Defending killing and eating animals is morally wrong

@Oikeiosis,

Oikeiosis;112238 wrote:

. Almost always he will agree that his compassion does not stem from the fact that: 1) humans use language, 2) humans compose symphonies, 3) humans do math, or 4) humans are moral agents. Instead, he will most likely agree that it stems from the fact that humans can suffer, feel pain, be harmed, etc. (It is worth noting that not all humans can do 1-4, anyway).

How eager you seem to strip away what differentiates us from the animals, and yet you appeal us as language using moral agents -- as you assure us that this sort of thing doesn't engage our sympathy....

@Oikeiosis,

Oikeiosis;112238 wrote:

The only assumption I have made is that causing unnecessary harm to innocent, uninformed, unconsenting sentient recipients, regardless of race, rank, or species, is morally wrong. If someone does not accept the basic assumption that causing unnecessary harm is morally wrong, then there is nothing else I can offer by way of persuasion. If you're unwilling to accept that basic assumption, then it is you who are in the wrong thread. My approach is no different from someone who creates a thread topic on the moral question of human slavery and who works with the basic assumption that using humans exclusively as means to our ends is morally wrong. If you cannot bring yourself to accept such assumptions, then you're not obligated to participate.

If something is unnecessary, without qualification, it means that it is possible to avoid. As it is always possible to refrain from causing intentional harm, providing we are in control of our actions, unless we mean to say we are simply to meekly allow animals to maul us in order to be moral, any set of constraints we place upon our actions with respect to animals must have some kind of get out clause, self-preservation, for example.

On the face of it our get out clauses when dealing with animals seem much less stringent than the ones we use with humans. To use a Crusoe case, we would normally hold that it is permissible for Crusoe to kill and eat the animals on his island in order to survive, but it is not okay for him to kill and eat Friday.

Quote:

Animal rights is much more cogently argued when it is argued from the standpoint of your opponent's morality, rather than some mythical, hard-to-define objective morality, as you would no doubt agree. An example of this method is to leverage a person's morality by asking him why he has compassion for human beings. Almost always he will agree that his compassion does not stem from the fact that: 1) humans use language, 2) humans compose symphonies, 3) humans do math, or 4) humans are moral agents. Instead, he will most likely agree that it stems from the fact that humans can suffer, feel pain, be harmed, etc. (It is worth noting that not all humans can do 1-4, anyway).

I agree, but can I really feel the same compassion and sympathy that I feel for an innocent man who has been imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay for an "innocent, uninformed, unconsenting" battery farmed Chicken? I don't think so. Also if the assumption upon which your argument rests is "that causing unnecessary harm to innocent, uninformed, unconsenting sentient recipients, regardless of race, rank, or species, is morally wrong", I would dispute whether you can apply words like 'innocent', 'uninformed' and 'unconsenting' to something like a chicken. In what sense is it possible to inform a chicken? What does it mean for a chicken to consent to something? And in what sense can a chicken ever be innocent as opposed to guilty? In order to be guilty something has to be responsible for its actions, and I don't think that is true of a chicken, certainly not in any way that allows us to say any of its actions are blameworthy.

Quote:

I understand you take your emotivist position very seriously. That said, you stand to be very disappointed in an ethics forum, since most moral arguments begin with axiomatic assumptions: for example, that causing unnecessary harm is morally wrong. If this assumption bothers you because it cannot be vindicated by reference to empirical evidence, or because it lacks an objective metaethical foundation, then you should probably move on.

Any moral position must have a meta-ethical foundation, if your position can be undermined on meta-ethical grounds then this seems like a legitimate line to pursue. Questioning your assumptions about sympathy, sentience and compassion is certainly acceptable. We may offer counterexamples which you must defend your assumptions against. For example, a judge may feel compassion and sympathy for a mother who stole to feed her children, or a young murderer who deserves to spend the rest of his life in jail, does that mean they should be let off?

@mickalos,

mickalos;112682 wrote:

If something is unnecessary, without qualification, it means that it is possible to avoid. As it is always possible to refrain from causing intentional harm, providing we are in control of our actions, unless we mean to say we are simply to meekly allow animals to maul us in order to be moral, any set of constraints we place upon our actions with respect to animals must have some kind of get out clause, self-preservation, for example.

