If you wish to raise the moral considerations of eating meat as a topic, then do so (a) directly, (b) with a minimum of hostile social signals, and (c) in a new post. The impression I get from your comment is that it was optimized to maximize perceived hostility. It is also off-topic.
Rather than engaging in a merits-based discussion of the various claims you make about my post, I propose to assess those claims by means of an analogy. Suppose that a community relevantly similar to LW existed in the US two-hundred years ago, and that one of its members announced a meeting in which slaves would be in various ways exploited to benefit participants. Suppose further that in discussing this announcement someone made a brief critical comment noting the tension between the stated purpose and the actual practice of this imagined community. Suppose finally that this comment was met with much hostility from members of that community. Do you think a reply analogous to yours would be a proper justification of that hostile reaction?
Suppose that a community relevantly similar to LW existed in the US two-hundred years ago, and that one of its members announced a meeting in which slaves would be in various ways exploited to benefit participants.
No, no. If you want to make this comparison, the laws of narrative causality mean you have to set it in Berlin in 1938.
Do you think a reply analogous to yours would be a proper justification of that hostile reaction?
Yes, it would. In your analogy, your comment would have hindered the goal of promoting emancipation, not helped it. If you wish to change people’s minds, there are social rules which you must observe, and being on the right side of an argument does not excuse failing to follow them.
I disagree: much social progress was hindered precisely by observance of such social rules. It also seems to me that you and those who agree with your comment would not be so quick to condemn the social critic in my analogy if it had not been presented in the context of the present argument. It’s like those who are prepared to say that they would eat human babies and cognitively disabled people only because they would otherwise be forced to admit that their case for eating meat lacks consistency.
I disagree: much social progress was hindered precisely by observance of such social rules.
You have to make at least a little bit of an effort before you can play the help-help-I’m-being-repressed card. Write your arguments as an essay, polish it, and post it at the top level. You shouldn’t expect a serious debate on the Christmas party logistics thread.
I never attempted to play the “help-help-I’m-being-repressed card”, since I’m manifestly not being repressed. (It’s unclear to me why you actually thought that I was trying to play that card.) Nor did I “expect a serious debate” about the arguments against eating meat on this thread. As I have said already, I was instead simply noting an instance of how even members of a community organized around the goal of overcoming bias can themselves be blatantly biased against certain other beings.
As I have said already, I was instead simply noting an instance of how even members of a community organized around the goal of overcoming bias can themselves be blatantly biased against certain other beings.
I don’t think you’ve established that this is bias. First, clarify what you mean by “bias” — you seem to be using it more in the colloquial sense of prejudice, while here it’s used in a different and more technical sense. Do you claim that this is an instance of a particular cognitive bias, or that it is an unjustified prejudice (which, surely, should also be overcome) based on something like unconsidered anthropocentrism? If the latter, you need to specifically justify the implication that most non-vegetarians here haven’t actually thought about the morality of eating meat, and are just going by a default lack of concern for different-looking entities. (Do you think that many LWers would eat Yoda?) I suspect that many among us (as in Kevin’s comment below) have considered the question much more deeply than John Q. Omnivore has.
Or if you simply want to argue that their moral reasoning is faulty or based on false factual beliefs, just say that, and say how; that’s much more useful then a blanket accusation of “bias”. (In general, it’s bad argument to tell people that they’re being “biased” or “irrational”, particularly on a site where everyone is well-acquainted with the more obvious and/or well-documented forms of systematic irrationality. It’s too fully general. If someone is wrong, stay at the object level and just tell them what they’re wrong about and what you think you know that you think they don’t know.)
You’re underestimating how seriously many of us have taken our decisions to be meat eaters. All the animal suffering is not something I take that lightly.
Indeed. I prefer organic free range as much for its effect on my own health as for the ethical issues of how animals should be treated.
Some meat eaters (unfortunately I’m not one of them, as I can’t always afford free range) are responsible for less animal cruelty than many vegetarians. The state of typical egg farms is horrible.
This is really off-topic, but I just wanted to say I agree with your comments about eggs. Indeed, according to Alan Dawrst’s estimates, consumption of eggs produces much more suffering than does consumption of any animal product other than fish.
