Head over to Cosmic Skeptic’s channel to hear our discussion on antinatalism! I would highly recommend watching his content and subscribing to his channel: th-cam.com/video/ZUCenKvOzhI/w-d-xo.html
If you want to convince people of wild animal suffering. It may be effective to make an Earthlings style video that shows the injuries, disease, predation etc. of wild animals.
Are you proposing to go against survival of the fittest? If you are, it would seem to me that this would disrupt the natural equilibrium and cause more suffering. It has been proposed that life on this plant would flourish to a higher degree if humans were removed from the planet.
CosmicSkeptic I’m a long time subscriber, It was great to witness you make the change over to a vegan lifestyle. I can see you doing great things for the movement.
You never talked about the 50 billion bees thats killed for your almond milk. Your just trying to sound intelligent bit come across as a typical vegan hypocrite
@@davidsheridan6323 have you even looked at animal deaths per calorie of food? Veganism isn't about perfection. it's about doing your best to avoid abuse and exploitation towards animals. But yeah i avoid almond milk since oat/soya are the most sustainable and ethical ones im currently aware off. Honey has a bigger negative impact on bees for example than almonds does. How is it hypocritical to suggest we minimise our harm?
@@justroberto5052 Veganism is killing far more animals you have no defense your cult religion is a joke you poision many rodents with rat poision shoot for cabbage and spinach plantations. Shoot deer to protect your orchards. Dogs tear up rats and mice to plant potatoes and all the crop death. The runoff from your herbicides and pesticides leak into rivers and kill many fish. Not to mention all the deaths through transporting your foods all over the world. Get off your high horse thinking your doing something righteous. Veganism malnurishes people and kills more animals the death cult
I’m my experience, non-vegans aren’t opposed to ending suffering in nature like they are opposed to giving up meat. Probably because one requires no behaviour changes and one does. I generally don’t talk about it that much though just because theoretically we could have animal liberation tomorrow, people just need to stop paying for animal products. Whereas right now we don’t have the knowledge and technology to end all natural suffering. But I agree it’s worth talking about. I’m only 1/3 of the way through but so far great discussion.
" Whereas right now we don’t have the knowledge and technology to end all natural suffering " . yes , we would have spaying neutering ways . or at least special reservations for a particular specie . 1:08:48 "talking about turtle "condoms" " . it's a important subject , esp as prep. for when corpsivores will try putting "natural" as a killing excuse .
well, that was sneaky... those few non-vegans, that you know, do not represent the opinion of the most non-vegans and they are probably just kind to you. in my experience, you have no idea what you are talking about.
my empty assumption about her empty assumption is capable of providing concrete evidence, but only after her empty assumption provides at least any evidence. since you haven't even tried to provide any evidence either that makes you equally useful. @ichew gum
@CastAirLead I remember that podcast. It was with Earthling Ed. They were talking about moral dilemmas. Of course I don’t agree with everything he says, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that he is extremely intelligent.
My sincerest admiration to both of you, for discussing highly controversial topics that are sure to lose you more subscribers than you gain from them. You are the true ethical leaders of our time, and you demonstrate that with open-mindedness and the courage required to upset your otherwise core audience.
Cruel is consciously causing the harmful act, callous is conscious inaction in regard to the act, ignorance is being unaware of the act or its impact, and compassionate is intervention on a personal or broad scale. It's great to see you guys discussing the black, white, and grey of this.
Love and respect to both of you 💚 My own opinion is that we should tackle the issue we are directly responsible for - man-made animal agriculture / factory farmed bred, exploited and enslaved animals - before concentrating on reducing the suffering of wild/free animals. We are still way too far from achieving the former to direct valuable activism time and energy away from this necessary first step in human compassion. IMO of course! 👍
I agree with you. I think Its like if you're a murderer, maybe you should try to stop murdering before thinking about donating to charity. But if you're not a murderer, maybe you should start thinking about/donating to a charity right now.
I support Humane Hancock for all else he does but his head off into this weird area that we can not yet do anything about is wasting his time, once there is an issue, not until. And I think he is totally wrong in his thoughts on it. I do not agree we should intervene with wild animals as that is natural biodiversity, only where we come across suffering that we can do something about without affecting a species population or its biodiversity.
