Animals I exploited during the holidays
John & Linda VanSickle
During the recent holiday season, I exploited quite a few
animals. I have no regrets. Here's a run-down:
Pig: Ate parts of many pigs, including ham, bacon, and a nice pork
roast. Thank God for the pig.
Chicken: What would like be like without Chick-fil-A? And let's not
forget the eggs.
Cow: Burger King. McDonald's.
Horse: Rode on one.
Turkey: Love that white meat!
Dogs: Own two. I'm still exploiting them for my own amusement.
Cats: Own four (as much as anyone can own a cat, which is debateable).
Donkeys: Got some slight amusement shouting "You jackasses!" at them.
Fish: Nice baked fish at Old Country Buffet.
Deer: Venison jerky is pretty good stuff.
If this be treason, make the most of it!
--
------------------------------------------------------
"You said they'd be treated decently!"
"They were treated decently. They were decently fed
and decently shot."
John and Linda VanSickle vans...@erols.com
Jessica Snyder
John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
>During the recent holiday season, I exploited quite a few
>animals. I have no regrets. Here's a run-down:
My tally is minimal compared to yours!
>Pig: Ate parts of many pigs, including ham, bacon, and a nice pork
>roast. Thank God for the pig.
Ditto.
>Cow: Burger King. McDonald's.
I was fast-food free (can't handle the grease levels since I started a
lowfat diet), but did have some marvelous beef sticks. Chomp, chomp.
>Horse: Rode on one.
Visited mine in her cage (stall), gave her carrots, felt her baby
kick. Yes, she is being exploited as a horse incubator for financial
gain (a sellable foal)
>Turkey: Love that white meat!
We have a frozen turkey in fridge. I guess it's already been
exploited, if not eaten :)
>Dogs: Own two. I'm still exploiting them for my own amusement.
Own one. Exploited for entertainment daily.
Over holidays, was locked in car with me for a 13 hour drive, and
was cruelly crated during parts of the holiday visit. Oh, and I stopped
him from fighting with another dog. Obviously just out of spite.
>Cats: Own four (as much as anyone can own a cat, which is debateable).
Three, and ditto. I did rumple the fur of one just to see the look on
her face. Clear exploitation and callousness on my part.
>Donkeys: Got some slight amusement shouting "You jackasses!" at them.
:)
No fish or deer for me. don't much like deer meat. Fish I just
didn't get around to. Although I do intend to capture some and put
them in a cage in my home soon (I've wanted an aquarium for years)
Animal exploiters uncovered. What evil creatures we are!
Jessica
------------------------------------------------------------
jrsn...@students.wisc.edu in Madison, WI
and the multi-species Home of Chaos
"Oh sure! But what's the speed of dark?"
------------------------------------------------------------
Martin Martens
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
[snip]
>
> Not evil necessarily, but certainly not true animal welfare
> supporters. Killing healthy non-debilitated animals is a
> profoundly different ethical action than taking a dog for
> a car ride or ruffling the fur of a cat. The former is a
> fundamental welfare violation and should be recognized
> as such. An animal welfare supporter would not respond
> to such killings with the breezy acceptance presented above.
>
> - Bob
You appear to confuse the notion of animal welfare with animal
rights. The purpose of animal welfare is to insure that
animals are treated well and according to exsisting laws and
regulations. Animal rights purports that the killing of animals
for food is wrong.
Everything Jessica did was completely within the existing ideas
of animal welfare.
Either you totally missed Jessica's sarcastic intent of her
message or you are attempting to take a even more subtle crack
at AR.
Care to expand your point a bit more coherently?
Jennifer Royce
John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
>Fish: Nice baked fish at Old Country Buffet.
I gotta say you have poor taste... even when I did eat meat, I
wouldn't have been caught dead at Old Country Buffet. Such cheesy,
tacky cafeteria style food... yuk! If it reminds you of home cookin'
your mom's a terrible cook. :P
Jennifer Royce
(and Bailey and Zoe and Cosmo)
http://www.spectra.net/~tworabit
twor...@spectra.net
-------------------------------------------------------------
For free rabbit care information send a self-addressed
envelope with .55 postage to:
~~~Southern Tier Rabbit Care Network~~~
~P.O. Box 27, Johnson City, NY 13790~
or visit: http://www.spectra.net/~tworabit/strcn.htm
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32D18B...@compuserve.com>,
Certainly, thanks for asking.
What Jessica and others are doing is this: they're overlooking
that a significant welfare violation occurs whenever a happy healthy
animal is killed. That pig who made a cameo appearance on the
holiday dinner table no longer has a welfare at all. Same goes for
those cows whose bodies were served up at the fast food places
or ground into beef sticks.
Unless the subjects' welfare states prior to death were irrevocably
bad, then their welfare has been damaged. And this should be a
concern to all who seriously claim to be supporters of animal welfare.
I hope this expansion will turn out to be more coherent.
- Bob
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
Tim Behlmer
John & Linda VanSickle wrote:
>
Glad to hear the holidays were enjoyable:
> During the recent holiday season, I exploited quite a few
> animals. I have no regrets. Here's a run-down:
>
> Pig: Ate parts of many pigs, including ham, bacon, and a nice pork
> roast. Thank God for the pig.
>
nope. Usually have the pig during Easter.
> Chicken: What would like be like without Chick-fil-A? And let's not
> forget the eggs.
>
Not for the holidays, but I did make an outstanding chicken soup using
plump fresh split breasts for stock. mmmmmm...
> Cow: Burger King. McDonald's.
>
Yep. prime rib with all the juice.
> Horse: Rode on one.
>
> Turkey: Love that white meat!
>
Oh,yeah.
> Dogs: Own two. I'm still exploiting them for my own amusement.
>
> Cats: Own four (as much as anyone can own a cat, which is debateable).
>
> Donkeys: Got some slight amusement shouting "You jackasses!" at them.
>
> Fish: Nice baked fish at Old Country Buffet.
>
Sashimi and sushi. There is something good about raw fish.
> Deer: Venison jerky is pretty good stuff.
>
peppered vension jerky, actually.
> If this be treason, make the most of it!
>
if it is, I'm guilty.
> --
> ------------------------------------------------------
> "You said they'd be treated decently!"
> "They were treated decently. They were decently fed
> and decently shot."
Didn't have to shoot, although I take much pleasure in acquiring my own
food.
>
> John and Linda VanSickle vans...@erols.com
Tim
Jessica Snyder
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>In article <5aopmo$3f...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
> Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>>
>> John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
>> >animals. I have no regrets. Here's a run-down:
>>
>>
>> >roast. Thank God for the pig.
>
>were slain for your platter. (I'm assuming the subjects were
>healthy and non-debilitated at time of death.)
>
>> Ditto.
>
>And you too.
I assume the same. But I'm not opposed to their welfare. I want
them kept as healthy and happy as possible up until the time they
are killed. To use the words "animal welfare" in any other context
is to rewrite the definition of the phrase. Which is your option,
but don't expect the rest of the world to jump in line with you.
>> >Cow: Burger King. McDonald's.
>
>And you are opposed to the welfare of cows served at these
>places.
See above.
>
>> I was fast-food free (can't handle the grease levels since I started a
>> lowfat diet), but did have some marvelous beef sticks. Chomp, chomp.
>
>And you are opposed to the welfare of the cows killed to produce
>those sticks.
See above. (gee, kinda repetitive, isn't it)
>> We have a frozen turkey in fridge. I guess it's already been
>> exploited, if not eaten :)
>
>Yes, his welfare was profoundly violated by the killing, unless he
>was in a terminally debilitated state at the time, in which case the
>carcass might not be safe to eat.
You are obviously re-defining the phrase animal welfare to suit your
needs. Unfortunately, animal welfare groups have already laid down
a solid definition of the term. If you assume killing a healthy animal
violates animal welfare, then you are an animal rights person.
Your option.
>> >Dogs: Own two. I'm still exploiting them for my own amusement.
>>
>> Own one. Exploited for entertainment daily.
>
>I see no obvious welfare violation here.
What about exploitation? Are they not being kept as slaves?
>Not evil necessarily, but certainly not true animal welfare
>supporters. Killing healthy non-debilitated animals is a
>profoundly different ethical action than taking a dog for
>a car ride or ruffling the fur of a cat. The former is a
>fundamental welfare violation and should be recognized
>as such. An animal welfare supporter would not respond
>to such killings with the breezy acceptance presented above.
a) animal welfare organizations are not opposed to the use of animals
as food. If you are, then you've crossed the line to being an animal
rights supporter.
b) Both of these posts were sarcastic responses to some of the
extreme animal rights positions mentioned in this newsgroup.
They were intended to be read with a sense of humor.
John & Linda VanSickle
Tim Behlmer saw my sig line:
> > "You said they'd be treated decently!"
> > "They were treated decently. They were decently fed
> > and decently shot."
>
> Didn't have to shoot, although I take much pleasure in acquiring my own
> food.
Actually, this bit of dialogue is from the film "The Outlaw Josey Wales."
A group of captured Confederate soldiers are offered parole if they will
swear their allegience to the Union. After their oath, Unions soldiers
come out of hiding and open up on them.
------------------------------------------------------
"I can face the peril."
"No you can't. It's too perilous."
John & Linda VanSickle
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> In article <32D18B...@compuserve.com>,
> Martin Martens <10513...@compuserve.com> wrote:
> >
> > bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> > [snip]
> > >
> > > supporters. Killing healthy non-debilitated animals is a
> > > profoundly different ethical action than taking a dog for
> > > a car ride or ruffling the fur of a cat. The former is a
> > > fundamental welfare violation and should be recognized
> > > as such. An animal welfare supporter would not respond
> > > to such killings with the breezy acceptance presented above.
> > >
This is interesting. My original post was simply to tug a bit on the
chains of the ARs around here. I've never pretended to be an animal
welfare supporter. My attitude towards animals is thus:
ME: What are you?
OTTER: I'm an otter. I swim on my back and do cute things with my hands.
ME: Cool! You're free to go. Next! What are you?
COW: I'm a cow.
ME: Get in the truck.
------------------------------------------------------
"You said they'd be treated decently!"
"They were treated decently. They were decently fed
and decently shot."
John and Linda VanSickle vans...@erols.com
John Mercer
<bl...@calspan.com> wrote:
Under your definition, bone marrow transplantation and the testing of
blood for HIV antibodies (and many other procedures) are "significant
welfare violations".
What is your proposed alternative (both personal and societal) to these
violations?
Why do those who claim to be animal "rights" advocates endorse these
practices?
> That pig who made a cameo appearance on the
> holiday dinner table no longer has a welfare at all. Same goes for
> those cows whose bodies were served up at the fast food places
> or ground into beef sticks.
>
> Unless the subjects' welfare states prior to death were irrevocably
> bad, then their welfare has been damaged. And this should be a
> concern to all who seriously claim to be supporters of animal welfare.
What do *you* seriously claim to be, Bob? Just how serious are you?
>
> I hope this expansion will turn out to be more coherent.
It depends on your personal behavior, Bob. Are you consistent?
>
> - Bob
> -------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
> http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
--
John Mercer
Scientist
McLaughlin Research Institute
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32D2AC...@unixg.ubc.ca>,
Martin Martens <mar...@unixg.ubc.ca> wrote:
>
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> [snip]
>
> > What Jessica and others are doing is this: they're overlooking
> > that a significant welfare violation occurs whenever a happy healthy
> > holiday dinner table no longer has a welfare at all. Same goes for
> > those cows whose bodies were served up at the fast food places
> > or ground into beef sticks.
> >
> > Unless the subjects' welfare states prior to death were irrevocably
> > bad, then their welfare has been damaged. And this should be a
> > concern to all who seriously claim to be supporters of animal welfare.
>
>
> Ok, you weren't confused, you are just using different terminology
> than is commonly used on this newsgroup. Take a look at the other
> response
> to your message. What you refer to as animal welfare is commonly
> referred
> to as animal rights in this newsgroup.
Actually, Martin, I think you were right the first time: I am confused.
I
posted
a statement saying that the killing of a happy healthy animal was a clear
violation of his WELFARE and that it seems like more supporters of animal
welfare should be concerned about this rather than treating it so
lightly.
In
response, I hear that I'm not talking about WELFARE (even though I
explicitly
said I was), but was instead referring to RIGHTS (which I haven't
mentioned
at all). So yes, it's safe to say that I'm confused by the response.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <1997010711...@mri2.mri.montana.edu>,
um...@gemini.oscs.montana.edu (John Mercer) wrote:
John, I'm a little mystified by your reaction. You didn't seem to
respond to my point, but went off and introduced a host of peripheral
topics. Did you want to address my point? Or was it just your
intention to start up a new conversation?
If the former, then here's what I'm saying. Most people claim to be
supporters of animal welfare. Yet most people tolerate a lot of
animal killing, often for relatively trivial reasons. They don't seem
to want to admit that this is a major area of welfare violation. I'm
puzzled by this. Why do you think this denial is so prevalent?
If the latter, I'll supply responses below...
[...]
> > What Jessica and others are doing is this: they're overlooking
> > that a significant welfare violation occurs whenever a happy healthy
> > animal is killed.
>
> Under your definition, bone marrow transplantation and the testing of
> blood for HIV antibodies (and many other procedures) are "significant
> welfare violations".
Depends how badly the animals are treated, doesn't it? And whether or
not
they're killed.
BTW I can understand the view that welfare violations could be justified
by benefits - though reasonable people could easily differ over whether
specific benfits actually do justify the violation. What I can't
understand
is the denial of the violations.
> What is your proposed alternative (both personal and societal) to these
> violations?
Eliminate violations as soon as possible. I don't claim to be the expert
in
how to do this and I'm willing to leave the techniques and timing to
others
more
qualified. But, if one does favor welfare for animals, then one has to
commit,
in principle at the least, to elimination of violations. This to me is
(or should
be)
the minimal requrirement before one could truthfully refer to oneself as
an
animal
welfare supporter.
> Why do those who claim to be animal "rights" advocates endorse these
> practices?
Don't understand. If you have a specific question about what I say or
do,
I'll
consider addressing it as long as you present it in a sincere and
respectful
manner.
If you have a question about what some nebulous group of unnamed
advocates
endorses, then you'll have to ask them.
Just out of curiosity, why do you place quotes around rights?
> > That pig who made a cameo appearance on the
> > holiday dinner table no longer has a welfare at all. Same goes for
> > those cows whose bodies were served up at the fast food places
> > or ground into beef sticks.
> >
> > Unless the subjects' welfare states prior to death were irrevocably
> > bad, then their welfare has been damaged. And this should be a
> > concern to all who seriously claim to be supporters of animal welfare.
>
> What do *you* seriously claim to be, Bob? Just how serious are you?
I claim to support animal welfare. And I conclude that killing a happy
healthy animal is a violation of that animal's welfare , and thus it's a
practice that is anti-welfare that should elicit opposition from animal
welfare supporters.
> > I hope this expansion will turn out to be more coherent.
>
> It depends on your personal behavior, Bob. Are you consistent?
Is anyone 100% consistent? I doubt it. There are just too many
situations
of clashing welfare and interests. But denying that a welfare violation
even
occurs, as the poster to whom I initially responded seem to do, isn't a
reaction
that impresses me much.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5au531$q...@library.airnews.net>,
<0012...@edtec.com> wrote:
[...]
> You're confusing two different senses of the expression, "animal
> welfare":
>
> (1) "animal welfare" refers to a doctrine that provides explicitly that
> animals may be exploited for food, experiments, etc., as long as we do
> so "humanely." Different versions of animal welfare in this first sense
> differ according to how they evaluate the meaning of "humane." But
> *all* versions of "animal welfare" in this first sense assume that it is
> morally acceptable to exploit animals subject to certain "limits"
> (whatever is regarded as "inhumane.)
>
> I think Ms. Snyder was using "animal welfare" in this first sense.
>
> (2) "animal welfare" can also refer to the "welfare of the animal" in
> the sense that we talk about the "welfare" of any being whose life is
> such that it can fare better or worse depending on how the being is
> treated. It is in my "welfare" that I have enough money to feed and
> clothe myself. In this sense, it clearly does not advanace the
> "welfare" of the pig to eat the pig. This is the sense in which you are
> using "welfare." And although that usage is perfectly acceptable, it is
> a different use from the one that I understood Ms. Snyder to be making.
Thanks 00128 for the lucid and coherent summary.
I would imagine that AW1 adherents would want to distance
themselves from their doctrine's name,since they're willing to,
not just tolerate but also, explicitly endorse major welfare
violations associated with killing. Also truth in labelling would
seem to call for such a distancing approach, since AW1 supports
these major welfare violations. In fact I guess I wouldn't expect AW1
adherents to even use the word "welfare" in describing their stance.
Some name like "humane treatment for the living seems more
accurate.
In any event, AW1 doesn't seem to make much sense. If one
cares about the welfare of animals, what would stop one from
following this to its logical conclusion and thus to AW2? If
maintaining an animal in a positive welfare state is a worthwhile
goal, why would elimination of that state altogether be acceptable?
...]
Jessica Snyder
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>I would imagine that AW1 adherents would want to distance
>themselves from their doctrine's name,since they're willing to,
>not just tolerate but also, explicitly endorse major welfare
>violations associated with killing.
Alternately, it can be seen this way:
a) all living things will die (fact)
b) domesticated animals have a higher quality of life than
non-domesticated animals, due to protection from disease,
ample feed & water, etc. (fact)
c) a life of less suffering is better for the welfare of an
animal than a life of more suffering. (opinion)
d) from the animal's perspective, a quick and painless death
is not suffering (they don't know about it, they're dead). (fact IMHO :)
e) so animals raised and killed for food, if cared for
properly, have a vastly better life and death than animals
not raised for food. (fact, IMHO)
f) raising animals for food is in fact in their welfare
Oh, and you can banty about the dictionary definition of welfare
all you want, but for decades the terms "animal welfare" and
"animal rights" have had specific meanings created by proponents
of each movement. These meanings don't necessarily have a 1:1
correspondence with dictionary definitions. To then argue that
animal welfare folks are violating the welfare of animals is
to ignore the publicly accepted meaning of the phrase.
Which is, of course, your option, but you shouldn't expect to
be taken too seriously if you ignore all established convention.
John Mercer
<bl...@calspan.com> wrote:
> In article <1997010711...@mri2.mri.montana.edu>,
> um...@gemini.oscs.montana.edu (John Mercer) wrote:
>
> John, I'm a little mystified by your reaction. You didn't seem to
> respond to my point, but went off and introduced a host of peripheral
> topics.
It was directly on topic, Bob. I was pointing out a "significant welfare
violation" that is overlooked by every ARA here to date.
> Did you want to address my point?
I did.
> Or was it just your
> intention to start up a new conversation?
>
> If the former, then here's what I'm saying. Most people claim to be
> supporters of animal welfare. Yet most people tolerate a lot of
> animal killing, often for relatively trivial reasons.
My point is that every ARA here has overlooked this one.
> They don't seem
> to want to admit that this is a major area of welfare violation. I'm
> puzzled by this. Why do you think this denial is so prevalent?
>
> If the latter, I'll supply responses below...
>
> [...]
>
> > > What Jessica and others are doing is this: they're overlooking
> > > that a significant welfare violation occurs whenever a happy healthy
> > > animal is killed.
> >
> > Under your definition, bone marrow transplantation and the testing of
> > blood for HIV antibodies (and many other procedures) are "significant
> > welfare violations".
>
> Depends how badly the animals are treated, doesn't it?
THey receive painful injections and are bled.
> And whether or
> not
> they're killed.
They are.
