Item — HN Reader

Regarding antispeciesism you're conflating two different concepts (although you may have you own opinion):

   1. antispeciesism = rejecting discrimination based solely on species membership.
   2. all living beings having exactly the same moral value.

Most anti-speciesists defend (1), not (2). Anti-speciesism also doesn’t imply that killing animals is always wrong, most people instead reason in terms of reducing suffering/benefiting interests, and proportionality. You can believe a guinea worm has moral worth and still think eradicating it is justified because of the suffering it causes.

And the “insects die for carrots” point is not really a problem specific to veganism, since animal agriculture typically requires even more crops, land use, and indirect animal deaths. Also there's vegans that are speciesists and anti-speciesists that aren't vegan. Those concepts intersects but are not strictly equal.

I'm not sure to understand your other points but strongly agree communication helps to grow ethics and gain empathy. However it's not absolutely required as seen with the exemples of comas, mute, newborn, or as you mentioned someone of a different culture or language. I hardly understand how is it "impossible for [the dogs] to make their preferences known" especially in the situation of being slapped. Perhaps I missed you point because that contradict all my interaction with dogs and gods's owners.

1 comments

Have you met someone who claimed that their dog liked being slapped? When I imagine such a situation I imagine a person who is just excusing abuse because of the priors in my life, I have an easy time imagining this since I have encountered more than one such person. Impossible is probably too strong of a word, but I mean that you must interpret their behavior and interpretation is to me more a form of estimation not knowing, these examples are intended to show that non-verbal communication is still deficient when compared to a person with problems with verbal communications. Whether it is ok (ethical) to slap another individual that hasn't done anything to you is dependent on knowing their preferences and that takes communication and hence we apply our ethics based on communications.

"Insects die for carrots," is a problem for vegans who base their preference on the idea that killing any animal is wrong for sustenance. A person willing to kill a cow because they like the way the flesh tastes or finds it more nourishing simply isn't going to see a problem with an insect dying for a carrot. One person is holding themself to a higher standard and therefore is vulnerable to this critique. Animals need to die so that we may live, people quibble about where the line should be drawn but the line exists for almost everyone (excluding the Jain vegetarians, but practically speaking it exists for everyone).

I am not so much conflating those two as arguing that a) anti-specism much like freedom of speech has all kinds of caveats built in and isn't absolute even in the few people that would preach it, b) anti-specism doesn't form a basis for ethics because there are more absolute truths that override it but also render it unnecessary.

Fair enough. I see your point on the limits of interpretation and how any philosophie ends up being somewhat arbitrary.

You still choose a frame (eg: "killing any animal is wrong"), then show that frame is irrational and deduct that the while group is wrong. Classical strawmaning, although I'm sure that's not your intent. "Animals needing to die" as a practical truth is not a problem for vegans, you're arguing alone here. However many people thinks suffering is not desirable and act accordingly to minimise it. You're free to critic though.

I understand better your second explication: there's not more absolute anti-specism than absolute freedom of speech. I find more interesting the "All models are wrong, but some are useful" perspective as it helps interacting with the world, but in a theorical land you're probably right.

If you haven't read it and want to learn more, a good one is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_Liberation_(book)