@@amelijaceica9617 This sounds like whataboutism, I think. Murdering doesn't get in the way of donating to charity at all. "But there are worse problems" is actually an argument that I have heard against veganism a lot. The first commenter pointed that the discussion of the topic shouldn't happen because it's a use of time and energy that is gonna lead nowhere. I disagree with that too because I don't believe activism focus has such a direct correlation with results, but that's maybe more complicated.
the awkward combination of words you picked arbitrarily, just because you think they look offensive makes no sense. I recommend deleting those before anybody else can read them. I swear I'm not going to tell anyone. go. @ichew gum
This really got me thinking. At times I disagree with either one of you or both. But it made me reflect on WHY I want to disagree. I have some more thinking to do. Bravo guys 👏
About the eating dairy to reduce wildlife suffering argument: So im no philosopher so feel free to point out where im wrong, but if industrial farming is a big contributor to climate change, which is also hurting wild life, then wouldn't eating dairy (contributing to the farming industry) not *necessarily* reduce animal suffering? I understand that this can't be precisely measured, but still i feel like its a necessary thing to point out.
I think the net impact of climate change on wild-animal suffering is itself unclear, but yes, that's another important factor. I'm pretty uncertain about the overall net impact of dairy, and I discuss various considerations in this (not super well written) piece: reducing-suffering.org/vegetarianism-and-wild-animals/ My full answer on being lacto-vegetarian is the top reply here: www.reddit.com/r/wildanimalsuffering/comments/9s617n/why_isnt_brian_tomasik_vegan/
@@amelijaceica9617 Yeah, I watched that one first. Tbh, I can see the arguments for antinatalism, but i feel if i ever get married, I'll want at least one kid. It's purely selfish though. A good method might be to have 1 kid of your own and adopt another. It has been shown that mothers have a better maternal instinct towards other young ones that are not their own kids. 2 to 1 would mean you aren't contributing to population growth either. 🤷🏻♂️
Yea no idea what planet theyre on tbh, Dairy fucks the environment and obviously the cows and calfs killed for it. And alexs obsession with factory farming should have been a bit of a red flag....
@@theprimevegan5410 I get what you mean he thinks he's a great debater but he comes across as a child. His etiquette is awful. It's not just people hating on Vegans who think that either. He had a meta-ethics debate and even though I agree with his position, the comments section ripped into him, because Issac won't let other people talk and presses the same point to death. Theres difference between being right and being convincing. It's hard to convince people when you yell No repeatedly at your opponent.
wtf! jhunt , when you see ad hom attacks from corpsivores , then we're knowing what scares shitty corpsivores and what threatens pos ( pos feeling threatened by ay ) .
That's what I respect Alex for. Instead of just laughing of the argument about reducing suffering in nature by eating diary, the first think he does is honestly consider it without assuming anything just because it might sound silly. His reaction is so different than what you might expect from most people. I've never in my life met anyone so open minded and intellectually honest in a sense that they not only logically consider every posibillity but also activily seek the most logical conclusions as a way to form opinions instead of forming opinion first, and looking for reasons later. I find most people I know insufferably absolutely not like that. Plus I always get criticised for having this kind of attitute in conversations and assuming that things people say and think should have some reasons other than feeling or thinking something, as in "I just feel/think it is true".
@@marceloarandia by eating dairy, you reduce the space available for wild animals, so overall there is less suffering because the potential wild animals are not born.
I, for one, am glad that Alex began talking about animal rights because after watching his content I reconsidered what I was doing by supporting animal agriculture, I came to the conclusion that I simply couldn't continue doing that. I've never made a better decision than to go vegan and I'm so thankful that he helped me make that decision :)
Could never understand at all why people started hating on cosmic skeptics was because his entire content he provides is him going over the facts and using logic as a basis for all of his outcomes. He literally went over all the main arguments for why being vegan is morally the right thing to do step by step and couldnt find a single flaw in the facts put forward of why people should go vegan.
There isn't a flaw in his reasoning as long as there is no right or wrong answer. You could come to another conclusion without any flaw in your reasoning, this is the essence of philosophy I think.
I watched cosmic sceptic before he became vegan ... And I was like this guy makes do much sense and so logical , how come he is not vegan .. And then that video about veganism came out I was like ofcourse !!!!
