Europe, Boring Until it's Not

[JohnDonne]

It is arbitrary in the sense that you value it a great deal more than I do, as I value my life a great deal more than you do (probably... I don't know you, you might be pathologically empathetic or something).

And I agree, the chicken's bad long division and its nutritional value aren't related. You brought up the idea of killing something for failing to live up to my arbitrary values. I was suggesting harvesting the chicken's nutrients in the pursuit of something I value more than the chicken's life, and suggesting that was morally defensible behavior.

For some reason my brain got stuck on this one. Anyway, I would say the life being threatened example is not arbitrary because a conscious life is the only source of the concept of value at all, it creates value and it values itself, therefore it is an intrinsic value, whereas something like a diamond is valuable only in relation to other intrinsic values. If you are trying to take away my intrinsic value for an extrinsic value, like my pocket change, or destroying a chicken's intrinsically valuable consciousness for the extrinsic value of cheap protein then that is an uneven bargain and not justifiable.


I will give you this: It is defensible for you to kill the chicken because you value its protein more than its life in precisely the manner that it is defensible for me to kill you for the loose change in your pocket because I value that loose change more than your life. That is, not very.

Since we are dealing with the moral universe of subjective experience, I think it is safe to say that your life is only intrinsically valuable to you. To me, it is merely another extrinsic value.

So the real question is, is it actually morally accurate to suggest that a human omnivore in pursuit of animal protein is equivalent to avarice.

For example, if you are starving, is killing me for my pocket change in order to buy vegetables morally equivalent to killing a chicken directly for it's delicious protein? I really don't think it is, because I think I can make a case that humans are superior in morally relevant ways. I would even suggest that a human is so superior, that it is more immoral for you to steal from me without harming me, than it is to kill and eat a chicken.

Supposing I am a chicken. Certainly, you can choose not to recognize that my life is valuable to myself, but that would be untrue since it is, and thus your ethical considerations would be founded on a false premise.

If you admit that I value my life, but assert that you do not hold it to be valuable to yourself, you've still admitted that my life is of value, at least to me. Your lack of value for my life does not negate the value I have for my own, anymore than non-existence negates existence.

The foundation of any value is the conscious determiner which deems things to matter or not. The chicken valuing its own life is valuing the mechanism by which value is created, a matteringness, so to speak.

Either my life being of value to itself is enough to create an intrinsic value, for moral value is only in relation to consciousness, or there is no intrinsic value. If there is no intrinsic value there is no ethical considerations. But your premise that humans are superior to chickens admits an ethical dimension. So there is intrinsic value and there is ethical considerations. Now your consideration is whether you are justified to kill the chicken for protein. You claim to have the justifications by reason of some measure of superiority which you have yet to outline. I am quite certain the criteria you will choose for judging chicken consciousness as less ethically considerable than human consciousness will amount to a distinction without much difference, but will rather be an exercise in rigging the game to turn up human.

(That last part came off as rude I think, my apologies). I am trying to say, the idea that murder is wrong being cast aside for a moment, the balance being weighed is the chicken's value of it's own life,(if anything like our own, immeasurable) versus ones value for chicken Mcnuggets, which can be confirmed at you local mcdonalds.

[Montegriffo]

Whilst on some points I agree with you on principle John the practicalities of everyone becoming vegan are hard to overcome.
Without manure far more chemical fertilisers will have to be used which are far more damaging to the environment.
Without grazing the countryside will become a huge featureless monoculture with no hedgerows and little space left for the diversity of wildlife we have currently (talking about the UK here)
There are not enough sources of protein to go around the 7 billion people on the planet. Most nuts are very low yeild per acre which is why they are so expensive already. Most other sources are high carb foods and the obesity epedemic is bad enough already.
There would be no more Bungay Balls Up juggling conventions because the beautiful meadow we hold it on would be a ploughed feild. I realise this is only going to affect me and is not really relevant.
The rare orchid which grows on this farm on the cow pasture would be ploughed up here and anywhere else it grows.

As I've said before attacking cruel and inhumane farming practises is going to yeild more good than simply attacking peoples desire to eat meat.
Meat should be a luxury product eaten in moderation only under humane conditions and not the cheap low standards intensive agriculture it currently is.
A world without meat consumption is not the utopia you think it will be. Jugglers have rights too.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

Supposing I am a chicken. Certainly, you can choose not to recognize that my life is valuable to myself, but that would be untrue since it is, and thus your ethical considerations would be founded on a false premise.

