The morality behind veganism

[Secular Sanity]

Do you consider it ethical for a few to suffer so that many more survive?

I’m not a utilitarian.  I’m not one who is concerned only with cold facts and numbers.

What about for many to suffer so they don't die?

IOW, is suffering worse than death?

That depends entirely on the situations at hand.

[Syne]

I’m not a utilitarian.  I’m not one who is concerned only with cold facts and numbers.

That depends entirely on the situations at hand.

Then what criteria do you use to determine what is or is not ethical? Feelings?

Like Baumhart's first respondent, many people tend to equate ethics with their feelings. But being ethical is clearly not a matter of following one's feelings. A person following his or her feelings may recoil from doing what is right. In fact, feelings frequently deviate from what is ethical.
...
What, then, is ethics? Ethics is two things. First, ethics refers to well-founded standards of right and wrong that prescribe what humans ought to do, usually in terms of rights, obligations, benefits to society, fairness, or specific virtues. Ethics, for example, refers to those standards that impose the reasonable obligations to refrain from rape, stealing, murder, assault, slander, and fraud. Ethical standards also include those that enjoin virtues of honesty, compassion, and loyalty. And, ethical standards include standards relating to rights, such as the right to life, the right to freedom from injury, and the right to privacy. Such standards are adequate standards of ethics because they are supported by consistent and well-founded reasons. - https://www.scu.edu/ethics/ethics-resour...is-ethics/

[Secular Sanity]

Why on earth would I even concern myself with the wellbeing of others, if I was emotionally detached?  You’re not asking me to leave my emotions at the door.  You’re asking me to direct my concerns to the majority in order to maximize pleasure, i.e., “tyranny of the majority.”  

[Syne]

Why on earth would I even concern myself with the wellbeing of others, if I was emotionally detached?  You’re not asking me to leave my emotions at the door.  You’re asking me to direct my concerns to the majority in order to maximize pleasure, i.e., “tyranny of the majority.”  

Actual ethics does require us to leave our emotions at the door, because they do often lead people to make unethical decisions. It's called objectivity. If you can't be objective, you really have no business discussing ethics at all. It is a false dilemma to assume you cannot be objective while emotionally invested, unless you prioritize emotional over reason. You should probably stick to moralizing, which does include emotional motivations and societal norms.

You seem to have become quite defensive. I didn't ask you to direct your concerns anywhere. I just asked you a few simple questions.

Here's a simpler question:
Is it better to exist or not exist?

[Secular Sanity]

Here's a simpler question:
Is it better to exist or not exist?

I can answer only for myself. As of now, it’s better to exist. Hell, yeah! I love life, but if I was to get some horrible disease such as locked-in syndrome then it would be better to not exist.

[elte]

I seem to agree with Peter Zapffe on the matter.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Wessel_Zapffe

[Syne]

Here's a simpler question:
Is it better to exist or not exist?

I can answer only for myself.  As of now, it’s better to exist.  Hell, yeah!  I love life, but if I was to get some horrible disease such as locked-in syndrome then it would be better to not exist.

Then you probably should avoid any pretense at discussing ethics. If you can only consider yourself, then you cannot be objective. Would you also say that something like locked-in syndrome would be sufficient reason for you to have NEVER existed?

I seem to agree with Peter Zapffe on the matter.

So you're a nihilist? Zapffe is an antinatalist, who believes it's better to have never existed than to suffer at all.

[Image: fig2.1.svg]

I would say that never existing is exponentially worse, since that is a total denial of potential. But then, I'm not a nihilist. If we seek to deny potential over the potential for harm, we should not favor the existence of any life at all, since all life is subject to some amount of suffering.

[Secular Sanity]

I seem to agree with Peter Zapffe on the matter.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Wessel_Zapffe

Yeah, awhile back I read "HIDING FROM HUMANITY" by Martha C. Nussbaum.  It was pretty good.  I think you’d like it.

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I would say that never existing is exponentially worse, since that is a total denial of potential.

That's hilarious.  

How would you know of any possible potential?  You never existed. The potential never existed.

[Leigha]

I seem to agree with Peter Zapffe on the matter.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Wessel_Zapffe

''Zapffe's theory is that humans are born with an overdeveloped skill (understanding, self-knowledge) which does not fit into nature's design.''

This is interesting, elte, thanks for sharing it! But if humans are born with that ''skill,'' why wouldn't it fit into nature's design? It doesn't seem like he feels it's nurtured or cultural, rather it's a natural trait. Just confused on that point. 

[Secular Sanity]

''Zapffe's theory is that humans are born with an overdeveloped skill (understanding, self-knowledge) which does not fit into nature's design.''

This is interesting, elte, thanks for sharing it! But if humans are born with that ''skill,'' why wouldn't it fit into nature's design? It doesn't seem like he feels it's nurtured or cultural, rather it's a natural trait. Just confused on that point. 

He just thought that we were too evolved, too smart for our own good. He thinks culture is a distraction from reality. He’s a pessimist and an existential nihilist believing that life has no intrinsic meaning or value.  He believes that our rationality has exposed us to the harsh nature of reality.  He believed that disillusionment was more than we could bear.  He sees us as being condemned by nature.

"The piece begins with a fable of a stone age hunter who, as he leaves his cave at night, is stricken by pity for his prey and has a fatal existential crisis. This is a parable resonating with two archetypical tales of Western culture. Firstly, it recalls the Allegory of the Cave in Plato’s Republic, which also relates the eye opening exit of a cave; secondly, it alludes to that origin myth of moral sentiment, the Fall of Man in Genesis. Zapffe chimes in with an exegesis to the effect that his caveman was a man who knew too much. Evolution, he argues, overdid its act when creating the human brain, akin to how a contemporary of the hunter, a deer misnamed the 'Irish elk' became moribund by its increasingly over-sized antlers. For humans can perceive that each individual being is an ephemeral eddy in the flow of life, subjected to brute contingencies on his or her way to annihilation. Yet only rarely do persons lose their minds through this realization, as our brains have evolved a strict regime of self-censorship – better known as 'civilization.'

The discussion is sprinkled with allusions to the fate of Nietzsche: the poster case, as it were, of seeing too much for sanity.

Lastly, Zapffe warns that civilization cannot be sustained forever, as technology liberates ever more time for us to face our demons. In a memorably ironic finish, he completes the tribute to Plato and Moses by foretelling a 'last Messiah,' to appear in a tormented future.

This prophet of doom, an heir to the visionary caveman, will be as ill-fated. For his word, which subverts the precept to "be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth," is not to please his fellow man: "Know yourselves – be infertile, and let the earth be silent after ye."

The View from Mount Zapffe

"We relate to the truth as do moths to a flame."  

Hmm...that's a pretty good line. I don't agree with it, but I do like it. 

You can imagine Sisyphus happy knowing he was not condemned to rolling the rock.  He did it because he could.  It was his choice.  However, if the struggle were to become unbearable, I do feel that we should retain the right to be or not to be.