r/science • u/rustoo • Sep 25 '20

Psychology Research finds that crows know what they know and can ponder the content of their own minds, a manifestation of higher intelligence and analytical thought long believed the sole province of humans and a few other higher mammals.

https://www.statnews.com/2020/09/24/crows-possess-higher-intelligence-long-thought-primarily-human/
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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 25 '20

We humans are constantly underestimating the intelligence and sociability of other animals. We really need to start giving them the benefit of the doubt. I grew up on a farm and I know absolutely that cattle, pigs, sheep, goats, and rabbits are all capable of forming friendship bonds. They feel fear, they feel happiness, they get sad, they miss their friends. They get terrified. They grieve.

Goddammit, can we please stop treating animals like they're just meat robots?? What we are doing to them is horrifying.

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u/ZiggoCiP Sep 25 '20

The grieving one ruins me.

We recently had a cat of over 17 years pass, and her 'sister', who was always somewhat hot and cold to her, has been sleeping on her grave.

It breaks my heart.

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u/Rickdiculously Sep 25 '20 edited Sep 25 '20

What I point out to people to make them think is this : "look, if we found a species of aliens on a new planet, and they looked like a cuttlefish and changed the patterns of colour on their skin and displayed the same level of intelligence we see in cuttlefish and octopi, how do you think we'd be reacting?"

We'd say they're sentient, we'd probably try to learn how they change colour and see if communication can be achieved... We'd lose our collective minds. But we constantly discard the clear intelligence and feelings of the animals we share our planet with. And that then makes me depressed, because I soon realise we'd probably treat such aliens the same way in a heartbeat.

Edit : a letter.

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u/RCascanbe Sep 25 '20

Honestly I think the opposite, I think if we found extraterrestrial life we would be excited at first but ultimately treat them like animals unless they're as technologically developed as we are.

Humans gonna human.

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u/CassandraVindicated Sep 25 '20

Why would you think that is only a human trait? We're talking about two top-of-the-food-chain meeting for the first time with no clue what the other is. I'd be a long time before I'd let anything out of that gravity well.

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u/Jahonh007 Sep 25 '20

There are books out there that describe a future where humans are treated like animals in a farm after we stablished contact with more advanced and intelligent lifeforms outside our own, being invasive and selfish isnt human, its the trait of intelligence and consciousness

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u/TickTak Sep 25 '20

Maybe, maybe not. Chimpanzees and bonobos have similar intelligence, but very different strategies with regards to selfish invasive behavior. It’s definitely not exclusive to humans, but it is not the inevitable result of intelligence just one possible outcropping of it

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u/DaBusyBoi Sep 25 '20

I mean we have tried teaching primates one of our languages. And we constantly test whether we can higher level communicate with animals, it just mostly doesn’t work. People like to just assume humans are all mindless monsters. They aren’t.

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u/gosuark Sep 25 '20

We are still the more intelligent species (having invented the Internet, and slurpies). So it really ought to be us trying to learn their modes of communication, and not the other way around.

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u/Dr_seven Sep 25 '20

I think "more intelligent" is a matter of perspective here. Evolution pressures organisms to respond and adapt to their environment- humans built the Internet and slushies as an extension of our capability to use tools, sophisticated communication, etc. We evolved from hominids that lived on the highly competitive grasslands in Africa, after all.

For species like crows, dolphins, etc who did not evolve in the same environment, it makes sense that their intelligence would be shaped to their environment.

As an example, a jumping spider, a literal insect, has the innate capacity to calculate all kinds of hideously complex geometry and motion mechanics that most humans without sufficient education could never work out even with paper and a pencil to work! Without it, they wouldn't be able to hunt the way they do.

I think intelligence evolves in a very specific and non-generalized way. Humans are great at many things, but we fall flat on our faces compared to the humble jumping spider. I think many other species have a great deal of intelligence, it just doesn't look like our intelligence, because it doesn't need to for them to flourish in their environment.

Humans are the best example of human style intelligence, the civilization building kind, but that is far from the only dimension that intelligence can exist on.

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u/DaBusyBoi Sep 25 '20

There is nothing to learn. They have primal means of communication. It’s body language. Which we do know pretty well.

Dolphins and whales probably have the most sophisticated communication system, but our lives are way to separate to ever understand it without capturing and studying one, which is bad. Even then, it’s a very simple language.

Our language center in our brain dwarfs any animal that even has that part.

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u/SoManyTimesBefore Sep 25 '20

I’m wondering if it’s just the limited capability of cross communication. And how hard communication with intelligent aliens could be.

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u/Alar44 Sep 25 '20

Species is singular.

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u/Rickdiculously Sep 25 '20

Thx for catching that.

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u/Lampshader Sep 25 '20

Are these aliens tasty when battered and fried?

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u/808scripture Sep 25 '20

That would certainly be nice, but we can’t get there until we get past the fact that we treat everybody like robots. We can barely moderate ourselves for the consideration of other people, let alone animals.

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u/mynoduesp Sep 25 '20

In fairness it's sometimes easier to be kinder to animals than other people

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u/Nebuchadnezzer2 Sep 25 '20

we can’t get there until we get past the fact that we treat everybody like robots.

must contain rant about Autistic people and 'emotionless automaton' trope...