On the face of it our get out clauses when dealing with animals seem much less stringent than the ones we use with humans. To use a Crusoe case, we would normally hold that it is permissible for Crusoe to kill and eat the animals on his island in order to survive, but it is not okay for him to kill and eat Friday.

I agree, but can I really feel the same compassion and sympathy that I feel for an innocent man who has been imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay for an "innocent, uninformed, unconsenting" battery farmed Chicken? I don't think so. Also if the assumption upon which your argument rests is "that causing unnecessary harm to innocent, uninformed, unconsenting sentient recipients, regardless of race, rank, or species, is morally wrong", I would dispute whether you can apply words like 'innocent', 'uninformed' and 'unconsenting' to something like a chicken. In what sense is it possible to inform a chicken? What does it mean for a chicken to consent to something? And in what sense can a chicken ever be innocent as opposed to guilty? In order to be guilty something has to be responsible for its actions, and I don't think that is true of a chicken, certainly not in any way that allows us to say any of its actions are blameworthy

These points you raise about get out clauses (e.g., self-defense/preservation) and moral agency (what nonhumans lack) were already addressed in my previous posts (my participation in this thread begins on page 19).

Quote:

Any moral position must have a meta-ethical foundation, if your position can be undermined on meta-ethical grounds then this seems like a legitimate line to pursue. Questioning your assumptions about sympathy, sentience and compassion is certainly acceptable. We may offer counterexamples which you must defend your assumptions against. For example, a judge may feel compassion and sympathy for a mother who stole to feed her children, or a young murderer who deserves to spend the rest of his life in jail, does that mean they should be let off?

I do not base my moral view on compassion alone, since even compassion can be diluted as an implicit sanction for certain injustices (e.g., mercy-killings of the mentally impaired, etc.). Rather, I argue that because sentience is a necessary and sufficient condition for inclusion in the moral community, we owe direct duties of justice to sentient nonhumans. For the details, however, I'll have to refer you back to my previous posts. Check them out and post me again with your objections or requests for clarification.

@Oikeiosis,

Oikeiosis;112693 wrote:

These points you raise about get out clauses (e.g., self-defense/preservation) and moral agency (what nonhumans lack) were already addressed in my previous posts (my participation in this thread begins on page 19).

I do not base my moral view on compassion alone, since even compassion can be diluted as an implicit sanction for certain injustices (e.g., mercy-killings of the mentally impaired, etc.). Rather, I argue that because sentience is a necessary and sufficient condition for inclusion in the moral community, we owe direct duties of justice to sentient nonhumans. For the details, however, I'll have to refer you back to my previous posts. Check them out and post me again with your objections or requests for clarification.

Having read over the posts, which was enjoyable, my points in the second paragraph, which I think you took to be about moral agency, remain unresolved. I was trying to raise issues about action in general, not merely whether or not animals have moral agency. To state it explicitly, the point of asking about the informed and consenting chicken, which to me is an absurd concept, is supposed to raise the question of whether animals act, or merely behave. Is an animal an agent? I think not.

The reason why this is important at all is because Kant's idea that you shouldn't treat beings (for Kant it was only human-beings) as mere means, but as ends, is derived from the idea that part of what makes of human is our autonomy and rationality. That is, the idea that we can apprehend in what ways we can act, and decide for ourselves what to do and how to do it, and that gives us an intrinsic worth that ought to be treated as an end in itself. When you manipulate people by misinforming, lying, or defrauding them, it is you who makes their decisions for them, they do not make an informed choice. Treating people as means rather than ends violates their personal autonomy, and this is impermissible. If animals are not capable of this kind of autonomy, then there seems to be no reason why we shouldn't treat them as means, and no reason we should treat them as ends.

However, you don't seem to base the idea that we shouldn't treat animals as means on autonomy, instead you say it is based on sentience. My reply to this would be that it simply doesn't follow from sentience, at least on first appearance, that we shouldn't treat animals as mere means. If sentience is to be your standard, at most you can say that you shouldn't cause displeasure to animals, but I don't see why sentience as a standard doesn't simply lead you to utilitarianism. At the moment you seem like a cross between a utilitarian and a Kantian. Something along the lines of: Among those acts available to you that don't violate C, act so as to maximize goal G. G being either the minimization of the displease of sentient beings, or simply happiness. C, however, should be independent of G, otherwise we should simply accommodate it in G.