> BTW I can understand the view that welfare violations could be justified
> by benefits - though reasonable people could easily differ over whether
> specific benfits actually do justify the violation. What I can't
> understand
> is the denial of the violations.
No one is "denying" them, Bob. We don't accept your semantic rules.
>
> > What is your proposed alternative (both personal and societal) to these
> > violations?
>
> Eliminate violations as soon as possible. I don't claim to be the expert
> in
> how to do this and I'm willing to leave the techniques and timing to
> others
> more
> qualified. But, if one does favor welfare for animals, then one has to
> commit,
> in principle at the least, to elimination of violations. This to me is
> (or should
> be)
> the minimal requrirement before one could truthfully refer to oneself as
> an
> animal
> welfare supporter.
Do you think that scientists and physicians PREFER to use animals
whenever possible, Bob? If so, please supply evidence from unbiased
sources.
> > Why do those who claim to be animal "rights" advocates endorse these
> > practices?
>
> Don't understand. If you have a specific question about what I say or
> do,
> I'll
> consider addressing it as long as you present it in a sincere and
> respectful
> manner.
> If you have a question about what some nebulous group of unnamed
> advocates
> endorses, then you'll have to ask them.
I have. I am simply, respectfully, asking if you are different.
>
> Just out of curiosity, why do you place quotes around rights?
>
Because I have yet to encounter anyone who practices what he/she
preaches regarding rights.
>
> > > That pig who made a cameo appearance on the
> > > holiday dinner table no longer has a welfare at all. Same goes for
> > > those cows whose bodies were served up at the fast food places
> > > or ground into beef sticks.
> > >
> > > Unless the subjects' welfare states prior to death were irrevocably
> > > bad, then their welfare has been damaged. And this should be a
> > > concern to all who seriously claim to be supporters of animal welfare.
> >
> > What do *you* seriously claim to be, Bob? Just how serious are you?
>
> I claim to support animal welfare. And I conclude that killing a happy
> healthy animal is a violation of that animal's welfare , and thus it's a
> practice that is anti-welfare that should elicit opposition from animal
> welfare supporters.
HIV testing and bone marrow transplantation don't elicit a smidgen of
opposition. Why is that?
Have any ARAs picketed blood banks and cancer clinics as they have fur
stores and research labs?
> > > I hope this expansion will turn out to be more coherent.
> >
> > It depends on your personal behavior, Bob. Are you consistent?
>
> Is anyone 100% consistent? I doubt it.
That's no excuse to avoid consistency in a given situation, Bob.
> There are just too many
> situations
> of clashing welfare and interests. But denying that a welfare violation
> even
> occurs, as the poster to whom I initially responded seem to do, isn't a
> reaction
> that impresses me much.
I agree with your premise, but not your terminology.
That is why I ask those who oppose animal experimentation the question
about HIV testing.
Their denials and evasions are not impressive.
>
> - Bob
> -------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
> http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
George Boggs
In article <8528306...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>[...]
>
> If the former, then here's what I'm saying. Most people claim to be
> supporters of animal welfare. Yet most people tolerate a lot of
> animal killing, often for relatively trivial reasons. They don't seem
> to want to admit that this is a major area of welfare violation. I'm
> puzzled by this. Why do you think this denial is so prevalent?
>
> [...]
I'm not answering for John, who is more erudite than I, but wish to
comment directly on your query. I am emotonally, financially, and
personally involved in animal welfare. Since one person can't do
everything, I focus on dogs - specifically German shorthair pointers - and
elk. However, I have no qualms about shooting a flushing pheasant out of
the air or hunting elk during legally sanctioned seasons. I do this
basically because I both like the meat and because I enjoy the activity of
hunting. I suppose you find this trivial, but, after all, there's no
accounting for taste, now is there?
Now, Sir, exactly what is it you assert I am denying?
--
G. Boggs God: "Sum id quod sum."
Descartes: "Cogito ergo sum."
Popeye: "Sum id quod sum et id totum
est quod sum."
jozar
Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
>>I would imagine that AW1 adherents would want to distance
>>themselves from their doctrine's name,since they're willing to,
>>not just tolerate but also, explicitly endorse major welfare
>>violations associated with killing.
>
>Alternately, it can be seen this way:
>
>a) all living things will die (fact)
>b) domesticated animals have a higher quality of life than
>non-domesticated animals, due to protection from disease,
>ample feed & water, etc. (fact)
>c) a life of less suffering is better for the welfare of an
>animal than a life of more suffering. (opinion)
>d) from the animal's perspective, a quick and painless death
>is not suffering (they don't know about it, they're dead). (fact IMHO :)
>e) so animals raised and killed for food, if cared for
>properly, have a vastly better life and death than animals
>not raised for food. (fact, IMHO)
A cow standing for weeks in their own dung while becoming the fatted calf so it could be yummy in your tummy is a vastly better life? There
is no such thing as proper care in the beef industry. Unless you
have your own free-roaming ranch where the cattle are somewhat
free and you slaughter it yourself, humanely, of course...the beef
on the grocer's shelf comes from the industry.
Chickens CRAMMED into a cage the size of an old vinyl LP record
12"x12"... going insane that they peck each others' eyes out so they
will need more antibiotics which therefore get into the human bloodstream.... have a vastly better life?
(same as above for free-roaming chickens that you may pluck.)
jozar
.
Rosemary Waigh
Jessica Snyder (jrsn...@students.wisc.edu) writes:
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>>I would imagine that AW1 adherents would want to distance
>>themselves from their doctrine's name,since they're willing to,
>>not just tolerate but also, explicitly endorse major welfare
>>violations associated with killing.
> Alternately, it can be seen this way:
> a) all living things will die (fact)
Okay.
> b) domesticated animals have a higher quality of life than
> non-domesticated animals, due to protection from disease,
> ample feed & water, etc. (fact)
I would say this is opinion rather than fact. On the one hand, they
are protected from disease, and provided with food and water. OTOH,
there are factors of confinement, mutilations (debeaking, tail docking,
etc), crowding, disruption of familial bonds, etc. which may come into
play. I don't think that it is always true that domesticated animals
have a higher quality than non-domesticated animals -- it depends on
the circumstances.
> c) a life of less suffering is better for the welfare of an
> animal than a life of more suffering. (opinion)
Okay.
> d) from the animal's perspective, a quick and painless death
> is not suffering (they don't know about it, they're dead). (fact IMHO :)
Maybe. But still the animal's welfare is toast. (And of course the
rights violation, which may be somewhat off topic but is still important.)
Also, although this may apply to some hunted animals (assuming that they
have not gone through the fear of being pursued by hunters), it applies
to very few slaughtered animals who have to go through the stress of
being transported to slaughter in crowded, unheated/unairconditioned
vehicles, etc etc.
> e) so animals raised and killed for food, if cared for
^^^^^^^^^^^^
> properly, have a vastly better life and death than animals
^^^^^^^^
> not raised for food. (fact, IMHO)
Big if.
> f) raising animals for food is in fact in their welfare
Even if this were true (raising them under ideal conditions), *killing*
them is not!
> Oh, and you can banty about the dictionary definition of welfare
> all you want, but for decades the terms "animal welfare" and
> "animal rights" have had specific meanings created by proponents
> of each movement. These meanings don't necessarily have a 1:1
> correspondence with dictionary definitions. To then argue that
> animal welfare folks are violating the welfare of animals is
> to ignore the publicly accepted meaning of the phrase.
> Which is, of course, your option, but you shouldn't expect to
> be taken too seriously if you ignore all established convention.
On the contrary, animal welfare is used to mean all sorts of different
things. Many animal welfare organizations are opposed to killing
animals for fur, for example, yet OTOH fur advocates also sometimes
claim to be in favour of animal welfare.
My beloved's article, "Rights and Welfare," in the forthcoming
_Encyclopedia_of_Animal_Rights_and_Animal_Welfare_ (ed. Marc Bekoff,
Greenwood Press), discusses several different kinds of animal
welfarism.
Peace,
Ro
--
Rosemary Anne Waigh |
| Visit my webpage at...
Toronto, Canada | http://www.ncf.carleton.ca/~bp239
bp...@freenet.carleton.ca |
Kris Carroll
On 01/09/97, jozar wrote:
> A cow standing for weeks in their own dung while becoming the fatted calf
These are animal welfare issues. What are you working on to solve these
problem?
Kris C.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5aufhg$1a...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
[...]
> I assume the same. But I'm not opposed to their welfare. I want
> them kept as healthy and happy as possible up until the time they
> are killed. To use the words "animal welfare" in any other context
> is to rewrite the definition of the phrase. Which is your option,
> but don't expect the rest of the world to jump in line with you.
Where is the phrase officially defined? And why does it include
by definition support for practices that are decidedly antithetical to
welfare? And maybe more importantly than its alleged definition,
why do people support the underlying position that's being
claimed for it?
[...]
> You are obviously re-defining the phrase animal welfare to suit your
> needs. Unfortunately, animal welfare groups have already laid down
> a solid definition of the term. If you assume killing a healthy animal
> violates animal welfare, then you are an animal rights person.
> Your option.
I choose the option of supporting the welfare of individual animals. And
I recognize that killing happy healthy animals is in opposition to that.
How
does that translate into animal rights, a notion not even mentioned?
> >> >Dogs: Own two. I'm still exploiting them for my own amusement.
> >>
> >> Own one. Exploited for entertainment daily.
> >
> >I see no obvious welfare violation here.
>
> What about exploitation? Are they not being kept as slaves?
Are their welfare and interests being safeguarded? If so, then
I see no welfare violation. You would know better than I would,
since it's your dog. I don't understand the gratuitous reference
to "slave" when the topic at hand is killing and its effect on welfare.
> >Not evil necessarily, but certainly not true animal welfare
> >supporters. Killing healthy non-debilitated animals is a
> >profoundly different ethical action than taking a dog for
> >a car ride or ruffling the fur of a cat. The former is a
> >fundamental welfare violation and should be recognized
> >as such. An animal welfare supporter would not respond
> >to such killings with the breezy acceptance presented above.
>
> a) animal welfare organizations are not opposed to the use of animals
> as food. If you are, then you've crossed the line to being an animal
> rights supporter.
How does pointing out the welfare infringement inherent in killing cross
such a line? The growing impression is that people are so eager to
label this idea (killing is a welfare violation) so they can then dismiss
it based on its label. Hope I'm wrong about that. It seems clear to me
that many killings tolerated by self-proclaimed animal welfare supporters
are in fact egregious violations of welfare.
> b) Both of these posts were sarcastic responses to some of the
> extreme animal rights positions mentioned in this newsgroup.
> They were intended to be read with a sense of humor.
Sure, that was clear. What's not clear is why welfare supporters
are so anxious to overlook the profoundly anti-welfare nature of
killing.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32D30B...@erols.com>,
John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
[...]
> This is interesting. My original post was simply to tug a bit on the
> chains of the ARs around here. ...
What an original idea!
> ...I've never pretended to be an animal
> welfare supporter. ...
So you would support the elimination of all anti-animal cruelty
laws?
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5b3ups$l...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> >I would imagine that AW1 adherents would want to distance
> >themselves from their doctrine's name,since they're willing to,
> >not just tolerate but also, explicitly endorse major welfare
> >violations associated with killing.
>
> Alternately, it can be seen this way:
>
> a) all living things will die (fact)
> b) domesticated animals have a higher quality of life than
> non-domesticated animals, due to protection from disease,
> ample feed & water, etc. (fact)
> c) a life of less suffering is better for the welfare of an
> animal than a life of more suffering. (opinion)
> d) from the animal's perspective, a quick and painless death
> is not suffering (they don't know about it, they're dead). (fact IMHO :)
> e) so animals raised and killed for food, if cared for
> properly, have a vastly better life and death than animals
> not raised for food. (fact, IMHO)
> f) raising animals for food is in fact in their welfare
I could quibble a little about a couple of these, but
generally I agree EXCEPT you've ignored the fact
that it's emphatically NOT in the victim's welfare to be
killed if she's happy and healthy at the time of killing.
The act of killing is an act against welfare, if the victim
is happy and healthy.
Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
until they die or until welfare considerations would
provide grounds for euthanasia. Otherwise, you're
violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
the victim?
> Oh, and you can banty about the dictionary definition of welfare
> all you want, but for decades the terms "animal welfare" and
> "animal rights" have had specific meanings created by proponents
> of each movement. These meanings don't necessarily have a 1:1
> correspondence with dictionary definitions. To then argue that
> animal welfare folks are violating the welfare of animals is
> to ignore the publicly accepted meaning of the phrase.
> Which is, of course, your option, but you shouldn't expect to
> be taken too seriously if you ignore all established convention.
Animal welfare folks are violating the welfare of animals when
they approve of the killing of happy healthy animals. This I
regard as a fact. You seem to be saying that they're not
violating "animal welfare" (under some definition that you
accept - why?) but please don't say that WELFARE is not
violated.
Why does an individual support "animal welfare?"
Presumably it's because she cares about the welfare of
animals. What's the effect of killing on the welfare of a
happy healthy animal? It's bad. It;s very bad. Then why
would the welfarist not care about the welfare infringement
that occurs here? It can't be just because some arbitrary
doctrine says so, can it?
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5b4fdm$9...@freenet-news.carleton.ca>,
bp...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Rosemary Waigh) wrote:
[...]
> > f) raising animals for food is in fact in their welfare
>
> Even if this were true (raising them under ideal conditions), *killing*
> them is not!
Thanks, Rosemary, for making this point. It's gratifying to
see that at least one person understood my point.
[...]
> My beloved's article, "Rights and Welfare," in the forthcoming
> _Encyclopedia_of_Animal_Rights_and_Animal_Welfare_ (ed. Marc Bekoff,
> Greenwood Press), discusses several different kinds of animal
> welfarism.
Sounds like it's definitely worth reading.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5b4dof$2...@dfw-ixnews10.ix.netcom.com>,
bis...@ix.netcom.com(Richard Bishop) wrote:
[...]
> It seems to be more than obvious that you really have very little
> experience with any phase of animal welfare. One thing you are
> ignoring, everything dies eventually. You'll die, I'll die, EVERYTHING
> dies. Whether that pig/cow/chicken dies to feed me or to feed you or
> dies from old age is immaterial. The main interest of animal welfare
> is to see that the animal is not abused or starved or neglected while
> it is alive. And also, when it does die to feed us, it is given death
> as swift and painless as possible.
Re: "everything dies eventually" ... so what? How does that justify
inflicting an earlier death on an animal who's happy and healthy?
If the main interest of animal welfare is to prevent abuse and
neglect, then, stating it in positive terms, it's to insure that animals
have some positive experiences. Depriving an animal of these
positive experiences is a violation of his welfare - whether it's
done by abuse and neglect or by killing.
> I am heavily involved in animal welfare. I belong to both a local and
> a state welfare organization. I help gather evidence in cases of
> abuse, go out and counsel people who are too ignorant to properly care
> for their animals and find homes for animals that have to be removed
> from an abusive place.
I'm very impressed and I'm happy there are people like you who
do this.
> Yes, I eat meat. I see no contradiction in this. Good farmers take
> excellent care of their animals because it is beneficial to both the
> animal and to them. I get most of my meat from a family farm where my
> father raises beef cattle. In fact, I just got a freezer full of
> venison and had venison barbeque for supper. It was excellent.
But unless the subjects' welfare was sufficiently bad as to justify a
conclusion that killing was preferable to continued life, then you
have ended, and thus violated, their welfare.
> Humane people make sure that animals are cared for humanely during
> their life. ...
And that they don't suffer a "premature" death unless there's
evidence that it's preferable to continued life.
> ... Animal rights people want all human/animal interaction to
> cease, they don't want hamsters in classrooms, dogs and cats in our
> houses, horses in our fields. It seems more and more obvious to me
> that they really don't like animals, otherwise why would they show such
> fear of them? You avoid something you fear. If you care for
> something, you don't want it to be extinct!
Sorry to have to say this, but I frankly don't think you know what
you're talking about here. Possibly your words could be applied
to some, but the generalizations are unfair IMO. They certainly
aren't supported by my own observations.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <gboggs-0901...@192.0.2.1>,
To the best of my knowledge I haven't asserted anything
about you and I have no idea who are (sorry!).
I will say from your statement above that in the act of killing
pheasants and elk, you're likely acting in a manner that's
diametrically opposed to their welfare. If you wish to deny
this, you're free to do so of course, but I'd be interested in
supporting arguments rather than simple denial, should you
choose to provide some.
PA Thomas
jozar wrote:
>
>
> A cow standing for weeks in their own dung while becoming the fatted calf so it could be yummy in your tummy is a vastly better life?
Hmmm....I didn't know you could turn a cow into a fatted calf. If you've
got a way to do this, you will be rich beyond your wildest dreams.
> There
> is no such thing as proper care in the beef industry.
Hmmm...that's not what the industry regulators have to say--they give us
very strict rules for "proper care".
> Unless you
> have your own free-roaming ranch where the cattle are somewhat
> free and you slaughter it yourself, humanely, of course...the beef
> on the grocer's shelf comes from the industry.
Small operators with a "free-roaming ranch" (though I've never seen a
ranch roam--though I guess maybe now land has rights too) are just as
much a part of the beef industry as the cow-calf man, the stocker, the
feeder, the hauler, or the packer.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <19970109120...@mri2.mri.montana.edu>,
um...@gemini.oscs.montana.edu (John Mercer) wrote:
>
> <bl...@calspan.com> wrote:
>
> > In article <1997010711...@mri2.mri.montana.edu>,
> > um...@gemini.oscs.montana.edu (John Mercer) wrote:
> >
> > John, I'm a little mystified by your reaction. You didn't seem to
> > respond to my point, but went off and introduced a host of peripheral
> > topics.
>
> It was directly on topic, Bob. I was pointing out a "significant welfare
> violation" that is overlooked by every ARA here to date.
Thanks for your input, John. Once it's been pointed out, has anyone
said: "No, that's not a 'welfare' violation; it's just a welfare
violation"
like the responses I've been getting? Do you have an example of
such a denial?
> > Did you want to address my point?
>
> I did.
And your answer is: "Yes you're correct; an egregious and
very common welfare violation is being overlooked by many
animal welfare supporters?"
[...]
> > > Under your definition, bone marrow transplantation and the testing of
> > > blood for HIV antibodies (and many other procedures) are "significant
> > > welfare violations".
> >
> > Depends how badly the animals are treated, doesn't it?
>
> THey receive painful injections and are bled.
Welfare violation. Agreed?
> > And whether or
> > not
> > they're killed.
>
> They are.
Welfare violation. Agreed?
> > BTW I can understand the view that welfare violations could be justified
> > by benefits - though reasonable people could easily differ over whether
> > specific benfits actually do justify the violation. What I can't
> > understand
> > is the denial of the violations.
>
> No one is "denying" them, Bob. We don't accept your semantic rules.
So you prefer to have "animal welfare" stand for something that includes
the antithesis of welfare? Sounds not too reasonable to me! Why are
your "semantic rules" better than mine?
[...]
> Do you think that scientists and physicians PREFER to use animals
> whenever possible, Bob? If so, please supply evidence from unbiased
> sources.
I don't know, John, but I do commonly observe that there's an
understandable human tendency to stick with the familiar
approaches. This applies to everyone, including me in
my work (computers and engineering). It's not surprising.
Can't say for certain how often this phenomenon is at work,
but I suspect quite often.
[...]
> I have. I am simply, respectfully, asking if you are different.
> >
> > Just out of curiosity, why do you place quotes around rights?
> >
> Because I have yet to encounter anyone who practices what he/she
> preaches regarding rights.