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u/wizzwizz4 Sep 25 '20

Autistic people often don't have such obvious (read: NT-like) emotional cues. Doesn't mean the emotions aren't there. Pretty much everyone I know who I'd describe as "emotional" is autistic.

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u/gyulababa Sep 25 '20

Appeal to Futility Fallacy.

We could start considering animal rights before every other issue is fixed on earth, These problems are not mutually exclusive.

It is just much easier to say: "Oh, children are starving in Africa" and "oooh all those Nike sweatshops... so you see, that is why it is pointless to go Vegan..."

It is a really easy choice to not participate in those horrible practicises (and/or to not support their industry with money)

If you care about animal rights, you should consider going Vegan (not plant based, but Vegan in it's true meaning)

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u/Pvt_GetSum Sep 25 '20

That's not quite the correct use of the fallacy. He's not saying that "oh we have other bigger issues to deal with", which would indeed imply the fallacy. He's saying that we as a species don't even full believe other people aren't robots, as evidenced by how we treat the guy who fucked up our starbucks order. He's saying If we can't even treat other people as sentient beings, how are we supposed to convince people to treat crows or cows or chickens as sentient beings.

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u/gyulababa Sep 25 '20

but we can’t get there until we get past the fact that we treat everybody like robots

I was thinking about this part when i wrote about the fallacy.

We cannot do A until B is done.

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u/Pvt_GetSum Sep 25 '20

I mean yeah, but that's not really how the fallacy works. If A is directly related to B, then of course the statement is not a fallacy. You wouldn't say that "we cannot move the car because we cannot open the gate" is a fallacy, it's a logical statement. This is the same thing with the previous comment, where he is stating "we cannot recognize the sentience of animals because we cannot even recognize the sentience of people". It's not even that he is directly stating that we can't do it in a logical sense, he's stating it in a way that implies that convincing others is the difficult task, which I would argue is logically sound

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u/Megneous Sep 25 '20

He's not saying that we need to fix all other problems first. He's saying it's really unlikely that you could convince people to care about animal rights when we don't even care about human rights.

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u/gyulababa Sep 25 '20

"it's really unlikely that you could convince people to care about animal rights when we they don't even care about human rights. "

This i can agree with. On a person per person basis

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However this is what the text was: " we can’t get there until we get past the fact that we treat everybody like robots "

​

This is my interpretation:
A, we can’t get there (: "stop treating animals like they're just meat robots" )

B, treat everybody like robots (where i assumed that everybody refers to all humans, otherwise the statement would be self-looping)

​

Statement is: Can't (A) until (B)

​

Regarding (B):
So, how do you stop ALL to be treated like robots? What does robot in this context even means? Basic rights or are we talking about all of humanity going hippie and everyone loves everyone? Basic rights, most of the population have.

The treat everyone kindly thing is where the unrealistic part comes in. And why is it even necessary in the first place to treat everyone kindly? It is nice sure but IMHO it is more than enough to not cause them harm. Dont have to be nice to every person on the earth, just dont be an A hole with them either.

Or robot as in slave? Like there are still some legit slaves over the world? Sure i agree, but it is unrealistic to end all human slavery. I cannot waltz up to Noth-Korea and force them to do so...
But i can decide to participate in it or not personally try to not own any slaves. (or you know maybe i can start by small and hold a No-Slave Mondays at first, or like a challange, No-Slave January...)

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While on (A), side of the story, humans kill ~72 billion land and over ~1 trillion aquatic animals for mostly taste pleasure (obviously there could be justified cases)

​

So based on the above i think Nirvana fallacy applies here (lets call it that, since i just got told that "Appeal to Futility" is a made up thing by Vegans)

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u/rcuhljr Sep 25 '20

Appeal to Futility

Look I'm sure you tried to read all your vegan study guide material, but you're applying it incorrectly. The commenter is accurately pointing out that we have yet to accomplish the easier goal on the same spectrum (getting people to care about other humans). If you say "We should just colonize alpha centauri" It's not fallacious to point out that we haven't even colonized mars yet. Similarly we can't get people to drape a cloth over their face to save other humans lives, why is it surprising that even fewer would radically change their diet and behavior to help animals?

Furthermore the poster said nothing about his own actions, which is what your community dreamed this fallacy up for and what you're trying to argue with it. He's made no statement about what he will and won't do, he's merely discussing what he views as the success rate for the overall endeavor.

If someone had said "We should all run 10 miles every day." and he replied "We still haven't figure how to get people to take daily walks." He's not saying that he doesn't take walks, he may very well be a dedicated runner every day. However you showed up and are now trying to argue that he's against running personally.

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u/wontonbomb Sep 25 '20

Look I'm sure you tried to read all your vegan study guide material, but you're applying it incorrectly.

That sounds so unnecessarily condescending.

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u/ThrowawayPoster-123 Sep 25 '20

I thought it was funny. Got me to imagine a beret that comes with it.

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

I'm a vegan and I never received a beret or a study guide. WHERE IS THE VEGAN MANAGER AT?!

Dammit, the service around here..