@New Mysterianism,

Sorry for the intervention. But i had participated here before, so perhaps i may do so again. You'll are having a very interesting debate. Very informed and respectful.
It led me to a doubt. Lets call it as my moral dilemma.

I love eating fish. I am also a animal rights activist.

My question is: Are my likings contradictory? Which one should I shed for the other?

@Jackofalltrades phil,

Jackofalltrades;113039 wrote:

Sorry for the intervention. But i had participated here before, so perhaps i may do so again. You'll are having a very interesting debate. Very informed and respectful.
It led me to a doubt. Lets call it as my moral dilemma.

I love eating fish. I am also a animal rights activist.

My question is: Are my likings contradictory? Which one should I shed for the other?

Depends on why you think they have rights and what rights they have. Presumably you think humans have rights, and you do not think that inanimate rocks have rights. Animals could plausibly occupy an intermediate position as they are devoid of or diminished in features that humans have, and as such, they may have some rights, but not as many as humans. Why should the right to life necessarily be one of these rights? Perhaps it could be argued that this is a fundamental right for humans, but that doesn't mean that it must be for animals. After all, animals don't really have a life in the same way that humans do. They don't have plans and projects, or personal relationships, they are merely alive.

@New Mysterianism,

Originally Posted by Oikeiosis
"The only assumption I have made is that causing unnecessary harm to innocent, uninformed, unconsenting sentient recipients, regardless of race, rank, or species, is morally wrong. If someone does not accept the basic assumption that causing unnecessary harm is morally wrong, then there is nothing else I can offer by way of persuasion."

Greetings, Oikeniosis

Your asumptiion does not have to be assumed but instead can be derived from earlier, more neutral axioms. It can be a deduction. How?

Once one agrees that concepts have an intension and an extention, and once one agrees on what "a valuable X" means - namely that something is valuable if (to some degree) it exemplifies its concept, we can then derive various dimensions of value by taking the basic kinds of concepts (synthetic, analytic, and singular - cf. Kant's book, - LOGIK), seeing what size intensions they have that could be fulfilled, exemplified.
Then those dimensions - which we may label S, E, and I - can be utilized as measures, 'measuring-sticks' so to speak....and also as classifiers. When they are applied to the cetegory: disciplines of knowledge which focus upon (whose concern is) indiviuals, we get:

S:Physiology/Anatomy - E: Psychology/Sociology - I: Ethics.

Ethics, thus, is the Intrinsic perspective on individuals. That being the case, if one is to be moral s/he has to Intrinsically value herself (have self-respect) and to Intrinsically value others.

From this it would logically follow that one would avoid doing harm to other people - whether they are consenting or unconsenting.
I won't go into the question as to whether I can judge whether any given adult is innocent -- I doubt that I can.

For if we I-value a person we certainly do not want to harm that person - or even that individual animal. After all, people have evolved as social animals. That's why they have capacities to be altruistic and/or cooperative. We are animals - and let's not kid ourselves otherwise!

If any of this is not clear enough, this paper entitled LIVING THE GOOD LIFE puts it in plainer language that is more understandable:
http://tinyurl.com/24swmd

For further details, albeit more technical at the outset, see the booklet referred to below in my signature, where a link is offered to it.

@deepthot,

deepthot;113173 wrote:

We are animals - and let's not kid ourselves otherwise!

This is true, but "animal" is just one such true abstraction. So there's a rhetorical element there. A person could just as well say we are "atoms" or "language users" or "omnivores their eyes in the front, not on the sides."

:flowers:

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;113174 wrote:

This is true, but "animal" is just one such true abstraction. So there's a rhetorical element there. A person could just as well say we are "atoms" or "language users" or "omnivores their eyes in the front, not on the sides."

:flowers:

It is factually wrong to call us "omnivores," although many of us behave like them. According to Physical Anthropoloy we are frugivores, in the same category as the great apes. Point by point, phyically, and genetically, we are 98% alike.

