrates this.
In fact I offer you a challenge, try to create the same distaste and revulsion as i did with my sentence but instead using the word carrot, or potato or cabbage.

Foul rotten moldy carrot.
Decomposing moldering potato.
rotten and foul smelling brown cabbage.

doesn't have the same effect does it, yet the putrescent flesh, or decomposing carrion does.

I suspect this is instinctive, and this distaste probably stopped early man from eating bad meat on many occasions.
Giradius wrote:
I don't find phrases like pompous bombast, and the accusation that my points lack intelligence to be especially pleasing on my first posts, however i will try and refrain from making snap judgements until i know people a little better.
You read far too much into it because I was making reference to very specific things.
I'm new so I will give the benefit of the doubt.
To me, a phrase like "why would you choose to eat food that screams" is nothing but pompous bombast.
Yet to me, it is a valid question!
Have you ever been to a slaughterhouse? have you ever seen the animals in the pens before their death? those places look like something from hellraiser, or some other Clive Barker novel (what with the bloodstains, blades and hanging chains).
It is naive to think the animals do not suffer, and if you eat Halal or kosher meat, they certainly suffer.

"why would you chose to eat, something which feels pain or suffers, when you can eat something which does not" is a valid question.
A statement like "putting decomposing corpse in your mouth" is a visceral image, not an intellectual argument.
It was meant to be visceral, if it evoked disgust in you, then it did its job of showing how I feel about it, that IS how i feel when i see somebody eating chicken.
You seem to have taken it as a general attack on your post and you personally and upped the vitriol accordingly, but it wasn't meant that way at all-
As I said, I reserve judgement, and your reply shows I was correct to do so.
- let's keep things at least moderately civil, please.
Maybe we got off on the wrong foot, I am new here don't forget, and so my defences are up.
Coupled with possible Aspergers syndrome on my part, this kind of thing is inevitable.
I do know what you mean, I got my label of "concise and honest" for a reason, too.
Both excellent qualities, I like to think I am honest (maybe a bit too honest at times), although I can tell from looking at this thread that I am NOT concise :p
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Jan »

OMG, this must be the longest post I've ever seen.

Your posts should come with abstracts (max. 80 words) and key-words (max. 5). :)
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by beowuuf »

Ok, I think everything has settled down (haven't read the big long replies yet, sorry), but just incase:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That is a nice line up there. Above it, anything said should be viewed with rose tinted glasses, everyone is right, anything said that sounded like an insult was probably mis-construed, and everything is fine. There were some nice points made, and anything around the nice points is a little bit blurry but probably was nothing that would upset anyone.

Below this line is the continued discussion. Only factual points should be addressed below it. Like I said, I think everything is already resolved, but just incase, a little nudge to keep this discussion about the discussion and not go OT about how the discussion was previously discussed.

As you were all.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Gambit37 »

Holy hell, I thought I was verbose, but I've been totally trumped!

A small tip to everyone: lively debate works better with short posts.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Sophia »

Giradius wrote:That's true, but why would you expect them to?
This a very humanocentric viewpoint, it sounds like you are saying that the only demonstrable intelligence must result in human behavior.
No, all that I was saying was that humans' social behavior has changed over the past few thousand years, while that of most other animals has not. It wasn't meant to say that learned social behavior was somehow superior to instinctual, merely that we have shown definite social evolution over that time period where other animals (see, "other animals," I have no problem with the notion that humans are animals too) have not.
Giradius wrote:And anyway, ants have, its called unicoloniality, multiple ant colonies merging to form a larger colony yet retaining their "family" groups.
This is just them seeing a familiar genetic marker in another colony. In a way it's like humans of one race all banding together. I'm not sure if this is good. ;)
Giradius wrote:Imagine a hypothetical insect, that creates a simple solar heating unit for its nurseries, the physics involved in this heater are every bit as complex as a heater built by humans, why does the fact that the insect know how to build this structure instinctively make it less of an achievement?
It's not an "achievement" at all. The insect doesn't understand the physics involved. It didn't see a need and try to solve a problem. Natural selection led to a solution to the problem, sure, but there was no ingenuity on the part of the insect. It wasn't as though some brilliant ant or bee figured it out herself.
Giradius wrote:some of the feats of animal engineering are on a par with our own, bees were using hexagonal cells while we were still using round barrels, spider silk has amazing tensile strength, and the dams built by beavers are impressive
With the key difference, as before, they don't understand why.
Giradius wrote:That is a actually an argument in favour of animals, I can think of fewer developments in human history, more damaging than the invention of religion.
You're right that it has led to a lot of violence and hatred, but then, I'd say religion was also instrumental in the creation of civilization in the first place. It's also pretty much an inevitable result when you have people that start asking "why." They all have their own version of "why" of course, and that's when the trouble starts.
Giradius wrote:However this can backfire where you see intention where there was none, and so when primitive man went about his daily life, he began to wonder about whose intention it was that the sun comes up everyday.
Well, sure, but deciding that there was no intention is a religious view, too. Atheism is a religious view.
Giradius wrote:But humans are not special, they are intelligent, and mighty, and wonderful in many ways, gifted yes, but unique? not really, we still do animal things, still indulge in animal behavior, we just do it better than many other animals.
I think this is the fundamental thing we disagree on, because, while I agree that much of what humans do is still motivated by instinct, I see a lot of progress in overcoming some of the more damaging instincts, too. We probably won't ever agree on this one so I don't think I have much else to say about it. :P
Giradius wrote:Global warming is a scientific fact
Sure. I actually agree with you, there. I said I didn't want to jump on the alarmism bandwagon, while I do accept a lot of the science. I think maybe part of the problem is that anyone who shows the least bit of skepticism is immediately flipped out upon and accused of being akin to a holocaust denier. It tends to shut down rational discussion.
Giradius wrote:I dont live in the US so i cant comment
So don't, then. :P