That said, the main objection I have against consuming such products is not the suffering caused by consumption, but the promotion of the meme that non-human animal suffering doesn’t matter, or matters less, than human suffering does. I believe this is also Alan’s position.
If you wish to raise the moral considerations of eating meat as a topic, then do so (a) directly, (b) with a minimum of hostile social signals, and (c) in a new post. The impression I get from your comment is that it was optimized to maximize perceived hostility. It is also off-topic.
Rather than engaging in a merits-based discussion of the various claims you make about my post, I propose to assess those claims by means of an analogy. Suppose that a community relevantly similar to LW existed in the US two-hundred years ago, and that one of its members announced a meeting in which slaves would be in various ways exploited to benefit participants. Suppose further that in discussing this announcement someone made a brief critical comment noting the tension between the stated purpose and the actual practice of this imagined community. Suppose finally that this comment was met with much hostility from members of that community. Do you think a reply analogous to yours would be a proper justification of that hostile reaction?
No, no. If you want to make this comparison, the laws of narrative causality mean you have to set it in Berlin in 1938.
Yes, it would. In your analogy, your comment would have hindered the goal of promoting emancipation, not helped it. If you wish to change people’s minds, there are social rules which you must observe, and being on the right side of an argument does not excuse failing to follow them.
I disagree: much social progress was hindered precisely by observance of such social rules. It also seems to me that you and those who agree with your comment would not be so quick to condemn the social critic in my analogy if it had not been presented in the context of the present argument. It’s like those who are prepared to say that they would eat human babies and cognitively disabled people only because they would otherwise be forced to admit that their case for eating meat lacks consistency.
You have to make at least a little bit of an effort before you can play the help-help-I’m-being-repressed card. Write your arguments as an essay, polish it, and post it at the top level. You shouldn’t expect a serious debate on the Christmas party logistics thread.
I never attempted to play the “help-help-I’m-being-repressed card”, since I’m manifestly not being repressed. (It’s unclear to me why you actually thought that I was trying to play that card.) Nor did I “expect a serious debate” about the arguments against eating meat on this thread. As I have said already, I was instead simply noting an instance of how even members of a community organized around the goal of overcoming bias can themselves be blatantly biased against certain other beings.
I don’t think you’ve established that this is bias. First, clarify what you mean by “bias” — you seem to be using it more in the colloquial sense of prejudice, while here it’s used in a different and more technical sense. Do you claim that this is an instance of a particular cognitive bias, or that it is an unjustified prejudice (which, surely, should also be overcome) based on something like unconsidered anthropocentrism? If the latter, you need to specifically justify the implication that most non-vegetarians here haven’t actually thought about the morality of eating meat, and are just going by a default lack of concern for different-looking entities. (Do you think that many LWers would eat Yoda?) I suspect that many among us (as in Kevin’s comment below) have considered the question much more deeply than John Q. Omnivore has.
Or if you simply want to argue that their moral reasoning is faulty or based on false factual beliefs, just say that, and say how; that’s much more useful then a blanket accusation of “bias”. (In general, it’s bad argument to tell people that they’re being “biased” or “irrational”, particularly on a site where everyone is well-acquainted with the more obvious and/or well-documented forms of systematic irrationality. It’s too fully general. If someone is wrong, stay at the object level and just tell them what they’re wrong about and what you think you know that you think they don’t know.)
You’re underestimating how seriously many of us have taken our decisions to be meat eaters. All the animal suffering is not something I take that lightly.
I for one seriously like bacon. Mmm. Crispy, salty, fatty deliciousness.
Me too, but I am a vegetarian anyhow, since the age of 13. I’ll get back to bacon once in vitro meat is becoming commercially obtainable.
Indeed. I prefer organic free range as much for its effect on my own health as for the ethical issues of how animals should be treated.
Some meat eaters (unfortunately I’m not one of them, as I can’t always afford free range) are responsible for less animal cruelty than many vegetarians. The state of typical egg farms is horrible.
This is really off-topic, but I just wanted to say I agree with your comments about eggs. Indeed, according to Alan Dawrst’s estimates, consumption of eggs produces much more suffering than does consumption of any animal product other than fish.
That said, the main objection I have against consuming such products is not the suffering caused by consumption, but the promotion of the meme that non-human animal suffering doesn’t matter, or matters less, than human suffering does. I believe this is also Alan’s position.