Nice discussion! I agree wild life suffering is a blind spot, and I'm happy you guys point my attention to it. The only person whom I've ever heard defending it before is in face Peter Singer in a discussion video somewhere on TH-cam. I do wish you could provide sources that backup some of the factual claims. I find it hard to believe there's more wild life (excluding insects) than factory farmed animals and would really appreciate if someone could back that up for me. Lastly I wanted to comment on Alex's description of natural selection around 36:05, which I hope Alex he didn't mean literally. He said that "Nature is breeding these animals with the express purpose of suffering", and mentions "... because it [nature] knows", and finally "that's why the principle [natural selection] has been developed in the first place". Just to make sure no one misunderstands: nature does not likely have any purpose, let alone to let animals suffer. It does and can not 'know', and to say that the principle of natural selection is 'developed' is highly questionable and certainly not an orthodox view held by scientists. Am I interpreting Alex the wrong way or does he seem serious about this? I find myself in agreement with him on so many things that it would surprise me that he would hold such an 'off' view on evolution. Great content, thanks guys.
A quick google came up with this article. mercyforanimals.org/study-60-percent-of-all-mammals-are-farmed Keep in mind that's only mammals. Even just including reptiles would tilt the numbers towards wildlife. The other article I think people have been incorrectly extrapolating from is: www.ecowatch.com/biomass-humans-animals-2571413930.html Keep in mind that this is also only mammals, but that 'biomass' is completely different from simply the number of animals. Yes, I believe Alex was taking some shortcuts with his language there assuming that most viewers would know exactly what you are saying. I think he would fully agree with everything you said. No need for concern.
Thanks to both of you for speaking up against injustice and cruelty! It`s sad to here, that CosmicSkeptic faced a lot of backlash from his subscribers. Veganism unfortunatly isn`t a popular position YET. Because of people like you, that will change. I subscribed to CosmicSkeptic`s channel as soon as I saw his video "A meat eaters case for Veganism". :) I wish you both the best for your future!
Wild animal suffering is a known topic that vegans do care about, but currently I think our options to mitigate that suffering are limited, so we choose to ignore it. In the future, I think we might have better tools to help wild animals.
The focus shouldn't only be on the death of the animal. Either by human hands or by natural predators, the prey will die. However, when it comes to factory farming, there is a plethora of suffering and torture being inflicted before the moment of slaughter. This is the truly unnecessary aspect of humans killing an animal; they have to be bred and raised in horrendous conditions. To me, this is where the vast majority of the immorality takes place. In the actual moments of demise, we know that the body releases endorphins to help mitigate the pain of dying. Many people who have been at death's door due to an unforeseen accident report feeling numb and detached as they are being attacked. The moment of death is somewhat cushioned by merciful biological adaptations. I would imagine that the same is true for animals. The major difference is that factory farmed animals endure years of torment by living in poor conditions and having their families separated. In a way, this is my main issue with the trolley problem. You have a trolley engineer, someone who designs the rail system, and a construction crew ignorant of the trolleys schedule. These issues have nothing to do with the person in front of the lever. The fault/blame shouldn't be placed on the passerby. However, when it comes to consuming or not consuming animals, the lever puller is more like a fully cognizant trolley engineer who can avoid all suffering because he/she is in control of the situation.
Lovely discussion, thanks to you both. Per the argument for eating dairy based on reducing wild animal suffering- we also need to consider that it is reducing wild animal pleasure as well. I think animals have many moments of pleasure as well as suffering throughout their lives, and you can put them on a scale with suffering being in the negative and pleasure being in the positive. The first assumption behind his argument is that the suffering of wild animals outweighs the pleasure. I do not think this is true. But if it is true, then it becomes an ethical act to actively destroy the environment with no ulterior motive. Then going on dairy consumption, the amount of NET suffering you are reducing (after accounting for pleasure reduction) by destroying the environment X amount has to outweigh the suffering you are causing by factory farming Y amount. Given the density of suffering in animal agriculture, combined with all of the wild animal pleasure you would be reducing, I think that it seems like a clear negative to consume dairy. But I agree that in the end it is nearly impossible to tabulate.
Animals don't consent to anything. Glad to see Alex figured that out. That is my favourite "trait" to name, btw: Animals are beings from whom we can't obtain consent. And if we deal with humans who can't consent, we also make decisions of life and death for them - automatically. There is no other way. Whenever a being can't consent, it is necessarily dependent on other people making decisions for them.