This doesn't sound logical. It's based on a form of ad hominem
fallacy: casting aspersions on ideas based on perceived
characteristics of the holders of those ideas. I suppose if an
unrepentant murderer gave the best argument against murder,
you'd reject the argument because the preacher of it failed to
practice what he preached?
I think there are viable reasons for using the quotes, but I fail to see
how your reason makes any sense. It seems based on a logical
fallacy.
[...]
> HIV testing and bone marrow transplantation don't elicit a smidgen of
> opposition. Why is that?
Probably it's deemed a lower priority. Of course, all supporters of
welfare for animals want it to end, right? Even if they aren't sure of
how to go about achieving this goal.
> Have any ARAs picketed blood banks and cancer clinics as they have fur
> stores and research labs?
Beats me. Fur stores get a lot of attention undoubtedly because the
welfare infringement is obvious and the benefit small and thus hard
to justify as having adequate counterbalancing weight.
> > > > I hope this expansion will turn out to be more coherent.
> > >
> > > It depends on your personal behavior, Bob. Are you consistent?
> >
> > Is anyone 100% consistent? I doubt it.
>
> That's no excuse to avoid consistency in a given situation, Bob.
No it's just an acknowledgement that no one is perfect.
Also you can oppose something while still tolerating its ongoing
continuation. I oppose air pollution, but I still drive a car. I don't
expect immediate solutions, but I would expect acknowledgement
of a problem that in principle must be opposed.
> > There are just too many
> > situations
> > of clashing welfare and interests. But denying that a welfare violation
> > even
> > occurs, as the poster to whom I initially responded seem to do, isn't a
> > reaction
> > that impresses me much.
>
> I agree with your premise, but not your terminology.
What troubles you about my terminology?
> That is why I ask those who oppose animal experimentation the question
> about HIV testing.
>
> Their denials and evasions are not impressive.
Perhaps, but I've noticed that what's perceived as evasive is
often nothing more than a response disliked by the perceiver,
rather than a true evasion. May not be true necessarily in
this case, but it's amazing how often it is. Also hostility built
up among participants can lead to declining interest in dialog.
John & Linda VanSickle
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> In article <5b4dof$2...@dfw-ixnews10.ix.netcom.com>,
> bis...@ix.netcom.com(Richard Bishop) wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > It seems to be more than obvious that you really have very little
> > experience with any phase of animal welfare. One thing you are
> > ignoring, everything dies eventually. You'll die, I'll die, EVERYTHING
> > dies. Whether that pig/cow/chicken dies to feed me or to feed you or
> > dies from old age is immaterial. The main interest of animal welfare
> > is to see that the animal is not abused or starved or neglected while
> > it is alive. And also, when it does die to feed us, it is given death
> > as swift and painless as possible.
>
> Re: "everything dies eventually" ... so what? How does that justify
> inflicting an earlier death on an animal who's happy and healthy?
Please present the proof that killing livestock requires justification.
> If the main interest of animal welfare is to prevent abuse and
> neglect, then, stating it in positive terms, it's to insure that animals
> have some positive experiences. Depriving an animal of these
> positive experiences is a violation of his welfare - whether it's
> done by abuse and neglect or by killing.
I'm sorry, but cattle and chickens are just too dim to enjoy a positive
experience.
> > Yes, I eat meat. I see no contradiction in this. Good farmers take
> > excellent care of their animals because it is beneficial to both the
> > animal and to them. I get most of my meat from a family farm where my
> > father raises beef cattle. In fact, I just got a freezer full of
> > venison and had venison barbeque for supper. It was excellent.
>
> But unless the subjects' welfare was sufficiently bad as to justify a
> conclusion that killing was preferable to continued life, then you
> have ended, and thus violated, their welfare.
Their welfare exists for a purpose. My welfare. If I could detect
happiness in the cows I fed at grandad's place, I might be tempted to
spare their lives. I've seen happiness in dogs, cats, humans, and horses,
but not in a cow or any bird. They're just too stupid.
Regards,
John
John & Linda VanSickle
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> I could quibble a little about a couple of these, but
> generally I agree EXCEPT you've ignored the fact
> that it's emphatically NOT in the victim's welfare to be
> killed if she's happy and healthy at the time of killing.
> The act of killing is an act against welfare, if the victim
> is happy and healthy.
You are forgetting that domestic livestock owes its very
existence to human nurturing. Were it not for our doings,
none of these animals would ever have been born. That we
choose to take back that which we have given cannot be
a crime. I support treating animals well, and I support
killing them in the least stressful method, because that
makes for better quality meat.
> Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
> until they die or until welfare considerations would
> provide grounds for euthanasia.
Except that waiting for the animal to get sick runs counter
to the reason I'm raising them, ie, getting good quality
meat.
> Otherwise, you're
> violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
> one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
> the victim?
Like I said: Unstressed livestock yield better meat.
> Why does an individual support "animal welfare?"
> Presumably it's because she cares about the welfare of
> animals. What's the effect of killing on the welfare of a
> happy healthy animal?
The emotional state known as "happy" does not exist within
the skulls of the animals we regularily use as food. They
are, quite simply, too stupid to be happy.
John & Linda VanSickle
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> In article <32D30B...@erols.com>,
> John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > This is interesting. My original post was simply to tug a bit on the
> > chains of the ARs around here. ...
>
> What an original idea!
>
> > ...I've never pretended to be an animal
> > welfare supporter. ...
>
> So you would support the elimination of all anti-animal cruelty
> laws?
I would suspend their enforcement in all communities with a measurable
murder rate, because the police should be concerned with that. Yeah,
I do think humans come first.
John Mercer
<bl...@calspan.com> wrote:
> In article <5b4fdm$9...@freenet-news.carleton.ca>,
> bp...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Rosemary Waigh) wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > > f) raising animals for food is in fact in their welfare
> >
> > Even if this were true (raising them under ideal conditions), *killing*
> > them is not!
>
> Thanks, Rosemary, for making this point. It's gratifying to
> see that at least one person understood my point.
But longevity is not at all natural.
If we take a more "natural" (i.e., nature's) definition of welfare, it
has much less to do with living than with reproductive success.
---snip---
Dale Anderson
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
>until they die or until welfare considerations would
>provide grounds for euthanasia.
I honestly know of no one who eats an animal while it's alive in this
neck of the woods. After all, when the animal in question is
slaughtered, it is *quite* dead.
When you have them by the balls,
their hearts and minds will follow.
Dale Anderson (Not tenured, either)
dand...@waun.tdsnet.com
(Not to be attributed to TDSNET)
FIDO 1:238/202
ANIMAL_RIGHTS Moderator
DAIRY_FARM Moderator
Jessica Snyder
jozar <beed...@summon.syr.edu> wrote:
> A cow standing for weeks in their own dung while becoming the fatted calf so it could be yummy in your tummy is a vastly better life?
Few if any calves are raised in this situation. Drive by a feedlot...
see any calves in there? Odds are, you won't. Calves roam around
in the field with their mothers... it's much cheaper that way.
Beef cattle spend *maybe* a few months in a feedlot. And, before
you scream "abuse", you'll have to give some indication that cattle
care at all about standing in their own shit. I've seen too many
cows with a full field of green grass lying in piles of shit to
believe that they care about it.
> There
>is no such thing as proper care in the beef industry.
Nice blanket statement. Care to tell us what proper care is?
Unless you
>have your own free-roaming ranch where the cattle are somewhat
>free and you slaughter it yourself, humanely, of course...the beef
>on the grocer's shelf comes from the industry.
"The industry". Where do you think "the industry" gets it's beef?
Maybe from the millions of free-ranging beef cattle in the western
US states?
> Chickens CRAMMED into a cage the size of an old vinyl LP record
>12"x12"... going insane that they peck each others' eyes out so they
>will need more antibiotics which therefore get into the human bloodstream.... have a vastly better life?
Hard for me to say, I don't know much about chickens or their needs.
Although I've seen very few if any caged chickens that peck each
other's eyes out (fully possible even if debeaked). But I'm far
from a chicken expert... and I'm willing to believe that they
are being raised in abusive conditions. And I'm willing to push
for legislation that outlaws those conditions, and forces farmers
to keep them in larger cages and less crowded conditions. But
the use/eating of them per se isn't the problem... the abusive
practices are. It is possible to keep chickens humanely (I know,
we did)
>(same as above for free-roaming chickens that you may pluck.)
What about chickens kept in a large pen where they can scratch
and peck all day long at grass and bugs, whose eggs are collected
daily for human consumption? (That's how we kept our chickens.
I am fully aware that industry chickens aren't kept that way)
Jessica Snyder
bp...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Rosemary Waigh) wrote:
>
>Jessica Snyder (jrsn...@students.wisc.edu) writes:
>> b) domesticated animals have a higher quality of life than
>> non-domesticated animals, due to protection from disease,
>> ample feed & water, etc. (fact)
>
>I would say this is opinion rather than fact. On the one hand, they
>are protected from disease, and provided with food and water. OTOH,
>there are factors of confinement, mutilations (debeaking, tail docking,
>etc), crowding, disruption of familial bonds, etc. which may come into
>play. I don't think that it is always true that domesticated animals
>have a higher quality than non-domesticated animals -- it depends on
>the circumstances.
Obviously abused domestic animals are suffering. But domestication
does not equal abuse... and I'm vehemently opposed to abusive
practices. (that's the whole point of animal welfare).
However, you need to ask yourself this: FROM THE ANIMAL'S PERSPECTIVE,
what things are abusive? Debeaking is painless (although the
conditions most chickens are kept in that require it are, I agree,
abusive). Tail docking I find abusive. Crowding, depends on the
animal (chickens and cattle are naturally close-grouping critters)
and the degree. Disruption of familial bonds? Few if any animals
have much of these. And in beef cattle it just doesn't happen.
But how about I rephrase: Domesticated animals generally have
a better quality of life than wild animals. (This allows room
for the abusive practices to be excluded. But not all domestication
is abusive, wouldn't you agree?)
>> d) from the animal's perspective, a quick and painless death
>> is not suffering (they don't know about it, they're dead). (fact IMHO :)
>
>Maybe. But still the animal's welfare is toast.
From the ANIMAL'S perspective, Ro. What other perspective is
relevant??? From the *animal's* point of view, they aren't suffering
and their welfare is not disrupted. IMHO, it is the animal's perspective
that is of prime importance in any decision about what is/isn't
cruel/abusive/acceptable. All other factors are human bullshit.
Of course, debating abut what the animal percieves can, and does,
keep people busy for decades. That's why animal experience is so
relevant in this area of argument.
(And of course the
>rights violation, which may be somewhat off topic but is still important.)
Not to the animal. Hence, not to me :)
>Also, although this may apply to some hunted animals (assuming that they
>have not gone through the fear of being pursued by hunters), it applies
>to very few slaughtered animals who have to go through the stress of
>being transported to slaughter in crowded, unheated/unairconditioned
>vehicles, etc etc.
You assume all transportation is stressful. I've transported animals
hundreds of times, and rarely are they stressed by it. If they are,
it's only minimally, and for the first time. And of course the
vehicles are unheated... animals generate TONS of heat. And in
order to aircondition a transportation vehicle, you'd have to close
off outside air circulation... which invites all sorts of nasty
diseases and problems in the transported stock. Fresh air is
always the best air, when animals are involved. Yet another reason not
to heat the vehicles, too.
*some* transportation practices are indeed abusive. Those I am
all in favor of having changed. But transportation per se
is not abusive nor inherently stressful for the animals.
>
>> e) so animals raised and killed for food, if cared for
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> properly, have a vastly better life and death than animals
> ^^^^^^^^
>> not raised for food. (fact, IMHO)
>
>Big if.
Agreed. That's what animal welfare laws are ALL ABOUT. Ensuring
that the "if" happens more often than not.
>> f) raising animals for food is in fact in their welfare
>
>Even if this were true (raising them under ideal conditions), *killing*
>them is not!
Remember, from the *animal's* perspective they lose nothing.
>On the contrary, animal welfare is used to mean all sorts of different
>things. Many animal welfare organizations are opposed to killing
>animals for fur, for example, yet OTOH fur advocates also sometimes
>claim to be in favour of animal welfare.
Fur is a tricky issue. But in general, animal welfare groups are
always willing to allow animals to be used by humans, *if used
humanely*. To argue otherwise is to ignore the traditional meanings
of the term.
Jessica Snyder
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>I could quibble a little about a couple of these, but
>generally I agree EXCEPT you've ignored the fact
>that it's emphatically NOT in the victim's welfare to be
>killed if she's happy and healthy at the time of killing.
>The act of killing is an act against welfare, if the victim
>is happy and healthy.
In dealing with animals, as I stated in another post, my ONLY
criteria is the ANIMAL'S perspective and subjective experience.
If it doesn't subjectively harm the animal, then it isn't
against the animal's welfare.
>Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
>until they die or until welfare considerations would
>provide grounds for euthanasia. Otherwise, you're
>violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
>one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
>the victim?
Because we define welfare differently. In my opinion, if
the animal is not suffering in any subjective (from the
animal's point of view) manner, then it's welfare is
taken care of.
>Animal welfare folks are violating the welfare of animals when
>they approve of the killing of happy healthy animals. This I
>regard as a fact. You seem to be saying that they're not
>violating "animal welfare" (under some definition that you
>accept - why?) but please don't say that WELFARE is not
>violated.
No, I'm saying the phrase "animal welfare" has commonly accepted
meanings that you are intentionally ignoring. You insist
that your definition of welfare is the only one. That's
your option, but I refuse to engage in a semantic debate with
you.
Jessica Snyder
John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
>The emotional state known as "happy" does not exist within
>the skulls of the animals we regularily use as food. They
>are, quite simply, too stupid to be happy.
Alternately, they are too stupid to be anything BUT happy.
Emotional states are pretty basic. Most of our food animals
have the brain capacity to experience most of our basic
emotions.
Jessica Snyder
dand...@waun.tdsnet.com (Dale Anderson) wrote:
> I had situations where I had literally close off areas, to keep the
>coes from laying where they shouldn't. One of the more interesting
>examples were the younger calves in the summer. They had the choice of
>lying under some trees in the shade, or in a small building where the
>amonia smell just *reeked*. Where do you suppose they wanted to go?
I was amazed when I drove by and saw a cow, who had an entire FIELD
of open green grass available to her, giving birth to her calf
in the muddy, shitty, churned up dirt of the lane to the barn.
I stopped and watched the calf try to stand for a while... very
cute, but covered immediately in shit.
>>Hard for me to say, I don't know much about chickens or their needs.
>
> Ine of our regulars in Animal Rights conducted an experiment. He
>bought a chicken, and placed it in a 12 X 12 area. Said the bird was
>content as could be. Could turn, preen, etc. A chicken really doesn't
>need a lot of room, according to his results. It's doubtul they show
>the kind of fear of close quarters that humans do. Maybe George can
>give us som insight? ;-)
:) I believe that a chicken can live happily in a 12x12 cage.
And they do prefer crowding to being alone, I remember that from
when we had ours... 30 feet of pen space, and all 15 would be crammed
into a 6 foot square area. But still, I think the conditions are
a little severe. Although given how incredibly stupid chickens
are, I've no idea if they care :)
Dale Anderson
Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>Beef cattle spend *maybe* a few months in a feedlot. And, before
>you scream "abuse", you'll have to give some indication that cattle
>care at all about standing in their own shit. I've seen too many
>cows with a full field of green grass lying in piles of shit to
>believe that they care about it.
Fascinating, isn't it? ;-)
I had situations where I had literally close off areas, to keep the
coes from laying where they shouldn't. One of the more interesting
examples were the younger calves in the summer. They had the choice of
lying under some trees in the shade, or in a small building where the
amonia smell just *reeked*. Where do you suppose they wanted to go?
> Unless you
>>have your own free-roaming ranch where the cattle are somewhat
>>free and you slaughter it yourself, humanely, of course...the beef
>>on the grocer's shelf comes from the industry.
>
>"The industry". Where do you think "the industry" gets it's beef?
>Maybe from the millions of free-ranging beef cattle in the western
>US states?
"The industry" becomes yet another undefinable "buzzword" for the
folks of AR. Along with "factory farm," and "agribusiness," to name
two. I'm sure there are more.
>
>> Chickens CRAMMED into a cage the size of an old vinyl LP record
>>12"x12"... going insane that they peck each others' eyes out so they
>>will need more antibiotics which therefore get into the human bloodstream.... have a vastly better life?
>
>Hard for me to say, I don't know much about chickens or their needs.
Ine of our regulars in Animal Rights conducted an experiment. He
bought a chicken, and placed it in a 12 X 12 area. Said the bird was
content as could be. Could turn, preen, etc. A chicken really doesn't
need a lot of room, according to his results. It's doubtul they show
the kind of fear of close quarters that humans do. Maybe George can
give us som insight? ;-)
When you have them by the balls,
Dale Anderson
Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>dand...@waun.tdsnet.com (Dale Anderson) wrote:
>
>> I had situations where I had literally close off areas, to keep the
>>coes from laying where they shouldn't. One of the more interesting
>>examples were the younger calves in the summer. They had the choice of
>>lying under some trees in the shade, or in a small building where the
>>amonia smell just *reeked*. Where do you suppose they wanted to go?
>
>I was amazed when I drove by and saw a cow, who had an entire FIELD
>of open green grass available to her, giving birth to her calf
>in the muddy, shitty, churned up dirt of the lane to the barn.
>I stopped and watched the calf try to stand for a while... very
>cute, but covered immediately in shit.
Yep. Seen it a lot. One thing that impressed me of the "caring" of
cattle was when we helped one with a tough delivery in a field. The
cow ran for the barn as soon as the calf hit the ground, and didn't
even look back.
John & Linda VanSickle
>
> I gotta say you have poor taste... even when I did eat meat, I
> wouldn't have been caught dead at Old Country Buffet. Such cheesy,
> tacky cafeteria style food... yuk! If it reminds you of home cookin'
> your mom's a terrible cook. :P
If the buffet had nothing I liked, I wouldn't go. The baked fish is
good. Their hot wings suck, though (too much vinegar). The wife
drags me there every once in a while. As long as there are a few
things on the buffet I like, I concentrate on those and don't gripe
about the variety.
Regards,
John
--
"On second though, let's not go to Camelot. It is a silly place."
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32d6e44...@news.tdsnet.com>,
dand...@waun.tdsnet.com (Dale Anderson) wrote:
>
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> >Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
> >until they die or until welfare considerations would
> >provide grounds for euthanasia.
>
> neck of the woods. After all, when the animal in question is
> slaughtered, it is *quite* dead.
Cute, Dale, but of course transparently evasive, as I think you
know what I mean.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5b72c4$3g...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> >I could quibble a little about a couple of these, but
> >generally I agree EXCEPT you've ignored the fact
> >that it's emphatically NOT in the victim's welfare to be
> >killed if she's happy and healthy at the time of killing.
> >The act of killing is an act against welfare, if the victim
> >is happy and healthy.
>
> In dealing with animals, as I stated in another post, my ONLY
> criteria is the ANIMAL'S perspective and subjective experience.
> If it doesn't subjectively harm the animal, then it isn't
> against the animal's welfare.
So you're arguing that death is not a subjective harm? Why
wouldn't it be? (as long as the animal was happy and healthy
at the time of death)?
> >Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
> >until they die or until welfare considerations would
> >provide grounds for euthanasia. Otherwise, you're
> >violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
> >one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
> >the victim?
>
> Because we define welfare differently. ...
But I think you're not just defining it differently. You're
corrupting it. In a profound way. You're assuming that
an animal who is faring well and is then reduced to a
carcass has not been subjected to a serious violation
of its subjective life.
> ... In my opinion, if
> the animal is not suffering in any subjective (from the
> animal's point of view) manner, then it's welfare is
> taken care of.
