RE: Peter Singer - The Genius of Darwin: The Uncut Interviews - Richard Dawkins

[mellamosean]

@WalksWithoutGod

I am one of the so-called ethical vegans you speak of. First of all, you mention that non-human animals show no empathy for their prey, and you think this is somehow related to the question of whether or not it is moral to kill animals for food. Please explain the logical relation. It seems you're using a "it's moral because it's natural" argument. Rape, infanticide, and (animal version of) homicide also occur in nature. Is that defense of those acts?

[mellamosean]

@WalksWithoutGod

Now, the point you brought up about growing meat in a laboratory. I have heard of and considered this, and my conclusion is that there is nothing morally objectionable about it. Try not to get hung-up on the irrationalities of individuals. In fact, I think you'll find a higher percentage of non-vegans who would oppose the idea of "growing" meat. I don't have the facts on nutrition, I'll leave that alone.

[mellamosean]

@WalksWithoutGod

So to sum it up.

1. vegans get more respect than they deserve ---that's simply not an argument whatsoever.

2. Abstracting moral values from the behaviors of other animals leads to the conclusion rape is acceptable.

3. (accidental) strawman

Your only real argument is the 2nd one, and I'd be happy to go into further detail about why I think it's fallacious. Btw, I respect you for putting your opinion out knowing you would get a lot of flak.

[NEUHEITEN100]

it obvious that u dont come from a scientific backround.. ur arguments r weak..

besides its really exhausting to watch this video.. u should think of what u wanna say before u switch on the camera nor after.. maybe make some notes..

1. I can give u way more examples for pro veganism than u gatherd.. olympic athlets who won medals live vegan for decades. hunderts of great physicians who promote veganism.

2. The production af meat and dairy is the main reason for environmental polution, ...

[NEUHEITEN100]

@NEUHEITEN100 .. deforestation and global warming. There is enough plant food produced to feed 13billion people but we use most of that food for life stock. Thats insane in a world where 40.000 children r starving every day. Since millions of people have proven that veganism is a completly healthy way of life its not them who r arrogant, but the omnivores.

Humans left the path of nature long time ago, its just stupid to compare our actions with them of a meat eater and say they r seciesist as

[NEUHEITEN100]

@NEUHEITEN100 well. Try this: under lions its the males that eat first than the women, so its sexist for a man to share his food with a woman.

I never meet a vegetarian who is against lab-meat. PETA even offers 1.000.000 dollar to the company that brings lab meat on the market till 2012.

I guess id try it, but actually i dont have any desire for meat.

3. Because meat production is the least necessarely but most harmfull issiue, we need to start there..

excuse my english, its not my1thlanguage

[richsmith2005]

It’s a well established fact that people who avoid meat have lower body mass index than those following an average western diet and from this follows lower death rates from heart disease, lower cholesterol, lower blood pressure and lower rates of type 2 diabetes, and various forms of cancer.

Bad diet is bad diet, wether vegan or otherwise.

[otonanoC]

Dear WalksWithoutGod,

Did you even watch the interview?

Peter Singer does not promote veganism. They talked at length about shellfish and fish and their nervous systems. Singer himself probably drinks organic whole milk. You dun goofed!

[ayesha080]

Oh and stupid me forgot to mention, I was a vegetarian for the first 10 years of my life (meaning I was born vegetarian) and now I've been vegan for 10 years.

[ayesha080]

Is this a joke? Do you know more than half of India's population is vegetarian/vegan? The babies who are vegetarian/vegan there aren't dying of malnutrition, they are being fed what they're SUPPOSE to, their mother's breast milk! Not some abused cow's milk.

[Technocratic]

The only objection I can see to lab grown meat would be the practicality of creating it. How much would it cost, and therefore, how efficient would it be to satisfy nutritional requirements compared to other ways to spend that money/resources.

Singer is not saying specisism is treating non-human animals differently. Speciesism is dismissing the interests of other animals just because they aren't human.

