 Did you see all their reactions, dude? I've seen this shaking my hands in here, like, people were like, Yeah, someone shook my hand, didn't you get that? You don't think it's cruel at all? What do you think of this? I love staying. You love staying? Even if you're talking about it now, it doesn't resonate with me, but it makes me feel really uncomfortable. Yeah. It really makes me feel like, oh my god. But you know what? You're making the connection again? I am making the connection. I have never lost a connection. But you know what? One of the best conversations I've had for a while, mate. Thank you. I'm showing it to people, asking them what they think. Meat is animal cruelty. Yeah. Do you agree? I do. You do agree? Yes. Why is it cruel? Do you think? I will give you my full attention. Why is this cruel? Eating meat? I would say, actually, it depends how. It depends how you kill them? That makes it cruel? I think it depends how you process the whole thing. I think excessive meat consumption is a bit harsh. Yeah. I think if you consume what you plant, or what you seed yourself, that's a bit more acceptable. But also I come from a culture that is a heavy meat eater. What culture? I'm Lebanese. Lebanese? I'm from Australia. Heavy meat eating there too. Yeah. Yeah, Lebanese is pretty heavy meat eating. But would you agree with that statement, if the animal was treated well, and they had their head cut off, would you say the act of killing that animal was cruel? I would think that's related to whether it is well treated or not. And also, we don't have that much, like, neuroscientific awareness whether animals do understand the idea of, like, that conscious sense of being. You don't feel that they're sentient? Like, they're not having their own conscious experience? We don't know that much. I know that for a fact. We don't know from a neuroscientific perspective. We don't know enough about that yet. We don't know that they're having their own conscious experience? Yeah, to the extent. Oh, really? Yeah. I mean, I've never actually heard that. I think they passed something in Cambridge. It's called the Declaration of Consciousness to Animals. Have you heard about that? Yeah. Wouldn't that suggest animals are conscious? Then play that idea in your mind for a bit. Being conscious about something is one thing, having, like, for example, I've had a dog for years. Tom came back, didn't recognize me, right? So this consciousness of being aware, I have feelings I know what you are. The memory thing you're saying? That's that. But you would still say your dog suffers and doesn't want to be harmed, and you would... Yeah, but it's a very temporary thing. It's not a kind of like a long-term, mnemonic activity that you go through that you remember trauma or anything. It's just a very short term thing. So if you kick a dog, they won't remember that the next time you see them? No. Oh, really? As far as I understand. I'm not a neuroscientist, but I tend to... So an animal won't remember being abused? No. Okay. But let's just say they have some well-being. Do you think that it's justified to rob them of that well-being? Would that be cruel? What do you mean? Animals experience well-being. They experience pain and joy. So you agree with that, yeah? Yeah. They get happy and sad and hungry, and do you think it's cruel to rob them of their life? Yeah. I wanted to ask you just the other way around. So it's not true, by the way, what I just said now before. But I wanted to ask you a question about that. If it's true that animals do have a long-term memory or not, or whether we believe that they have a long-term consciousness or not, does it make a difference whether you actually treat the animal the way you treat them or not? I don't think it does. I think if a human being didn't have a long-term memory, it wouldn't justify killing them or treating them immorally. If a dog didn't remember, you know, whatever, I don't think we should treat animals in a certain way based on their intelligence, just the fact that they can feel pain and want to live and have experienced joy and well-being in those things. I feel like we should respect, still respect their life. Do you think we need to eat meat? No. I've been exposed to these things quite a few times, and the last two statements I said were not true in terms of the idea of not having consciousness or anything, but I want to see what kind of like, for lack of better terminology, squishiness or kind of like... Wow, you were testing me. A little bit, just to see what kind of person you are. Just to see what you have in mind. In today's video, we're just talking about this idea, literally just now, about the idea of qualia. So qualia is what it's like to be. So the qualia for bat means like what it's like to be a bat. So what is it to experience or to step into the shoes off, right? It's like an ontological concept. And we're just literally discussing this. So like empathy. Yeah, exactly. So putting yourself in other people's position, in a pig's position, in a cow's position. And we're literally having conversations. It's not about animals, but we're having a discussion like does empathy make a difference when it comes to... Like if you step into something, even not someone, something's shoes, then you would not treat it differently once you've come back to your own body and look at