This seems very counter-intuitive to me. If someone kills
you instantly and painlessly, what's the effect on your
subjective life? It's bad. Your subjective life has been
brought to an end and (again assuming that your life was
good at the time of killing) you have been subjectively
harmed. Your subjective life, your welfare, have been
infringed upon. In a very serious way! I would not expect
someone who supports human welfare to defend the killing
with a claim that your welfare/subjective life weren't
adversely affected.
> >Animal welfare folks are violating the welfare of animals when
> >they approve of the killing of happy healthy animals. This I
> >regard as a fact. You seem to be saying that they're not
> >violating "animal welfare" (under some definition that you
> >accept - why?) but please don't say that WELFARE is not
> >violated.
>
> No, I'm saying the phrase "animal welfare" has commonly accepted
> meanings that you are intentionally ignoring. You insist
> that your definition of welfare is the only one. That's
> your option, but I refuse to engage in a semantic debate with
> you.
If you still think the critical issue here is simply a semantic
one about the phrase "animal welfare," then I don't think
you've understood what I'm saying. What's the effect of death
on one's welfare/subjective life? Is it an improvment or not? If the
answer is "yes, it was an improvment," then I would conclude
that the animal was in a state of severe terminal suffering. Any
other state would not permit one to claim that death is an
improvement. Any other state would be indication of an
infringement on welfare/subjective life.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32D6D0...@erols.com>,
John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
>
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> > I could quibble a little about a couple of these, but
> > generally I agree EXCEPT you've ignored the fact
> > that it's emphatically NOT in the victim's welfare to be
> > killed if she's happy and healthy at the time of killing.
> > The act of killing is an act against welfare, if the victim
> > is happy and healthy.
>
> existence to human nurturing. Were it not for our doings,
> none of these animals would ever have been born. That we
> choose to take back that which we have given cannot be
I don't see any argument here that can dispute the claim
that the killing itself violates the victims' welfare. The fact
that the victims owe their existence to humans is irrelevant.
You're just saying that humans have acted in the victims'
welfare for a while and then stopped doing so at the instant
of killing.
Also I haven't said anything about a "crime". I'm just
pointing out a common welfare violation that for some
bizarre reason seems to be overlooked by many welfare
supporters.
> ... I support treating animals well, and I support
> killing them in the least stressful method, because that
> makes for better quality meat.
Killing in a least stressful way makes for better meat
quality? I never heard this before. I'm not saying it's
false; I'm just saying that I never heard it before. Is it
really true?
Also I've heard that in some countries slow strangulation
of dogs can result in better tasting dog meat. If true, this
seems to go against your claims that tend to equate humane
killing with better meat. Do you favor legalizing that killing
method in this country? To satisfy your need for better
meat? Or are you not including taste as an aspect of
"better quality meat?"
> > Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
> > until they die or until welfare considerations would
> > provide grounds for euthanasia.
>
> Except that waiting for the animal to get sick runs counter
> to the reason I'm raising them, ie, getting good quality
> meat.
True, but I'm pointing out that when a healthy animal is killed
for food, then his welfare is infringed upon. Yet a lot of welfare
supporters fail to support welfare in such cases. Why? Why, if
they really care about welfare (rather than some apparently
contradictory principle of "animal welfare" that was allegedly
defined decades ago)?
> > Otherwise, you're
> > violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
> > one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
> > the victim?
>
> Like I said: Unstressed livestock yield better meat.
So in these cases, you don't care about welfare? Just
better meat? Fortunately for the victims, you happen to
find welfare and better meat to be compatible. But if the
opposite were, then too bad for the victims,right?
> > Why does an individual support "animal welfare?"
> > Presumably it's because she cares about the welfare of
> > animals. What's the effect of killing on the welfare of a
> > happy healthy animal?
>
> The emotional state known as "happy" does not exist within
> the skulls of the animals we regularily use as food. They
> are, quite simply, too stupid to be happy.
Huh? Who says intelligence is necessary for happiness?
My mother (a former teacher of retarded children) used to
note how much happier many of her students seemed than their
brighter counterparts. I think you have no basis for your claim
here.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32D6D0...@erols.com>,
John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
>
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> > I could quibble a little about a couple of these, but
> > generally I agree EXCEPT you've ignored the fact
> > that it's emphatically NOT in the victim's welfare to be
> > killed if she's happy and healthy at the time of killing.
> > The act of killing is an act against welfare, if the victim
> > is happy and healthy.
>
> You are forgetting that domestic livestock owes its very
> existence to human nurturing. Were it not for our doings,
> none of these animals would ever have been born. That we
> choose to take back that which we have given cannot be
> killing them in the least stressful method, because that
> makes for better quality meat.
>
> > until they die or until welfare considerations would
> > provide grounds for euthanasia.
>
> Except that waiting for the animal to get sick runs counter
> to the reason I'm raising them, ie, getting good quality
> meat.
>
> > violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
> > one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
> > the victim?
>
> Like I said: Unstressed livestock yield better meat.
>
> > Presumably it's because she cares about the welfare of
> > animals. What's the effect of killing on the welfare of a
> > happy healthy animal?
>
> The emotional state known as "happy" does not exist within
> the skulls of the animals we regularily use as food. They
> are, quite simply, too stupid to be happy.
>
> John
>
> ------------------------------------------------------
> "You said they'd be treated decently!"
> "They were treated decently. They were decently fed
> and decently shot."
>
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
bl...@calspan.com
In article <W_Ens-ya02368000...@news.cc.umanitoba.ca>,
W_...@UManitoba.CA (Werner Ens) wrote:
>
> In article <8529043...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> > [...] you've ignored the fact
> > that it's emphatically NOT in the victim's welfare to be
> > killed if she's happy and healthy at the time of killing.
> > The act of killing is an act against welfare, if the victim
> > is happy and healthy.
> >
> > until they die or until welfare considerations would
> > violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
> > one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
> > the victim?
>
> that the alternative to killing Betsy for food when it's
> most profitable to do so, is allowing her to live
> out her life in comfort. Well, unless someone is willing to
> pay the keeper, the alternative is that Betsy never gets
> born. Since animal welfare cannot
> exist without the animal, a short pleasant life is more
> in the interest of animal welfare, than no life at all.
Again here I fail to see any claim that refutes my repeated
theme: the act of killing a healthy happy animal is generally
a serious infringement on the victim's welfare. It doesn't
matter directly what's gone on before and how we came
to this state. All that matters is the animal's present and
projected future states. There are certainly examples of
animals who face such a bleak future of suffering that
killing them could be justified on welfare grounds. But if
this is predictively the case repeatedly (i.e. nobody 's willing
to pay Betsy's keeper), then we should seriously question
further decisions to bring more "Betsy's" into the world.
> Of course this semantic argument is entirely beside the point.
> The relevant question (to me anyway) is not whether
> killing animals for food is consistent with what you consider
> to be "animal welfare" or with its more usual meaning.
> The question is whether or not the activity is
> ethically acceptable. It is to the vast majority.
But should it be? If we all support the welfare of animals,
then why don't we want animals to continue living as long
as they're faring well? Why would we want to end their state
of positive welfare, IF we really care about their welfare?
If faring well is something we favor, then why end it?
> [...]
> > Animal welfare folks are violating the welfare of animals when
> > they approve of the killing of happy healthy animals. This I
> > regard as a fact. You seem to be saying that they're not
> > violating "animal welfare" (under some definition that you
> > accept - why?) but please don't say that WELFARE is not
> > violated.
>
> Don't humane societies kill healthy dogs and cats for population
> control? Isn't that in the interest of animal welfare in general,
> even your contrived definition of it?
It depends on the alternatives. I could see cases, where due to
overcrowding, killing is the best option for the animal's welfare if
the only other choices are seriously sub-standard care or release
to fend for themselves. Since both of these options can be worse
IMO than death, then I can understand how such killings could be
justified on welfare grounds in a relative sense.
But the difference between this and other killings commonly accepted
by welfare supporters is that they're done with the animals' interests
and welfare in mind. The killings aren't done to serve the interests
of others. They're not done for, say, producing better meat for humans.
- Bob
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32D6D2...@erols.com>,
John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
[...]
> Please present the proof that killing livestock requires justification.
I don't have a clue how to PROVE a claim like that. Perhaps you
could help get the discussion started by presenting your thoughts
on how a claim like that could be proven? Or disproven for that
matter?
What I have tried to do is present an argument as to why I think that
animal welfare supporters need to justify the killing of happy healthy
animals - whether said animals be livestock or other classes of animals.
[...]
> I'm sorry, but cattle and chickens are just too dim to enjoy a positive
> experience.
See my other post about the relationship (or lack thereof) between
intelligence and happiness.
[...]
> Their welfare exists for a purpose. My welfare. ...
This is not a very strong argument. It's basically the
juvenile's whing cry: "I want it, so I should have it."
Out here in the real world of adults, there are competing interests
and welfares. Arguments need to be given as to why some
interests merit greater weight than others.
> ...If I could detect
> happiness in the cows I fed at grandad's place, I might be tempted to
> spare their lives. I've seen happiness in dogs, cats, humans, and horses,
> but not in a cow or any bird. They're just too stupid.
Again, I find this to be seriously flawed thinking. This alleged
connectedness between happiness and intelligence. I do hope
that you follow through on this though. If you come to appreciate
the capacity of these animals for some degree of happiness or
contentment, that you will re-consider your attitude toward them.
Dale Anderson
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>In article <32d6e44...@news.tdsnet.com>,
> dand...@waun.tdsnet.com (Dale Anderson) wrote:
>>
>> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>>
>> >Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
>> >until they die or until welfare considerations would
>> >provide grounds for euthanasia.
>>
>> I honestly know of no one who eats an animal while it's alive in this
>> neck of the woods. After all, when the animal in question is
>> slaughtered, it is *quite* dead.
>
>Cute, Dale, but of course transparently evasive, as I think you
>know what I mean.
in order to live, something else must die. The only ones that are
evasive about this fact are the ARAs.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32d97f2d...@news.tdsnet.com>,
dand...@waun.tdsnet.com (Dale Anderson) wrote:
>
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> >In article <32d6e44...@news.tdsnet.com>,
> > dand...@waun.tdsnet.com (Dale Anderson) wrote:
> >>
> >> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> >>
> >> >Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
> >> >until they die or until welfare considerations would
> >> >provide grounds for euthanasia.
> >>
> >> I honestly know of no one who eats an animal while it's alive in this
> >> neck of the woods. After all, when the animal in question is
> >> slaughtered, it is *quite* dead.
> >
> >Cute, Dale, but of course transparently evasive, as I think you
> >know what I mean.
>
WOW! What an icredible insight. Why didn't I figure that out?
[Much congratulations and hearty backslapping. A round of
drinks for all concerned!]
Now back to the topic at hand, Dale, would you
care to comment on my claim that killing an animal
is a violation of his welfare?
> ... The only ones that are
> evasive about this fact are the ARAs.
Supporting evidence?
PA Thomas
Dale Anderson wrote:
> >Hard for me to say, I don't know much about chickens or their needs.
>
> Ine of our regulars in Animal Rights conducted an experiment. He
> bought a chicken, and placed it in a 12 X 12 area. Said the bird was
> content as could be. Could turn, preen, etc. A chicken really doesn't
> need a lot of room, according to his results. It's doubtul they show
> the kind of fear of close quarters that humans do. Maybe George can
> give us som insight? ;-)
I am no chicken expert; this is my official disclaimer. I have taken
courses in poultry production, and seen firsthand the day to day
operation of both egg and broiler operations.
Birds kept in individual cages are being protected from themselves. When
allowed to be kept in groups, they will maim and kill each other.
Light manipulation is an almost universal system of broiler and layer
operations. Layer hens are manipulated for prime production by being
kept on decreasing daylight scheduled, then allowed to rest on a short
reverse cycle. These giant light and climate controlled houses are
simply the most cost-efficient method of producing eggs--other systems
have a very hard time competing unless they have that *natural* niche
market.
Broiler birds in groups are kept exposed to as much as twenty-three and
three quarters hours of daylight every day--they will eat only during
daylight. The longer the day, the faster they grow. Producers without
this advantage of light manipulation often can't compete. Those with it
keep the birds separated to keep them from canibalising or smothering the
others. Even with the occasional "dark down" (the fifteen minutes of
dark in the long light schedule), group birds panic during darkness and
will pile up in one corner of the barn. As much as half of the flock can
be dead in a matter of minutes. I can see why the practice is so common.
I also learned that caged birds are less succeptible to communicable
diseases, much like the veal calves. And the best way to ensure that
every animal is allowed by the others to eat and drink is separation. I
guess chickens can be pretty brutal.
-Patti
Kris Carroll
On 01/12/97, bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>care to comment on my claim that killing an animal
>is a violation of his welfare?
I would care to comment. As currently written, your statement can be proved
false or irrelevant in a variety of ways. Unless you learn to craft a
statement with precise language and agreed upon definitions, you can't even
start an intelligent conversation. That, of course, may not be your
intention.
Kris C.
Chuck Narad
In article <32DA69...@earthlink.net>, PA Thomas <shamr...@earthlink.net> writes:
>
> I am no chicken expert; this is my official disclaimer. I have taken
> courses in poultry production, and seen firsthand the day to day
> operation of both egg and broiler operations.
> Birds kept in individual cages are being protected from themselves. When
> allowed to be kept in groups, they will maim and kill each other.
so one *could* say that the chickens are being confined to small cages
to protect their right to live a life free of intereference, suffering,
and injury brough about by their fellow chickens :-)
chuck/
who exploited a cat over the holidays by forcing it to endure
prolonged experiments in petting.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Chuck Narad -- diver/adventurer/engineer |
| |
| "Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. And today? |
| Today is a gift. That's why we call it The Present." |
| - Babatunde Olatunji |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Chuck Narad
In article <853089...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com writes:
> In article <5b72c4$3g...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
> Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
> >
> > bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> >
> > >I could quibble a little about a couple of these, but
> > >generally I agree EXCEPT you've ignored the fact
> > >that it's emphatically NOT in the victim's welfare to be
> > >killed if she's happy and healthy at the time of killing.
> > >The act of killing is an act against welfare, if the victim
> > >is happy and healthy.
> >
> > In dealing with animals, as I stated in another post, my ONLY
> > criteria is the ANIMAL'S perspective and subjective experience.
> > If it doesn't subjectively harm the animal, then it isn't
> > against the animal's welfare.
>
> So you're arguing that death is not a subjective harm? Why
> wouldn't it be? (as long as the animal was happy and healthy
> at the time of death)?
because, lacking the abililty that humans have to anticipate an
abstract event, there is no sense of impending loss to that
animal.
> > >Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
> > >until they die or until welfare considerations would
> > >provide grounds for euthanasia. Otherwise, you're
> > >violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
> > >one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
> > >the victim?
> >
> > Because we define welfare differently. ...
>
> But I think you're not just defining it differently. You're
> corrupting it. In a profound way.
actually she is using the commonly used and commonly accepted
definition of AW. you seem to be the one intent on redefining it.
>
c/
Chuck Narad
well stated, kris.
I'd only add, in the spirit of francione, that the question at the
top is proof of the sexism inherent in the AR movement...what about
all of the *female* animals?
(just kidding, but we've had a few nuts around here from the other
side of the aisle that repeatedly made statements like that...not
that I would mention which lawyers and professors of law that hang
out around here were likely to do so... :-)
Dale Anderson
kcar...@halcyon.com (Kris Carroll) wrote:
>On 01/12/97, bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>>care to comment on my claim that killing an animal
>>is a violation of his welfare?
>
>I would care to comment. As currently written, your statement can be proved
>false or irrelevant in a variety of ways. Unless you learn to craft a
>statement with precise language and agreed upon definitions, you can't even
>start an intelligent conversation. That, of course, may not be your
>intention.
Whoops! You figured him out! ;-)
Dale Anderson
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>> in order to live, something else must die. ...
>
>WOW! What an icredible insight. Why didn't I figure that out?
You got me.... Some of us accept the fact, rather than get all weepy
eyed over it happening.
>Now back to the topic at hand, Dale, would you
>care to comment on my claim that killing an animal
>is a violation of his welfare?
It's as much of a "welfare violation" as eating a potato or cutting
dwon a tree, in my mind. To try to equate it with concepts and
principles of human welfare, is flat ridiculous.
Jennifer Royce
John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
>If the buffet had nothing I liked, I wouldn't go. The baked fish is
>good. Their hot wings suck, though (too much vinegar).
Hot wings should not have vinegar in them anyway - hot sauce and
butter and a little salt, maybe some cayanne pepper if you want them
hotter. That's it.
I do miss hot wings, but now I put the hot wing sauce on deep-fried
mushrooms. Yummy!
Jennifer Royce
(and Bailey and Zoe and Cosmo)
http://www.spectra.net/~tworabit
twor...@spectra.net
-------------------------------------------------------------
~~~Southern Tier Rabbit Care Network~~~
~P.O. Box 27, Johnson City, NY 13790~
http://www.spectra.net/~tworabit/strcn.htm
-------------------------------------------------------------
Silence: Music's original alternative
John & Linda VanSickle
Jennifer Royce wrote:
>
> John & Linda VanSickle <vans...@erols.com> wrote:
>
> >If the buffet had nothing I liked, I wouldn't go. The baked fish is
> >good. Their hot wings suck, though (too much vinegar).
>
> Hot wings should not have vinegar in them anyway - hot sauce and
> butter and a little salt, maybe some cayanne pepper if you want them
> hotter. That's it.
Yeah, but a lot of commerical hot sauces have vinegar as one of the main
ingredients.
--
"On second though, let's not go to Camelot. It is a silly place."
John and Linda VanSickle vans...@erols.com
Dale Anderson
na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>
>In article <32DA69...@earthlink.net>, PA Thomas <shamr...@earthlink.net> writes:
>>
>> I am no chicken expert; this is my official disclaimer. I have taken
>> courses in poultry production, and seen firsthand the day to day
>> operation of both egg and broiler operations.
>> Birds kept in individual cages are being protected from themselves. When
>> allowed to be kept in groups, they will maim and kill each other.
>
>so one *could* say that the chickens are being confined to small cages
>to protect their right to live a life free of intereference, suffering,
>and injury brough about by their fellow chickens :-)
Thereby benefiting *both* their welfare, *and* their "personhood?"
Gets more and more interesting as we move along these avenues of
thesis! ;-)
Jessica Snyder
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>In article <5b72c4$3g...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
> Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>> In dealing with animals, as I stated in another post, my ONLY
>> criteria is the ANIMAL'S perspective and subjective experience.
>> If it doesn't subjectively harm the animal, then it isn't
>> against the animal's welfare.
>
>So you're arguing that death is not a subjective harm? Why
>wouldn't it be? (as long as the animal was happy and healthy
>at the time of death)?
I'm arguing that from the perspective of the animal, death
isn't harmful, because once it's dead the animal doesn't
care about any future living it may have done.
>> Because we define welfare differently. ...
>
>But I think you're not just defining it differently. You're
>corrupting it. In a profound way. You're assuming that
>an animal who is faring well and is then reduced to a
>carcass has not been subjected to a serious violation
>of its subjective life.
In the first place, I don't think you can "violate" anything
about an animal. They have no rights to violate.
In the second place, I have said I'm not going to quibble
about the definition of "welfare". I'm using it in the
traditional "animal welfare" sense. You are using the
dictionary definition to say that "animal welfare" is
a misnomer. I won't argue about it with you.
>
>> ... In my opinion, if
>> the animal is not suffering in any subjective (from the
>> animal's point of view) manner, then it's welfare is
>> taken care of.
