If you’re interested in a double crux, here’s my half; if a majority of humans preferred not existing in the first place vs existing and having their lives cut short, then I would update strongly away from wanting farm animals being properly (that is, given enough space and exercise and food before being humanely killed) raised for meat. (I’d rather ask cows, but they’re incapable of properly answering the question. [citation needed]) Alternately, if I found out that the animals I thought were having decent lives were in fact suffering badly for most of their lives, I would update towards either wanting more care taken or towards sufficiently good lives not being something we could provide to them. Either of these would cause me to decrease the amount of meat I consume, possibly cutting it out entirely.
I will say that the latter would probably require a high level of evidence- I’m not talking about the median farm in a study I’ve read, I’m talking about a decade spent working as a hand on one of the farms I buy from now. If those animals were generally suffering, then I am completely incapable of determining whether a non-human animal is suffering.
If you found out that people generally want to have lived rather than not have lived, and also that you could purchase meat from animals that had lived generally happy lives, would you start eating some meat?
If you’re interested in a double crux, here’s my half; if a majority of humans preferred not existing in the first place vs existing and having their lives cut short, then I would update strongly away from wanting farm animals being properly (that is, given enough space and exercise and food before being humanely killed) raised for meat. (I’d rather ask cows, but they’re incapable of properly answering the question. [citation needed]) Alternately, if I found out that the animals I thought were having decent lives were in fact suffering badly for most of their lives, I would update towards either wanting more care taken or towards sufficiently good lives not being something we could provide to them. Either of these would cause me to decrease the amount of meat I consume, possibly cutting it out entirely.
I will say that the latter would probably require a high level of evidence- I’m not talking about the median farm in a study I’ve read, I’m talking about a decade spent working as a hand on one of the farms I buy from now. If those animals were generally suffering, then I am completely incapable of determining whether a non-human animal is suffering.
If you found out that people generally want to have lived rather than not have lived, and also that you could purchase meat from animals that had lived generally happy lives, would you start eating some meat?