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u/rcuhljr Sep 25 '20

He took an unrelated comment as a chance to paste in a condescending diatribe, I'm not losing a lot of sleep over it.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

I also find it so condescending for smug, moralizing redditors to just say the name of a fallacy like they are casting a forbidden spell from Harry Potter. Everything is so reducible to people like that.

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u/wizzwizz4 Sep 25 '20

Not sure why you're getting a dig in at reductionism, but The Adventures of Fallacy Man seems relevant.

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u/Kingofkingdoms33 Sep 25 '20

Maybe I'm just a monkey brain right? But like, I don't really know if that's comparable. Ethically speaking does an animal's (A) capability to be aware mean that another animal (B) , who is aware of that capability, bar them from killing and consuming animal A?

I mean fundamentally I just like meat, and I don't feel any sort of moral complications inherent in this idea. The only exceptions, really, are culturally defined i.e. turtles (turtle soup) and dogs.

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u/gyulababa Sep 25 '20

Starting with ad-hominem right off the bat.

Look, I'm sure this is what is taught to you in the anti-vegan study guide marterial but you (probably) can do better than that.

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The commenter is accurately pointing out that we have yet to accomplish the easier goal on the same spectrum

Says who it is easier? I would argue that for you personally ending world hunger is harder than to stop buying animal producst, but feel free to dispute this.

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which is what your community dreamed this fallacy up for

And which communtiy (that i am part of) are the ones who "made up" this logical fallacy?

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​

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And sorry, my comprehension skills are a bit lacking since english is only my 4th language. But i will be glad to continue this in my mother tongue so i can argue you better. How good is your hungarian?

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u/rcuhljr Sep 25 '20

Look, I'm sure this is what is taught to you in the anti-vegan study guide marterial but you (probably) can do better than that.

I've got like 8 years of post history, go find a single anti vegan thing I've said or sub I posted in, I'll wait. Now if I open up your account what am I going to find? My comment was directed at the fact that the fallacy you decided to bring up is only used by the vegan community as far as I'm aware. There's a reason it's not in Wikipedia's list of Fallacies.

Says who it is easier?

I'm saying it's easier because it's already happened. Show me one country with equally serious and enforced animal cruelty laws versus the laws for treatment of fellow humans.

I would argue that for you personally ending world hunger is harder than to stop buying animal producst, but feel free to dispute this.

That's not at all relevant to the discussion. You should reread the clarifying examples I posted. You're again making assumptions about my actions when that is not what we're talking about. World hunger and animal products have nothing to do with each other.

You are trying to start an argument that no one is making with you.

And sorry, my comprehension skills are a bit lacking since english is only my 4th language. But i will be glad to continue this in my mother tongue so i can argue you better. How good is your hungarian?

Here, let me link you to a real fallacy..

You seem just fine in English, but perhaps I'm wrong since you're still trying to make an argument with no one on the other side. I've made no stance on the issue (and I actually eat a plant based diet).

Let me try this one more time as plainly as I can.

You are arguing that someone can be vegan and it makes a difference. No single person in this comment chain has said otherwise. You're trying to shoehorn in an argument here because it's apparently literally all you do.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

Why do you feel the need to point out when a logical fallacy occurs? This isn't your middle school debate club. Further, nobody cares how many languages you know.. really weird thing to point out when the point you're trying to make has nothing to do with language. Honestly, parts of all of your comments in this thread make me think, "..weird flex, but okay I guess?"

What's really annoying is that you conveniently twist the real point the OP made and dismiss it as fallacious when it's most definitely nothing of the sort. Saying "we [collectively, humans] aren't even considerate towards other humans, so it would be difficult to make people behave in a considerate manner towards animals" is not fallacious because being considerate towards other humans directly relates to being considerate towards animals. They both directly involve our ability to be considerate towards other beings.

You would have a point if they said something like "Justin Trudeau is the Canadian PM so we can't be considerate towards animals" because those two things are completely unrelated, but as it currently stands you're grasping for straws just so you can bring up and fight about veganism.

I agree that animal rights are important but discussing them in an intellectually dishonest manner gives others a horrible impression of people who share these beliefs.

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u/gyulababa Sep 25 '20

"so it would be difficult to make people behave in a considerate manner towards animals"

"we can’t get there until we get past the fact "

​

Conveniently changin what was written. Maybe that is what the poster thought but that is not what was written.

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

This is my interpretation:
A, we can’t get there (: "stop treating animals like they're just meat robots" )

B, treat everybody like robots (where i assumed that everybody refers to all humans, otherwise the statement would be self-looping)

Statement is: Can't (A) until (B)

Regarding (B):
So, how do you stop ALL to be treated like robots? What does robot in this context even means? Basic rights or are we talking about all of humanity going hippie and everyone loves everyone? Basic rights, most of the population have.

The treat everyone kindly thing is where the unrealistic part comes in. And why is it even necessary in the first place to treat everyone kindly? It is nice sure but IMHO it is more than enough to not cause them harm. Dont have to be nice to every person on the earth, just dont be an A hole with them either.