>
>This seems very counter-intuitive to me. If someone kills
>you instantly and painlessly, what's the effect on your
>subjective life?
Nothing, because I'D BE DEAD.
Subjective as in from the perspective of the animal.
Or, in this case, from the perspective of me. If someone
sneaks up and kills me painlessly and instantly, my subjective
experience is simply ended. Whether that is bad or not is
in the eye of the beholder. Me, I'd be too dead to think
or care about it.
>It's bad. Your subjective life has been
>brought to an end and (again assuming that your life was
>good at the time of killing) you have been subjectively
>harmed.
According to who? Not to me, the dead person. I don't
have any opinions any more. I'm dead, remember?
>If you still think the critical issue here is simply a semantic
>one about the phrase "animal welfare," then I don't think
>you've understood what I'm saying. What's the effect of death
>on one's welfare/subjective life?
A sudden perception of nothingness.
>Is it an improvment or not?
According to who? The dead creature no longer cares, and hence
to the creature itself asking "is being dead better than being
alive" is a pointless question, because it's dead. It can't
make those judgements.
> If the
>answer is "yes, it was an improvment," then I would conclude
>that the animal was in a state of severe terminal suffering. Any
>other state would not permit one to claim that death is an
>improvement. Any other state would be indication of an
>infringement on welfare/subjective life.
You are assuming that being is always worse than being happily
alive. I don't always assume that :)
But mainly, you miss my point. From the perspective of the
animal, being dead is not a bad thing, any more than being
asleep or otherwise unconscious is a bad thing. Is it against
the animal's welfare to go to sleep? Their subjective experience
is probably pretty much the same as when they are killed
instantly and painlessly.
Pat Lohmann
bis...@ix.netcom.com(Richard Bishop) wrote:
>In <5b8hvp$35...@news.doit.wisc.edu> Jessica Snyder
><jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> writes:
>>
>>dand...@waun.tdsnet.com (Dale Anderson) wrote:
>>
>>> I had situations where I had literally close off areas, to keep the
>>>coes from laying where they shouldn't. One of the more interesting
>>>examples were the younger calves in the summer. They had the choice
>of
>>>lying under some trees in the shade, or in a small building where the
>>>amonia smell just *reeked*. Where do you suppose they wanted to go?
>>
>>I was amazed when I drove by and saw a cow, who had an entire FIELD
>>of open green grass available to her, giving birth to her calf
>>in the muddy, shitty, churned up dirt of the lane to the barn.
>>I stopped and watched the calf try to stand for a while... very
>>cute, but covered immediately in shit.
>
>calf in the very worst place she could find. One time she had it in a
>swamp, another time she had it on the bank of a creek. In very cold
>weather. And of course the calf managed to fall into the very shallow
>water. I was only about nine, much too small to drag the calf to
>safety. I very impatiently had to wait until my father came home to
>carry the calf to safety, take it to the house, spoon whiskey down its
>throat and wrap it up until it was warm. Of course, we named the calf
>Bourbon.
>
>>
>>>>Hard for me to say, I don't know much about chickens or their needs.
>>>
>>> Ine of our regulars in Animal Rights conducted an experiment. He
>>>bought a chicken, and placed it in a 12 X 12 area. Said the bird was
>>>content as could be. Could turn, preen, etc. A chicken really doesn't
>>>need a lot of room, according to his results. It's doubtul they show
>>>the kind of fear of close quarters that humans do. Maybe George can
>>>give us som insight? ;-)
>>
>>And they do prefer crowding to being alone, I remember that from
>>when we had ours... 30 feet of pen space, and all 15 would be crammed
>>into a 6 foot square area. But still, I think the conditions are
>>a little severe. Although given how incredibly stupid chickens
>>are, I've no idea if they care :)
>>
>
>names of Dumb and Dumber.
>
>>Jessica
>>
>>------------------------------------------------------------
>>jrsn...@students.wisc.edu in Madison, WI
>>and the multi-species Home of Chaos
>>
>>"Oh sure! But what's the speed of dark?"
>>------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>
>
>
Come on, lighten up. What's with the anti-chicken sentiment? Maybe its nuture
not nature. My chickens aren't that stupid. They know there's catfood in the
house, where it is, and how to get to it...just hide behind the kitchen door,
wait until I walk out, and charge. One or two always make it in. Some know the
difference between a glass of water and a mug of beer and that if they watch
long enough I'll eventually put the beer down and they can steal a few sips.
And they're real good at remembering where they live at night. A couple have
even figured out that the fox can't fly and they can't run. Maybe you just
expect too much. I suspect a free-range chicken may be smarter than (or at
least not as dumb as) a penned chicken. Or maybe the real dumb ones just don't
come back.
Pat Lohmann
Woods Hole, MA
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5be52g$7...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
[...]
> > So you're arguing that death is not a subjective harm? Why
> > wouldn't it be? (as long as the animal was happy and healthy
> > at the time of death)?
>
> because, lacking the abililty that humans have to anticipate an
> abstract event, there is no sense of impending loss to that
> animal.
So what? The animal still underwent a loss. One can lose
something without knowing about it.
> > > >Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
> > > >until they die or until welfare considerations would
> > > >provide grounds for euthanasia. Otherwise, you're
> > > >violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
> > > >one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
> > > >the victim?
> > >
> > > Because we define welfare differently. ...
> >
> > But I think you're not just defining it differently. You're
> > corrupting it. In a profound way.
>
> actually she is using the commonly used and commonly accepted
> definition of AW. you seem to be the one intent on redefining it.
She's trying to argue that welfare (subjective experience) is
important to a living animal and thus of concern to us, but
that the TOTAL ELIMINATION OF THIS IMPORTANT THING
FOREVERMORE is of no concern. I don't see how that can be.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32daa60b...@news.tdsnet.com>,
dand...@waun.tdsnet.com (Dale Anderson) wrote:
[...]
> >Now back to the topic at hand, Dale, would you
> >care to comment on my claim that killing an animal
> >is a violation of his welfare?
>
> It's as much of a "welfare violation" as eating a potato or cutting
> dwon a tree, in my mind. ...
I disagree. Neither a potato nor a tree has subjective
experiences or a welfare as animals do. Neither a
potato nor a tree is deprived by death of these, like
animals are. Welfare considerations don't apply to
your examples. They do apply to animals.
[...]
Pat Lohmann
>>until they die or until welfare considerations would
>>provide grounds for euthanasia.
>
>neck of the woods. After all, when the animal in question is
>slaughtered, it is *quite* dead.
>
>
>
>their hearts and minds will follow.
>
>Dale Anderson (Not tenured, either)
>dand...@waun.tdsnet.com
>(Not to be attributed to TDSNET)
>FIDO 1:238/202
>ANIMAL_RIGHTS Moderator
>DAIRY_FARM Moderator
I don't know which neck of the woods you're writing from, but the oysters I
collected and ate on the way home last night were very much alive. They
wouldn't have been much longer, though, if I'd left them alone. They were
exposed by an exceptionally low tide and I had to compete with the gulls for
the ones I got.
Pat Lohmann
Woods Hole MA
Chuck Narad
In article <8532652...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com writes:
> In article <5be52g$7...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
> na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > > So you're arguing that death is not a subjective harm? Why
> > > wouldn't it be? (as long as the animal was happy and healthy
> > > at the time of death)?
> >
> > because, lacking the abililty that humans have to anticipate an
> > abstract event, there is no sense of impending loss to that
> > animal.
>
> So what? The animal still underwent a loss. One can lose
> something without knowing about it.
sounds like a subject for about 80 years of talmudic debate :-)
> > > > >Raise animals for food if you have to, but don't eat them
> > > > >until they die or until welfare considerations would
> > > > >provide grounds for euthanasia. Otherwise, you're
> > > > >violating their welfare when you kill them. Why would
> > > > >one want to do this, if one cares about the welfare of
> > > > >the victim?
> > > >
> > > > Because we define welfare differently. ...
> > >
> > > But I think you're not just defining it differently. You're
> > > corrupting it. In a profound way.
> >
> > actually she is using the commonly used and commonly accepted
> > definition of AW. you seem to be the one intent on redefining it.
>
> She's trying to argue that welfare (subjective experience) is
> important to a living animal and thus of concern to us, but
> that the TOTAL ELIMINATION OF THIS IMPORTANT THING
> FOREVERMORE is of no concern. I don't see how that can be.
I understand and appreciate that you don't see how that can be; frankly,
I'm at a loss of where to take the conversation, since we seem to be
lacking a common ground or even a common vocabulary to discuss it. any
ideas?
once one has studied a bit about the bits and pieces of the biosphere
and how they fit together, one gains insight into how important the
death of each critter (including humans) is in the food chain and
detrital chain (althugh food web is a more descriptive and popular
phrase these days.) I think that one common element among ARA's seems
to be an appreciation of the life of each animal (well, not *all* animals,
but that's a side topic) that has misled them into believing that the
life itself is precious and is the *only* purpose of each critter's
niche in this world. in fact, each critter's death and the subsequent
disbursement of the energy that it has concentrated during its life
is equally important to the ecosystem and is equally precious.
being self-aware tends to make people stress the importance of the
life and to dislike the thoughts of our own mortality, leading
to this disconnect that is core to many of the discussions here.
cheers,
Chuck Narad
In article <5beqv5$c...@news.doit.wisc.edu>, Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> writes:
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> >This seems very counter-intuitive to me. If someone kills
> >you instantly and painlessly, what's the effect on your
> >subjective life?
>
> Nothing, because I'D BE DEAD.
right, the problem we have with our own death is the anticipation
of it, and the anticipation of the effects it will have on our
loved ones.
> Subjective as in from the perspective of the animal.
> Or, in this case, from the perspective of me. If someone
> sneaks up and kills me painlessly and instantly, my subjective
> experience is simply ended. Whether that is bad or not is
> in the eye of the beholder. Me, I'd be too dead to think
> or care about it.
>
> >It's bad. Your subjective life has been
> >brought to an end and (again assuming that your life was
> >good at the time of killing) you have been subjectively
> >harmed.
>
> According to who? Not to me, the dead person. I don't
> have any opinions any more. I'm dead, remember?
exactly. the "harm" is seen by others still living in the complex
and abstract world that humans inhabit. the corpse is simply a
slab of meat (but please use my parts! is everyone here an organ
donor? I strongly recommend it.)
> >If you still think the critical issue here is simply a semantic
> >one about the phrase "animal welfare," then I don't think
> >you've understood what I'm saying. What's the effect of death
> >on one's welfare/subjective life?
>
> A sudden perception of nothingness.
>
> >Is it an improvment or not?
according to buddhist doctrine, yes.
Chuck Narad
In article <32dbec3...@news.tdsnet.com>, dand...@waun.tdsnet.com writes:
> Pat Lohmann <pat> wrote:
>
> >I don't know which neck of the woods you're writing from, but the oysters I
> >collected and ate on the way home last night were very much alive.
>
> Wisconsin. Barely above zero, and not a lot of oysters lying in the
> snow. ;-)
>
> I stand corrected, though. To be honest, I doubt if the AR supporter
> was thinking oysters as the emotional posting about animals being
> slaughtered was being presented.
how can they resist? swallowed alive by the human exploiter...of
course, even <respectful pause> Peter Singer eats bivalves and considers
them below his personal line. speciesism is okay, you see, as long
as your arbitrary personal line doesn't include the cute fuzzies.
Pat Lohmann
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>In article <32d97f2d...@news.tdsnet.com>,>> >In article <32d6e44...@news.tdsnet.com>,
>> >> >until they die or until welfare considerations would
>> >> >provide grounds for euthanasia.
>> >>
>> >> neck of the woods. After all, when the animal in question is
>> >> slaughtered, it is *quite* dead.
>> >
>> >know what I mean.
>>
>
>WOW! What an icredible insight. Why didn't I figure that out?
>drinks for all concerned!]
>
>care to comment on my claim that killing an animal
>is a violation of his welfare?
>
>
>> evasive about this fact are the ARAs.
>
>Supporting evidence?
>
>-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
> http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
I have to admit I've never thought about these issues before.
If it weren't for their food potential my chickens wouldn't exist in the first
place. I don't kill hens unless they're seriously injured (if I don't, the
other hens will and they're pretty nasty about it). I kill most of the roosters
because the natural 1:1 rooster:hen ratio is too large, and the roosters try to
kill each other if I don't and I do it a lot faster than they do. I wonder at
what point I've stopped doing the chickens a favor and started violating their
welfare? When I kill a healthy hen? At some point, every hen that I keep alive
denies the existence of a new chick, because I just can't keep a flock of more
than 100 healthy and happy. I think I care a lot about my chickens' welfare,
those I have now as well as those in the future.
Because of their food potential, through the summer I've helped move oysters
that have set too high in the marsh to survive the winter into deeper water.
Lately I've been harvesting some on my way home for an afternoon snack...live
oysters on the halfshell. Given the choice, I usually take those that are
either exposed to predation by gulls or are so covered with slipper shells that
they're bound to die from competition anyway. I eat the slipper shells, too,
because if I throw them back they'll just infest other oysters. I'm certainly
not helping out the slipper shells, but at what point have I violated the
oyster's welfare? When I took one without slipper shells from water deep enough
to protect it from gulls? Aren't I owed a few from all those I saved from dying
in the high marsh? Seems to me that most of the oysters are better off because
of my interest in eating them.
The scallops I harvest (and eat live) are two years old. They're natural life
span is only about two years so they don't have much welfare left to violate.
And because of their food potential I go out of my way to remove their
predators (whelks). Seems to me that I'm looking out for the welfare of even
the scallops I'm eating.
If I didn't help open up the streams closed by winter storms, the herring
wouldn't be able to spawn in the spring. Why would I care about that? Because I
like smoked and pickled herring and herring caviar so I grab a few hundred of
the tens of thousands on their way in.
Because I'm interested in eating these animals I think that, on the whole, as a
species, or a population, or a flock, they're better off. Anyway, it certainly
isn't clear to me at what point I've violated their welfare. Its certainly not
as simple as saying its when I kill some of them.
Dale Anderson
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>> It's as much of a "welfare violation" as eating a potato or cutting
>> dwon a tree, in my mind. ...
>
>I disagree. Neither a potato nor a tree has subjective
>experiences or a welfare as animals do. Neither a
>potato nor a tree is deprived by death of these, like
>animals are. Welfare considerations don't apply to
>your examples. They do apply to animals.
Chuck did better than I think I can on this, but...
"Welfare" suggests some sort of concept of "happyness." For one, I
don't see animals having any concept of "happyness" as we humans do.
For sure they have no real concept of life or death philosophys, like
we do. As such, like applying the concept of "welfare" to a plant, or
animal, relative to it's death is rather ridiculous.
"Welfare," or h"appyness" for a cow consists of having a full belly,
water, and reasonably comfortable surroundings. Trying to apply much
beyond that is just trying to layer human concepts of "happy" upon an
animal that can neither apply or understand such concepts.
Chuck Narad
In article <8532644...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com writes:
> In article <5bdsga$b...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
> kcar...@halcyon.com (Kris Carroll) wrote:
> >
> > On 01/12/97, bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> > >care to comment on my claim that killing an animal
> > >is a violation of his welfare?
> >
> > I would care to comment. As currently written, your statement can be proved
> > false or irrelevant in a variety of ways. ...
>
> Then by all means, do so. Pick several ways and do it! Show
> how, in welfare terms, death is either an improvement over or a
> lateral transition from a happy healthy state.
a "lateral transition from a happy healthy state"?
hmmmm....okay, here you go. prior to it's death, the animal
was healthy, well-fed, and had no concept of the absract idea
of it's own death (probably not really of its own existance, either.)
it was not unhappy.
after its death, it was still not unhappy.
:-)
but here's a question for you; since you seem to find something
distasteful about the idea of an animal's death, why is it that
you only attribute this requirement to domestic animals? do you
think that allowing a fox to kill and eat a rabbit is not only
"against that animal's welfare" but something that should be prevented?
Animal Welfare (as the term is commonly used) describes humane
treatment of animals in human care *while they are alive*. certainly
something better that what they would have as a wild animal...what
is it about death that you find so distasteful?
c/
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Chuck Narad -- diver/adventurer/engineer |
| |
| "It's not that I don't want to die; I just don't want to be |
| there when it happens." --Woody Allen |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Dale Anderson
Pat Lohmann <pat> wrote:
>I don't know which neck of the woods you're writing from, but the oysters I
>collected and ate on the way home last night were very much alive.
Wisconsin. Barely above zero, and not a lot of oysters lying in the
snow. ;-)
I stand corrected, though. To be honest, I doubt if the AR supporter
was thinking oysters as the emotional posting about animals being
slaughtered was being presented.
When you have them by the balls,
Jessica Snyder
na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>
>In article <5beqv5$c...@news.doit.wisc.edu>, Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> writes:
>> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>>
>> >This seems very counter-intuitive to me. If someone kills
>> >you instantly and painlessly, what's the effect on your
>> >subjective life?
>>
>> Nothing, because I'D BE DEAD.
>
>right, the problem we have with our own death is the anticipation
>of it, and the anticipation of the effects it will have on our
>loved ones.
I really don't see how that can be so difficult to understand,
but I guess we're just coming from incredibly different
points of view, eh?
I totally agree with your comment in the other post... before
it's death, the animal was happy. After it's death, the animal
was still happy (or at least was definately not unhappy). Net
loss: 0.
>exactly. the "harm" is seen by others still living in the complex
>and abstract world that humans inhabit. the corpse is simply a
>slab of meat (but please use my parts! is everyone here an organ
>donor? I strongly recommend it.)
Yep! Keith and I have strict instructions to each other that should
one of us die, the first thing the other will do upon finding
out is to inform whoever that all organs can and should be used.
The *next* thing is to have that nervous breakdown.....
>> >you've understood what I'm saying. What's the effect of death
>> >on one's welfare/subjective life?
>>
>> A sudden perception of nothingness.
>>
>> >Is it an improvment or not?
>
>according to buddhist doctrine, yes.
I forgot about them! That's right, they do consider death as
a move to a higher plane of existence.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5beqv5$c...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
> > Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
> >> In dealing with animals, as I stated in another post, my ONLY
> >> criteria is the ANIMAL'S perspective and subjective experience.
> >> If it doesn't subjectively harm the animal, then it isn't
> >> against the animal's welfare.
> >
> >wouldn't it be? (as long as the animal was happy and healthy
> >at the time of death)?
>
> isn't harmful, because once it's dead the animal doesn't
> care about any future living it may have done.
But the animal did want to continue living and had positive
welfare yet to experience. From her perspective, taking this
away was harmful.
We're talking about the transition from an initial happy and
healthy state to an end state of nonexistence. Unless this end
state is equivalent to the initial state (or an improvement
over it), then a harm has been inflicted.
> >> Because we define welfare differently. ...
> >
> >But I think you're not just defining it differently. You're
> >corrupting it. In a profound way. You're assuming that
> >an animal who is faring well and is then reduced to a
> >carcass has not been subjected to a serious violation
> >of its subjective life.
>
> In the first place, I don't think you can "violate" anything
> about an animal. They have no rights to violate.
Now who's doing the semantic quibbling? Rights are not the
only thing that can be violated.
But I'm not irrevocably attached to the word "violate" here.
I'm talking about an infringement, a harm, a reduction/elimination
of something valuable possessed by the victims. Such value is
already implicitly admitted by one's support for animal welfare.
If you don't like to think of it as a violation, feel free to
suggest a different term.
> In the second place, I have said I'm not going to quibble
> about the definition of "welfare". I'm using it in the
> traditional "animal welfare" sense. You are using the
> dictionary definition to say that "animal welfare" is
> a misnomer. I won't argue about it with you.