For what it's worth, I didn't vote for George W. Bush and plenty of others didn't either. We were as sick of his crap as everyone else. Probably more so because we live here. I personally can't stand Bush and others using any controversy (real or invented) about global warming as an excuse to completely push aside all forms of environmentalism. If CO2 and water vapor were the worst things we were pumping into the environment, we'd be a lot better off, whatever was happening with the climate.
Giradius wrote:Well my old professor once told me "People use statistics like a drunk uses a lamppost: for support rather than for illumination".

In my views, its a pretty open and close case, I am a vegetarian, i am in good health
You're right about statistics, but I think it's fair to say it's a logical fallacy to say "it works for me so it can work for anyone," because everyone's different. I'm not sure what the long-term health effects are, positive or negative. This page says "the health of Western vegetarians is good and similar to that of comparable non-vegetarians." Maybe it's that simple.
Giradius wrote:But doesn't this also suggest that vegetarianism is the choice made by people who actually think about what they eat?
Not really. It suggests that people who think about what they eat may choose vegetarianism, whereas people who don't really think about what they eat won't choose it because it's not something in the "cultural norm." It'd be interesting to see how this plays out in a culture like India where vegetarianism is a cultural norm even among people who don't particularly think about what they eat-- they do eat a lot of fatty deep fried snacks and drink sugary pop, for example.
Giradius wrote:In fact I offer you a challenge, try to create the same distaste and revulsion as i did with my sentence but instead using the word carrot, or potato or cabbage.
I don't know, if you forget about a cabbage and it gets that rotting cabbage smell, while the ends of the leaves get all liquidy and start turning into slime, it's pretty nasty.

It's pretty subjective. :P

I'll just leave it at that, because Gambit's right, and I don't want to lose the "concise" part of my label either. :D
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by linflas »

ok, my eyes hurt too much and my brain thinks exclusively in english now.. :?
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Giradius »

No, all that I was saying was that humans' social behavior has changed over the past few thousand years, while that of most other animals has not.
You are referring to humanity as a collective, which is not accurate because humanity does not live as a collective (which is in my view one of our biggest drawbacks).
Western civilization has changed, and so have some others, but there are people in Papua new guinea and the amazon basin whose way of life has not changed in millennia.
Humanity has retained tribalism, and so you can only talk about specific tribes.

I am inclined to think that many of the changes you refer to are cosmetic, we still have aristocrats we just call them by different names (celebrities, unelected representatives etc), many societies society have not changed THAT much.
It wasn't meant to say that learned social behavior was somehow superior to instinctual, merely that we have shown definite social evolution over that time period where other animals (see, "other animals," I have no problem with the notion that humans are animals too) have not.
I agree with that, but its not really saying much.
Crocodiles have changed very little over the countless year they have lived, but it would be foolish to say they are "less developed" than animals that have changed.

Change is not an indication of superiority. (in evolutionary terms its the opposite, as a fit specimen faces no selection pressure, and thus doesn't change).

Evolution requires selection pressures, and if an animals social structure is not subject to evolutionary pressure, then it wont change.
Are you familiar with memetics?