[Technocratic]

The essence of speciesism, according to the video, s essentially that it's wrong to dismiss the interests of non-humans specifically because they aren't human.

Some people just can't plan diets properly, regardless of the type. A vegetarian diet is harder to plan, and probably for that reason, may lead to problems.

[tejasgokhale01]

point3: I am all for lab meat if it is not going to cause harm to animals or promote unnecessary breeding of animals.

point4:If you think we are all equal why is cannibalism frowned upon where as meat eating not? If you really saw the video you should have got this point.

[tejasgokhale01]

point2: Reducing cruelty to non-humans does not make us different. We also strive to reduce cruelty to humans caused by other humans and/or animals. Similarly we try and reduce cruelty to animals.

We are different than other non humans in the aspect that we intelligent to think about pleasure and pain. So animals kill each other but murder is a crime in human world. So we are different than animals but there are still basic common factors which cannot be ignored just for our own pleasure.

[tejasgokhale01]

I can give contact details of all of us plus at least 100 vegetarians for whole of their lives. Plus there are about 300 million vegetarians in India.

[tejasgokhale01]

point 1.I am vegetarian since birth. My family, extended family, all my relatives have been vegetarians since birth. If I trace back my ancestors at least 3-400 yrs back most of them were vegetarian for whole of their lives(I can say that because it was religious for them).My paternal grandfather died at 72, maternal grand father at 80, maternal grandmother at 75 and paternal grandmother is still alive at 90 all of whom were/is vegetarians for whole life.

[magnusjsolberg]

It really is not a tough subject. You just don't understand it, or so it seems. Killer whales can't survive eating only plant life. We can, though it may require some planning. Nor do killer whales have the intellectual capacity to evaluate their eating habits. This is obvious. For your next videos, write down your arguments beforehand, so you don't use 90% of the video stuttering and not really making any points. The thing that's hard about it, is actually not eating meat. Meat is delicious.

[newmexicoflygirl]

What in the world is this guy trying to say????

[mindprism]

'artificially chicken flavored soy patties' and lab grown meat are a lot like kiddie porn (say lolicon) to the moral vegan. Thats because this is religious, not strictly moral.

They hate the idea, not the actuality.

[OrderoftheWhiteHand]

I am a vegetarian and I am healthy :). I think people should do what they can. Also, you seem to be implying that Dr. Singer is for a bunch of new age nonsense. He is not and he never advocates starving children.

[ANTkiller2k]

There are plenty of sources of B12, vitamin D and proteins.

I eat meat but it is totally unnecessary in my or anybodies diet.

The problem isn't vegetarianism cant be healthy, it is the lack of knowledge in

administering of this style of diet because our delivery systems (common cooking)

have been geared towards meat consumption for thousands

of years. Can we make hydrogen and electric cars? Yes ... But most of us are familiar with fuel injectors cause thats what we've been given.

[skittle1971]

I believe in lab grown meat, as does Singer, but, a true vegan CAN raise children without health issues (if properly educated). You are making a good point and I agree with a lot of what you say, but in order to provide meat (and cheap meat at that) animals do suffer. If humans can create so many technological 'toys' then we should also be able to create a way of eating that does not cause animals to suffer as they do for our consumption.

[tubeyoube66]

what a shit video. If you dont understand it then dont talk about it. I dont have time to watch you stutter and gather your thoughts then make shitty conclutions.

[tubeyoube66]

what a shit video. If you dont understand it then dont talk about it. I dont have time to watch you stutter and gather your thoughts then make shitty conclutions.

[Baratgab]

"It is the position of the American Dietetic Association that appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. Well-planned vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence, and for athletes. ..."

[mischachiaro]

Saying that we should treat animals differently is speciecist? Do you know what speciecism is? Why is it?

[stephenblackman2003a]

We dont stop being ethical because we find that some human beings are psychopaths (some of them are biologically so predisposed). You say it is because we are different from (I presume you mean more rational than) animals that we are able to cause less suffering. You have to keep in mind that we are also able to cause more suffering because of our rationality.

