I should add that, of the two points I asked you to take for granted when answering (animal welfare matters a lot; and animal agriculture is overwhelmingly net-negative for animal welfare), only the first is completely pointless to discuss, because it’s a question of ground-level values.
The effect of animal agriculture on animal welfare is partly an empirical question, so if you have any surprising facts to offer, I’d like to hear them. What I think would be a waste of time is arguing over how bad some type of life is (e.g. being a pig in an intensive farm) where we both agree on the observable facts.
I can’t imagine being convinced that animal agriculture, taken as a whole, is not overwhelmingly negative for animal welfare, but I can imagine being convinced that there are sufficiently numerous and discoverable exceptions that it is okay/good to eat certain kinds of animal product from certain sources.
In fact, I already know there are some small-scale dairy farms that seem genuinely committed to giving their cows a decent life, and I expect that some of them do a pretty good job of if. Specific recommendations, or arguments that humane animal agriculture (or humane commercial hunting of wild animals) is more common than I think, are welcome.
I should add that, of the two points I asked you to take for granted when answering (animal welfare matters a lot; and animal agriculture is overwhelmingly net-negative for animal welfare), only the first is completely pointless to discuss, because it’s a question of ground-level values.
The effect of animal agriculture on animal welfare is partly an empirical question, so if you have any surprising facts to offer, I’d like to hear them. What I think would be a waste of time is arguing over how bad some type of life is (e.g. being a pig in an intensive farm) where we both agree on the observable facts.
I can’t imagine being convinced that animal agriculture, taken as a whole, is not overwhelmingly negative for animal welfare, but I can imagine being convinced that there are sufficiently numerous and discoverable exceptions that it is okay/good to eat certain kinds of animal product from certain sources.
In fact, I already know there are some small-scale dairy farms that seem genuinely committed to giving their cows a decent life, and I expect that some of them do a pretty good job of if. Specific recommendations, or arguments that humane animal agriculture (or humane commercial hunting of wild animals) is more common than I think, are welcome.