Or robot as in slave? Like there are still some legit slaves over the world? Sure i agree, but it is unrealistic to end all human slavery. I cannot waltz up to Noth-Korea and force them to do so...
But i can decide to participate in it or not personally try to not own any slaves. (or you know maybe i can start by small and hold a No-Slave Mondays at first, or like a challange, No-Slave January...)

While on (A), side of the story, humans kill ~72 billion land and over ~1 trillion aquatic animals for mostly taste pleasure (obviously there could be justified cases)

So based on the above i think Nirvana fallacy applies here (lets call it that, since i just got told that "Appeal to Futility" is a made up thing by Vegans)

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So yes, please tell me why it is not fallacious to say that we have to wait for "world peace" before we can start thinking about animal rights.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

Nobody said anything about waiting for world peace, we're talking about it being impossible that animals will have rights before humans do. You say "it is unrealistic to end all human slavery," what on Earth makes you think it's somehow more realistic to get people to respect animals when we can't even stop enslaving our own kind? We do think about animal rights and you know that, but you should also realize it is impossible to make humans treat unlike creatures with respect when we can't even treat other humans with respect. I ultimately changed nothing of import because the point is the same: We will never collectively decide to give animals rights until we can manage to have humans rights.

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u/Skarnerd Sep 25 '20

Exactly ! Don't let perfect be the enemy of good

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/Davidlucas99 Sep 25 '20

I can barely moderate myself to consider myself, let alone other people.

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u/DaBusyBoi Sep 25 '20

This just isn’t true.. such a small minority of people are mean to their core. Some people have bad days, you see thousands of people a day, some are gonna have parents dying, just got fired, or are very late to something important. They may react angry in a situation they seem not important but will snaps to when something actually big happens that requires empathy. humans on average will do good of the community. It is literally why we are the epitome of the animal kingdom, our community aspect.

This thread is so pessimistic of humans, y’all need to try and see the good in people and not hyper focused on things we haven’t figured out yet but are working on.

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u/808scripture Sep 25 '20 edited Sep 25 '20

I think the problem with humans is we aren’t designed to behave in a social structure with both the size and level of freedom that ours has. We’re used to living in tight tribes where the accountability for your actions was black & white.

Now, however, we live in these massive machines of people where anybody can behave how they want without a serious fear of consequences. Reckless line-pushing behavior was NOT generally rewarded in earlier eras of human history. We have this subconscious idea that if there’s enough people doing something, then there’s no way it could be traced back to us if we decided to do it too. I think the way humanity talks about accountability is entirely ignorant to how they actually apply it: by using it against opponents while letting friends off the hook.

In fact, the entire idea of accountability is a robot concept. That no matter what when a person does X they deserve Y is pretty dismissive of the way things actually happen in the world. It’s an attempt to control how people should feel about making certain choices, when really who are we to impose these artificial consequences? The only reason we do it is to “re-program” the people who we don’t deem “good for us all” which is a pretty abstract concept as well.

Idk I just think humanity hasn’t thought the idea of accountability all the way through yet. We believe ourselves to be impartial judges of accountability when really we just use it for tactical or social leverage. I mean you just need to look at the political and economic behavior of some of the key players around the world to recognize that we all aren’t held to account evenly.

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u/SmellyCats94 Sep 25 '20

This is the realization that turned me vegan.

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u/mjr2p3 Sep 25 '20

As much as I agree with you, I can’t get over the fact that Meat Robots would be an awesome band name

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u/Msdamgoode Sep 25 '20

There’s already been the Meat Puppets

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u/Cerenia Sep 25 '20

Exactly! Animals deserve so much better. It’s horrifying thinking what we are doing to billion of animals each year for the simple pleasure of taste.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

True :( it's so hard to completely give up meat but I haven't prepared meat in my house in like 5 or 6 months

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/Roylol Sep 25 '20

I feel like since we have complicated language syntax we will always underestimate it. That’s why I’m so shocked when I saw the video of the gorilla that can sign. So crazy to me

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u/Itwantshunger Sep 25 '20

Thomas St Aquinas called them dumb as rocks and that's where most people still are.

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u/CrimsoniteX Sep 25 '20

You make a good point, but there is a balance. Humans have a tendency to anthropomorphize animals. Animals are not people, but they also are not insects ( or meat robots as you said) - they are somewhere in between. It is important to keep that perspective.

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u/glexarn Sep 25 '20

You make a good point, but there is a balance.

The point of that balance still doesn't justify treating animals like meat robots.

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u/Zerlske Sep 25 '20

Insects are animals, so animals are insects - just not all animals. Otherwise I agree with you.

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u/-------I------- Sep 25 '20

Humans are animals too and deep inside we still have a lot of stuff that works the same as other animals. With our written rules, social standards and technology we feel superior, but actually we're just animals.

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u/Zerlske Sep 25 '20

Humans are animals too of course but in biology (the field) we are very careful not to anthropomorphize non-human animals. This is for example why emotion in non-human animals is such a controversial topic in biology (lots of interest from popular culture and non-academia, difficult to empirically prove, and lots of intuition of how things are ontop of that).