[VeganTruth]

thats not evidence that the diet is bad. Its just evidence that some people dont know how to eat properly. Ive been vegan for 7 years, and meat free for 14 years. i know lots of vegans who bring up there children vegan with no health problems. You can always find bad stories and point fingers at it as proof... however you have to look at all the healthy vegans and wonder.

More omnivores die each year due to malnutrition.

[rodrigoferrarinunes]

@VeganTruth - It's baffling someone would like to eat "lab meat" instead of growing vegetables themselves, and learn about 'nutrition' by looking at all the variation of nutrients that exists in vegetables. And, he forgot to wonder: "how did they get to have about a billion people in India on a vegetarian diets"? If you only eat potato, of course you will die of malnutrition. Pythagoras, who was quite important, was vegetarian (w/ reason): just google 'Pythagoras vegetarian'

[FIGHTFANNERD3]

@VeganTruth vegan's are not more healthy fact

[LostSimply]

Vegetarians fuck me off, we've been eating meat for at least 100,000yrs and it helped provide the energy to build a bigger brain which obviously has been crucial to our success.

It's only been the last century that we finally figured out to put meat and vegetables together, instead of before with the elite eating mostly meat and the poor mostly vegetables due to economic reasons and therefore suffering for it i.e. malnutrition and obesity. Vegetarians are just arrogant fucktards.

[rojassan]

That's a great way to argue. You've pretty much just laced a tired argument of "well they/we do it too" with insults, so you've basically gone no where.

[LostSimply]

They and we are both animals fucktard. Meat in our diet serves a purpose. If you want to be a stupid lettuce muncher then fine but fuck off telling others to eat only vegetables.

[jeace99]

I want to eat you, and don't tell me, what to do, i like to eat human animal.

[LostSimply]

Go ahead and try, want and actually achieving it are very different things. Cannibalism exists only in desperate situations though.

[BaileysBeads]

As for health related concerns:

- Vegetarians do actually miss out on a bit, they don't get allot vitamin B12, K as well as zinc. It's not really a big deal and it's easily being obtained with supplements.

- The problem with your articles is that it's all about irresponsible people, it would be the same as citing countless stories about people who died off a heart disease because they ate too much meat (sure it's not meat alone).

In the overal score, vegetarians do tend to live longer.

[SaganAppreciationSoc]

Humans needs very little B12, and clinical B12 deficiency from lack of dietary intake is very rare. The human body is very good at recycling B12.

Anyway, i'm not happy with the video. If you can't pronounce names, at least spell them so people can look up other primary sources of information. If this is the case i'm thinking of, they were widely reported to be vegetarians, but in fact, were not. The court transcripts and prosecutors case made this very clear.

[BaileysBeads]

Oh come on, you've got to appreciate at least some of the spontaneousness of the video :-)

But you're right, even B12 isn't much of a problem, the vitamin supplements I take got a 1000% of the advised daily intake.

[BaileysBeads]

5:00

You actually seem to be making a point for the vegetarians here (or at least very human organic farming) . Killer whales can't make the concious deciscion not to eat meat (nor would they survive that deciscion) yet we can. Most of us don't, and cause suffering troughout the entire lifes of the animal. I'm all for lab-grown meat, it doesn't suffer. Perhapse even raise a cow without a brain, would be awesome.

On the health issue google 'vegan body building'

[fathead8489]

Eat fish, they may suffer but no way is their capacity to suffer equal to that of a cow or a pig. That way your argument about nutrition is moot.

As for vegetarian being against synthetic meat you must have just made that up, I've never even heard of an ethical vegetarian who was anything but a strong supporter of synthetic meat.

[BaileysBeads]

Fathead8489:

A fish has the same primary brain and nerve endings as any other vertrebrate. So there's no reason to think they feel less pain then a human getting a hook in it's mouth or choking as it's lungs fill wilt the wrong substance.

A fish however, does miss a great deal in social and emotional needs, in that we can discern fish from mammals.