I was following Alex as an atheist, I always skipped his animal rights videos based on the titles, until I watched by mistake one on “cognitive dissonance” because I thought it would be related with religion. As a person who is anti-bullfighting I couldn’t get myself arguing against it without feeling an hypocrite and turned vegan on the spot, no transition period, it would be impossible for me to eat meat after agreeing with his reasoning on that video.
This was a fantastic talk. I never hear anything about wild animals though we humans effect them as well. Maybe I misunderstood but they both agreed on a fundamentally wrong assumption; that there is more animal suffering in the wild. There are more animals overall in agriculture than in the wild. So this can’t be... Also, humans are not responsible or accountable for the wild animals who suffer at the means of other animals.. When the world is fully vegan, this will be an attainable goal and we will decide whether or not to go through with policing the wild.
Your statement could be true if we only talk about macroscopic animals, you are not accounting for insects, shellfishes and microscopic fauna, they outnumber anything we could even imagine to breed.
@Sergio How do you know that ? It has been shown that flies experience fear, which is a form of suffering. If flies do, then why not krill and tardigrades ?
@@sekishudai insects and microscopic fauna are included and related to domestic animal killing as well. So i'm not sure how we would measure that. Either way it doesn't make sense to me to focus on injustice outside our species influence before we focus on the harm humans are causing first.
What's the argument for dairy reducing suffering again? Is it because it destroys nature so there's less nature to suffer? Isn't that destruction causing MORE suffering overall and at an accelerated pace even?
Depends on what you build that farm on. If it's a desert then the farm is worse, if it's a jungle, the farm is probably better. A parking lot would be best.
I really can’t express how reassuring this video was as a vegan who favors animal sterilization. I always feel totally alone in this, and to hear two folks talk about species extinction as a gesture of mercy is beyond refreshing. Thank you. I would love to hear you both discuss the ethics of gradual climate change through an antinatalist lens. I think there’s a lot of nuance to that topic beyond the knee jerk reaction of “global warming bad.”
Great stuff, thought provoking indeed. My first thought is that we should stop breeding domestic cats, allow them to go extinct, given that they all needlessly kill wildlife when allowed to venture outside?
I came here via CosmicSkeptic and this is a great example of how I can get frustrated with activists and philosophers. 5 min into the video I'm sold...I care about animals in the wild but then you need to come to me with what changes I should make to show that care then I can debate if I agree with those actions, until then my default is step back and do no harm. As an example lets say their are people in the middle of a desert that are starving to death and you come to me and convince me I should care which is an easy task, so then you drop vitamins and saltine crackers to them. Yeah we might have solved them starving but now they are dying of thirst. The point is convincing me I should care but then not giving me options to show my care is a pointless endeavor.
Hey, thanks for watching and I understand how you feel. Towards the end of this video I discuss what we can do as individuals to help: th-cam.com/video/XjCp6bUp__M/w-d-xo.html
Thank you for talking about such an important topic! 🙏 I'm not sure if I can agree with your statement of "there's nothing worse than life in nature", indicating that life in a factory farm would be a better option. Disease, stress and terrible health conditions are common in both worlds. Long and conscious deaths often occure at the slaughterhouses as the methods are not perfect (let's not talk about the workers...). Also, billions of animals die while being babies like calfs, lambs or the male chicks who die on their first day through maceration. And after seeing documentaries like "Factory: the industrial exploitation of pigs" I don't think I will ever see something worse in my entire life... Both worlds are terrible and full of suffering. But personally, I would rather experience a life in the wild with lots of suffering but also a small glimpse of "life", like being able to move, run, see the sunlight or fulfill my primal instincts. Even if that's only a tiny part of my existence, it's better than nothing. I mean, that's how humans have lived for millions of years, right? I wouldn't criticize the vegan community for being more engaged about farming exploitation, specially because humans are fully responsable for it. Anyway, I agree with you, this should a discussed topic and we should make ourselves responsable for wildlife suffering too. Animals can't speak for themselves, and that's why we must speak for them 🌱 My biggest admiration for the two of you for bringing such a controversial topic with so much rationality and interesting arguments
This is genuinely an interesting video to watch, I’m vegan but never thought of wild animals, Obv I wouldn’t go out and hurt them & I’ve rescued owls etc that I’ve found on walks etc. very interesting 🤔
15:00 One thing that needs to be pointed out is the wildfires in Australia weren't actually natural. They're were caused by climate change, which we are at fault for. But even if it weren't human-caused maybe people would still be going out and trying to save the koalas. I dunno.