If you admit that I value my life, but assert that you do not hold it to be valuable to yourself, you've still admitted that my life is of value, at least to me. Your lack of value for my life does not negate the value I have for my own, anymore than non-existence negates existence.

The foundation of any value is the conscious determiner which deems things to matter or not. The chicken valuing its own life is valuing the mechanism by which value is created, a matteringness, so to speak.

Either my life being of value to itself is enough to create an intrinsic value, for moral value is only in relation to consciousness, or there is no intrinsic value. If there is no intrinsic value there is no ethical considerations. But your premise that humans are superior to chickens admits an ethical dimension. So there is intrinsic value and there is ethical considerations. Now your consideration is whether you are justified to kill the chicken for protein. You claim to have the justifications by reason of some measure of superiority which you have yet to outline. I am quite certain the criteria you will choose for judging chicken consciousness as less ethically considerable than human consciousness will amount to a distinction without much difference, but will rather be an exercise in rigging the game to turn up human.

Why must ethics only be concerned with 'intrinsic' value?
The first four sentences of your final paragraph look like a staggering tautology to me, but if you have an argument for why intrinsic values are the only ones we need to be ethically concerned about, I would be open to hearing it.

I am not at all certain that the bright line between intrinsic and extrinsic, or arbitrary and definite value is all that useful a distinction, ethically speaking. I would call my happiness intrinsically valuable, but that doesn't mean that it always has more ethical weight than the extrinsic value of the coin in your pocket.

We seem to get hung up on the idea that I reject the notion that a chicken values it's own life. Quite the opposite, I assume the chicken places the maximum possible value on it's own life. I am just not convinced that the chicken valuing its own life is a sufficient condition for me having any moral obligation to the chicken, even if we define the chickens self-value as universally 'intrinsic.'

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

(That last part came off as rude I think, my apologies)

I didn't take it as rude at all.

[Montegriffo]

(That last part came off as rude I think, my apologies)

I didn't take it as rude at all.

Hey what happened to our duel Hanarchy? I was there foil in hand after a satisfying cheese omelette for lunch and you failed to turn up.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

(That last part came off as rude I think, my apologies)

I didn't take it as rude at all.

Hey what happened to our duel Hanarchy? I was there foil in hand after a satisfying cheese omelette for lunch and you failed to turn up.

IT'S 'CAUSE I'M YELLER, DAMNIT! THERE! ARE YOU HAPPY NOW!?

[Montegriffo]

I didn't take it as rude at all.

Hey what happened to our duel Hanarchy? I was there foil in hand after a satisfying cheese omelette for lunch and you failed to turn up.

IT'S 'CAUSE I'M YELLER, DAMNIT! THERE! ARE YOU HAPPY NOW!?

I take no pleasure from your fortitudinal inferiority, I blame it on your meat consumption. You are what you eat and clearly you eat too much chicken.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

Hey what happened to our duel Hanarchy? I was there foil in hand after a satisfying cheese omelette for lunch and you failed to turn up.

IT'S 'CAUSE I'M YELLER, DAMNIT! THERE! ARE YOU HAPPY NOW!?

I take no pleasure from your fortitudinal inferiority, I blame it on your meat consumption. You are what you eat and clearly you eat too much chicken.

I am going to eat nothing but panther hearts for a year, and then you are going to be in trouble, you sum'bitch!

[Montegriffo]

[Montegriffo]

Get schnappy: German brewery releases sausage-flavoured drink
A GERMAN distiller has combined the country's two passions - alcohol and sausages - to create a sausage-flavoured schnapps.The sausage drink made with the essence of the ever popular bratwurst sausage is the brainchild of 50-year-old Jens Waechter, who works as a distiller at the E. Schueerholz Likoerfabrik, a liqueur distillery in Ritschenhausen, Thuringia.

The company became famous for producing a herbal liquor called Rhoentropfen, which originates from the city in Meiningen and was famous all over East Germany in the Cold War.

Speaking about the new drink Mr Waechter said: "A flavour trader, who is a friend of mine, sold me the patented basic recipe. I have refined it since then and now it tastes just perfect."