“Cows look calm, but really they are gay nymphomaniacs"

[Kuciwalker]

The assumption that farm animals cannot suffer from conditions that would be considered intolerable for humans is partly based on the idea that they are less intelligent than people and have no “sense of self”.

Increasingly, however, research reveals this to be untrue. Keith Kendrick, professor of neurobiology at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge, has found that even sheep are far more complex than realised and can remember 50 ovine faces — even in profile. They can recognise another sheep after a year apart.

What does this have to do with a sense of self? In fact, I find it funny that they use this as their argument just after saying:

“People have assumed that intelligence is linked to the ability to suffer and that because animals have smaller brains they suffer less than humans. That is a pathetic piece of logic,” he said.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Thucydides
I really don't believe anyone seriously thinks that animals don't feel pain. I notice that the only people who espouse that argument are vegetarians that put it up as a strawman argument to take down.

You haven't paid enough attention to the OT lately (wait until Kuci shows up)

Seriously though, that point of view was developed by Descartes quite a few centuries ago, and it was mainstream among educated circles for a very long time. The Church, with its "animals have no souls" argument, also kept the uneducated people believing it.

Even today, if you speak about the issue, you'll fairly often meet people who simply cannot believe that cows are deathly afraid of the meat grinder (to the point that some die of heart attack before being slaughtered).

[Kuciwalker]

They feel pain. They are not self-aware. If they were, then I'd consider them morally equivalent to people.

Oh, and I can admit that they are afraid - but I believe the emotion is just like numbers in the register of a computer.

The only reason I believe other people are self-aware - something for which I have virtually no real evidence - is that their brains are practically similar to mine, and I am self-aware, and I believe self-awareness is an emergent property of matter - ergo, other people are probably self-aware since the mechanism that makes me so exists in very similar form in other people.

[The Emperor Fabulous]

Gay bovine nymphos...

Great...like I needed another reason for Jaguar to assert that I'm homosexual

[Dis]

btw I'm a vegan. Because I live in Las Vegas.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by The Emperor Fabulous
Gay bovine nymphos...

Great...like I needed another reason for Jaguar to assert that I'm homosexual

But at least you have the coolness factor of being a nymphomaniac

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
The only reason I believe other people are self-aware - something for which I have virtually no real evidence - is that their brains are practically similar to mine, and I am self-aware, and I believe self-awareness is an emergent property of matter - ergo, other people are probably self-aware since the mechanism that makes me so exists in very similar form in other people.

On what grounds do you justify the belief that only human beings can be self-aware? Is there any evidence that there is some sort of cutoff for self awareness?

This is a flimsy bit of logic, as it makes a huge, unjustified assumption.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Elok
Maybe the animal can feel pain, and I think it wrong to make an animal feel more pain than necessary, just on principle, but the beast is not human. It was bred and raised for the explicit purpose of being killed and eaten someday. So far as we can discern it, the purpose of these beasts' lives is to end, as Agent Smith put it in a really crappy movie. Yay for meat.

Some people used to be bred and raised for the purpose of being exploited for labor. We call them slaves. We all find that institution repugnant, don't we?

In a future society (since you brought up the Matrix), if human beings were used for such a purpose, we'd all find it an atrocity. So what's different about animals? Sure, they aren't "human," but does that in and of itself make a justification, or prove they somehow don't have consciousness/emotions/self-awareness/whatever?

[Urban Ranger]

The assumption that farm animals cannot suffer from conditions that would be considered intolerable for humans is partly based on the idea that they are less intelligent than people and have no “sense of self”.

Increasingly, however, research reveals this to be untrue. Keith Kendrick, professor of neurobiology at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge, has found that even sheep are far more complex than realised and can remember 50 ovine faces — even in profile.

Research still hasn't shown sheep are as intelligent as humans and have a sense of self.

BTW where the article came from?

[Bkeela]

I would become a cannibal and kill humans if I was starving, so such news doesn't really affect me.

[Ben Kenobi]

/me lurks.

Let's see. Side A, says that you don't need a big brain to feel pain, or to be considered a person.

Side B tries to show why humans are special animals unlike all the other animals.

I'm torn!

[Whaleboy]

BK: I don't think that "feeling pain" is adequate criteria for being considered a person, since it would presumably apply to any vertebrate with a nervous system. Remember my lifeform - person(a) - being distinction? I think that would be applicable here.

[Zoid]

Originally posted by Dissident
btw I'm a vegan. Because I live in Las Vegas.

Is that a requirement to live there?

[Heresson]

Kendrick has also described how sheep can form strong affections for particular humans, becoming depressed by long separations and greeting them enthusiastically even after three years.

"Oh! There's my friend! And He's carrying a knife to set me free from this rope and we'll spend the rest of our lifes happily together! Hurra! Huzzah!
(...)
Argh
"

What's interesting that it seems a sheep can recognise human face for 3x longer period than ovine one.

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
The problem is that the cows are often sacrificed in an assembly line manner. The cow behind the one getting slugged in the head by the pneumatic hammer can probably see what's happening. The poor thing probably nearly has a heart attack, yet is too overcome by grief over the passing of her dear friend to run for life. Clearly a more humane process is required.

In fact, in EU, or at least in Poland, at least when it comes to pig, the next one should not see what's happening to the previous one. But it's not one of the respected laws.

Great thread!

[Ari Rahikkala]

Originally posted by Heresson
"Oh! There's my friend! And He's carrying a knife to set me free from this rope and we'll spend the rest of our lifes happily together! Hurra! Huzzah!

Well, in a way, they will