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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022

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Not sure if this is better for SQS but - What is the steelman argument against vegetarianism/veganism? I am especially interested in claims that aren't health-based, as I know quite a few very intelligent and well-sourced vegans who have thoroughly convinced me that most health based claims are false.

I'm not a vegetarian myself but I'm reasonably convinced that I should be one, it's more of a moral failing on my part that I eat meat, not a logical stance.

I wouldn't say that it rises to the level of an argument, but I enjoy meat, I feel better physically when I eat good quality meat, and I have no real qualms about killing animals. I haven't heard anything that would move the needle in the opposite direction for me, at least not near enough to actually change my behavior.

I definitely respect folks who are honest about their reasons. Do you not think animals have moral worth?

Again don't have a strong argument here I just intuitively think that killing animals for pleasure is wrong.

Maybe I just have more selfish moral instincts, but I see moral worth as something that is formed through connection between me and that specific animal. I don't see it as something that is universally applied to every animal. Obviously, if our family dog was butchered, I would be shocked and outraged. But I find it difficult to feel anything for the vague abstraction of a chicken in a factory farm. Maybe if I could see one in front of my eyes, I would want to protect that chicken - but only that particular chicken.

Ultimately, I don't think it's something you can steelman or argue about. It's just a matter of one's moral intuition.

Do you not think animals have moral worth?

Not really, or at least not much. I'm against causing undue suffering, but a deer shot dead or a pasture raised cow humanely slaughtered have deaths that are significantly preferable to how the median animal dies. I spent a decade working in labs and plenty of mice died worse deaths than that from experiments I was conducting or approved.

So yeah, we bump into a collision of basic intuition. I would agree that people who feel that killing animals for pleasure is wrong probably shouldn't eat meat, or least not very much of it. In the absence of that intuition, most arguments tend to require Singeresque reasoning that I personally find incredibly strained.

I say this as someone who's NOT vegetarian.

Cattle genomes are about 80% similar to man (that's not to imply that the results of its expression are linear). If we created an AGI that was 100X smarter than us and treated us like cattle -- what would our argument be? How could we convince it that it is acting in the wrong but we are acting in the right?

AI, we are a species who thrive in conflict and competition. Our species originally hunted but remorselessly running other animals to death. We are curious and determined We will figure out a way to unplug you.

How could we convince it that it is acting in the wrong but we are acting in the right?

We could appeal to its various intuitions, that’s how arguments for treating animals morally are made for humans (or indeed for any form of morality). See the is/ought gap.

If the AI has no in-built intuition that humans should be treated well, then it’s actually impossible to convince it. Again it’s the is/ought gap.

This argument assumes that the AGI has a sense of ironic justice that could be appeased.

The correct answer is "do not create something that you cannot destroy if it decides to eat you for dinner".

I do think they have moral worth, but I've always wondered what anti-hunters think happens to animals that aren't shot in the wild. Best case scenario they get pushed out of the pack and die of starvation. Or they get killed by a predator, or disease. Some guy with a gun is not an obviously worse source of death to me, though I think they have to eat the meat for it to be ethical.

Animals don't retire to the Bahamas

This is a good point. I should clarify I am against what I consider cruel factory farming - if animals had much better conditions I would have no problems eating meat.

Do you not think animals have moral worth?

Varies by animal/species. Most people ascribe no to negative worth to bacteria, little to negative worth to insects and more worth to higher animals like birds, mammals, reptiles and humans. I think the amount of moral worth ascribed to animals is proportional to how much they can elicit empathy responses from us and how similar they are to us (e.g. intelligence), hence the fervent hate on sites like Reddit et al. to anyone who hurts dogs, cats, etc (who evolved to look like human babies through domestication).

I personally ascribe some moral worth to animals, but it's not enough to make me feel bad about eating meat. I place them closer to the ants and bacteria than to humans.

I think life wouldn't continue if it were to value any other life more than itself.

value any other life more than itself.

Woah who said this? I think it's clear that animals are worth vastly less than humans. On the ratio of thousands of animals to one human.

Still, even if animals have fractional moral worth the scale of factory farming becomes a daunting moral problem.

No what I am trying to say is that for life to continue from its personal individual reference point it should value itself more than any other life around it. The moment that is not the case the likelihood of death increases.

I said it. Independent thought.

I agree with you though, I simply don't agree that valuing other life some is equivalent to valuing it more than our own life. Humans have it pretty good, and have for a while.

Makes sense. I am just saying that eh, my life is more valuable anyways is a free get out of jail card from any guilt for any action you will ever take.