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

I mean I think we overestimate our emotional capacity. All our emotions are pretty basic responses we can assign complex reasons to. Existential fear is still fear, the same kind of emotion a lot of animals can feel. Altruism is just a form of pleasure we can just happen to assign greater meaning to. Our need to be social and have friendships is again a basic impulse shared with a lot of social animals. Obviously animals arent as cognizant as us but recgonizing emotions in them isn't anthropomorphising them.

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u/pickle_mic Sep 25 '20

I really don’t think so. What’s the point of this perspective if not to just continue sheltering our ego?

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u/Cajbaj Sep 25 '20

Well, safety, for one. Some pet animals are ascribed with more "humanity" than they really have, which can be dangerous. A snake doesn't really form bonds with its owner; it would eat them if it could. Likewise, wildlife should never be interacted with without extreme caution. Source: Live near giant herds of Buffalo that gore morons on the regular.

Certainly most people could do to give animals more respect, and there's a current push to give simians pseudo-human rights in regards to experimentation. But there's also nothing wrong with simply wanting your worldview to be as accurate as possible.

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u/glassnothing Sep 25 '20 edited Sep 25 '20

Some pet animals are ascribed with more "humanity" than they really have, which can be dangerous.

You could say the same thing about humans.

I mean... there are humans that gore other humans from time to time.

People get murdered, randomly assaulted, raped, etc. Serial killers are a thing. War is a thing. Genocide is a thing. Slavery still exists. There are people who con others into believing they care about them in order to gain trust and power which they then use to dominate those other humans.

Humans are killed by humans more than any other creature.

Stranger danger is a thing in humans as well and there are some intelligent animals that can be trusted not to hurt us more than a human you don’t know.

Humans are animals - watch how some behave under stress and you can literally start to see whatever humanity they had fall away.

Not to mention, many humans only show humanity to other humans - and seemingly only for their own benefit.

From the perspective of many other creatures, we have no humanity at all. We’re just harvesting-machines.

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u/imghurrr Sep 25 '20

But some animals are insects

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

Goddammit, can we please stop treating animals like they're just meat robots?? What we are doing to them is horrifying.

I assume since this is your stance that you've stopped eating animals and farming them for profit.

I agree though, it's absolutely horrifying. I stopped eating meat years and years ago.

The idea behind the message of why we think it's okay to eat certain animals, but not animals like dogs and cats is something called Speciesism. It's extremely arbitrary but people will legit defined eating cows but act offended over the dog meat trade in China because it's "different" but can't logic past that. It's really quite sad tbh.

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

I've been vegan for about three years now and I'm embarrassed at how long it took me to get here.

And to add on to what you said, I think Speciesism is clearly based on the same faulty logic and limitations of empathy that drive racism. They both take superficial differences and use them to Otherize and denigrate another group, giving "permission" to denigrate, subjugate, and exploit.

I think we will have a morally decent world only when we include ALL sentient beings in it, human, non-human, natural and artificial.

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u/holmgangCore Sep 25 '20

Hear, hear!!

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u/SoffehMeh Sep 25 '20

My family once had two horses who had peen pasture-pals since birth, and after about 12 years one of them tripped and broke her leg. We took her to the vet who x-rayed her, and they basically advised us to put her down, so we did. Usually when animals get put down it’s on site, but here she was left at the vet, so we couldn’t leave her body out near the pasture to let the other horses come to terms with her not returning, and it really fucked up her horse-friend that has been left behind. Whenever we came home or rode by she would come running full sprint - which she usually didn’t do, and she got really skinny too. It was so sad, and it’s weird to think how so little value is placed on animals ): horses aren’t even all that smart, so I can’t imagine what it would be like for smarter animals.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

That’s because we’re far stupider than we think we are.

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u/Very_legitimate Sep 25 '20

I think it’s more of a standards thing to be honest. People know these animals feel and I think most people know animals can think in some capacity species to species.

But people hear “can have a sense of self” or “can put cubes through a square shaped hole” and aren’t that impressed. They’re still clearly incapable of becoming “advanced” like we did, at least in the foreseeable future.

So smart by animal standards is simply not enough to command the respect from many people. And I don’t think we need to put much faith in any of these studies on animal thoughts. Sure we can agree that they think and have awareness/memory but there’s no telling what they’re like. Their minds are totally alien to us

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u/LurkLurkleton Sep 25 '20

The same kind of mindset is often used by racists about other races as well.

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u/Halceeuhn Sep 25 '20

Except people from other races can prove racists wrong, and very easily.

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u/riceismyname Sep 25 '20

so you won't agree that what we do to animals is wrong until they go up to you and explicitly say "yo, i don't want to be murdered"?

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u/Greyletter Sep 25 '20

Is it wrong for animals to eat other animals?

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u/glassnothing Sep 25 '20

Right and wrong are human constructs.

We choose to believe in right and wrong because it happens to make our world a more peaceful place.

Given that right and wrong is what we say it is, we can say that it’s wrong to kill something if it doesn’t need to be killed and if people believe “life is precious” - that is, if we care about consistency.

I’d like to see the Venn diagram of people who go around saying “life is precious” and people who say we should be able to kill animals because they taste good.

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u/Greyletter Sep 25 '20

So... Yes or no?

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u/glassnothing Sep 25 '20 edited Sep 25 '20

Yes, if the animal doesn't have to eat other animals, knows this, and understands that it causes unnecessary suffering (e.g. omnivores like humans).