And as Singer pointed out, the main difference that discerns humans from animals are long therm ambitions which would cause suffering if barred.

[fathead8489]

I agree that fish feel pain. However I think their capacity to suffer is much less. I think that is a key difference. A pig locked in a cage its whole life that is to small to turn around in, may not necessarily feel pain however it is certainly suffering.

I don't doubt that a fish feels pain when it is hooked however most fish come from fish farms. I am skeptical to whether a fish has the mental capacity to associate being locked in a crowed tank with a low quality of life.

[BaileysBeads]

No doubt the fish in the farms have worse lives then the ones swimming in the ocean.

They're swimming in their own manure tightly packed together causing lots of stress.

But yeah asI agreed with you before, pigs have it even worse, these animals have IQ's higher then that off dogs.

[fathead8489]

Of course farm fish have worse lives my questions is whether the fish care considering they low mental capacity. Maybe they do, maybe they don't I don't know. However there is simply no doubt that pigs, cows, and even chickens suffer

It is clear when a pig or cow suffers since they moan and cry, fish on the other hand aren't capable of communicating their suffering. Which sucks but I think it's ok to focus on farm animals for the time being until more research can be done on the brain of a fish

[BaileysBeads]

Sure, there's still a completely different reason we should be careful about fish, we're running out of it. We can't keep the fish production up wether we catch it (empty seas) or farm it (non-durable food farmed).

But that's completely besides the animal ethics discussion.

I don't think 'we can't know how an animal feels' is a very good argument for treating them cruelly, it's more an argument to be extra careful for all we know they could be more sensitive then we've ever thought.

[jtoddguelph]

I love you last point. Best argument I've heard in a while

[BaileysBeads]

Credit goes to J.M. Coetzee for that one :-)

[JTsmiley14]

That other organisms do not consider the morality of their actions is not a reason for humans not to be concerned. We have a moral capacity and we must use it, whereas animals (and young children and the mentally-enfeebled) do not have that capacity and thus are not held to that standard. Altruism does not require reciprocity. :) Vegetarians and vegans, in general, support lab meat and in fact PETA has offered $1 million to someone who can come up with a good solution.

[JTsmiley14]

To attribute these things to a vegan diet is to seriously misunderstand what is meant by 'vegan' diet. Although vegan means an absence of animal products from the diet, what is endorsed is a healthy, balanced diet that does not include animal products and gives us all the nutrition required. That this is possible, if not optimal, is reflected in books like 'Skinny Bitch', 'The China Study', and the largest diet study ever undertaken by Walter Willett of Harvard. This video is ignorant. :(

[ashbash986]

many responsible adults also choose not to eat meat for similar reasons and are extremely healthy, whilst many responsible adults who eat meat are extremely unhealthy, again it's a question of responsibilty.

[ashbash986]

a baby's nutritional requirements are totally different from an adult's though, whether veg or omni. if you fed a 6 week, or 2 month old on the diet of an adult meat eater, it'd die horrifically as-well.

peter singer's main argument in the video is that animals in factory farms suffer to the extent that it's unethical to support the the system they're farmed in. it's irresponsible also, according to him in a way (using your example) a whale isn't capable of being irresponsible...

[jwdink]

Well, that was painful.

[xmod2]

I don't understand why reading stories (which you didn't actually read the articles, just the blurbs) about some nutjobs with energy machines is evidence to you for the health benefits of meat in adolescence.

Try science, not anecdotes.

Anyway, I don't see why any normal utilitarian vegetarian would be against lab meat. Would you be against human lab meat for consumption?

Health benefits could be one argument, but then I'm not against unhealthy foods, I'm against suffering.

[jkraju1]

This is the position of the Americian Dietitians Association:

Well-planned vegan and other types of vegetarian diets are appropriate for all stages of the life cycle, including during pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood and adolescence. Vegetarian diets offer a number of nutritional benefits, including lower levels of saturated fat, cholesterol, and animal protein as well as higher levels of carbohydrates, fiber, magnesium, potassium, folate, and antioxidants.

