Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Sam Harris on the ethics of Meat
I'm a fan of Sam Harris, generally. But despite the fact that he comes to what I feel is the correct conclusion, his thinking seems pretty muddled.
Two points stood out: He says that 'as soon as there is an alternative' to killing animals for food, it will no longer be ok. In other words, eventually we'll have synthetic meat, and then we won't need to kill. But in reality, well managed vegetarian and vegan diets are healthier than meat-based diets. Harris should probably have put in a little more effort into his own vegetarianism.
Second, citing Peter Singer, he says it's not ok to deligate the killing of animals to others. I'm not sure if this is what he meant, but it sounded as if he was implying that what is wrong is the act of deligating something you find repulsive, and not the actual act (for example, then hunting, or raising livestock might be ok if you thought so).
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I think he's saying that not only is it wrong to kill animals, but it's also wrong if I have someone do it for me. Like hiring a hit man to kill someone, I may not have pulled the trigger, but I am still culpable for the crime. I think it goes without saying that the act itself is also wrong, not just the delegation.
ReplyDeleteSeems to me his position is consistent.
I suppose so. I guess he eats meat out of lazyness, then?
ReplyDeleteNot laziness, Sam says early in the video he was a vegetarian for six years but because of his active lifestyle, he wasn't getting enough protein from a veggie diet. He began feeling "better" when he started eating meat again.
ReplyDeleteNow you may disagree and say you feel fine from a veggie diet, but maybe some people need more animal protein than others. I think it's open for debate.
Following the logic of HerbNBrew, I could say I do not feel fine from a veggie diet; in fact, I do not feel fine from simply adding animal protein. What I need and crave and of course eat, because it makes me feel fine, is animal protein of the human variety. Now Herb may feel fine from eating other animal species, but maybe some people need more human flesh than others. I think it's open for debate. DM
ReplyDeleteConsuming human flesh is not required to live healthy although there is evidence for the need of humans to consume animals fats and protein. Also, I don't equate human and animal life on an equal level, not to say animals should suffer unnecessary cruelty. While amusing, I don't think your extended logic completely follows Anon.
ReplyDeleteI don't think i'll convince you H$B but there is not much you can get from animals that you can't get from plants; and usually, the plant version is better.
ReplyDeleteConsuming animal flesh is not required to live a healthy life (undisputed medical fact), although there is evidence for the need of humans to consume animal fats and proteins because their daddies and mommies did it too. Similarly, female circumcism is not required in order for a female to be healthy; however, in countries where the daddies and mommies of many generations did it to their girl-children, it must be right.
ReplyDeleteSince it is not necessary for HerbNBrew to eat pork, I would suggest that he consider the lot of the pig: unanaesthetized castration, dental mutilation, horrendous confinement, terrifying transportation and the final lovely experience in the abatoir amid the squeals and screams of the dying. Does not that make it wrong morally for you to eat bacon? All that suffering so that you and your family casn enjoy the time-honored tradition of bacon (or ham) and eggs in the morning with your steaming hot pot of coffee and your homemade jams.
A final note: I consider the life of my wonderful dog quite on an equal to many humans I know. In fact, she is superior to many (take the carming Russel Williams).
My extended logic holds and flows, except for those who put up a dam to its flow and refuse to permit the questioning of our tradtions. DM
I would eat anonymous' dog and it would make me stronger than a God. Undisputed fact.
ReplyDeleteI quite liked Johnson's terseness of phrase, with its touch of poetry. Certainly I know it is true that the testicles of lions are desired in some cultures as empowerering men who eat them (you men are an odd lot, really!), and I know that in Korea it is customary to beat a dog almost to death so that the hormone adrenaline (and others) will be infused throughout the flesh of the animal (so it is believed). After slaughtering and eating the dog, its flesh will make you very strong - so the tradition says. I guess this is what Johnson was talking about when he said he would eat my dog and it would make him stronger than a God. Nice, Johnson. Real real nice. DM
ReplyDelete@DM: I'm not so sure this is an "undisputed medical fact", after all, Sam Harris claimed to feel better by going back to meat, so was he just doing something wrong as a vegan? Or maybe his body was telling him something?
ReplyDeleteAlso, I never made an appeal to tradition, so I'm not sure where you're getting the idea I'm not willing to question our traditions. In fact, I'm sure most vegans were meat eaters once.