Human societies have been subject to selection pressure of a memetic nature, this is what gives rise to revolutions.
I'd say religion was also instrumental in the creation of civilization in the first place.
And your evidence for this what?
There have been mythologies that claim humans were civilized by the gods, etc, but that's all it is...mythology.

I agree that religion has been instrumental in the creation of a lot of art, music, etc

Civilization exists because there is survival benefit in communal living, 2 are heads are better than 1 and that.
Religion may have been useful in the past for social cohesion, and establishing in and out groups, but religion in no way is responsible for civilization.

Statements like this are a short step away from "Religion is the source of morality" type arguments.
It's also pretty much an inevitable result when you have people that start asking "why." They all have their own version of "why" of course, and that's when the trouble starts.
Well its like any other ideology that divides people into "us" and "them", this is another manifestation of human tribalism, in europe we have football (soccer) hooligans, who organise miniature wars against supporters of different football teams.

The fact is, if you got rid of religion as a mechanism of division, something else would replace it.

It also seems that there is only trouble when this "why" is exclusive, this the view most often held by monotheistic religions, polytheistic religions on the other hand tend not to have as big a problem, as they just view other pantheons as different incarnations of their own.

most of the religious fighting over the years has been between the monotheistic faith (each claiming that only their god exists).
Atheism is a religious view.
Oh not this old chestnut again!

Atheism is a philosophical standpoint, which is not the same as a religious belief.
You have two types of atheism, weak and strong atheism, weak atheism is simply accepting the null hypothesis of the god question, a sort of agnosticism which tends towards atheism.
Only strong atheism is an actual belief that there is no god, and even then most strong atheists have a clearly defined concept of the sort of god they don't believe in.

Strong atheists don't believe in a theistic god, and as a theistic gods existence CAN be tested, they can dismiss it quite logically, however while denying theistic deities, most strong atheists are a little more relaxed on deistic or pantheistic concepts of god.

in short, the existence of a theistic god can be tested (because theism makes falsifiable claims) but deistic gods cannot be tested, and so the usual argument against those are philosophical in nature, rather than scientific or historical.

In short, science has nothing to say about a deistic god one way or the other, but it does have something to say about the deluge, the origins of life, cosmology, geology, embryology etc and as such it does indicate something about the supoosedly true and perfect words of so called infallible gods.
I think maybe part of the problem is that anyone who shows the least bit of skepticism is immediately flipped out upon and accused of being akin to a holocaust denier.
The reason for this is that both activities amount to the same thing, the denial of evidence based facts or ideas which are important.
For what it's worth, I didn't vote for George W. Bush and plenty of others didn't either. We were as sick of his crap as everyone else. Probably more so because we live here.
I can imagine, from what I have heard, his dad was not much better.
I don't want to comment on Reagan because he is a distant relative of some sort (my folks got into genealogy a while back) but I have heard he was not much better.
I personally can't stand Bush and others using any controversy (real or invented) about global warming as an excuse to completely push aside all forms of environmentalism.
The use of controversy seems to be something that happens a lot, wasn't one of the creationism in science lessons slogans "teach the controversy", the annoying thing is that there is NO controversy on the subject, and people with agendas simply try to make it appear that there IS a controversy.

Climate change seems to have the same kind of thing going on.
You're right about statistics, but I think it's fair to say it's a logical fallacy to say "it works for me so it can work for anyone," because everyone's different.
Its not a logical fallacy because the claim I am making is biological in nature and supported by empirical evidence.
Everybody is different, but not that different! human nutritional requirements are fairly standard, as long as you take into account the persons lifestyle (how active they are etc).
I don't know, if you forget about a cabbage and it gets that rotting cabbage smell, while the ends of the leaves get all liquidy and start turning into slime, it's pretty nasty.
[/quote]

The slime bit was quite nasty, and the smell is pretty vile but it seems harder to evoke a visceral feeling of revulsion using vegetables to that which you can do with meat.
However as you say, it is quite subjective.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Giradius »

Giradius wrote:
And anyway, ants have, its called unicoloniality, multiple ant colonies merging to form a larger colony yet retaining their "family" groups.
This is just them seeing a familiar genetic marker in another colony. In a way it's like humans of one race all banding together. I'm not sure if this is good.