>
> >
> >> ... In my opinion, if
> >> the animal is not suffering in any subjective (from the
> >> animal's point of view) manner, then it's welfare is
> >> taken care of.
> >
> >This seems very counter-intuitive to me. If someone kills
> >you instantly and painlessly, what's the effect on your
> >subjective life?
>
> Nothing, because I'D BE DEAD.
The effect is that your subjective life has come to an end.
Your present and future welfare have been taken from you.
You've had a lot taken from you, whether or not you're
aware of it after the fact.
> Subjective as in from the perspective of the animal.
> Or, in this case, from the perspective of me. If someone
> sneaks up and kills me painlessly and instantly, my subjective
> experience is simply ended. Whether that is bad or not is
> in the eye of the beholder. Me, I'd be too dead to think
> or care about it.
I think it's possible to talk about this in a more objective
manner than you realize. Living beings can be happy and healthy
or thay can be unhappy and suffering. The former state can be
seen as one of positive welfare; the latter state as one of
negative welfare. The dead state is a bit more problematic,
and I think the best we can say is that it's a neutral state
in terms of welfare, subjective experience, etc.
If you undergo a metamorphosis from a positive state to
a neutral state - as I'm claiming occurs with death - then
I would say that your welfare has been harmed. Similarly,
if you transition from a state of permanent suffering to a
neutral state, I'd say your situation has improved.
And in fact we make judgments like this frequently where
animals are concerned. We routinely euthanize sick and
suffering animals and we do it because we believe it's for
their welfare and interests. We believe it's a preferable
choice for them. Their welfare state has become so bad
that death is a welfare improvement. If we kill a happy
and healthy animal, the opposite is true: it's a welfare
violation (infringement, degradation, whatever word you
want to denote the opposite of an improvement). The happy
healthy animal didn't want her life to end, didn't want to
forego good future experiences. And if one views
this from the animal's point of view, I fail to see how
one could overlook this.
> >It's bad. Your subjective life has been
> >brought to an end and (again assuming that your life was
> >good at the time of killing) you have been subjectively
> >harmed.
>
> According to who? Not to me, the dead person. I don't
> have any opinions any more. I'm dead, remember?
According to those still alive who can assess the impact of
death on the victim's welfare. According to what you'd want
if you could express a preference.
> >If you still think the critical issue here is simply a semantic
> >one about the phrase "animal welfare," then I don't think
> >you've understood what I'm saying. What's the effect of death
> >on one's welfare/subjective life?
>
> A sudden perception of nothingness.
Exactly. And if it follows a perception of something positive,
then welfare (subjective life, whatever you want to call it)
has been adversely affected. Clearly there's a violation there!
> >Is it an improvment or not?
>
> According to who? The dead creature no longer cares, and hence
> to the creature itself asking "is being dead better than being
> alive" is a pointless question, because it's dead. It can't
> make those judgements.
You (the dead victim) don't need to be the one who makes
the judgment. All you need is an objective person still
among the living to evaluate whether you're better off dead.
This is what I'm saying that animal welfare supporters
should do. They should be assessing whether the animal
victim is really better off dead. They can do this by evaluating,
to the best of their knowledge, the quality and welfare of
the pre-death life and comparing it to the non-existence
state. I find that many times it's clear that the quality
of pre-death life was sufficiently good that the animal should
be permitted to go on living if possible. And I can't imagine
someone claiming that such victims are better off dead, or
equally well-off, or that their welfare is not damaged by death.
> > If the
> >answer is "yes, it was an improvment," then I would conclude
> >that the animal was in a state of severe terminal suffering. Any
> >other state would not permit one to claim that death is an
> >improvement. Any other state would be indication of an
> >infringement on welfare/subjective life.
>
> You are assuming that being is always worse than being happily
> alive. I don't always assume that :)
Why not? How could it be any other way, from the subject's
standpoint, which is how we both want to view it, right?
(I assume here that you meant to say that I'm assuming that
non-being is worse than being happily alive.)
> But mainly, you miss my point. From the perspective of the
> animal, being dead is not a bad thing, any more than being
> asleep or otherwise unconscious is a bad thing. Is it against
> the animal's welfare to go to sleep? Their subjective experience
> is probably pretty much the same as when they are killed
> instantly and painlessly.
First, I think that equating sleep with death is a serious
error. Death is the end of consciousness (at least its
association with our physical bodies). Sleep is just
another state of consciousness. And further it's a
temporary state, unlike death. It's not against the animal's
welfare to go to sleep, especially if she's tired. It is
against her welfare to be killed, as long as she was in a
good state prior to death.
Also animals do seem to dream. It would be surprising if
dreaming were a uniquely human activity. So there is
subjective experience involved. There can be pleasant
dreams, nightmares, etc.
Being dead IS a bad thing for the victim, if it implies
deprivation of welfare and subjective experiences that
could have been enjoyed by the victim.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5bgq1s$e...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>
>
> In article <5beqv5$c...@news.doit.wisc.edu>, Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> writes:
> > bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> >
> > >This seems very counter-intuitive to me. If someone kills
> > >you instantly and painlessly, what's the effect on your
> > >subjective life?
> >
> > Nothing, because I'D BE DEAD.
>
> of it, and the anticipation of the effects it will have on our
> loved ones.
I think there's more to it than that. There's the future things
you're going to do and experience.
> > Subjective as in from the perspective of the animal.
> > Or, in this case, from the perspective of me. If someone
> > sneaks up and kills me painlessly and instantly, my subjective
> > experience is simply ended. Whether that is bad or not is
> > in the eye of the beholder. Me, I'd be too dead to think
> > or care about it.
> >
> > >It's bad. Your subjective life has been
> > >brought to an end and (again assuming that your life was
> > >good at the time of killing) you have been subjectively
> > >harmed.
> >
> > According to who? Not to me, the dead person. I don't
> > have any opinions any more. I'm dead, remember?
>
> exactly. the "harm" is seen by others still living in the complex
Harm seen by others is still harm.
> and abstract world that humans inhabit. the corpse is simply a
> slab of meat (but please use my parts! is everyone here an organ
> donor? I strongly recommend it.)
>
> > >If you still think the critical issue here is simply a semantic
> > >one about the phrase "animal welfare," then I don't think
> > >you've understood what I'm saying. What's the effect of death
> > >on one's welfare/subjective life?
> >
> > A sudden perception of nothingness.
> >
> > >Is it an improvment or not?
>
> according to buddhist doctrine, yes.
Odd then isn't it that we fail to witness masses of buddhist
hordes all scurrying to get immediately to this improved state?
Chuck Narad
In article <8533537...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com writes:
> In article <5bgq1s$e...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
> na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
> > In article <5beqv5$c...@news.doit.wisc.edu>, Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> writes:
> > > bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> > >
> > > >This seems very counter-intuitive to me. If someone kills
> > > >you instantly and painlessly, what's the effect on your
> > > >subjective life?
> > >
> > > Nothing, because I'D BE DEAD.
> >
> > right, the problem we have with our own death is the anticipation
> > of it, and the anticipation of the effects it will have on our
> > loved ones.
>
> I think there's more to it than that. There's the future things
> you're going to do and experience.
your human biases are once again coming into the picture, and
you are using anticipation of future abstracts again.
once you're dead, you're dead. As tom robbins wrote, "your hair
and nails continue to grow, but your phone calls taper off."
(actually the hair and nails do not continue to grow, but as the
rest of the body shrinks they give that appearance...but I digress.)
you seem to have a real problem, a denial, when it comes to death.
at some point you are going to die, and will not be able to experience
anything anymore. there's always those "future things" at some
point that you won't get to experience. the fact that you as a human
can anticipate future experiences and feel a sense of loss in anticipation
of dying and not being able to experience them has nothing to do
with what that cow we were talking about can anticipate; I feel
that you are projecting your own feelings onto a creature that can
neither understand nor miss them.
what is it that makes you think that your human experience of life
is at all relevant to what non-humans anticipate and feel attachment
to?
> > > Subjective as in from the perspective of the animal.
> > > Or, in this case, from the perspective of me. If someone
> > > sneaks up and kills me painlessly and instantly, my subjective
> > > experience is simply ended. Whether that is bad or not is
> > > in the eye of the beholder. Me, I'd be too dead to think
> > > or care about it.
> > >
> > > >It's bad. Your subjective life has been
> > > >brought to an end and (again assuming that your life was
> > > >good at the time of killing) you have been subjectively
> > > >harmed.
> > >
> > > According to who? Not to me, the dead person. I don't
> > > have any opinions any more. I'm dead, remember?
> >
> > exactly. the "harm" is seen by others still living in the complex
>
> Harm seen by others is still harm.
not subjectively for the stiff, which is where this all started.
all you are saying is that *you* feel bad about the cow dying, not that
the cow experienced harm. all it experienced was death.
> > > >If you still think the critical issue here is simply a semantic
> > > >one about the phrase "animal welfare," then I don't think
> > > >you've understood what I'm saying. What's the effect of death
> > > >on one's welfare/subjective life?
> > >
> > > A sudden perception of nothingness.
> > >
> > > >Is it an improvment or not?
> >
> > according to buddhist doctrine, yes.
>
> Odd then isn't it that we fail to witness masses of buddhist
> hordes all scurrying to get immediately to this improved state?
actually, buddhists work towards achieving the nothingness while
still alive, which is a much tougher row to hoe.
c/
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Chuck Narad -- diver/adventurer/engineer |
| |
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5bh9t2$34...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>
> na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
> >
> >In article <5beqv5$c...@news.doit.wisc.edu>, Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> writes:
> >> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> >>
> >> >This seems very counter-intuitive to me. If someone kills
> >> >you instantly and painlessly, what's the effect on your
> >> >subjective life?
> >>
> >> Nothing, because I'D BE DEAD.
> >
> >right, the problem we have with our own death is the anticipation
> >of it, and the anticipation of the effects it will have on our
> >loved ones.
>
> but I guess we're just coming from incredibly different
> points of view, eh?
As indicated in an earlier response to Chuck, I think there's
more to "the problem we have with our own death."
> I totally agree with your comment in the other post... before
> it's death, the animal was happy. After it's death, the animal
> was still happy (or at least was definately not unhappy). Net
> loss: 0.
I don't buy the math here. The happy animal has a welfare
which can be represented as some positive number, say
+N. The dead animal's welfare is 0. Net loss = N. The
transition from +N to 0 involves a welfare violation. Q.E.D.
[...]
>> > A sudden perception of nothingness.
> >
> > >Is it an improvment or not?
>>
>> according to buddhist doctrine, yes.
>
> I forgot about them! That's right, they do consider death as
> a move to a higher plane of existence.
For those who find this convincing, let them demonstrate
by hastening their move to that plane, forthwith.
But of course no one here would argue that their religious
belief demonstrates that death is, in a welfare sense, better
than a happy life.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5bgpi3$e...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
> In article <8532652...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com writes:
> > In article <5be52g$7...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
> > na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
[...]
> > So what? The animal still underwent a loss. One can lose
> > something without knowing about it.
>
> sounds like a subject for about 80 years of talmudic debate :-)
We should be able to dispense with it in about a t.p.a. week.
[...]
> > She's trying to argue that welfare (subjective experience) is
> > important to a living animal and thus of concern to us, but
> > that the TOTAL ELIMINATION OF THIS IMPORTANT THING
> > FOREVERMORE is of no concern. I don't see how that can be.
>
> I understand and appreciate that you don't see how that can be; frankly,
> I'm at a loss of where to take the conversation, since we seem to be
> lacking a common ground or even a common vocabulary to discuss it. any
> ideas?
>
> once one has studied a bit about the bits and pieces of the biosphere
> and how they fit together, one gains insight into how important the
> death of each critter (including humans) is in the food chain and
> detrital chain (althugh food web is a more descriptive and popular
> phrase these days.) I think that one common element among ARA's seems
> to be an appreciation of the life of each animal (well, not *all* animals,
> but that's a side topic) that has misled them into believing that the
> life itself is precious and is the *only* purpose of each critter's
> niche in this world. in fact, each critter's death and the subsequent
> disbursement of the energy that it has concentrated during its life
> is equally important to the ecosystem and is equally precious.
>
> being self-aware tends to make people stress the importance of the
> life and to dislike the thoughts of our own mortality, leading
> to this disconnect that is core to many of the discussions here.
Good post, Chuck. Though of course it's in error :-)
I've always thought that you were at your best discussing
ecological concerns (ex: an excellent statement you posted a couple
years ago in response to Jeff Kempe) and at your worst posting about
animals. But you've taken this far beyond where I've gone so far in
these
recent discussions. I've been just trying to establish that killing is a
violation of the victim's welfare, a point about which many seem to be
in denial, but a point that's obvious to me. Once we establish some
common ground there, then it would seem appropriate to discuss which
such violations might be justifiable and which aren't and perhaps bring
in
some of your points above. But that would be jumping ahead.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5bgp21$e...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>
>
> In article <8532644...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com writes:
> > In article <5bdsga$b...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
[...]
> > Then by all means, do so. Pick several ways and do it! Show
> > how, in welfare terms, death is either an improvement over or a
> > lateral transition from a happy healthy state.
>
> a "lateral transition from a happy healthy state"?
>
> hmmmm....okay, here you go. prior to it's death, the animal
> was healthy, well-fed, and had no concept of the absract idea
> of it's own death (probably not really of its own existance, either.)
> it was not unhappy.
>
> after its death, it was still not unhappy.
>
> :-)
Prior to death, was the animal happy? Yes? Afterwards, was she?
No? Just as I thought. Not a lateral transition, which BTW I think
would
be difficult to show. It requires that there exists some living state
which
is equivalent in welfare terms to the state of death.
> but here's a question for you; since you seem to find something
> distasteful about the idea of an animal's death, why is it that
> you only attribute this requirement to domestic animals? do you
> think that allowing a fox to kill and eat a rabbit is not only
> "against that animal's welfare" but something that should be prevented?
Sue asked something similar (like was a lion violating the welfare of
a gazelle that he was killing for food?). I regret that I couldn't
respond
to
her post (the other points in it are forgotten), but the post disappeared
and I can't find it.
The answer to her question and yours is: yes of course. Absolutely, it's
a violation of their victims' welfare. But the lion never claimed to
support
animal welfare. Almost all humans do claim that. If I could do
something
to change animal violations of animal welfare, I probably would, just as
I can do something to reduce violations committed by me. But as it is,
I would probably do more harm than good, if I tried to extend this to
lion/gazelle or fox/rabbit interactions on a large scale.
> Animal Welfare (as the term is commonly used) describes humane
> treatment of animals in human care *while they are alive*. certainly
> something better that what they would have as a wild animal...what
> is it about death that you find so distasteful?
Whom are you quoting here?
I find violations of animal welfare to be unjust. And death, which
reduces
welfare to zero, IS a violation.
Ace & Cat
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> In article <5beqv5$c...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
> Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
> >
> > bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> But the animal did want to continue living and had positive
> welfare yet to experience. From her perspective, taking this
> away was harmful.
>
You are generalizing here and assuming that since you know about the
'state of death' that the animal does too. Since the animal has not
experinced any type of sensation or experience of death, how can it
"want" to continue living? It has no other refernce point to go by but
living.
> We're talking about the transition from an initial happy and
> healthy state to an end state of nonexistence. Unless this end
> state is equivalent to the initial state (or an improvement
> over it), then a harm has been inflicted.
No, there is no realization of the change, just an end.
>
> > >> Because we define welfare differently. ...
> > >
> > >But I think you're not just defining it differently. You're
> > >corrupting it. In a profound way. You're assuming that
> > >an animal who is faring well and is then reduced to a
> > >carcass has not been subjected to a serious violation
> > >of its subjective life.
> >
> > In the first place, I don't think you can "violate" anything
> > about an animal. They have no rights to violate.
>
> Now who's doing the semantic quibbling? Rights are not the
> only thing that can be violated.
>
> But I'm not irrevocably attached to the word "violate" here.
> I'm talking about an infringement, a harm, a reduction/elimination
> of something valuable possessed by the victims. Such value is
> already implicitly admitted by one's support for animal welfare.
> If you don't like to think of it as a violation, feel free to
> suggest a different term.
>
Where you may see it as something of value, an animal does not have the
comprehension, or the understanding to see it's own death as a
violation, or as a harm. Animals don't sit around thinking about death,
people do. Animals exist on instinct and urges, hunger, thirst, sleep,
an itch on the butt... death doesn't enter their world as they do not
have the same comprehension of it that we do.
>
> The effect is that your subjective life has come to an end.
> Your present and future welfare have been taken from you.
> You've had a lot taken from you, whether or not you're
> aware of it after the fact.
It doesn't matter either, once a person is dead. Dead people and dead
animals are no longer there for any type of "regrets". That is left for
those who remain. Even an animal that loses a baby to death for whatever
reason, eventually moves on and does not show any sign of grief
afterward. Sure, it may stay around for a few days, or even only a few
hours, nudging the dead baby, but perhaps this is out of instinct...
knowing that the baby should not just lie there, but lacks the
comprehension of "why" it does not get up. Eventually it moves on and
goes back to it's normal behavior.
>
>
> > Subjective as in from the perspective of the animal.
> > Or, in this case, from the perspective of me. If someone
> > sneaks up and kills me painlessly and instantly, my subjective
> > experience is simply ended. Whether that is bad or not is
> > in the eye of the beholder. Me, I'd be too dead to think
> > or care about it.
>
> I think it's possible to talk about this in a more objective
> manner than you realize. Living beings can be happy and healthy
> or thay can be unhappy and suffering. The former state can be
> seen as one of positive welfare; the latter state as one of
> negative welfare. The dead state is a bit more problematic,
> and I think the best we can say is that it's a neutral state
> in terms of welfare, subjective experience, etc.
The 'problem' is left for humans. Dead is dead. Lights are off, nobody
home... that's it. For the deceased, there is no longer a positve or a
negative. Personally, I think both states are a positive situation. If
I die, my organs will go to help someone else. When a deer is shot by a
hunter, it goes to feed a family. Even if the deer were allowed to die
of starvation (they do not 'die' of old age, their teeth wear down and
they starve), it's body goes to feed the earth it lands on, fertilizing
the ground, feeding small preditors, and of course "nature's
garbagemen". In either case, a positve ending, the deer has improved
something by it's death.
>
> If you undergo a metamorphosis from a positive state to
> a neutral state - as I'm claiming occurs with death - then
> I would say that your welfare has been harmed. Similarly,
> if you transition from a state of permanent suffering to a
> neutral state, I'd say your situation has improved.
I disagree. Death is not a 'neutral state' for animals, there is no
neutrality there. It is an end, nothing more, there is no point in
glorifying it.
>
> > >It's bad. Your subjective life has been
> > >brought to an end and (again assuming that your life was
> > >good at the time of killing) you have been subjectively
> > >harmed.
> >
> > According to who? Not to me, the dead person. I don't
> > have any opinions any more. I'm dead, remember?
>
> According to those still alive who can assess the impact of
> death on the victim's welfare. According to what you'd want
> if you could express a preference.
>
>
How can the animal express a preference, when it does not know the
difference (ie, never having an experience of both life and death).
> > >If you still think the critical issue here is simply a semantic
> > >one about the phrase "animal welfare," then I don't think
> > >you've understood what I'm saying. What's the effect of death
> > >on one's welfare/subjective life?
> >
> > A sudden perception of nothingness.
>
> Exactly. And if it follows a perception of something positive,
> then welfare (subjective life, whatever you want to call it)
> has been adversely affected. Clearly there's a violation there!
>
why would you think that? The animal is no longer capable at that point
of thinking or feeling anything.
>
> > >Is it an improvment or not?