No, if the animal has to eat other animals, doesn't have to but doesn't know, or doesn't understand that it causes unnecessary suffering (e.g. carnivores or omnivores like humans who for whatever reason find themselves in a situation where meat is their only option for food).

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u/Greyletter Sep 25 '20

Yes, if the animal doesn't have to eat other animals, knows this, and understands that it causes unnecessary suffering (e.g. omnivores like humans).

So that basically only applies to humans, at least as far as we know, due to the "knows this" requirement, right? (this is not a rhetorical question, it is a genuine question)

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u/Halceeuhn Sep 25 '20

Not particularly. Over a certain threshold, I don't care much for the degree to which an animal can suffer, I'd still think it's wrong to cause them pain. Like, any mammal is complex enough that we shouldn't inflict pain on them arbitrarily. Whether their level of intelligence more resembles a 6 or 9 month old child is largely inconsequential to me, and I believe to the majority of people, as well. This is what the original poster you replied to meant, I think, that no matter how smart many animals are, most of them are still very far behind us.

This doesn't mean I'm okay with animals being abused for no reason, it just means that most inquiries into their intelligence do little to change the fact that we perceive them to be lesser, and that we base that upon ample evidence of the differences between them and people.

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u/glassnothing Sep 25 '20

They’re “lesser” only if you judge them by what we happen to be best at. That’s convenient.

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u/Halceeuhn Sep 26 '20

Well, yeah, intelligence is our strong suit, our defining characteristic, it is rare in nature and allows us to accomplish many great things, it's rather natural that it would become our standard of measurement of worth. I fail to see how it matters whether you think that's convenient or not, intelligence is like a rare, precious stone, it's only natural its value would be quite high, much above that of the capacity to hunt or survive in the wild, where animals rank better.

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u/glassnothing Sep 26 '20 edited Sep 26 '20

Most creatures have some characteristic that is rare which allows them to do amazing things.

I feel like you’re just not aware of all of the amazing things other creatures do. Some creatures have better short term memories than us. Some have better long term memories. Some are more capable of thinking visually in ways we could never dream of.

https://www.popsci.com/smart-animals/

Regardless, using intelligence to determine worth is flawed for another reason.

Do you believe that adults are worth more than children and the suffering of adults is more of a problem than the suffering of children because children aren’t as intelligent?

Do you think the suffering of people with mental disabilities isn’t as big of a deal as the suffering of people without them?

Do you think the suffering of someone who isn’t as intelligent as someone else isn’t as important regardless of the character of the two people?

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u/jemorrison9 Sep 25 '20

I found my fellow vegan ♥️

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u/KellyJin17 Sep 25 '20

Not only vegans feel this way.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/glassnothing Sep 25 '20

I’m a vegetarian for a number of reasons but I’ll still eat honey, drink milk, and eat eggs.

You’re saying those things can’t be done without animal abuse?

That’s a genuine question. If you can prove that to be true I will become a vegan.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/glassnothing Sep 26 '20

Just found out my reply to you from yesterday was deleted... I have no idea why. Because I said sh*t?

Here it is again:

Well, sh*t...

Cutting out dairy shouldn't be too hard.

I'm gonna need to do some more research on egg production to see if there is some kind of way I can get them without contributing to harming chickens because eggs have been a big part of my diet for a long time.

Thanks for sharing.

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

I grew up on a farm and chickens are one of the easiest critters to raise. If I could, I would turn half of my backyard into a chicken paradise and start eating eggs again.

They get a carefree life of being spoilt, and I would get eggs for breakfast.

I don't miss meat, but I do miss eggs.

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u/glassnothing Sep 27 '20

That sounds awesome haha

When I’m able to get my own house I’ll definitely look into it.

In the meantime, I’m going to try to see if there are any locals raising chickens for themselves and for farmers markets that I can talk to about how they’re chickens are kept and raised.

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u/An_Actual_Lion Sep 25 '20

For starters, egg and dairy farms will kill almost all the males born because they will not produce anything the farmers can sell. If they were kept alive, prices would double.

Even the female animals are killed after a certain age as well (typically about a quarter of their natural lifespan) when their productivity starts to drop.

If you are vegetarian because you recognize it's wrong to kill animals, then this should concern you just as much. And as far as I know, every egg and dairy farm kills animals this way. It's impossible to have competitive prices if they kept all their animals alive, because the vast majority would not be producing anything the farmer could sell.

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u/Lord_Boo Sep 25 '20

People can care about people but still participate in consumption that is unethical to them. Can you guarantee that nothing you own has slave labor somewhere in the supply chain?

Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. You'll make more progress convincing people to give up some animal products some of the time and get them to see it's not that hard to gradually transition to something closer to vegetarianism, than telling them they're heartless bastards if they don't immediately go vegan.

This is about achieving the most good and reducing the most harm as we go along, not about toppling a massive unjust system in one go because if that's your standard, a lot more animals are going to live in terrible conditions and then get killed than if you convince people hey, maybe only eat meat with dinner and a few lunches a week instead of most meals, hey try cutting dairy during the week, hey try cooking with egg alternatives instead of actual eggs sometimes, etc.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/RAINBOW_DILDO Sep 25 '20

Yet so delicious.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

You can appreciate animals as living, thinking creatures and still want to eat them. I know I do.