[If this is a digression from the them of the thread, I apologize....I do not want to go off on a tangent, nor do I want to hijack a topic. Please let us not digress !] To my way of looking at things, it would be ideal if we valued our health; and gradually, very gradually, the knowledge is spreading that for optimum health vegetarianism is recommended. People are slowly learning the value of eating salads of fresh, raw fruits and vegetables, in season.

As someone who believes in self-improvement as a moral practice I am heartened by the spread in some large parts of the planet of the teaching of wellness. {In the new Consumer-Protection and Health Reform bill, there is a little (tiny bit) of money allocated for it.}

Once the insights about wellness are well-known, about how to stay in tip-top shape, like, say, Jack LaLanne, or Scott Nearing, much of the dispute about eating animal flesh will be moot because when the requirements of wellness are thoroughly popularized, wise parents will raise their children accordingly.

@New Mysterianism,

Well, I can't say that I am convinced that we are frugivores. I trust my eyes more than the experts. 2 percent puts a man on the moon. Still, I wish you well....

@Reconstructo,

Purely from a diet perspective, it's best to eat as healthy as a vegetarian, but with some meat added. Meat can be very healthy. It's just that most people eat a lot of it and add french fries and a coke.

I don't agree that healthy is good and unhealthy is bad though.

@New Mysterianism,

Defending killing and eating animals is morally wrong

I will have to agree. There are many things that I think need to be considered here. Yes, we are still surviving and we will eat that which will not eat us and we kill that, that can. Personally I care not to witness the lion feasting on a zebra. I find no joy in that at all but for some it does as they proclaim it refreshing to observe nature in the raw.

Exactly what is that nature of the animal to the human? Does "their" instinctive nature have anything to do with ours? Good question? I think it does. I also think as far as wisdom is concerned as it relates to the Earth, the Earth before us was animal in it's nature and at that time it was just that and that God too, as we observe that nature today not only in the animal but the human being as well and there are consequences to that until we separate the two. They were never one but they do affect one another in ways we do not know. It could be concluded if it were not for the animal, we would be more human. Do we understand all that that proposes? No.............not yet and as of yet we need the animal to survive.

Natural selection has prepared a way for US, you know the human element in it all, and the animal is a part of that. They are here for us to survive and nothing more. Yes, we can domesticate some and they do provide comfort when the human element is missing or not being all that the human is capable of that we have yet to know.

When we speak of morality we are far more moral to the animal than we are to the human and there is a lot of evidence to support that. We use animals in many ways to nourish us, comfort us and we do learn from them when I applies to the unity of it all and the simplicity of what harmony means.

The animal has no notion of what surviving is. They just do. They just do without argument that can be applied to any moral sense, like we do and should. We are a little more complicated than the animal as it relates to that which can be said is our "human instinct", but we do have an instinct that connects us as it does the animal and not understanding that in some ways makes us worse than the animal for we become predators and we are not meant to be because we simply know better, The animal doesn't.

The evil in the world comes from our animal instinct. Is this innate? No, it is not at least to a degree that we can defined anyway. But it is there as we become more human we break away from that wisdom that was of the earth before our arrival and when we do those animals that were before will indeed become extinct. That wisdom that drives the animal and influences the human will no longer exist and the human will be one with that God as it was animal in "their" time when we were not.

What we the human is meant to accomplish here if far beyond that of what animal can do which is evident in all that the human has done with what the Earth has provided us with. Are we of the Earth? No, all life arrived at a specific time "that lead from one thing to the other" in a forward progression up until this instant in what we call time; a needless commodity that we will one day come to learn does not exist.

It is not yet known it all it's entirety what it is that we can call a 'perfect nutrition' and that is what odor is all about and why we do smell and create the waste that we do. It can be assumed when we do arrive at that which is perfect for us to consume the anterior orifice that we have now will not no longer be necessary. The body will use all it consumes which will be very little. As it stands now we have to put up with the smell. We are still going through what your might say is trial and error, ha!

The animal only exists because there is a place for them now and a need. When I observe the places where so many humans gather and consider all the area they don't, it truly bothers me as I effort to understand why that is and know now why. Those are survival centers and are a crying shame when so much room is wasted in which to provide plenty of room for all; not so bunched together like sardines in can. Of course that can be discussed in another thread and perhaps it has as it relates to over population of the planet which I feel for one, it isn't and not even close.................yet!