And I am not in favor of animal cruelty. All those things you describe are horrible. My family and I eat locally produced meat from animals that actually get to walk around outside and graze on real grass, not fed with corn and anti-biotics. Factory farming is a problem for sure.
On a final curious note, how do you justify owning a pet dog? Is this not slavery? Sure he gets belly rubs, love and attention, but is it not an immoral position for you gain pleasure from the ownership of another animal? Seems like an inconsistent position.
DM: Healthier without meat? Don't you know that meat was central to human evolution, and that people are omnivores. Humans need iron, and b12, and all the amino acids and proteins that are found in animal flesh.
ReplyDeleteAnon2: Uh... you can get all that stuff from plants. Proteins and iron are found in beans, nuts, legumes; various seeds and grains. B12 is naturally occuring in organic soil - where do you think the animals get it to begin with. Stop getting your nutrition through an intermediary!
ReplyDeleteHnB: there is no nutrient that humans need that is found in animals but not in some plant.
Do you really think that there is such thing as humane slaughter? Do you also believe in humane rape? It's highly inconsistent to say: "well cruelty is wrong, but slaughter for my own pleasure is ok. After all, we fed the cow grass."
HerbNBrew, I have a few points to contest with you, since you clearly need a little bit of guidance on this matter. As AM writes, plant nutrition provides everything (except B12) a human requires to live a long, healthy, and disease-free life.(Vitamin B-12 was once in the soil and we could get it from eating plants; poor soil management has recently minimized its presence). Sam's anecdotal craving for animal protein proves nothing about anything. Perhaps he was being excessively sedentary (people who are sedentary never feel very well); perhaps his vegan girlfriend left him in the lurch; perhaps he is a fat-a-holic of the animal flesh kind - only that greasy gravy dripping in (free-range) beef fat will satisfy...Truth of the matter is, he has no moral fiber. He CAN live without destroying another's life, and so can you. And so can I. And I think we should. Is this not the scene of the mythological garden of eden, where the lamb can lay down with the human without fear of being slaughtered in six months (the time when humans typically like to butcher their lamb, for profit of course). I do not have to kill or have anything killed in order to enjoy my life. Do you? DM
ReplyDeleteAll those things can be found in plants, but the truth is, you generally have to eat a ton of those plants to get the same health benefits that you would by eating a comparatively small portion of meat.
ReplyDeleteMost cuts of meat contain about 7 grams of protein per ounce. To get similar protein from a vegetarian diet, you'd need to eat about two cups of quinoa, or two whole potatoes, half a cup of kidney beans, etc etc.
Certainly, the current mainstream methods of farming and slaughtering animals is unethical, but from a strictly scientific point of view (ignoring ethics--and also ignoring the amount of hormones that are pumped into factory farmed meat), clearly humans are still genetically predisposed to eat meat. It is the most readily available and convenient source of things we need in our diets.
So, I guess I fall on the laziness side of things. I know the methods used to obtain it are wrong, but 'd much rather eat a steak than a plate full of plants and grains.
Plus, as much as I loathe supporting factory farming, ultimately it is hard to argue with a thick-cut medium rare steak and a glass of red wine or a cold beer.
The Keg. See you tonight.
Johnson: I think you may be mistaking high protein content for health benefits. I completely agree that meat has tons of protein, but normal servings of a veggy diet give you more than sufficient levels of protein and tons of other great stuff as well, sans needless killing. That humans eat meat is a sociological and historical fact, but just like religion and other venerable yet harmful traditions, we'd be better off with out it.
ReplyDeleteYou can't leap to the conclusion that because it is contributing to unethical treatment of animals we are therefore better off without it.
ReplyDeleteHaving a ready supply of protein is a health benefit. Protein is what builds and repairs tissues--as was noted above, it is the building block of life.
You'll get no argument from me about the uselessness of religion, but the comparison is hardly apt. We evolved eating other living things. Religion springs from an attempt to explain the natural world. We can now happily discard religion and I'd argue we'd benefit greatly. I'm not so convinced the same can be said of consuming meat.
For the sake of argument, let's assemble two armies, one of vegetarians and one of omnivores. We'll have them compete in a series of tasks, both mental and physical, and we'll solve the question of comparable dietary benefits once and for all.
Next Saturday work for you?
f there were no supply of readily avaliable nuts, legumes, seeds, beans, and grains that contain more that enough good amino acids and proteins to keep you healthy on a plant-based diet, then we would agree on the need to kill for food, on occasion. Yet we live in a world where these natural plant proteins are plentiful, and so it is hard to excuse killing.