it. And we don't know. What about a cat? What animals do you eat? I'm quite open to all animals. So you eat any animal? Or every animal? The ones I've been exposed to. So like culturally, what animals would you eat? Cows and lambs and shit. Yeah, like do you watch them be slaughtered? I have, I have a bust. And actually we had this discussion as well. Yeah, how did you feel when... I was quite young as well but the reason why I brought up the initial point and that's the real one that I believe in is I think there is a difference in terms of how you treat an animal for sure. It doesn't make a difference whether it's short-term or long-term memory as you were saying before, like imagine this human being that has just no memory. Out of Thomas? Exactly, yeah. Or even just like rock from the memory. Like I think MKUltra, CCIA days, right? It doesn't justify mistreating them in that sense. So I come from a culture that's heavy meat eater. I am slowly transitioning into vegetarianism. But I am continuously asking myself the question why am I, right? Because I don't know why I'm doing it. I know that there's a lot of repercussions that we as humans have on... from that point of view. So we should minimise it. But I'm not the kind of person who thinks about it as I should do it, thus I should. So I'm trying to analyse... Well, I'm trying to... Let me work out your moral system for a second here. So do you think we have a responsibility not to harm other people? Other people, humans... Anything in the ecosystem that is even remotely alive, which we should not. So do you think there's... Well, I'm with you when it comes to human beings and animals. When it comes to plants though, like obviously, I don't think they have consciousness. No, but as we've said before, that's why I try to put that premise down and see how you think. Even that for me, it doesn't make a difference. Like even when you take care of someone's fucking car because it's small. An object at the end of the day, when you build a sentimental value to it. You remember this example, if I call this Ben and talk to you about Ben for 10 minutes and then break Ben, you're like... It's about where we plant our emotion, right? Yeah. So the consciousness, as I was saying, is why I was talking about that conscious aspect because consciousness actually makes a difference when it comes to our relation to things. We've had crusades for years and that's just a concept. Like God's not around us. Well, the only reason we matter is because we can experience well-being and suffering. Exactly. If you're in a coma and you were never going to be woken and you had no family that were going to be sad that you were killed and you died or someone killed you, there would be no real repercussions for that. You're not ever going to experience any well-being or consciousness. But then that's the whole debate about utilitarianism versus communism which is do you do things based on the consequence or by principle? A mixture. Do you have a mixture? Yeah. Because otherwise one is too idealistic, one is too inhuman. Yeah. I still think it's wrong to kill even... But I do think there's scenarios that justify killing. But I just don't think our pleasure or culture or tradition, the reasons we eat meat are justifications for eating animals. That's true. But to finish my point and I'll leave you on that is I've been questioning myself about why I'm gradually going into vegetarianism. And I don't want it to be based on guilt because if I ever want to teach somebody else be it my kid, my friend, my mum, whomever how I became a vegetarian I wouldn't want it to be based on guilt because being guilt as the main basis of change as proven historical and not to work that's why you pass around, you see this kid this African kid on the poster and you move around, you get desensitized. So I'm trying to find one of the things beyond guilt that are turning me from a meat eater into a vegetarian. What about moral consistency? Because you apply your ethical system to humans and other animals but there's certain animals you exclude from that moral system. Yeah. Although... It's still something I'm still thinking about on a continuous basis. I think a lot of it has to do with if it takes me a little bit of effort to make a difference I will do it, right? And as humans we are a lazy breed. That's convenience. Convenience. And if my moral convenience can allow me to do good then I'll kind of steer that boat in that direction but still to go back to my initial point I'm trying to figure out outside of guilt and I'm talking about myself you might tell me, yeah, but morally if we don't always wake up and think about the structure of what the couple is doing No. We think about our day-to-day microcosm that is I, that is my friends that is my family I'm not caring about you because you do exist in my universe, right? Yeah, you don't mind not care about me but you wouldn't want to see me get harmed and killed and exploited for your burger. But people are... people are exploited every single day and I don't wake up thinking about them. That's why I'm going like... If your conscious decision was causing harm to a human being or an animal that you... Everything that I'm wearing probably has... Yeah, maybe. Maybe somewhere down the line but it's direct as a burger like it's direct as eating their flesh Like, I