4 ms·

This is probably gonna sound a bit dystopian, but would you eat beef if we eliminated suffering with CRISPR? I don't get to talk to a lot of vegetarians/vegans

• bigDinosaur 4y ago
  I don't know. My moral intitutions and reasoning fall apart if you remove suffering from the equation. By that logic it would also be okay to farm and eat humans if we eliminated their ability to suffer using CRISPR. What would you think of that? I don't even know where to start.
  • genousti 4y ago
    • ben_w 4y ago
      First, poor argument: https://thenib.com/mister-gotcha/ https://thenib.com/mister-gotcha/ Second, Apple is actually trying to make sure that doesn’t happen: https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple-Combat-Human-Trafficking-and-Slavery-in-Supply-Chain-2020.pdf https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple-Comb...
    • bigDinosaur 4y ago
      That'd be an okay but irrelevant to meat eating point if I was against supply chain transparency and stopping slavery. I am very much happy to see anyone who has enslaved anyone going to prison for the rest of their life though, and I'm very happy for companies to find alternative sources to warlords and corrupt banana republics.
    • lopis 4y ago
      > Yet u write this probably on an iphone or whatever computer where rate minerals where harvested by slaves who died doing so. This is the lowest effort meme argument commonly found in any animal rights discussions. Yes there are problems in the world. My choice of phone makes barely any difference ethically; thus I must leave society behind, lest im banned from arguing about anything at all? No, you evaluate what you have power over and act accordingly. I have access to all my nutrition in plat based food, so that's what I eat. I can afford and am able to use a Fairphone, so I do that. Defeatist comments like yours don't drive discussion nor help anyone, but those too lazy or accommodated to re-evaluate their impact on the world.
• Timwi 4y ago
  I would, but I think the premise is unrealistic. The term “suffering” itself is pretty vague and undefined. You might be thinking of just removing pain receptors in the brain or something, but there are many more sources of suffering than just pain.
• lopis 4y ago
  If you invent an animal that is designed to grow muscle tissue for harvesting and isn't sentient nor suffers, you've solved lab meat, in an organic container. While many vegns grew a distaste for meat, that would indeed satisfy the vegan principle of eliminating suffering. However, the reason farm animals are so cheap is because they are conscious, autonomous meat machines that you can order around easily. * You do enter into another question here about whether brain dead or deeply disabled people are ethical to be eaten. Most people would say no.
  • iamacyborg 4y ago
    I think your latter point is a bit different to the topic at hand. Cannibalism isn’t widely seen as distasteful because of the suffering involved, but because you're eating people. Maybe a better question would be around eating dog, dolphin or to a lesser extent, horse meat.
    • rhn_mk1 4y ago
      Or the inverse: turning the brain dead into animal feed or fertilizer. Closer to home: donating them to research/organ donation before they formally die.
• imtringued 4y ago
  Sorry, nobody is going to eat your meat eggs :P