When it comes to applying what we effort to define as to what morality means and we are slowly losing any concept of whatever we want it to mean, (what hell is all about) to animal is ludicrous when we are having a problem with it ourselves. Yes, I will agree no living creature should be abused and pain inflicted upon in any context but the killing for survival some animals that have no other Earthly purpose but to provide us nourishment does not fall under that requisite. To assume that it does would be to place the human on a par with animal and that, as we have seen, can be disastrous as we maintain the erroneous standard that controls the animal world to that of human and "survival of the fittest and only the strong survive". We are so much better than that but as anything else we are not "that civilized".....................yet! Sad! I think we are but there are just too many "human predators" out there that have the ways and means to convince others of the notion in ways we effort to rationalize to survive down to that idiocy and many innocent suffer for it. It is that influence of animal that was here when we arrived that is responsible for that now.

So the notion of what man can perceive and believe can be achieved is accurate, but it is in that we learn and trial & error is how we learn to eliminate that which was our error from those erroneous perceptions. No malice, we had no choice but to perceive as we did. There was no book of rules for us to go by.

There are those animals that we do domesticate that one would wish to continue in our eternal trip but one also has to take into consideration that unknown link we have that dictates it will retard our continuum. I am not aware of all that entails but it plays a major part of that retardation. When we regard animal in a higher/better/par capacity than that human we diminish what that human is able of accomplishing. We start going backward rather than forward and can be somewhat seen in Nietzsche's confusion in his understanding of our eternal continuum depicted in the role Bill Murray played in Groundhog's Day. That would drive anyone mad and that my dear students of philosophy is what philosophy is all about. To fully understand our eternal nature and eliminating that which will retard it's continuance. Simply call it friction if you will. Imagine what we can accomplish once we get beyond the heat of argument and all work together for this common dream. I promise you..................it is not a dream.

What we consume is indeed important and under the influence of our insane economic structure, in order to survive in that understanding we can make anything "appetizing". There is profit to be made in that and that is the sole reason as to why that is as it is with so many other things that cause waste. Plastic being one of them when glass or steel would suffice better, longer and environmentally more friendly. Planned obsolescence is a scam rationalized as necessary to maintain balance we call equilibrium. It is a farce, big time.

For many I know it will be hard to understand once we become more human to realize that the animal could become extinct. That is what is causing all the argument here and now. Will that be all animals? I do not know that but it could very well be just that.

Once we regard all humans the way we should regard all humans as humans there will be no need for the attachment to them we have now. As I have attempted to illustrate, that is a double edged sword. When we depict the devil's with cloffed hooves and a tail, that is for a reason. Perhaps what I have offered is a better understanding of that reason.

William

@Jebediah,

Jebediah;113279 wrote:

Purely from a diet perspective, it's best to eat as healthy as a vegetarian, but with some meat added. Meat can be very healthy. It's just that most people eat a lot of it and add french fries and a coke.

I don't agree that healthy is good and unhealthy is bad though.

You don't agree that healthy is good and unhealthy is bad? What do you mean when you say healthy or unhealthy, then? Because, generally, healthy refers to what is good for the body, and unhealthy refers to what is bad for the body.

@New Mysterianism,

Although I've been a vegetarian who is fussy what he ingests since I was 18 (and now I'm 79) and throughout my life I've had a relative minimum of aches, pains, and sicknesses, I must take note of this:

A subset of the human species, living in the far North of the planet, e.g., the Inuit tribes, have evolved into carnivores. They learned to eat blubber and a predominantly meat-filled diet. Once they enter the 21st century and start living in cities with advanced technology they will adapt to a different lifestyle.

When farmers, who are largely libertarian in philosopjhy, come into the city, they must adapt to more social attitudes and philosophies, such as not packing a gun openly, such as caring for the very poor through entitlement programs rather than the charities they had for the elderly and the handicapped in the 1920s, and earlier -- a set-up in which many unfortunately fell through the cracks and starved to death.