ReplyDeleteNext Saturday works. How is 2:00? The soldiers of veggy army will briefly stray their principles of to feast on the flesh of your overfed, omnivore rank and file. Whoops, I misread 'series of tasks' as 'machete death match.' I still accept.
And we'll have no moral qualms about devouring the protein-rich, grain-fed flesh of your fallen skinny nerd army.
ReplyDeleteMachete Death Match actually will be one of the tasks. But it's a super fun board game from Mayfair Games, makers of Settlers of Catan! See you on Saturday!
I totally agree with AM and not a whit with Johnson. (People running and winning marathons are vegans - all sorts of athletes from every sport have embraced the cruelty-free eating lifestyle). The Great American Agribusiness Corporate Myth is that we must ingest HUGE quantities of protein, specifically that from the flesh of animals, to be healthy and strong. Scientific studies (and there are many, but I will mention specifically the most well-known in recent years, that of The China Study) demonstrate that the higher the quantities of animal protein ingested, the higher the risk (in a very significant way) of cancer developing and growing in those human carnivores who revel in the taste of blood in their mouths and then suffer the sad consequences of putrefying flesh in their colons (leading to colon cancer of course); eventually this blood and animal flesh lust kills the unhappy being who is consuming said animal flesh. Please note, HerbNBrew and Johnson, high intake of protein is linked to kidney failure and other serious disorders. Non-animal protein sources do not cause the same problems in humans.
ReplyDeleteAs to Sam Harris, whoever the heck he is, all I can say is, well, simply put, the man talks with a complete lack of logic in so many instances that I almost felt sorry for him. He must lay awake at night embarrassed that he made such a colossol fool of himself publically. I have to say, Johnson and HerbNBrew did a better job than Sam - but only because they are more articulate and clearly more intelligent. It is very frightening for the animals when intelligent people cannot realize how wrong it is that animals are used as products to be enjoyed over a cold beer.
I am with Johnson and HerbnBrew. Humans EVOLVED to eat meat. Sorry. Fact. The problem is people in the west eat way the f' too much meat. So sure, Anon9:10, that's what probably causes cancer. Eat less, eat better. Eat more veggies. But eating meat is natural and our bodies have evolved that way. Look at human incisors! We're not chewing carrots with those.
ReplyDeleteHM
Just to defend Sam, I am familiar with his work on atheism and he is a smart, and reasoned individual IMO. He does have some moral fiber.
ReplyDeleteI am aware of the health consequences of eating too much meat, or sugar, or salt or really too much of anything for that matter. A balanced diet is of course ideal.
As to your point about big Agri business, I totally agree! I am not in favor of them manipulating the health department or making it seem bacon and cheese are required in every meal for health living.
As for humane slaughter, its difficult. Is war a form of humane slaughter?
Draining the animal of blood while still alive I don't agree with, as this is completely unnecessary, unless you need to please Jehovah. Maybe slaughter is slaughter no matter how you slice it (bad pun), but there is no need to be cruel unnecessarily.
AM: Did you know your coffee table was once a tree that housed an owl or some other animal? By buying a wood product, you are supporting deforestation and killing wildlife habitats. So you are indirectly killing animals so that you have nice coffee table you can put your feet up on. Is this morally justified for you when there are alternatives?
Careful which way you swing that mirror.
Wow, massive beat down from Anon9:10!
ReplyDeleteto Anon 10:08: I wouldn't use evolution to prescribe, only describe. War, rape, and ethnic cleansing were all part of human evolution. Just because things happen doesn't mean that they are are "right." I would put meat eating in this category. In the state of nature, life is nasty brutish and short; people ate meat to avoid starvation and because it was efficient in that context. The context has changed.
As for the Owl in the tree, HnB, you make a good point. All of our houses were built in woods that once housed animals. I think we're allowed to compete for resources.
If it can be excused to kill habitats so that we can live in warm and comfy homes when there are alternatives, (you could live in a tipi) then I can be excused for eating the animal without destroying his home. We're both competing for resources and we go for the easiest ones. If you can accept your position as being immoral, then I guess I can accept mine as the same.
ReplyDeleteGood point: I do have difficulty drawing the line. I'd like to get the opinion of an 'abolitionist' on this. Maybe everyone gets to choose their own level of hypocrisy?
ReplyDelete