{"items": [{"author": "Christopher", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621609133192", "anchor": "fb-621609133192", "service": "fb", "text": "Depends on your a priori beliefs. Some posit souls for humans but not for animals, and build reasonable moral frameworks from that.", "timestamp": "1374845943"}, {"author": "Todd", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/112947709146257842066", "anchor": "gp-1374848642952", "service": "gp", "text": "I think the main reason centers on our empathetic understanding of the rich mental life that other people have, and our lack of same regarding non-human creatures. Even with people that we know don't fully have it, we expect that they will in the future (babies) or we believe they have a limited version that still surpasses anything displayed by non-human creatures.\n
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\nThe only exception I can think of, where you could say that some animals might surpass a human's current and future capacity for mental life, would be people in vegetative states due to injury. And even though our moral intuitions tend not to be refined enough to allow us to comfortably separate such cases from the norm, we sometimes do things like cut off life support in those cases.", "timestamp": 1374848642}, {"author": "Victor", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621613674092", "anchor": "fb-621613674092", "service": "fb", "text": "Gray areas are difficult, but shouldn't be completely ignored. I think there are reasons to feel differently about killing a mosquito than killing a chimpanzee. A more intelligent animal can suffer more, partly by anticipation is one of the reasons.", "timestamp": "1374849098"}, {"author": "Alex", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/100936518160252317727", "anchor": "gp-1374849551192", "service": "gp", "text": "I roughly agree with \n@Todd\n\u00a0-- there is a huge distinction between current ability to empathize and the anticipated capacity to do so. I respect other humans of all sorts because I know that they are potentially capable of respecting me. If empathy were evaluated only at the current moment, I'd be totally down with killing sleeping people, but not when those people wake up.", "timestamp": 1374849551}, {"author": "Daniel", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621614512412", "anchor": "fb-621614512412", "service": "fb", "text": "I wouldn't want you to kill all the chickens to save my life.", "timestamp": "1374849691"}, {"author": "Ben", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621625515362", "anchor": "fb-621625515362", "service": "fb", "text": "This is why I consider a lion eating a zebra and me eating a cow to be morally equivalent. I don't have a good answer as to why cannibalism is wrong:p", "timestamp": "1374854985"}, {"author": "Caleb", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621626403582", "anchor": "fb-621626403582", "service": "fb", "text": "Why not say \"value all persons equally and value all nonpersons slightly less\"? This removes the speciesism and to be a much more plausible line to draw. Of course then you have to explain what a person is (I had in mind the psychological conception, someone who is aware of their existence through time and has a sense of the future--this conception will certainly include some nonhuman animals)", "timestamp": "1374855617"}, {"author": "Steininger", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621630380612", "anchor": "fb-621630380612", "service": "fb", "text": "I wounder what criteria makes us think humans are morally relevant? I am quite sure that I am not really capible of feeling; I only approximate feelings through a complex biological process.", "timestamp": "1374858596"}, {"author": "Chris", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/112938759017605010116", "anchor": "gp-1374861180776", "service": "gp", "text": ">\u00a0If you asked me how many chickens I would be willing to kill to save your life, the answer is effectively \"all of them\".\u00a0\n
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\nI suspect it won't change your answer, but I think the question ought to be \"how many chickens would I be willing to commit to a lifetime of extreme suffering to save your life?\". \u00a0(I think death is actually a comparatively minor inconvenience, such that killing most factory farmed chickens would probably be an improvement suffering-wise.)", "timestamp": 1374861180}, {"author": "Michael", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621638130082", "anchor": "fb-621638130082", "service": "fb", "text": "We don't really have to scientifically justify what animals we assign \"moral worth\" to. It is a human concept and we can define it however we like. The question is, as a species, how do we want to interact with other species? Who do we choose to be? Admittedly though, it's not that simple, because when many people contemplate \"mistreating\" other species, they experience a negative emotional reaction. So we need to figure out whether this reaction is just an inherent human defect or \"quirk\", or basically what is the deal with that?", "timestamp": "1374864255"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621660026202", "anchor": "fb-621660026202", "service": "fb", "text": "The post might come across like a refutation of the argument from marginal cases, which I don't think it is. It may be an explanation of why Jeff isn't swayed by the argument, but it still could be that almost everyone else should be swayed. http://lesswrong.com/lw/i3s/why_eat_less_meat/9gt4", "timestamp": "1374877809"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621660540172", "anchor": "fb-621660540172", "service": "fb", "text": "\"Making this distinction among humans, however, would be incredibly socially destructive\" <== I don't think this makes sense -- we can't avoid making the distinction among humans. According to the last polls I saw (sorry, no citation), the median American makes the distinction somewhere in the 2nd trimester.", "timestamp": "1374878108"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621680764642", "anchor": "fb-621680764642", "service": "fb", "text": "@David: \" we can't avoid making the distinction among humans\"
And it's a mess. I wouldn't want to make it worse by advocating more gradation, a more complex system, or anything after birth.", "timestamp": "1374892871"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621608549362?comment_id=621707431202", "anchor": "fb-621707431202", "service": "fb", "text": "@Ivan: \"all attempts of rationalizing morality are really just disguised attempts to categorize people as moral or immoral\"
No. I'm interested in understanding morality because I want to focus my altruism in the right direction. If after talking to people I started valuing animals more, I would probably switch from donating to the Against Malaria Foundation to Effective Animal Activism.", "timestamp": "1374932438"}]}