I’m not really sure how I feel about intelligence relating to “deserving compassion.” I think high intelligence is an indicator of a complex brain system, and that it might indicate the ability to suffer ADDITIONALLY because it is able to perceive long term dread or hopelessness or something like that, but I think it’s perfectly possible to be stupid enough to keep touching a burning stove, yet still hurt every time, and it doesn’t mean that continuously, deliberately burning that entity is okay.
I’m not entirely sure what you mean by awareness. If the chicken honestly doesn’t even seem that bothered by the dog… well, I’m not sure what to think about that. But I’m also not sure how much I’d generalize from that one example either.
As far as intelligent animals go, however I will note that squid are not only pretty smart, but the manner in which they are caught (at least some of the time, haven’t done enough research yet to see whether there are other practices and how frequent they are) involves tricking them into wrapping their mouth around a series of barbs and then trapping them on it.
If anyone does know some specifics about the calamari industry I’d be curious. So far my google-fu hasn’t worked out that well.
In my moral calculus, intelligence is a necessary but not sufficient condition for deserving compassion or consideration. Other entities can have “derived” compassion if they are valued by those that I value.
I feel I should partially share the values of others, which usually includes valuing themselves. Entities that aren’t aware or intelligent enough to have even rudimentary goals or values don’t normally get my concern. An entity could also simply not value itself, but evolution doesn’t produce many of those, so I haven’t seen any.
That chicken was exceptionally stupid, but it was among dozens not much smarter. The example wasn’t intended to illustrate that memory is necessary for value...but evolution also doesn’t produce many intelligent entities that are unable to learn. Chickens seem very reflexive, and not at all self-aware to me. I’m not willing to bet my life on this, but I currently don’t care much for them. Maybe 20,000 chicken-years to each human-year.
I’ve never thought much about the moral value of cephalopods, but until I think more about it I won’t eat them. I don’t really enjoy eating them much anyway.
I’m not really sure how I feel about intelligence relating to “deserving compassion.” I think high intelligence is an indicator of a complex brain system, and that it might indicate the ability to suffer ADDITIONALLY because it is able to perceive long term dread or hopelessness or something like that, but I think it’s perfectly possible to be stupid enough to keep touching a burning stove, yet still hurt every time, and it doesn’t mean that continuously, deliberately burning that entity is okay.
I’m not entirely sure what you mean by awareness. If the chicken honestly doesn’t even seem that bothered by the dog… well, I’m not sure what to think about that. But I’m also not sure how much I’d generalize from that one example either.
As far as intelligent animals go, however I will note that squid are not only pretty smart, but the manner in which they are caught (at least some of the time, haven’t done enough research yet to see whether there are other practices and how frequent they are) involves tricking them into wrapping their mouth around a series of barbs and then trapping them on it.
If anyone does know some specifics about the calamari industry I’d be curious. So far my google-fu hasn’t worked out that well.
http://www.squidjig.com/commercialstylesquidjigs/coastalsquidjigs.htm
In my moral calculus, intelligence is a necessary but not sufficient condition for deserving compassion or consideration. Other entities can have “derived” compassion if they are valued by those that I value.
I feel I should partially share the values of others, which usually includes valuing themselves. Entities that aren’t aware or intelligent enough to have even rudimentary goals or values don’t normally get my concern. An entity could also simply not value itself, but evolution doesn’t produce many of those, so I haven’t seen any.
That chicken was exceptionally stupid, but it was among dozens not much smarter. The example wasn’t intended to illustrate that memory is necessary for value...but evolution also doesn’t produce many intelligent entities that are unable to learn. Chickens seem very reflexive, and not at all self-aware to me. I’m not willing to bet my life on this, but I currently don’t care much for them. Maybe 20,000 chicken-years to each human-year.
I’ve never thought much about the moral value of cephalopods, but until I think more about it I won’t eat them. I don’t really enjoy eating them much anyway.