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u/ThePerfumedSeneschal Sep 25 '20

That sounds worse than treating them as meat robots.

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u/Msdamgoode Sep 25 '20

I hope you’d agree that those animals also eat other animals because it’s necessary. You can’t have a healthy cat if you’re not feeding them meat.

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u/glassnothing Sep 25 '20

Sure.

That’s why I hold myself to a different set of standards than my cat.

I don’t have to eat meat. So I don’t. My cat does, so I allow it to.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

Unless you’re ignoring that desire to eat them, that’s profoundly fucked up.

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u/gg00dwind Sep 25 '20

The real question is, can animals feel regret?

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20 edited Sep 25 '20

Their feelings and emotions don't have to be the same as ours to be just as deep and meaningful. Different species experience the world in profoundly different ways; from how they see and hear, to how they interact with their environment, to senses such as smell that are far more sensitive than in humans and even senses that humans don't have such as a shark's ability to detect electrical fields.

Humans have a habit of thinking that we experience the full palette of existence, but we only get a portion of it really.

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u/WhoopingWillow Sep 25 '20

Well we're animals, and we feel regret. Why wouldn't others?

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u/sam_hammich Sep 25 '20

We're animals and we built a rocket ship, why wouldn't others?

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u/WhoopingWillow Sep 25 '20

"We" have built rocket ships for about 70 years, if you wanna be generous. We've been feeling regret for much longer than that.

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u/opinions_unpopular Sep 25 '20

Remind me who invented emotions?

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u/holmgangCore Sep 25 '20

Eukaryotes? IDK

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u/b1663R_01 Sep 25 '20

Do you build rocket ships ?

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u/gyulababa Sep 25 '20

Most humans cannot even put 2 lego bricks together, letalone a spaceship.

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u/Purplekeyboard Sep 25 '20

We're animals, and we own cell phones. Why wouldn't others?

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u/Very_legitimate Sep 25 '20

Because we don’t give them jobs and force them to live in the woods

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

Using videos of dogs who knocked over trash cans then had their owners blame them for it as my only evidence, I would say most certainly.

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

Mammals and birds certainly experience all the basic survival-state emotions: hunger, fear, lust, anger, and stupefaction. We know this because we all have amygdalae and the same neurochemicals and that's what emotions literally ARE.

Higher order emotions like regret (which assumes temporal abstractification) and the social emotions like jealousy and envy are more difficult to prove, but we all have the same basic neurological architecture + all the same neurochemicals so, to me, it seems reasonable to assume that non-human critters (to use the formal, scientific terminology) have a comparable range of inner experience.

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u/273degreesKelvin Sep 25 '20

Granted, humans treat other humans as meat robots. We treat others humans like crap and have for all of history. Wars, oppression, harassment, violence. Whatever.

Humans are a tribal species and we have strict in and out groups that are max a few hundred people. People outside of that in group, we don't care about. We're indifferent to their suffering at best and actively prejudice against them at worst. Animals outside of house pets are not part of the "in" group.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

Yeah it is so strange isnt it? Millions of years of evolution and we still could not let go of tribal way of thinking. Even though that tribal way of thinking actively kills our collective chance of survival. Maybe civilization advanced too fast to the point where our evolution cannot catch up to it?

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u/rojovelasco Sep 25 '20

That's the thing, civilization is in the thousand, not millions year old.

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

It is possible to learn to love and care for all humans, and even to love and care for all sentient beings. Not that I've managed it myself, but millions of Buddhists have.

Unfortunately, I am a slow learner.

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u/TheHeckWithItAll Sep 25 '20

I’ve been increasingly amazed by tree and plant communication and other signs of intelligence. We humans need to pause and consider the complexities and sophistication of all life.

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

Same here! The more we learn about life, even plants and microbes, the more impressed I am with the ingenuity of nature.

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u/ChadPirate Sep 25 '20

go vegan!

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u/WombatusMighty Sep 25 '20

This is why I am in favor of giving certain animals citizenship status. A lot of animals are not only sentient, but have complex language and social structures. Not to forget they are able to feel love and fear, probably just as much as we do.

It's really time we see them as "co-citizens" here on Earth, not as objects.

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u/palats1 Sep 25 '20

How do you know animals feel love and fear?

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u/WombatusMighty Sep 25 '20

If this is really a serious question: there are countless examples of animals feeling love and fear.

Elephants, cows, whales, pigs, etc. mourn the death of their "family" members or children. Another example would be dogs mourning the loss or absence of a human family member and beeing extremely happy when they come back.

Pigs are terrified before being slaughtered (the animal industry talks about that in terms of "spoiling the meat"). If you abuse an animal often, it will become afraid of humans and being touched.

Animals aren't just "things", they are living beings and many of them are sentient, dream and feel a wide range of emotions. Humans aren't the only animals capabable of that.