> >
> > According to who? The dead creature no longer cares, and hence
> > to the creature itself asking "is being dead better than being
> > alive" is a pointless question, because it's dead. It can't
> > make those judgements.
>
> You (the dead victim) don't need to be the one who makes
> the judgment. All you need is an objective person still
> among the living to evaluate whether you're better off dead.
>
> This is what I'm saying that animal welfare supporters
> should do. They should be assessing whether the animal
> victim is really better off dead. They can do this by evaluating,
> to the best of their knowledge, the quality and welfare of
> the pre-death life and comparing it to the non-existence
> state. I find that many times it's clear that the quality
> of pre-death life was sufficiently good that the animal should
> be permitted to go on living if possible. And I can't imagine
> someone claiming that such victims are better off dead, or
> equally well-off, or that their welfare is not damaged by death.
Animal conservationists already have this in practice. It is called
hunting. A study is done to see how many animals the land can
comfortably support, and then decides how many need to be added to/taken
away to acheive this effect. It looks at the species as a whole instead
of the individual animal.
This seems to be the point of contention right here. Whether or not
'you' have the right to decide, or whether or not 'I' have the right to
decide. It is obvious that the animal cannot express any wishes in this
matter. If their death does some good, for the rest of the population
(one less mouth for the habitat to feed, so that there is 'enough' for
the other, by fertilizing the ground, by feeding another...whether is be
man or predator), then the general welfare of the entire area has not
been damaged, but improved. In a society (whether it be a society of
animals, or both animals and people), the overall picture must be looked
at. Whether the animal's death is an improvement or an infringement,
the *whole* society must be taken into consideration.
Cat in Alaska
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5bdsga$b...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
kcar...@halcyon.com (Kris Carroll) wrote:
>
> On 01/12/97, bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> >care to comment on my claim that killing an animal
> >is a violation of his welfare?
>
> I would care to comment. As currently written, your statement can be proved
Then by all means, do so. Pick several ways and do it! Show
how, in welfare terms, death is either an improvement over or a
lateral transition from a happy healthy state.
- Bob
Malcolm McMahon
On 14 Jan 1997 20:24:28 GMT, na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck
Narad) wrote:
>
>right, the problem we have with our own death is the anticipation
>of it, and the anticipation of the effects it will have on our
>loved ones.
>
But there's also the problem that life has postive value which is
going to cease at death. A death therefore has a negative effect on
things.
---------------------------------+----------------------------------
I was born weird: This terrible | Like Pavlov's dogs we are trained
compulsion to behave normally is | to salivate at the sound of the
the result of childhood trauma. | liberty bell.
---------------------------------+----------------------------------
Malcolm
bl...@calspan.com
In article <32dc0e4a...@news.tdsnet.com>,
dand...@waun.tdsnet.com (Dale Anderson) wrote:
[...]
> "Welfare" suggests some sort of concept of "happyness." For one, I
> don't see animals having any concept of "happyness" as we humans do.
> For sure they have no real concept of life or death philosophys, like
> we do. As such, like applying the concept of "welfare" to a plant, or
> animal, relative to it's death is rather ridiculous.
Trying to get around the semantics here...the purpose of animal welfare
is
to protect some aspect of life that animals have and that we perceive as
important to them. Whatever name you call it, it goes away with death.
That
positive thing becomes zero. That very thing that animal welfarists seek
to
preserve is gone. And that's why I see death as the withdrawal of
something
which welfarists would want to conserve.
[...]
Jessica Snyder
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>In article <5beqv5$c...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
> Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>> I'm arguing that from the perspective of the animal, death
>> isn't harmful, because once it's dead the animal doesn't
>> care about any future living it may have done.
>
>But the animal did want to continue living and had positive
>welfare yet to experience. From her perspective, taking this
>away was harmful.
You are making the assumption that the animal had any thoughts
whatsoever about being alive. I would argue that most animals
aren't capable of such thoughts.
Do you have any evidence that cows, for example, think
about whether they "want" to continue living?
>We're talking about the transition from an initial happy and
>healthy state to an end state of nonexistence. Unless this end
>state is equivalent to the initial state (or an improvement
>over it), then a harm has been inflicted.
You are assuming that nonexistence is not a happy state, and
basing your argument on that. Yet thousands of buddists would
disagree with you.
>But I'm not irrevocably attached to the word "violate" here.
>I'm talking about an infringement, a harm, a reduction/elimination
>of something valuable possessed by the victims. Such value is
>already implicitly admitted by one's support for animal welfare.
>If you don't like to think of it as a violation, feel free to
>suggest a different term.
Harm is fine with me. But again, you are making assumption that
the life of the animal is consciously valued by that animal.
Alternately, you are assuming that the existence of life is
inherently a better thing than the lack of life. And I disagree
with both of those assumptions.
If you are arguing the latter (the existence of life itself is
preferable to no life), then you must be in favor of using animals
as food... because if they weren't used as food, they would never
be born to begin with. So essentially the opitons are:
a) short, healthy, reasonably happy life
b) no life
Which do you believe to be in the greater welfare of the animal?
>> Nothing, because I'D BE DEAD.
>
>The effect is that your subjective life has come to an end.
>Your present and future welfare have been taken from you.
>You've had a lot taken from you, whether or not you're
>aware of it after the fact.
But if I'm not aware of it, then my *subjective* experience
is unaffected. And, if I'm not aware of any harm being done,
where is the harm?
>I think it's possible to talk about this in a more objective
>manner than you realize. Living beings can be happy and healthy
>or thay can be unhappy and suffering. The former state can be
>seen as one of positive welfare; the latter state as one of
>negative welfare. The dead state is a bit more problematic,
>and I think the best we can say is that it's a neutral state
>in terms of welfare, subjective experience, etc.
Depends on who you talk to :) One can also view happiness
as the lack of any unhappiness... in which case death is
a state of happiness.
>If you undergo a metamorphosis from a positive state to
>a neutral state - as I'm claiming occurs with death - then
>I would say that your welfare has been harmed.
From an objective point of view, possibly so. But given that
I only care about the animal's subjective experience, and the
animal is totally unaware that any change of state has occured,
I don't think the animal's welfare (as determined by the animal's
subjective state) has been harmed.
>The happy
>healthy animal didn't want her life to end, didn't want to
>forego good future experiences.
Again, you are assuming that animals think about their lives and
have opinions on their future. I don't share that assumption.
And if one views
>this from the animal's point of view, I fail to see how
>one could overlook this.
Easily, if one does not assume human qualities in animal thought
processes. Which is what you are doing.
>> >It's bad. Your subjective life has been
>> >brought to an end and (again assuming that your life was
>> >good at the time of killing) you have been subjectively
>> >harmed.
>>
>> According to who? Not to me, the dead person. I don't
>> have any opinions any more. I'm dead, remember?
>
>According to those still alive who can assess the impact of
>death on the victim's welfare. According to what you'd want
>if you could express a preference.
But I'm dead, and cant' express a preference, and don't care
about any of it, particularly the opinions of the living.
Hence, their opinions don't matter in terms of my subjective
welfare.
>You (the dead victim) don't need to be the one who makes
>the judgment.
Well I should hope not, as I would be totally incapable of it :)
>All you need is an objective person still
>among the living to evaluate whether you're better off dead.
Ah. So what you're saying is that what the dead individual
is subjectively perceiving is irrelevant to whether or not
the action taken towards that individual was a welfare violation.
Apparently you have missed my entire point. Either that, or
you are being deliberately obtuse.
In any case, there is no point in discussing this further, because
you seem unwilling to evaluate the animal's welfare based
on the *subjective experience of the animal*. You insist
on bringing in the opinion of outside observers, which I don't
think is very relevant. Unless you are willing to acknowledge
my point of view, the discussion seems to be over.
Kevin Patrick Myers
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
[...]
: I don't buy the math here. The happy animal has a welfare
: which can be represented as some positive number, say
: +N. The dead animal's welfare is 0. Net loss = N. The
: transition from +N to 0 involves a welfare violation. Q.E.D.
[...]
There's your fallacy, IMO. A deceased organism's welfare is
not 0. Rather, it is "undefined" (in the mathematical sense of
the term).
Kevin.
--
*speaking for myself only*
Kevin Patrick Myers
Malcolm McMahon (mal...@pigsty.demon.co.uk) wrote:
: On 14 Jan 1997 20:24:28 GMT, na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck
: Narad) wrote:
: >
: >right, the problem we have with our own death is the anticipation
: >of it, and the anticipation of the effects it will have on our
: >loved ones.
: >
: But there's also the problem that life has postive value which is
: going to cease at death. A death therefore has a negative effect on
: things.
For the survivors, maybe, but not for the decedent.
And I'd also say that, in some ways, a life can continue
to have a positive value after it ends. Yesterday many
people celebrated the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King.
Years after his life ended, it seems to me that the effects
of his life continue to have benefits for some (many?) people,
just none for him.
Chuck Narad
In article <8533759...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com writes:
> In article <5bgpi3$e...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
> na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>
> > > So what? The animal still underwent a loss. One can lose
> > > something without knowing about it.
> >
> > sounds like a subject for about 80 years of talmudic debate :-)
>
> We should be able to dispense with it in about a t.p.a. week.
um, right. right after we finish with the minor and obvious
things, like whether morals come from God, government, mass
hallucination, or individual decisions :-)
hmmm...I'll accept the compliment and let the other part lay. (unless
of course my worst is still pretty good, but I don't *think* that's
what you meant to imply :-)
> But you've taken this far beyond where I've gone so far in
> these
> recent discussions. I've been just trying to establish that killing is a
> violation of the victim's welfare, a point about which many seem to be
> in denial, but a point that's obvious to me.
I'm not sure that we can get there from here, bob. the reason for this
is that you have a premise which assumes a lot about role of each
individual and the assigning of human value judgements of life events
to non-humans; the conclusion (violation of the victim's welfare) is
not a certain conclusion, and you may find that the discussion covers
some broad ground and is not likely to converge on general agreement
with your premise.
where I'm coming from and what jessica is saying
is basically that if I'm fat and happy and living the good life, and
it ends suddenly and without my anticipating it, then I never
experienced anything but fat and happy; my sense of well-being
(welfare) was never degraded as far as I was aware. then when I'm
gone, I'm gone. it's only when you throw in all of those human things
like parents and children and our networks of friends and that mortgage
company that comes looking for payments from beyond the grave that there
is any sense of loss after that time. before that time, sure, I might
be sitting here saying "damn, if I die now I'll never get to scale
mt. mckinley" but that's human anticipation of future abstracts again.
the problem with this conversation is that there are some widely varied
concepts of what is meant by 'welfare', obviously. to many of us, it
is important that we limit the unecessary suffering of animals that
are in our care, while still acknowledging that these animals are
being exploited for human purposes, and that at times (for example,
in a limited subset of animal research) the needs of humans will
supercede our desire to limit infliction of suffering. this same
starting point accepts that animals will be killed by people, and
desires that it is done quickly and painlessly. what I have just
described is my own personal position, and I believe that it is
consistent with what is commonly referred to as an Animal Welfare
position.
Can you do me a favor? I can see this discussion getting bogged down
in semantics (as so many do on this newsgroup) over the use of
the word "welfare", and I don't see resolution of that on the horizon.
can we deem that most of us use the word to indicate "well-being while
alive", with the implications as I described above, then move on? in
fact, I'd prefer that we just not use the word at all.
> Once we establish some
> common ground there, then it would seem appropriate to discuss which
> such violations might be justifiable and which aren't and perhaps bring
> in
> some of your points above. But that would be jumping ahead.
oh, I wasn't looking to use my discussion of the cycle of life and
death for specific justification of animal use, suffering, and/or
death, but rather to point out what I think is the real point of
dissonance; that since humans are self-aware and can anticipate
future abstract pleasures and their own deaths, that it heavily
colors some people's attitude towards death of non-humans in ways
that I feel are misapplied. perhaps I'm trying to say that I
see many people (and you in this particular discussion) romanticizing
the life of the animal by projecting their own concerns about mortality
and their own distaste for the idea that it all ends someday, into
a general protest about anything that might shorten an animal's life
(human-induced, of course...sigh, someday we'll end up on predation
in one of the subthreads of this...) as being the same thing as
taking your own life away from you.
I don't see us reaching common ground for discussion, the best we
can do is explore the root paradigms that differ between us and
perhaps learn something from each other that way.
regards,
chuck/
Chuck Narad
In article <8533771...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com writes:
> In article <5bgp21$e...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
> na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>
> > but here's a question for you; since you seem to find something
> > distasteful about the idea of an animal's death, why is it that
> > you only attribute this requirement to domestic animals? do you
> > think that allowing a fox to kill and eat a rabbit is not only
> > "against that animal's welfare" but something that should be prevented?
>
> The answer to her question and yours is: yes of course.
"yes of course"???? predation is something that should be prevented???
predation is something that should be prevented???
(I had to ask that twice, I'm kinda shocked.)
> Absolutely, it's
> a violation of their victims' welfare. But the lion never claimed to
> support
> animal welfare. Almost all humans do claim that. If I could do
> something
> to change animal violations of animal welfare, I probably would,
you see, when I read things like this I *know* that I absolutely don't
understand your world view. the cycles of life are beautiful in
their completeness, and yet you want to appreciate only one side
of it and are horrified by the rest. you want disneyland without
any knowledge about the machines running the rides, you want the
running water without the sewer line. you want dinner without the
dirty dishes.
where I see predation as a normal and natural part of life, you
see it as a violation of the lunch's welfare. honestly, I just
don't understand that point of view.
> just as
> I can do something to reduce violations committed by me. But as it is,
> I would probably do more harm than good, if I tried to extend this to
> lion/gazelle or fox/rabbit interactions on a large scale.
you sure would. and as long as your world view includes seeing
predation as an evil thing, there is no room for discussion about
your view of human interactions with and uses of animals; your world
apparently does not include accepting death caused by another, period,
end of story. humans become just a minor subtheme in that world.
> > Animal Welfare (as the term is commonly used) describes humane
> > treatment of animals in human care *while they are alive*. certainly
> > something better that what they would have as a wild animal...what
> > is it about death that you find so distasteful?
>
> Whom are you quoting here?
nobody. please see my post on this from yesterday in which I expanded
on the idea (I think you recieved my posts out of order.)
>
> I find violations of animal welfare to be unjust. And death, which
> reduces
> welfare to zero, IS a violation.
who ever claimed that the world is a just place? if you honestly believe
that the fox is being unjust to the rabbit, there isn't a whole lot
of room to discuss whether the farmer is violating the welfare of
the cow, or if the researcher is violating the welfare of the mouse.
your claim is that every animal out there is getting it's welfare
violated just by being part of the biosphere. wow.
completely blown away,
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5bk4r6$1m...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>
>Major snippage, this is getting too long)
>>> I'm arguing that from the perspective of the animal, death
>>> isn't harmful, because once it's dead the animal doesn't
>>> care about any future living it may have done.
>>
>>But the animal did want to continue living and had positive
>>welfare yet to experience. From her perspective, taking this
>>away was harmful.
>
>You are making the assumption that the animal had any thoughts
>whatsoever about being alive. I would argue that most animals
>aren't capable of such thoughts.
No I'm not really making that assumption. The only assumption
I'm making is the same one that underlies animal welfare: i.e.
animals can fare well or not and we should strive for the
former in our dealings with them. The animal doesn't need the
capacity to think about it, just the capacity to fare well and the
ability to have conscious preferences. If we accept that an
animal having good experiences is a good and worthwhile
thing for the animal, then we have to conclude that ending
this is bad for the animal. That's why I would term it a welfare
violation.
>Do you have any evidence that cows, for example, think
>about whether they "want" to continue living?
Not relevant. See above. We do have evidence that cows care
whether they feel okay. So stopping them from feeling okay is
bad, from their point of view.
>>We're talking about the transition from an initial happy and
>>healthy state to an end state of nonexistence. Unless this end
>>state is equivalent to the initial state (or an improvement
>>over it), then a harm has been inflicted.
>
>You are assuming that nonexistence is not a happy state, and
>basing your argument on that. Yet thousands of buddists would
>disagree with you.
I'm assuming that non-existence is neither a happy nor an
unhappy state. If you have arguments that this is not correct,
feel free to provide them. And as I asked, are those Buddhists
all rushing out to commit suicide in order to reach that state?
No? Well perhaps they don't really disagree with me. In any event,
what they think isn't relevant. What do you think and what
supporting arguments is it based on?
>>But I'm not irrevocably attached to the word "violate" here.
>>I'm talking about an infringement, a harm, a reduction/elimination
>>of something valuable possessed by the victims. Such value is
>>already implicitly admitted by one's support for animal welfare.
>>If you don't like to think of it as a violation, feel free to
>>suggest a different term.
>
>Harm is fine with me. But again, you are making assumption that
>the life of the animal is consciously valued by that animal.
No just their experiences, which I would claim is tacitly
admitted by all welfare supporters, even using your notion of
welfare.
>Alternately, you are assuming that the existence of life is
>inherently a better thing than the lack of life. And I disagree
>with both of those assumptions.
I'm not making this specific assumption and in fact I too
disagree with it. I am concluding (I think it's more than just
an assumption) that an existing life which includes the capacity
for welfare and which is in a state of positive welfare
is better than death. Why wouldn't this true? Death
is a step down for such a life.
>If you are arguing the latter (the existence of life itself is
>preferable to no life), then you must be in favor of using animals
>as food... because if they weren't used as food, they would never
>be born to begin with. So essentially the opitons are:
>a) short, healthy, reasonably happy life
>b) no life
I've never argued that.
>Which do you believe to be in the greater welfare of the animal?
Once alive, the greater welfare from the individual's viewpoint
is to continue living as long as welfare is good. That's
what's in the greater welfare of the animal. It's certainly
preferable to the termination of this pleasant state for the animal.
It's better for the animal that this period of good welfare to continue
on.
>>> Nothing, because I'D BE DEAD.
>>
>>The effect is that your subjective life has come to an end.
>>Your present and future welfare have been taken from you.
>>You've had a lot taken from you, whether or not you're
>>aware of it after the fact.
>
>But if I'm not aware of it, then my *subjective* experience
>is unaffected. And, if I'm not aware of any harm being done,
>where is the harm?
You can be harmed without knowing it. Surely you can think of
examples.
And your subjective experience IS affected by death. In a very
drastic way. It was ended. How can you say your subjective
experience was not affected? Isn't bringing something to
a swift termination affecting it?
>>I think it's possible to talk about this in a more objective
>>manner than you realize. Living beings can be happy and healthy
>>or thay can be unhappy and suffering. The former state can be
>>seen as one of positive welfare; the latter state as one of
>>negative welfare. The dead state is a bit more problematic,
>>and I think the best we can say is that it's a neutral state
>>in terms of welfare, subjective experience, etc.
>
>Depends on who you talk to :) One can also view happiness
>as the lack of any unhappiness... in which case death is
>a state of happiness.
Interesting point, but then that state of "non-unhappiness"
is still an inferior state to a state of happiness. So
transitioning to it amounts to a reduction of welfare.
>>If you undergo a metamorphosis from a positive state to
>>a neutral state - as I'm claiming occurs with death - then
>>I would say that your welfare has been harmed.
>
>From an objective point of view, possibly so. ...
Not just possibly so. Is so (I would argue).
>...But given that
>I only care about the animal's subjective experience, and the
>animal is totally unaware that any change of state has occured,
>I don't think the animal's welfare (as determined by the animal's
>subjective state) has been harmed.
I'm claiming that from an objective point of view, we can
say that the animal's subjective experience and welfare were
harmed, even though the victim herself is no longer around to
concur. How can something that was positive and now no longer
exists not amount to a harm?