don't know As much as I want to say everything I'm wearing is ethical it's not, is it? I don't know if there's a Filipino kid that was wearing this but that's what I mean by the idea of like how as a society can we move away from guilt and just think a bit more constructive and also still more pragmatic than your philosophical construct because I don't wake up in the morning thinking about my philosophical construct or my moral compass Again, I'm wearing everything that I'm hoping is not so in my 12 year old Filipino kid I mean obviously we cause some amount of harm we can't avoid all harm but that doesn't mean we should but that causes maximum amount of harm possible My point is like, pick your battles Yeah, I mean this is a really easy one to win, I mean Yeah Like changing your diet I mean eating a vegan burger over a beef burger I mean Yeah, that's true I think a lot of it has to do with like for me it's even the little things like when I go back home it's that about pissing off my grandmother who's like spent all these years Fall off all hummus and peanut bread Okay brother, let me give you this This is English slaughter and farms stuff about the environment and health but here's a vegan challenge 22 days on Facebook and they'll just give you like so you can dip your feet in the water and then if you feel like continuing it on it's all free, everything's free it's just an information No, I'm 23 It's funny, we're just talking about quantia just now is it like what outside of guilt can drive humans to change behaviour or kind of like shift from A to B whatever A Entity? That's kind of tied to guilt but it's not the same energy It's funny, I just I work in virtual reality we've done what we call body swap experiences where you swap bodies with someone else and these are experiences where they are meant to drive empathy by design it works in a short amount of time but then it dissipates back to the end I think it's because even empathy we've learned how to desensitise empathy it's a very powerful tool looking me wrong You only need it for when you get hungry so that's a short amount of time True, true That's cool What are you guys working on? I'm just asking people with their they think this is true and then finding out their stance on it because most people kind of agree with it but we get some thinking because most people's actions are out of line with their own beliefs on animals so just experiments public experiments so yeah I appreciate this conversation you brought a lot to the table and I yeah you're very intelligent and I like how you tried to test me because someone today did the same thing to me they gave me two rubbish scientific facts and I'm like no that's not true but that's not about that and I just did the same thing to you it's intriguing because when you say 99% of X is Y and you're like oh really people just want the statistic just to pass through it and just build an opinion on top of that and today someone did that to me and it's just so fresh in my mind now you guys came to me I'm like the animals aren't it hasn't been proven that animals are conscious and I was like what wait a second and my dog does fucking remember people yeah it's interesting man but it's true it's a very interesting thing I've been thinking about especially after a music festival I just came back from a video it's a big gathering of tribal people you see all breeds of people and I've been really questioning myself like what else can drive me but guilt because I'm a very guilt driven person in my day to day life and guilt separate reason they do I can give you a bit of my family historical but guilt works for me right yeah and in many ways if it gets me to behave in a good way why not but it's not something I can pass on to my kid one day because I don't want my kids to be guilt ridden like you have to drive positive reinforcement like these are the positive consequences of your actions and let that drive them that's a really good value to instill yeah exactly that's why like I'm trying to fight that not just when it comes to to this to a lot more things in terms of like I want to cut down on drugs not because of X or Y when it comes to my body but more like what else can you bring in gain what can you gain from it exactly I love that really good thanks brother thank you peace to you mate excellent alright we've got two really good conversations he was a legend that guy he was a legend see how he tricked me animals that haven't been proven to be conscious and my dog would not remember me I was just like what he was so interesting he tricked me through those questions at me there's a couple of ways to argue things like that like in principle he was wrong when it came to dogs being able to remember you know long term but I just granted him if that were true you know if that were true would that morally justify harming the dog because they didn't have long term memory and then you can just draw the comparison to humans would that then justify harming a human who didn't have a long term memory so in principle he was wrong but we can still grant someone that they're right and see if it still fits but he was excellent to talk to I hadn't really enjoyed that so yeah anyway I think that was a good day that was good the little experiment worked I think we've got a lot of heads turning and we have some good conversations