How is that different from what humans have done?, wasn't one of the reasons that Hitler annexed Austria (and met with little resistance) because he felt Austrians and germans were the same and should be part of the German Reich?
why does the fact that the insect know how to build this structure instinctively make it less of an achievement?
It's not an "achievement" at all. The insect doesn't understand the physics involved. It didn't see a need and try to solve a problem.
yet the problem was overcome anyway, again this suggests you have a bias toward conscious over unconscious behavior.
Maybe I am a bit of a utilitarian, but as far as I am concerned its results that matter, and if the people who build my house were taught, or know how to do it instinctively is unimportant.
Giradius wrote:
some of the feats of animal engineering are on a par with our own, bees were using hexagonal cells while we were still using round barrels, spider silk has amazing tensile strength, and the dams built by beavers are impressive
With the key difference, as before, they don't understand why.
neither do many humans, most people don't understand how their television works, despite using one everyday.
and besides, from a utilitarian perspective, why is simply not important.
It's also pretty much an inevitable result when you have people that start asking "why." They all have their own version of "why" of course, and that's when the trouble starts.
Well its like any other ideology that divides people into "us" and "them", this is another manifestation of human tribalism, in europe we have football (soccer) hooligans, who organise miniature wars against supporters of different football teams.

The fact is, if you got rid of religion as a mechanism of division, something else would replace it.

It also seems that there is only trouble when this "why" is exclusive, this the view most often held by monotheistic religions, polytheistic religions on the other hand tend not to have as big a problem, as they just view other pantheons as different incarnations of their own.

most of the religious fighting over the years has been between the monotheistic faith (each claiming that only their god exists).
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Giradius »

Atheism is a religious view.
Not this old chestnut again :p

Atheism is a philosophical standpoint, which is not the same as a religious belief.
You have two types of atheism, weak and strong atheism, weak atheism is simply accepting the null hypothesis of the god question, a sort of agnosticism which tends towards atheism.
Only strong atheism is an actual belief that there is no god, and even then most strong atheists have a clearly defined concept of the sort of god they don't believe in.

Strong atheists don't believe in a theistic god, and as a theistic gods existence CAN be tested, they can dismiss it quite logically, however while denying theistic deities, most strong atheists are a little more relaxed on deistic or pantheistic concepts of god.

in short, the existence of a theistic god can be tested (because theism makes falsifiable claims) but deistic gods cannot be tested, and so the usual argument against those are philosophical in nature, rather than scientific or historical.

In short, science has nothing to say about a deistic god one way or the other, but it does have something to say about the deluge, the origins of life, cosmology, geology, embryology etc and as such it does indicate something about the supoosedly true and perfect words of so called infallible gods.
I think maybe part of the problem is that anyone who shows the least bit of skepticism is immediately flipped out upon and accused of being akin to a holocaust denier.
The reason for this is that both activities amount to the same thing, the denial of evidence based facts or ideas which are important.
For what it's worth, I didn't vote for George W. Bush and plenty of others didn't either. We were as sick of his crap as everyone else. Probably more so because we live here.
I can imagine, from what I have heard, his dad was not much better.
I don't want to comment on Reagan because he is a distant relative of some sort (my folks got into genealogy a while back) but I have heard he was not much better.
I personally can't stand Bush and others using any controversy (real or invented) about global warming as an excuse to completely push aside all forms of environmentalism.
The use of controversy seems to be something that happens a lot, wasn't one of the creationism in science lessons slogans "teach the controversy", the annoying thing is that there is NO controversy on the subject, and people with agendas simply try to make it appear that there IS a controversy.

Climate change seems to have the same kind of thing going on.
You're right about statistics, but I think it's fair to say it's a logical fallacy to say "it works for me so it can work for anyone," because everyone's different.
Its not a logical fallacy because the claim I am making is biological in nature and supported by empirical evidence.
Everybody is different, but not that different! human nutritional requirements are fairly standard, as long as you take into account the persons lifestyle (how active they are etc).
I don't know, if you forget about a cabbage and it gets that rotting cabbage smell, while the ends of the leaves get all liquidy and start turning into slime, it's pretty nasty.
The slime bit was quite nasty, and the smell is pretty vile but it seems harder to evoke a visceral feeling of revulsion using vegetables to that which you can do with meat.
However as you say, it is quite subjective.
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by Sophia »

Giradius wrote:You are referring to humanity as a collective, which is not accurate because humanity does not live as a collective
You can still look at the trends affecting humanity as a whole. I'm not trying to say everyone's the same here; some humans have evolved, so you're adding it to the "average," as it were. I didn't necessarily mean everyone had evolved in the same way or to the same degree.
Giradius wrote:How is that different from what humans have done?
My only point is that it wasn't. By the way, you just referred to "humans" as a collective.
Giradius wrote:yet the problem was overcome anyway, again this suggests you have a bias toward conscious over unconscious behavior.
Maybe I am a bit of a utilitarian, but as far as I am concerned its results that matter
Then you should know that you can get better results when you actually understand what's going on. Numerous studies have been done involving animals that instinctively know how to build something or other, and it's always found that they're not very good at all at adapting that knowledge to a different purpose. If you instinctively know, like a beaver, how to build a dam, then you can build dams, but you're never going to figure out-- because the knowledge isn't in the realm of conscious thought-- how to adapt your knowledge of making watertight wood structures to build a boat. The technology may exist, but it's inflexible.