>>The happy
>>healthy animal didn't want her life to end, didn't want to
>>forego good future experiences.
>
>Again, you are assuming that animals think about their lives and
>have opinions on their future. I don't share that assumption.
Nope, I'm assuming they have conscious preferences about what
happens to them.
> And if one views
>>this from the animal's point of view, I fail to see how
>>one could overlook this.
>
>Easily, if one does not assume human qualities in animal thought
>processes. Which is what you are doing.
Disagree. I'm not doing this. Certainly not intentionally.
See above.
>>> >It's bad. Your subjective life has been
>>> >brought to an end and (again assuming that your life was
>>> >good at the time of killing) you have been subjectively
>>> >harmed.
>>>
>>> According to who? Not to me, the dead person. I don't
>>> have any opinions any more. I'm dead, remember?
>>
>>According to those still alive who can assess the impact of
>>death on the victim's welfare. According to what you'd want
>>if you could express a preference.
>
>But I'm dead, and cant' express a preference, and don't care
>about any of it, particularly the opinions of the living.
>Hence, their opinions don't matter in terms of my subjective
>welfare.
I'm just showing that the violation occurs despite your (as a
dead person) incapacity to know it. The violation still
happened.
>>You (the dead victim) don't need to be the one who makes
>>the judgment.
>
>Well I should hope not, as I would be totally incapable of it :)
>
>>All you need is an objective person still
>>among the living to evaluate whether you're better off dead.
>
>Ah. So what you're saying is that what the dead individual
>is subjectively perceiving is irrelevant to whether or not
>the action taken towards that individual was a welfare violation.
I'm saying that the withdrawal of the dead individual's ability
to subjectively perceive is a violation even though said
individual can no longer perceive that the violation occurred.
>Apparently you have missed my entire point. Either that, or
>you are being deliberately obtuse.
>
>In any case, there is no point in discussing this further, because
>you seem unwilling to evaluate the animal's welfare based
>on the *subjective experience of the animal*. You insist
>on bringing in the opinion of outside observers, which I don't
>think is very relevant. Unless you are willing to acknowledge
>my point of view, the discussion seems to be over.
The purpose of mentioning an outside observer was to answer
your complaint that the dead individual can't perceive anything.
You seemed to think that we can't deduce occurrence of a harm
unless some perception of harm could be made. So I introduced
another agent to draw the conclusion to satisfy your own
requirement (as I saw it).
But remember, the purpose of animal welfare - as I figured we
agreed - is to project oneself into the animal's position and
decide what's best from the animal's standpoint. In other
words, the purpose is to take an objective look at the animal's
subjective state. We do this when the animal lives and we can
certainly do this when the animal no longer lives. We can ask:
was it in the animal's welfare and interest to die at that time?
Often I think we'll see the answer is negative.
Dale Anderson
na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>> > but here's a question for you; since you seem to find something
>> > distasteful about the idea of an animal's death, why is it that
>> > you only attribute this requirement to domestic animals? do you
>> > think that allowing a fox to kill and eat a rabbit is not only
>> > "against that animal's welfare" but something that should be prevented?
>>
>
>> The answer to her question and yours is: yes of course.
>
>"yes of course"???? predation is something that should be prevented???
>
>predation is something that should be prevented???
>
>(I had to ask that twice, I'm kinda shocked.)
Shoot, chuck... They probably figure all one has to do is "reason"
with the preditor.
Like I said, never never land...
Jessica Snyder
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>Trying to get around the semantics here...the purpose of animal welfare
>is
>to protect some aspect of life that animals have and that we perceive as
>important to them.
Nope. The purpose of animal welfare is to make the animal's subjective
experience as comfortable and stress/distress free as possible.
That you would presume to call it anything else simply indicates that
you are unfamiliar with animal welfare as it is practiced today.
Chuck Narad
In article <5bmb5o$m...@ds2.acs.ucalgary.ca>, powl...@freenet.calgary.ab.ca writes:
> In article <8534350...@dejanews.com>, <bl...@calspan.com> wrote:
>
> >- Bob
> >-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
>
>
> Hmmm, Gary ("Henry" "Bob") Francione, perchance?
nah, bob's been around a long time, and is rational (not that I
agree with his premises, but at least we can discuss them.)
bob, I had a friend who worked at calspan; are you perchance at the
nasa ames facility? if so, wave; I'm across the swamp from the wind
tunnel :-)
c/
Chuck Narad
In article <32e14811...@news.demon.co.uk>, mal...@pigsty.demon.co.uk writes:
> On 14 Jan 1997 20:24:28 GMT, na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck
> Narad) wrote:
>
> >
> >right, the problem we have with our own death is the anticipation
> >of it, and the anticipation of the effects it will have on our
> >loved ones.
> >
>
> But there's also the problem that life has postive value
wow, malcolm, I could ask at least 15 different questions about
what that means. that's an assertion worthy of quite a few of
our t.p.a. regulars, but I'm very surprised to hear it come
from you.
> which is
> going to cease at death.
life ceases at death. "positive value"...to the owner of that life
ceases to have meaning upon death; there's nothing left to perceive
it, ne c'est pas? the "positive value" to the deceased's loved ones
(aside from the insurance payment and the fact that nobody is leaving
the toilet seat up anymore) is what I explicitly pointed out in
the quoted sentence. what did you miss?
> A death therefore has a negative effect on
> things.
"on THINGS"? well, sure, your phone calls taper off and you don't
get invited to as many parties...but if you are dead you won't have
your feelings hurt by that. on your family and friends? I already
covered that.
really, malcolm, what are you trying to say? that the corpse has
strong feelings about its death? what was your point? you are
usually so eloquent.
chuck/
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Chuck Narad -- diver/adventurer/engineer |
| |
| Everybody wants to go to Heaven, but nobody wants to die |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Jessica Snyder
Having just seen your reply to Chuck, and Chuck's response
back, I am not going to bother with a point-to-point response
on this, because I agree totally with him.
You apparently see predation itself as a bad thing... I can't
comprehend that. And if we differ so widely there, we obviously
have no common ground to talk on.
Thanks for the conversation, though... it *has* made me think.
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5bmpbq$28...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
>
> bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> >Trying to get around the semantics here...the purpose of animal welfare
> >is
> >to protect some aspect of life that animals have and that we perceive as
> >important to them.
>
> Nope. The purpose of animal welfare is to make the animal's subjective
> experience as comfortable and stress/distress free as possible.
> That you would presume to call it anything else simply indicates that
> you are unfamiliar with animal welfare as it is practiced today.
How does what you say here contradict what I said? I was merely using
generalized nomenclature in an effort to get Dale to refrain from
quibbling
over my word selection. Where I said "some aspect ...that we perceive as
important to them" simply swap in your words "comfort" and
"stress/distress
free", fix up the syntax for readability and it seems to me we're saying
the
same thing.
- Bob
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> jrsn...@students.wisc.edu in Madison, WI
> and the multi-species Home of Chaos
>
> "Oh sure! But what's the speed of dark?"
> ------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5blmug$8...@newsgate.duke.edu>,
If one accepts this premise, then the fairest approach would
be to let each individual decide for himself whether he wishes
to risk the transition from a state of positive welfare to this
unknown "undefined" state. We do observe that humans
seldom choose this option. Is there reason to believe that
animals would in general choose differently or want the
decision made differently for themselves? I think not. Thus
I would conclude that this "undefined" state can reasonably
be assigned the same zero value as a neutral state.
- Bob
bl...@calspan.com
In article <5bmf29$e...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>
>
> In article <8533771...@dejanews.com>, bl...@calspan.com writes:
> > In article <5bgp21$e...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
>
> >
> > > but here's a question for you; since you seem to find something
> > > distasteful about the idea of an animal's death, why is it that
> > > you only attribute this requirement to domestic animals? do you
> > > think that allowing a fox to kill and eat a rabbit is not only
> > > "against that animal's welfare" but something that should be prevented?
> >
>
> > The answer to her question and yours is: yes of course.
>
> "yes of course"???? predation is something that should be prevented???
>
> predation is something that should be prevented???
>
> (I had to ask that twice, I'm kinda shocked.)
Thanks for the chance to clarify. The "yes" actually applied to the
part regarding whether the victim animal's welfare was violated.
In haste, I didn't see the part about "something to be prevented",
which I hope would be clear from my other statement to the effect
that trying to stop it could lead to much more harm than good.
> > Absolutely, it's
> > a violation of their victims' welfare. But the lion never claimed to
> > support
> > animal welfare. Almost all humans do claim that. If I could do
> > something
> > to change animal violations of animal welfare, I probably would,
>
> you see, when I read things like this I *know* that I absolutely don't
> understand your world view. the cycles of life are beautiful in
> their completeness, and yet you want to appreciate only one side
> of it and are horrified by the rest. you want disneyland without
> any knowledge about the machines running the rides, you want the
> running water without the sewer line. you want dinner without the
> dirty dishes.
I don't see how any compassionate person could fail to experience
a sense of horror at some things that occur. Yes there is much
beauty in nature, but there's also much suffering, pain, and agony.
I don't see why humans who understand all this should contibute to it
needlessly - as I should expect any good animal welfare supporter
would appreciate.
>
> where I see predation as a normal and natural part of life, you
> see it as a violation of the lunch's welfare. honestly, I just
> don't understand that point of view.
Why not? It clearly looks like a welfare violation to me. Now it
may be a justifiable one, or one we're powerless to stop without
creating greater evil, but it's still a welfare violation nonetheless.
>
> > just as
> > I can do something to reduce violations committed by me. But as it is,
> > I would probably do more harm than good, if I tried to extend this to
> > lion/gazelle or fox/rabbit interactions on a large scale.
>
> you sure would. and as long as your world view includes seeing
> predation as an evil thing, there is no room for discussion about
> your view of human interactions with and uses of animals; your world
> apparently does not include accepting death caused by another, period,
> end of story. humans become just a minor subtheme in that world.
I didn't pass judgment on predation as an "evil" thing, just as a welfare
violation. It's not the way I would've designed the world, but then I
wasn't
consulted.
[...]
> > I find violations of animal welfare to be unjust. And death, which
> > reduces
> > welfare to zero, IS a violation.
>
> who ever claimed that the world is a just place? if you honestly believe
> that the fox is being unjust to the rabbit, there isn't a whole lot
> of room to discuss whether the farmer is violating the welfare of
> the cow, or if the researcher is violating the welfare of the mouse.
> your claim is that every animal out there is getting it's welfare
> violated just by being part of the biosphere. wow.
By being part of the biosphere the way it works yes. Every
living creature likely has its welfare violated at times, but as animal
welfare supporters we all wish to reduce and eliminate our part
in doing this, don't we? Why else would one support animal
welfare?
John Mercer
<bl...@calspan.com> wrote:
> In article <5bmpbq$28...@news.doit.wisc.edu>,
> Jessica Snyder <jrsn...@students.wisc.edu> wrote:
> >
> > bl...@calspan.com wrote:
> >
> > >Trying to get around the semantics here...the purpose of animal welfare
> > >is
> > >to protect some aspect of life that animals have and that we perceive as
> > >important to them.
> >
> > Nope. The purpose of animal welfare is to make the animal's subjective
> > experience as comfortable and stress/distress free as possible.
> > That you would presume to call it anything else simply indicates that
> > you are unfamiliar with animal welfare as it is practiced today.
>
> How does what you say here contradict what I said? I was merely using
> generalized nomenclature in an effort to get Dale to refrain from
> quibbling
> over my word selection.
There's a HUGE difference.
> Where I said "some aspect ...that we perceive
"WE percieve" is the difference. The difference is in *your* perception
that animals anticipate in the same way that we do.
> as
> important to them" simply swap in your words "comfort" and
> "stress/distress
> free", fix up the syntax for readability and it seems to me we're saying
> the
> same thing.
>
> - Bob
>
--
John Mercer
Scientist
McLaughlin Research Institute
Ace & Cat
> >-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
>
Jeez, speaking of multiple personalities... can 'they' even keep
themselves straight?? <g> At least some people don't mind discussing
things with a real address. Makes things a little easier to figure out,
but then of course I suppose that some of these might have 'multiple
accounts'.
Cat
(now 'who' was I talking to...oh, hi Jim)
Ace & Cat
bl...@calspan.com wrote:
>
> I don't see how any compassionate person could fail to experience
> a sense of horror at some things that occur. Yes there is much
> beauty in nature, but there's also much suffering, pain, and agony.
> I don't see why humans who understand all this should contibute to it
> needlessly - as I should expect any good animal welfare supporter
> would appreciate.
>
That is 'the nature of the beast'. I think you make a good point,
although it may not be the one you wished to make. Nature can be kind
and gentle, but is also a b*tch in reality. This IS the real world. You
have to accept the good and the bad.
> I didn't pass judgment on predation as an "evil" thing, just as a welfare
> violation. It's not the way I would've designed the world, but then I
> wasn't
> consulted.
Still you have 'passed judgement'. Perhaps there was a reason you
weren't consulted. [Disneyland in the making here]
> By being part of the biosphere the way it works yes. Every
> living creature likely has its welfare violated at times, but as animal
> welfare supporters we all wish to reduce and eliminate our part
> in doing this, don't we? Why else would one support animal
> welfare?
As a hunter and as someone who believes in animal welfare (and knowing
the two CAN co-exist), my reasoning for supporting animal welfare is to
keep the greatest variety of species, in the greatest amounts
(supportable) in co-existance with man. Some populations have to be
controlled in order for others to be able to exist. Otherwise, the
overpopulation of one can and does destroy the habitat of another.
Cat
(who definatly has a different definition of 'welfare violation', having
nothing to do with animals at all)
>
> - Bob
> -------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
Chuck Narad
bob-
you still seem hung up on "welfare". as you point out
below, what you term "welfare violations" of animals are part and parcel
of life on this planet, and yet you somehow deem them to be
an unnatural thing that should be avoided at all costs. this
is an example of what I meant when I said that you are trying to
get others to share your personal distastes.
as I said before, the world ain't a just place, death is
part of life...and "welfare violations" are just as much a part of
life as eating (and in fact are closely related in large part to
eating.)
you seem to have an insistence that just because we humans
live in societies that provide some protection from "welfare violations"
among humans, that this should be extended to animals (certainly animals
among humans, and apparently your desire is to project the same
paradigm onto animal interactions with other animals if you had
your druthers.) you acknowledge that, in addition to pleasure or
comfort in nature there is "much suffering, pain, and agony," yet your
basic model seems to be that there is something wrong with that. I
on the other hand accept it as part of the world that we are part of.
I repeat; these are all part of the normal cycles of life,
and to desire a world free of killing, free of suffering, and free
of "welfare violations" is to desire a world created by walt disney,
not the one that nature has cooked up for us all.
you ask
> Every living creature likely has its welfare violated at times, but as animal
> welfare supporters we all wish to reduce and eliminate our part
> in doing this, don't we? Why else would one support animal
> welfare?
because (while accepting that animals are used, and that animals are
killed) we project a bit of our social contract onto the critters
that are in our care and try to not cause them uneccessary pain and
suffering because we can relate to it ("necessary" being a very
subjective and personal value judgement.) Because we are programmed
to want to nurture pudgy things with small noses and big eyes. Because
we project a little bit of our humanity onto the creatures we spend
our time with, and can put ourselves in their places enough to say
"oh, that probably isn't pleasant, I can change that a bit." Because,
all evidence to the contrary on this planet, most people honestly
want to do the good and righteous thing.
The difference between an AW supporter and an AR supporter is that the
former still admits to our animal nature and also accepts that this
projection, while a good thing, does not need to be taken to an
extreme position wherein we forget that it *is* simply projection.
regards,
chuck/
> I don't see how any compassionate person could fail to experience
> a sense of horror at some things that occur. Yes there is much
> beauty in nature, but there's also much suffering, pain, and agony.
> I don't see why humans who understand all this should contibute to it
> needlessly - as I should expect any good animal welfare supporter
> would appreciate.
> >
> > where I see predation as a normal and natural part of life, you
> > see it as a violation of the lunch's welfare. honestly, I just
> > don't understand that point of view.
>
> Why not? It clearly looks like a welfare violation to me. Now it
> may be a justifiable one, or one we're powerless to stop without
> creating greater evil, but it's still a welfare violation nonetheless.
>
>
> >
> > > just as
> > > I can do something to reduce violations committed by me. But as it is,
> > > I would probably do more harm than good, if I tried to extend this to
> > > lion/gazelle or fox/rabbit interactions on a large scale.
> >
> > you sure would. and as long as your world view includes seeing
> > predation as an evil thing, there is no room for discussion about
> > your view of human interactions with and uses of animals; your world
> > apparently does not include accepting death caused by another, period,
> > end of story. humans become just a minor subtheme in that world.
>
> I didn't pass judgment on predation as an "evil" thing, just as a welfare
> violation. It's not the way I would've designed the world, but then I
> wasn't consulted.
> [...]
>
> > > I find violations of animal welfare to be unjust. And death, which
> > > reduces welfare to zero, IS a violation.
> >
> > who ever claimed that the world is a just place? if you honestly believe
> > that the fox is being unjust to the rabbit, there isn't a whole lot
> > of room to discuss whether the farmer is violating the welfare of
> > the cow, or if the researcher is violating the welfare of the mouse.
> > your claim is that every animal out there is getting it's welfare
> > violated just by being part of the biosphere. wow.
>
> By being part of the biosphere the way it works yes. Every
> living creature likely has its welfare violated at times, but as animal
> welfare supporters we all wish to reduce and eliminate our part
> in doing this, don't we? Why else would one support animal
> welfare?
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Chuck Narad -- diver/adventurer/engineer |
| |
David Veal
In article <8535474...@dejanews.com>, <bl...@calspan.com> wrote:
>In article <5bmf29$e...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
> na...@nudibranch.asd.sgi.com (Chuck Narad) wrote:
>> "yes of course"???? predation is something that should be prevented???
>>
>> predation is something that should be prevented???
>>
>> (I had to ask that twice, I'm kinda shocked.)
>
>Thanks for the chance to clarify. The "yes" actually applied to the
>part regarding whether the victim animal's welfare was violated.
>In haste, I didn't see the part about "something to be prevented",
>which I hope would be clear from my other statement to the effect
>that trying to stop it could lead to much more harm than good.
It would be mighty impractical to try and stop non-human predation,
especially since it would be very expensive to produce synthetic food
substitutes for all those predators. But if their "welfare" is being
violated, and we have an obligation to put a stop to that when we can, if
we have the means don't we also have that obligation?
This sounds like an attempt to have your cake and eat it, too.
Trying to say both predation is wrong and that it is necessary. I don't
see how you can avoid the conclusion that if predation is wrong by its
nature that we should *eliminate the predators* in the most humane way
possible.
>I didn't pass judgment on predation as an "evil" thing, just as a welfare
>violation. It's not the way I would've designed the world, but then I
>wasn't consulted.
Predation is part of the same effect that created you. You wouldn't
exist in a world where predation wasn't necessary. Most likely nothing
more advanced than replicating proteins would exist in such a world of
endless bounty.
However, I don't see that saying predation is a "welfare violation"
on the one hand and "not evil" on the other hand is a meaningful
distinction. If it is harmful and we have an obligation to minimize harm,
we have an obligation to minimize it (where possible) whether you want to
call it "evil," "horrible," or simply "purple." It is like making a value
judgement on a rock that falls on somebody's head. Whether it is morally
wrong or not we normally consider it our obligation to keep it from
happening.
--
David Veal ve...@web.ce.utk.edu / lve...@utk.edu
"Any smoothly functioning technology will be
indistinguishable from a rigged demo." Isaac Asimov