Now as we are transitioning into the Third Wave, to use a phrase from Alvin Toffler. In this phase the highly-trained and the well-educated survive and the rest will have to be garbage collectors or landscaper's crew, which is as necessary and as dignified work as anyone else's work, but it doesn't pay as much. Just as there was a lot of upheaval and suffering as the Industrial Revolution came in (The Second Wave),with city life displacing the farmers, there will be upheaval as we are entering The Third Wave, where intellect may be key to surviving.

My response to New Mysterium, to Oikeiosis, or to anyone else who defends the thesis that the killing of animals is morally wrong is: let's at least focus on getting the world to see that killing of humans is morally wrong, and once we reach that level of sensitivity we can extend it to other animals. In other words, I say, "Let's clean up our own act first."

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;113304 wrote:

You don't agree that healthy is good and unhealthy is bad? What do you mean when you say healthy or unhealthy, then? Because, generally, healthy refers to what is good for the body, and unhealthy refers to what is bad for the body.

Yes, I was just saying that "bad for the body" isn't the same as "bad for the person". There's a bit of a health craze going on which seems like an overreaction to obesity and such, although I'm sure there have always been people who treat the body like a temple.

@Jebediah,

Jebediah;113335 wrote:

Yes, I was just saying that "bad for the body" isn't the same as "bad for the person". There's a bit of a health craze going on which seems like an overreaction to obesity and such, although I'm sure there have always been people who treat the body like a temple.

Hi, Jebadiah

...So you choose to be unhealthy, rather than give in to the "health craze"?

Does this somehow enhance your personhood? I am curious.

You see, you are the first person I've ever encountered who knocks health. In my naivete I always considered it a high value. :bigsmile:

Let's not over-react and avoid pain. After all, there is always available an advanced hospital/pharmaceutical/insurance/medical complex to turn to for a quintuple bypass.

.....But we digress. I feel we are off-topic. Let's return to the topic of the o.p.

@deepthot,

deepthot;113345 wrote:

Hi, Jebadiah

...So you choose to be unhealthy, rather than give in to the "health craze"?

Does this somehow enhance your personhood? I am curious.

You see, you are the first person I've ever encountered who knocks health. In my naivete I always considered it a high value. :bigsmile:

Let's not over-react and avoid pain. After all, there is always available an advanced hospital/pharmaceutical/insurance/medical complex to turn to for a quintuple bypass.

.....But we digress. I feel we are off-topic. Let's return to the topic of the o.p.

I enjoy exercise, but drinking and tasty food are worth more than perfect health. So, as far as the dietary part of the vegetarian discussion goes, I don't think the "healthier" part is significant.

@Jebediah,

Jebediah;113347 wrote:

I enjoy exercise, but drinking and tasty food are worth more than perfect health. So, as far as the dietary part of the vegetarian discussion goes, I don't think the "healthier" part is significant.

The exercise one does may compensate for missing out on other factors of health, such as plenty of sleep; fresh, organically-grown raw food; sunshine, fresh air, and love. So, Jeb, you may yet live to 95.

With respect to the concern of New Mysterium, who originated this thread, I would reaffirm that the killing of the human animal with or without malice -- unless as an act of mercy with consent of the closest relatives and the party himself if conscious -- is definitely wrong. Once we Forum members acknowledge that, I am ready to go even further.

@Jebediah,

Zetherin;113304 wrote:

You don't agree that healthy is good and unhealthy is bad? What do you mean when you say healthy or unhealthy, then? Because, generally, healthy refers to what is good for the body, and unhealthy refers to what is bad for the body.

Hello Z and if I might add what is unhealthy for the body is not just pertaining to food alone. As I have noted before, we could eat razor blades and crap ball bearings if our system was in balance. Of course if our system was in balance we wouldn't have to do such a thing.

We have no idea of how the body metabolizes food in it's natural state, undisturbed and un-invaded. Anytime we invade we alter that natural state and receive erroneous results. That's why most surgery now is laparoscopic instead to cutting one wide open to remove an appendix. In effect we are trying to shut the body up and trying to understand how it will and can heal itself from the damage that we have done to it.

The mind and mood are critical in the health of the body much more so than the food we imbibe. Many times to note a person to be healthy is a product of observation when one appears to be "physically fit". We have proven that not to be so many times; but they do look good no doubt and so many take advantage of that and profit from it. I commented once about the breath of those so called "fitness experts" was enough to curl your hair it was so bad. Yet they were on a healthy diet or so they appeard to be anyway.