[GirlyVoice]

You're point about lab grown meat is important, unfortunately many vegetarians have irrational reasons for their views. Thats strange considering it should be quite the opposite!

Point number 2 doesn't make sense because we already try to reduce the suffering of humans so it is consistent!

[lamkdndjfek]

In response to points 2 and 3:

2. We try to minimize suffering in humans, and so trying to minimize suffering in animals is the opposite of speciesist.

3. Not eating meat IS a way to resolve the problem, in absence of lab-grown meat.

[lamkdndjfek]

Regarding the anecdotal 'evidence' read out at the beginning: My sister is a vegan and she raises her two year old as a vegetarian (not vegan). He seems healthier than any child I know. Eating meat is not necessary, as long as we take in animal protiens from eggs and milk, etc. As long as it is done correctly, vegetarianism is as healthy, and forces one to think about nutrition.

It is not necessary to eat meat for nutritional reasons.

I don't eat farmed animals but would eat lab-grown meat.

[KnittyGrittyNatch]

I grew up vegetarian and I'm obviously still alive. Kangarooelaine went vegetarian at the age of six; she's not dead either.

None of these diets have much to do with vegetarianism but rather, the parents neglect to feed them a health, balanced vegetarian diet. The outcome would have been the same had the parents fed them meat; they weren't vegetarians, they were starving their children.

[cont'd]

[KnittyGrittyNatch]

A vegan or vegetarian diet should consist of fruits, vegetables, grains, nuts, seeds, beans/legumes, fluids, etc. Not soy milk and apple juice.

The issue is not merely about eating animals. Personally, I think that is a consumer choice that I don't agree with. The issue is animal exploitation and suffering (not necessarily death). [cont'd]

[KnittyGrittyNatch]

[cont'd]

So whether or not other animals will eat another animal is irrelevant. The fact of the matter is that a killer whale is not exploiting the seal, the owl is not exploiting the mouse, etc. I highly recommend watching the documentary 'Earthlings' to learn about the various forms of non-human animal exploitation.

As for schmeat (lab-grown meat), I am in support of it as long as the means of getting these tissues does not cause suffering for the animal.

[mattpodd]

Your opening comments have little impact on proving anything against vegetarian practices. It more proves something against people too idiotic to understand nutritional value in non-meat substances. There should certainly be more education around non-meat diets. Millions of people have figured it out quite well. You are wrong about we "should" be eating meat. We should be eating protein or other elements found in meat, but they CERTAINLY don't need to come from other species.

[zollyftn]

O SHI*, SMUG ALERT!!! SMUG ALERT!!!

[wavtracks]

Pt4. Non-human animals act on instinct, they do not have the developed compassion and intelligence that allows them to think outside of their instincts. We do have resoning and that is why we are moral obligated to think about the suffering we contribute to them.

[wavtracks]

Pt3. It it moral for humans to care for the weak because we do have a choice. We have transcended purely survivalist, propogation of the species instincts.

It is not a moral attitude for a human animal to think 'why should I care about the very real suffering of non-human animals when they don't care about the suffering they cause on other non-human animals'. That is a cop out.

[wavtracks]

Pt2. For example, we look after (and favour to an extent) weaker members of our communities that in the non-human societies would be left alone to die and not propogate. We look after and provide for those that can't look after themselves. I don't believe whales do that (or any other non-human animal) to any significant degree and certainly not to point of possible negative future prospects of their species.

[LostSimply]

African dogs hunt and carry on feeding lame dogs that are useless to the pack. Your point is incorrect.

[wavtracks]

Pt1. I understand your point regarding whales not caring for seals etc. However, you do miss a very important point. The main thing that seperates humans from non-human animals is that with the combination of our evolved intelligence and our evolved compassion, we are a species that has managed to in a way transcend the type of Darwinian evolution that we see in non-human animals.

