One common approach to debating the ethics of meat is to argue within the context of utilitarianism.
Put is simple terms, for the utilitarian, an action is right if it creates more utility for the morally relevant beings than disutility. A key part of the debate for the utilitarians is the moral status of animals: are they morally relevant or not?
If animals are not morally relevant, then their treatment would not be morally significant. If animals are morally relevant, then their treatment would be relevant to the moral assessment of actions.
Of course, it is possible to accept that animals are morally relevant, but to argue that humans count more than animals. For example, Mill argues that sentient beings count morally but he also argues that humans have higher faculties. This can be used to argue that humans count more than animals and this can, in turn, be used to justify treating animals worse that humans.
One way to argue that animals count is to argue (as Mill did) that pleasure is of positive value (utility) and pain is of negative value (disutility). Since animals feel pleasure and pain, they would play a role in the calculation of utility and hence would be relevant beings.
The template for arguing on utilitarian grounds has the following steps:
1) The utility generated by the practice is assessed.
2) The disutility generated by the practice is assessed.
3) If the disutility outweighs the utility, then the action is immoral.
4) If the utility outweighs the disutility, then the action is moral.
As an example, consider the following argument about veal: Humans enjoy eating veal and gain some pleasure from this. The creation of veal involves imprisoning a calf in a stall that is too small for movement, force feeding the calf which causes the calf to have various problems, and then killing the calf. The horrible treatment of the animals creates more pain than the eating of veal generates. Therefore the treatment of the animals is morally wrong.
Of course, the utilitarian approach can also be used to argue for treating animals not so well. For example, humans test important medicines on animals and develop treatments for serious health conditions. The animals involved in the testing suffer from these experiments. However, the animals are treated as humanely as possible and the medicines significantly increase the patients’ quality of life and even permit them to keep on living. The benefits of such testing outweigh the suffering of animals, therefore the testing is morally acceptable.
Getting back to the matter of meat, utilitarian arguments can be given for eating meat. One argument can be based on pleasure: while the suffering of animals creates pain, the enjoyment that people get from eating meat outweighs this suffering. Therefore the eating of meat is morally acceptable.
Of course, this sort of argument could be used to justify any sort of seemingly wicked activity. This would be done by merely showing that those committing the apparent misdeeds enjoy their misdeeds more than their victims suffer. This problem is not specific to meat, but rather a general concern with utilitarianism.
A second sort of utilitarian argument can be based on need: humans need to consume meat in order to remain healthy. While animals suffer from being killed for food, the need of humans outweigh the needs of animals. Therefore eating meat is acceptable.
This argument can, of course, be challenged. There is considerable debate over whether humans actually need meat or not. The best evidence seems to be that humans can do fine without meat, provided that they have access to foods that can replace meat. Naturally, in some contexts, people do not have an alternative to meat. Of course, this line of reasoning can also justify cannibalism, at least in survival situations. However, just as cannibalism is unacceptable when there are alternatives, it would seem that eating animals is also unacceptable when there are alternatives.
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The most unhealthy peoples in the world are those that do not have regular access to meat.
People can live for a long time on shoe leather and tree bark. Ask Vietnam POWs.
That doesn’t mean it’s healthy.
Too much of your arguments is based on either/or choices. One must be completely utilitarian, completely capitalist and anti-poor.
Only the worst people in history have ever been so black and white. Fortunately, most of us make small adjustments daily to fill in the gaps.
I don’t know, magus. It could be argued that those who don’t have access to water get much unhealthier, much sooner, than those who don’t eat meat. That might explain, in part, why in disaster situations we see helicopters landing with water rations and bags of grain.
“The most unhealthy peoples in the world are those that do not have regular access to meat.” But, is this due to the fact that they lack access to meat? Or is the lack of access to meat an effect of another cause? To be specific, those who do not have access to meat would also seem likely to be in poorer countries with less health care, harsher conditions and so on. So, it seems likely it is these other factors that would be the main cause of poor health.
I’m not an expert on diet, but according to people I know in the field of nutrition and diet at FSU, a proper vegetarian diet is more healthy than a meat diet. Of course, I am still a meat eater myself-but this is the result of habit and taste for meat that I cannot shake.
It doesn’t have to be a false dilemma. After all, utility does allow for degrees. For example, perhaps eating meat that is not raised in horrific ways would create more pleasure than pain and hence be okay. So, a utilitarian argument could be given for it being acceptable to eat certain meats while it is also argued that other types (like human meat) would be morally wrong.
I’m pretty sure that if you gave these people a steak a week, their health would improve drastically and quickly.
I don’t know how the people at FSU would know what the long term affects of vegetarianism on a large population is–there simply are no examples to study. Even The China Study, which claims vegetarianism is the way to go, proved its point by doing what?–studying people who are not vegetarians–the Chinese.
Anytime tribes eat only vegetables it is out of need. They would eat a steak if you put in front of them in a heart beat.
I mean, how many true vegetarians are there to study? If you threw a group of people out into the wild, they would have to immediately start forming weapons to kill wild life. They could not possibly make enough gardens quickly enough to sustain themselves, and they surely could not get enough vegetable variety to be healthy.
We all descend from hunter-gatherers. It is the only way man could have survived.
I have nothing against vegetables. I eat them all the time. I eat meat quite often too, in reasonable quantities. I’m a flexitarian, if you care to Google the term. I avoid junk food.
There is no single vegetable that gives the nutrient value of meat.