Jebediah;113335 wrote:

Yes, I was just saying that "bad for the body" isn't the same as "bad for the person". There's a bit of a health craze going on which seems like an overreaction to obesity and such, although I'm sure there have always been people who treat the body like a temple.

Ageed and well put. It is not necessarily an over reaction for no one wants to be overweight; ask them and they will tell you. It is using them as an example that denotes what un-healthy "looks like" although that person could contribute much to what is "healthy" as it relates to the other more personal influences that causes one to over indulge that causes, in part, that obesity for they have been there and know what it is like.

Creating fear in others has a great profit potential and scares people into doing things they would not do so society would not think them so different, negatively so. Today's society is rift with such tactics. When "well enough best be left alone". The mind when not disturbed like the body will adapt when they are left alone though it may appear they are not. Only the person knows that. One can tell by the mood and personality of that individual that it is so and looks simply don't count in in those cases; and to offer to scare them to think otherwise is a travesty.

"Give me your money and I will give you the secret to the fountain of youth"; what a crock!!!!!! Quality of life has absolutely nothing to do with quantity of life though many profit greatly from making others think that it does.

deepthot;113345 wrote:

Hi, Jebadiah...So you choose to be unhealthy, rather than give in to the "health craze"?

Sorry my friend but this is exactly what I am talking about. Yes, you are 79 and congratulations on that in that you have lived that long. I promise you there are some and perhaps many who do not have such aspirations that I am sure have lived better than you and do not concern themselves with how long they live. This is not meant to attack you and please don't think that.

Edgar Cayce, a well known mystic noted in his many sleeps that old age was a form of greed in most cases and was not healthy but could be conceived as such. Deepthot, I know you are an exception to that rule and I think it is because of your mental state and if that is indeed the case, you would have live this long no matter what you ate if you indeed have something to offer others needed. When you are done, you will die too just like the rest of us.

deepthot;113345 wrote:

Does this somehow enhance your personhood? I am curious. You see, you are the first person I've ever encountered who knocks health. In my naivete I always considered it a high value. Let's not over-react and avoid pain. After all, there is always available an advanced hospital/pharmaceutical/insurance/medical complex to turn to for a quintuple bypass.

I can only hope that from what I have said you consider how so very damaging the above statement truly is, my friend. What is it you wish, to scare him to death as it seems for you to belittle him so in that he does not think the same as you. "Just look at me! You want to be like me don't you"? I hope I have in some way illustrated that is not the avenue to take. We do like to stress our accomplishments and you are to be complimented and I am sure you are and have been on many occasions; but please don't use that as armor to do battle with as we regard old age as a prize we do battle over to see who can live the longest.

Jebediah;113347 wrote:

I enjoy exercise, but drinking and tasty food are worth more than perfect health. So, as far as the dietary part of the vegetarian discussion goes, I don't think the "healthier" part is significant.

If you do not fear that you consume it can be but let's use reason and sensibility in that! If one is told that he is eating "unhealthy", and is prone to believe it, it doesn't matter what he is eating it will do him harm if he continues.

And yes we are getting off topic her, but not far; it does pertain to a certain degree. :bigsmile:

William

@New Mysterianism,

I do not wish to scare anyone to death. I feel the great security that comes with knowing that you may die at any moment. I'm usually fearless.
I am not saying Be like me; at the same time I don't thing you can judge that someone lived better than me, since you don't know me. You don't know at all about the activist phase in my life when I actiively "fought" on the front lines and put myself out there at high risk.

I do know that maturity often comes when an individual passes 50 years of age, and people then often develop a more-ethical sense of values. This does not preclude that anyone younger can have moral insight and maturity (as a consensus of psychiatrists define the concept.)

Anyhow, I wish all readers and members here a Happy, Merry, and Holy holiday season. I also wish you all Long Life, a long and healthy life.
It is very gratifying to have personally witnessed the various 'revolutions' that have taken place, and to have been a part of them, whether it is an appreciation of folk music, women's rights, voting rights, civil rights, internet access, and coming up: broadband access, health-care as a right, gay rights, the Green Revolution,cybourg rights, etc.

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Defending killing and eating animals is morally wrong

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