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Comment by bigDinosaur | Hacker News Reader

if you have literally no concern about the suffering of animals, then it's a good thing. If you think that the suffering of animals outweighs people's preferences (not needs, you can thrive on a vegetarian diet) then this is absolutely not good. I'm happy to see high prices for beef, and would be happy if everyone was priced out of eating it. As second best, I'd be happy if people at least considered the suffering that went into their food production and chose to reduce that consumption even if they feel they cannot eliminate it.

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We weep for the blood of a bird, but not for the blood of a fish. Blessed are those who have voice. - Mamoru Oshii

Lots of people don't eat fish.

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 so honest question.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Sorry, nobody is going to eat your meat eggs :P

I respect your choice, and hope some day the work we see here can open doors to a lab grown alternative that eliminates the suffering so that you also can experience the joy of a ribeye, bone-in with a compound butter and runny egg.

I also eat meat, so not going to play the saint here.

But it seems you have absolutely no remorse of what happens to those animals that end up on your plate. Or you do and try to cover it up by playing the tough guy.

I try to cut back on meat as much as I can. I also enjoy some ribs, but I don't eat meat every day. And when I do, I try to stick with fish or poultry.

I suggest you watch some slaughterhouse videos, so you know what those animals have to go through to end up as tasty meat on your plate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTenibfTutI . Please watch it all up until the end.

If you still have no remorse, you are for sure a psychopath.

That video is slowed down in the most shocking moments to make it look like the suffering of the animals lasts for longer.

Acute suffering and fear tends to last longer, subjectively, for humans. Psychological time stretches. Perhaps slowing it down is a more accurate portrayal of the animal's experience than not doing so.

Ok, fair enough. Can you provide a video that is more realistic then?

Watching videos of slaughterhouses is not one of my hobbies so I don't know of any other video like that.

Yeah, probably because they're all gruesome, slowed down or not.

They are animals. Do you weep for the bugs and rabbits that are killed when wheat is harvested?

They probably didn't live in a box about the size of their own body their entire life.

A psychopath? Who's the tough guy?

So which one is it? Are you just PLAYING the role of a tough guy, or do you really have no remorse when watching that video?

I agree. I think eating meat is abhorrent, and genetically mutilating animals even more so. Selective breeding is one thing, but this opens the doors to all kinds of ‘design gene’ questions that I don’t think the world is ready for, or ever should be.

How is selective breeding good? There are dog breeds that have respiratory problems all their lives. CRISPR should open the door to genetic improvements without genetic diversity loss

The breathing issues found in certain breeds of dogs aren't from diversity loss. Rather, the breathing issues are caused by the traits being bred for. Pugs, for instance, are bred to have small noses, so small that they restrict airflow. CRISPR could exacerbate the desire of breeders to express physical characteristics in dogs without considerations for the impact of those changes on the well-being of the dog.

I felt sad seeing the cows in the featured article :( Friends not food.

> not needs, you can thrive on a vegetarian diet

Not true for everyone. I have a specific health issue and to ingest the necessary daily intake of proteins solely through non-meat source would mean ingesting a lot more carbs that I can handle for a day.

Also explain how would CRISPR increase the suffering of animals?

I don't think they were claiming that it increases suffering. But it doesn't decrease it either. We should at least decrease suffering, or ideally, eliminate it. CRISPR does not constitute any progress in that regard. If anything, it gives more people more excuses to continue supporting the suffering.

That is correct. Ideally we will move to lab grown meat or just lab grown edibles/drinkables that contain all the nutrients you need and you get to choose the ratio of nutrients for each meal.

My thinking was that it allows us to continue to improve yields without corresponding costs being paid by the consumers. In other words, people will just keep buying huge quantities of cheap meat. I do not consider this a good thing because meat is a luxury. In this case, it's keeping meat cheap(er) despite screwing the planet with climate change.

My vegan protein powder is 20g protein for 2g carbs 2g fiber so it’s definitely possible.

> you can thrive on a vegetarian diet

as long as you take vitamins B12, D and some iron, you should be fine.

but having been meat eaters for 2.4 million years will be hard to shake off.

if anything eating beef will increase in the future as more and more people rise to the “middle class”. we should probably take this into consideration and it’s implications, no matter how you feel about the subject.

People bring this up, but like, is eating dog okay? Even if you say yes, is factory farming them okay? Is eating human okay? No - just because we may have had meat in our diet for millions of years doesn't mean we have to choose the most advanced life to factory farm and eat. We certainly have more reservations against eating certain kinds of meat than can be explained purely from an evolutionary perspective - and that aspect should be expanded to cover more species. Plenty of Westerners will be outraged when the Japanese slaughter a whale but seem fine with the immense suffering in the farms in their own country. I don't think this can be reconciled if people knew just what actually went on.

I'll note that personally I don't shame people for eating meat - that's just not a nice way to live and leads to immense resentment. I do think people are making the wrong choice here though.

The virtue signaling is strong here. Humans have been eating animals forever. It played a large part in our evolution. It's a normal part of life. Wringing hands over it helps nobody.

This is just pure naturalistic fallacy. We have done plenty of terrible things for millions of years (rape, murder, war) but having done those for millions of years is no real justification for their continuation.

You're 100% right about this. What's going on right now with mass slaughter of animals will hopefully end one day soon and be looked back on as the darkest time in the Earth's history.

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