Anyway, earlier, you said "Change is not an indication of superiority," which is true-- if you mean that change is not an automatic indication of superiority. However, this notion of flexible technology is a form of change that is often good, because it allows people to be able to do things that they couldn't previously do. If those things are for the betterment of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness (or whatever), then that's a good thing, don't you think? Curing a disease that we couldn't cure before is good. Feeding people who would've formerly gone hungry is good. And so on...
Giradius wrote:Statements like this are a short step away from "Religion is the source of morality" type arguments.
That's the thing, though. If we're talking about the birth of civilization, religion was the source of morality. Back in the ancient past, they didn't have Adam Smith or Karl Marx. They didn't have the US Constitution. They didn't have the scientific method. What they did have was religion. They had Hammurabi's code, the Ten Commandments, and so on. In these societies, either the king was god (Egypt) or the king was appointed by god (China), and so on... This was all well and good because convincing the people that god(s) would punish them if they stepped out of line was a great tool for keeping people in line, but that did also allow order to take hold. Living in our secular world with the benefits of our modern sciences, we tend to forget that for a long time, there was pretty much nothing else and this stuff was real.

Now, there are people who don't realize that then is not now and that "old time religion" isn't the only explanation for how the world works any more. The "Religion is the source of morality" types who say that now ought to know better. Back then, nobody did.
Giradius wrote:Atheism is a philosophical standpoint, which is not the same as a religious belief.
I'd say that anyone making an unprovable statement based on faith, whether that faith is in one god, many gods, or the absence of any of them, is holding a "religious belief." By your definitions, this would include the strong variety of atheism, but not the weak one, I guess. Interestingly, I've noticed most people (at least around here) who call themselves "atheists" (most of which professing the complete absence of any sort of god-- that is, strong atheism) are more against the Jewish/Christian/Islamic concept of "God" rather than actually not believing in any sort of god of any kind.
Giradius wrote:The reason for this is that both activities amount to the same thing, the denial of evidence based facts or ideas which are important.
The right wing here tends to endorse some completely unscientific nonsense. That annoys me. However, the ones who continually fail to tell the difference between this and any skepticism at all and want to just tar and feather everyone who dissents in any way whatsoever as "one of them" aren't adding anything to the discussion either. Name-calling and invective will just shut down discussion, not change any minds. In fact, all it'll do is bolster the opposition.
Giradius wrote:the claim I am making is biological in nature and supported by empirical evidence. Everybody is different, but not that different! human nutritional requirements are fairly standard
Which claim? If it's that you can eat a nutritionally complete diet without any meat, then, in the Western world, sure, probably. Another difference is what food is actually available, so, in the developing world, I'd wonder about protein sources.

I will say, though, that comparing your typical doesn't-care-what-he-shoves-in-his-mouth American to a diet-conscious vegetarian and making a health claim is no more fair than comparing a diet-conscious non-vegetarian to some hypothetical vegetarian who subsists on McDonald's apple pies and french fries and sugary colas (but no meats).
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Re: Animal rights and sexuality discussion (no connection)

Post by beowuuf »

Interesting point about religion encouraging cohesive civilisation. The evidence that nothing else works as well:

Enlightened self interest does not work alone. There are too many examples every day in the paper, or in visible view, of people's selfishness or small group mentality over-riding the common good.

People are not racing to expand their surroundings with more people for the added benefit, every addition to a city or country is not welcomed by its constituents.

That leaves forced expansion of groups (empire building by the rulers for resources, etc). History shows the logical limit of expansion, every empire has collapsed under its own weight or the resentment of the constituents.

Meanwhile, religions are still going strong. The only divisive element are people chosing a flavour since, as pointed out, people don't like to act in large groups for a common good.

Even given this, general religious belief can still be used as a call to arms or a common connect between countries that otherwise would not come together, even for the common good.
Was unable to (permenantly) kill off ian_scho (Haynuus), Ameena, oh_brother (Westian), money (Falkor), raixel (Petal) and Lord_Bones (Aurek) in the DM D&D game Time's Champions!

CONGRATULATIONS TO THOSE WHO MADE THE GAME WHAT IT WAS - GREAT!
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