PENS hitting me with all kinds of ridiculous comparisons–like going without water. I’m sure if they did empirical studies on the affects of going without water for a month, the results would be declarative–unlike what you’d find if you went without either meat or vegetables for that amount of time. In that case, you probably would see little difference. Except the vegetarian group would be drastically weaker do to a lack of Adenosine Triphosphate in the muscle cells. ATP is created, in part, by creatine, which is obtained by meat, though small amounts are created in our own bodies. This is also why vegetarians are much less muscular.
A proper vegetarian diet is only possible in a very advanced society, such as our own. It must be planned, and controlled to a high degree.
Sure, but undernourished folks’ health would also improve if you gave them apples, carrots or soy.
Again, I’m no expert on vegetarianism. However, as long as a person is getting the proper nutrients, then that person would be fine over the long term. Vegetarians seem to be able to get all they need from non-meat sources, so it seems unlikely that they would have problems in the long term.
The fact that we descended from hunter gatherers does not tell us what the best food is for us. After all, people used to live without antibiotics, advanced surgery and so on-but I would not let the past determine what I do now. We can, of course, look at the biology of humans to see what is best for us, but what our ancestors did is not, in itself, a good guide to what we should do.
Proper diets in general would seem to require an advanced society. After all, the science of proper nutrition requires chemical analysis, knowledge of biology and so on.
If veggies don’t want to eat my meat then there is more to go around for others.
“I’m sure if they did empirical studies on the affects of going without water for a month…”
Speaking of things for which “there simply are no examples to study”. http://www.survivaltopics.com/survival/how-long-can-you-survive-without-water/
Note the chart about halfway down the page. See how long a person can survive with no water.
But of course, you knew that. And this:
http://www.survivaltopics.com/survival/how-long-can-you-live-without-food/
To paraphrase you: “I mean, how many people who have lived 16 days without water are there to study?” So, I must stand by my objection to your rather rash statement that “The most unhealthy peoples in the world are those that do not have regular access to meat.” And reaffirm my own claim that “It could be argued that those who don’t have access to water get much unhealthier, much sooner, than those who don’t eat meat.”
Potable water: The most important component of every human’s diet.
Vegans are like pacifists: We hardly ever meet a real one.
I don’t think I have ever met a real pacifists. I’ve met people who are scared of fighting, but that is hardly pacifism. I know several devoted vegetarians. However, I also know folks who are a bit flexible in their vegetarian ways. Of course, how they act has no bearing on the issue of whether vegetarianism is healthy or ethical.
I saw one light himself on fire in an old Vietnam video. That monk was dedicated. Of course I never met him though.
Pass the A-1 sauce…
Better (and more moral) living through advanced technology, guys.
Test tube meat will solve this quandary once and for all.
Human nature doesn’t change. The only progress we have is technological progress. Our tools define us.
So until something better comes along we’re meat-heads.
You mean like Vienna sausages and Spam?
Those are, technically, meat.
“I do love cakes and sweet things, doughnuts are my favourite,” she said.
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/world/1027360/woman-aims-to-become-worlds-fattest
Technically, those are not meat.
OK–here it is in a nut shell:
Vegetarians make the argument for their diet based on health/morality. A big problem is that becaise they think it’s moral, they look for reasons for it to be heathy.
Clearly we are omnivores. Is this groundbreaking? Is there anyone that disagrees? I would bet money that human bodies function better with small amounts of meat. I know of no true vegetarians myself–but perhaps that because I’m not an academic. There was one guy in my advanced Army training school who claimed to be, but ate bacon every chance he got. Other than that, he ate a lot of potato puffs and pie.
The body is very thrifty, it can get by on almost anything or nothing. I know my body will not function as well without meat–I’ve tried it. Many athletes have tried it and go back to meat.
So–the moral argument doesn’t hold up well because vegans can’t be consistant about the value of animal life: They kill insects without much thought.
The health benefits are at best, very debateable.
We should eat less of everything, especially junk food.
And again–tomorrow I’ll score in the 300th percentile on my PT test, I’ve eaten plenty of meat this month and have 8% bodyfat.
“Vegetarians make the argument for their diet based on health/morality. A big problem is that becaise they think it’s moral, they look for reasons for it to be heathy.”
Even if this were true, it would not apply to vegetarians who are not motivated by moral concerns. Also, whether it is healthy or not has no connection to their motivations (real or alleged). This is an empirical question and can thus be settled objectively.
Yes, we are omnivores. But, this does not entail that we need meat to be healthy. Again, this is an empirical question and can be tested scientifically. Naturally, appealing to anecdotes or a limited sample set (the people I or you know) would not be adequate.
It might not be that the body does not function as well without meat-it might be that it does not function well without certain nutrients and these nutrients might be available from non-meat sources.
>So–the moral argument doesn’t hold up well because vegans can’t be consistant about the value of animal life: They kill insects without much thought.nd again–tomorrow I’ll score in the 300th percentile on my PT test, I’ve eaten plenty of meat this month and have 8% bodyfat.<
But perhaps you'd score higher without meat. To assume that the meat is helping or not harming based on a sample of 1 would be a rather hasty generalization.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/15/us/15smell.html?hp
Excellent:
http://www.beyondveg.com/billings-t/comp-anat/comp-anat-9b.shtml
http://www.chetday.com/billings.html
Vegetarians are mean…
http://www.amazon.com/Vegetarian-Myth-Food-Justice-Sustainability/dp/1604860804?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1268894064&sr=1-1
“Real” is the preferred term.