[ateap0tist]

And finally, its not cool to select the comments. I am not complaining, u have not censured any of my comments yet but i think its one of the reasons for the low ratings. Let people speak their minds

[WalksWithoutGod]

I haven't done anything to any comments. I don't believe in it.

[ateap0tist]

the comments dont appear right away. If that is due to lag and not you selecting which of them we can see than I do apologize.

[WalksWithoutGod]

It's all good. The comments I post don't seem to appear for a coupla minutes either.

[laquec]

@WalksWithout

i'm certainly not an expert. it is very easy to point to diets that are unhealthy whether it is eating just goats or eating just carrots. but according to my environmental biology textbook, biophysics, & the united nations we are putting n way 2 much land, H2O, & other resources to support meat based diets. it is a matter of biophysics whether or not we get more energy ie calories out of eating lower on the food chain. & we do get more calories/lb of say bread vs a lb of meat.

[laquec]

@WalksWithoutGod

i plan to look into this issue more over the summer. i was looking at a presentation on genetics, and one of the topics was"evolution of human digestion". i later read an abstract of an experiment under this topic. u could say its kinda mixed results. 4 example u have some people who are clearly lactose intolerant(ie evidence supporting a vegan diet) but others with little 2 no aversion 2 animal or animal byproducts. they have discovered a genetic link to this.

[laquec]

@WalksWithoutGod

i'm an athiest too. richard dawkins and jared diamond are my favorite scientists. i hear you have a cat in your other video. cats are my favorite animal;)

[ateap0tist]

One other point... Nobody is saying that we should feed our kids stupid diets just because we are morons. If you want your kid not to eat meat see a nutritionist. And i guarantee that none of the morons you cite at the begining of your video did. So that is not a point against vegetarians. It is one against idiots who happen to be vegetarian. There are examples of the same morons who feed their kids large amounts of meat when they are not ready also...

[TheHumanHighlander]

This is a very difficult subject and frankly, I don't know enough about it to form a worthwhile opinion. I've heard time and time again that people don't need meat to be healthy but I've also heard time and time again that they actually do.

The cases you talk about in the beginning of this video are terrible but I do wonder if the number of such cases are proportionately high. But again, I just don't know.

[TheHumanHighlander]

I'm surprised at the ratings this video is receiving since you weren't pushing any particular viewpoint just raising legitimate questions.

[WalksWithoutGod]

Yeah, I agree with it being difficult to find information on. I've searched and searched and all that I've found is quite biased. I feel like I'll end up revisiting it a fair bit.

Yeah, I don't think those cases at the beginning are a fair representation of most veg heads. The point I was trying to bring out was that it wasn't just a simple case of morals, but of survival as well. I didn't realize just how damned hard it is to get to every point in under 10 minutes!

[ateap0tist]

u have never read a book about ethics. Your questions about why whales are not worried about causing suffering are stupid, u'd know this if you would pick up a book. Really bad video man!

[WalksWithoutGod]

I wasn't wondering why a killer whale doesn't concern itself with suffering, I was just relating it to the points made in the other video. I'm simply stating that we as humans should be concerned with suffering precisely because we *are* different than other animals. In the Singer interview, they make the case that we should worry about suffering in animals because we *are not* different from other animals. Sorry I wasn't clear enough on the point.

[ateap0tist]

Well we are NOT different from animals in any signigicant matter. What we have and they dont is the capacity to reason. And because reasoning is an important part of ethics we are the only ones capable of making ethical decisions so far. The capacity to reason is not sufficient reason to think that we are different (as in superior) any more than the capacity to fly is for birds...

[KnittyGrittyNatch]

Other species have shown a capacity to reason to a certain extent. There are few, if any, characteristics that humans possess that other species do not also express to some degree. Each species shows their own emphasized characteristic.

Perhaps our most emphasized characteristic is reason, but it is not entirely unique.

[tersse]

the problem about growing meat in a petrie dish is it tastes like shit, we cant add the flavour that meat has from its fuck tarded eating of shit in the real world, thats were it get the flavour, from eating crap we dont know about.