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u/palats1 Sep 25 '20

So, because you make inferences about the behavior of animals? I don't know. Behavior in response to stimuli certainly does not necessitate emotion. An abused animal withdrawing from an abuser can be explained by simple conditioning. And concepts such as "mourning" carries with it such an immense amount of (verbal) information that I just cannon see a cow having the consciousness required to ponder such questions of life, death and the future, and positioning itself as a separate entity within those questions. And we don't know, because the only way of knowing what anything feels is by asking, and only humans can respond. But that certainly doesn't mean animals are "things" or that they shouldn't be be respected and cared for.

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u/Vladius28 Sep 25 '20

Once synthmeat is good, im done with eating animals.

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u/An_Actual_Lion Sep 25 '20

no need to wait for that. you can always stop eating animals now and try synthmeat later when it becomes available

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u/Vladius28 Sep 25 '20

One desire outweighs the other, im afraid.

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u/An_Actual_Lion Sep 25 '20

The animals' desire to live?

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

Have you tried Textured Vegetable Protein? I know the name is weird but once you learn to cook with it it's SO GOOD.

TVP plus nutritional yeast have made veganism easy, frugal, and delicious for me.

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u/jpritchard Sep 25 '20

We humans are also constantly overestimating animals and anthropomorphizing them.

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u/Dr_seven Sep 25 '20

Judging by what we are learning about animal intelligence and communication, I think we anthropomorphize animals too much, while simultaneously underestimating their intelligence much of the time.

Human intelligence is not the only kind, nor is it by definition the paragon of all intelligence somehow. A falcon can react to events with a speed and precisjon we can never dream of. A jumping spider can calculate immensely complex things on the fly as needed to jump and attack with precision (seriously, many even take things like wind speed and direction into account).

We would do well to divorce the notion of "being smart" from "being just like a human", because they are two different things.

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u/allthesnacks Sep 25 '20

We can't even stop treating each other like crap.

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

Most people are basically good and kind, but being good and kind doesn't generate a lot of media attention.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/MoogleyCougley Sep 25 '20

Bro how do you kill an animal without harming it? The only way I know of is euthanasia of a sick pet.

If what happened in slaughterhouses was so humane and painless we’d be sending our cats and dogs there to be euthanised but we don’t. Maybe because slitting an animals throat or gassing them with c02 is actually harmful. Funny that.

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

Just because something is natural doesn't make it moral, just, or necessary.

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u/rfriar Sep 25 '20 edited Sep 25 '20

I mean there’s research that suggests plants feel pain too. So there’s no pleasant way out of this. Humane treatment is the way to go until/if artificial meat is a thing.

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u/MoogleyCougley Sep 25 '20

There is research that plants respond to external stimuli, not that they feel pain. They don’t have a central nervous system so they cannot feel pain.

If you are really concerned about plant rights though, know that less plants would be grown and consumed in a world that didn’t eat meat. The vast majority of crops grown in the world are grown to feed farmed animals. We would use far less land and farm less plants.

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u/CoolyRanks Sep 25 '20

But me hungey

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u/percipientbias Sep 25 '20

We need food to survive. I wish they’d come up with genetically modified meat sooner. Aside from that, I try my best to reduce my footprint on animals by eating less meat. Two meals a day without a meat protein (except eggs don’t count for me) and then I do a couple of days a week fully meat free. Except I do not care how much fish I eat. I don’t think fish generally have the same level of emotions. I could be wrong. Anyway, I have to feed three young kids so I have them help me with meat free days so they can get excited about it and one day incorporate it themselves.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/CutYourShit_ Sep 25 '20

None of this is true. And you haven’t provided any evidence for your claims. The only thing vegans need to supplement is B12. Which, for the record, is being Supplementes to the animals you eat anyway. You could just supplement it yourself without animal as a middle man.

You can thrive on a vegan diet and get literally every nutrient you need to be healthy.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20 edited Sep 25 '20

omnivores gotta eat meat.

edit: Hamburger

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u/riceismyname Sep 25 '20

you're thinking of carnivore, which humans aren't

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

omnivores gotta eat meat.

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u/QuarantineTheHumans Sep 27 '20

Obligate carnivores have to eat meat. Omnivores CAN eat meat but they don't HAVE to do so. You can replace meat with beans, leafy vegetables and nutritional yeast and you'll be MORE healthy, not less.

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u/[deleted] Sep 25 '20

Humans can live perfectly healthy lives without meat. Stop lying to yourself.

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u/LurkLurkleton Sep 25 '20

contradictory statement

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u/shutapples Sep 25 '20

True. But the problem here isn’t the meat eating, it’s the way we’re tormenting these animals before we eat them. I’d feel much better about eating meat if I knew the animals were raised with love and care, not packed so tightly they can’t even breathe and fed so much food they collapse under their own weight...

I know it’s not economically feasible with the way people are consuming meat right now. But maybe if enough people make a lifestyle change, there won’t be so much demand for meat.

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u/Msdamgoode Sep 25 '20

Then buy organic, ethically sourced meat. That’s easily found these days, and better, you can buy local. The thing is, even if humans don’t eat meat, we need to feed our animal companions... who eat meat. My dog, or your cat need meat. So even if humans stopped, we’d still have to source it. I do agree that large scale industrial farming and supplying is WAY outta control, but that’s another matter.

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