New science indicate that plants may be more scentient than we have thought. At least we know now that trees in the forest communicate and help each other with nutrients and protection. Is this something they do mechanically, or do they have some awareness about being alive? The question is if plants are "alive". If they are alive and experience being alive, then what suffering is caused by chopping a branch off a tree? What does it mean to be alive, and does it apply to plants? If plants are alive and have some form of experience of it? Maybe safer to eat the things the plants want you to eat, like fruits, and pick them after the plant itself releases them. The point I am getting at here is where is it comfortable to draw the line about what to eat without causing suffering? I can appreciate coosing a lifestyle of not causing suffering. I do it myself in most regards, and i admire munks that look before they take a step in order to not squash any insects. This lifestyle can help you to feel some elevation from making such an effort not to harm. I fully support it, but the judgement of others living differently seems a bit hasty to me. Also the intellectual defence of one lifestyle as a rule for everybody is not something even the munks are trying to achieve. They know if everybody lived like them it would not work, but in their role in society this effort has to do with purification to achieve a higher experience of life, and the widsom aquired is a gain for the rest of society. So I just wonder how you work this all out intellectually, and where you draw the line for what type of suffering is insignificant.
@@eightspeach3548 I don't think it's a reason to not try to reduce suffering. I just think reducing suffering in the wild is far more complicated than saving prey from predators.
Bree Bell or one Gazelle feeds many lions, followed by hyenas and birds as scavengers, and finally flies and other insects. Trying to weigh up the suffering here is not easy.
@@gazrygames2481 That's true, though for a lion to be sustained throughout it's natural lifetime would require the death of many animals. The ecosystem is very complex because it has evolved to depend on the death of other animals. Preventing the lion from hunting seems like the more ethical stance, but it's hard to take all of the other possitive effects that animals death could have into account.
Appeals to nature can never be valid ought statements, but they are valid is statements. And as such, they describe reality, and thus the limitations on our oughts. Just like you can't get an ought from an is, you also can't get an is from an ought: Just because we think the world ought to be a certain way, that doesn't mean there actually is a possibility for it to be this way. So whenever we want to formulate realistic oughts that are not just based in wishful thinking, we need to resort to "ought implies can". And if the "can" part is disproven, we need to adapt the "ought".
Small point but saving the bees isn't a valid example for the "playing god argument", since its seen as undoing an intervention we already did (mainly pesticides, deforestation, monocrop agriculture, destruction of wildflower meadows). You can be consistently anti-interventionist in nature and still want to reverse those kind of changes. It would apply to attempts to avert extinctions not caused by humans, although with the current rate of climate/biosphere change its hard to find many extinctions where human influence hasn't played a role.
Great discussion. The views I’m expressing here are only mine, just to be clear, they might be shared by others but I’m not talking for a “collective” if you will. I'll try to keep it short, which is not easy as the topic(s) are very interesting and quite complicated (which is great but not suited for the platform of TH-cam...) • As with human animals, I believe we also have the moral responsibility to non-human animals and, whenever needed, utilize our knowledge and apply this as far as possible to all. Having said that, I don’t think we have the obligation to actively intervene and/or actively seek out situations. As your point of us having a moral obligation to help a child with a broken ankle, even if it’s not our kin. A problem is the harm and suffering we cause due to, for example, agriculture when animals (human & non-human) are harmed. This we should try to prevent as far as possible but as with a road we build, we know human animals will die/suffer but that’s not the intent and here’s the difference, which as I said earlier, we should try to improve as far as we can, through technology etc. • Sterilizing dogs/cats (domesticated animals). The reason is exactly this, they are bread into existence by us and this is something I believe we ought to stop doing. To elaborate, these animals would not have existed without us, this is not (explicitly) the case with “wild animals”. I'm happy to engage in further discussions.
Maybe we could feed lab grown meat to the carnivorous wild animals so that they won't have to either kill or starve. Simultaneously this would protect the herbivorous animals from the carnivorous ones.
dietary and lifestyle needs of wild carnivores are far more complicated than feeding them lab grown ass tissue from a pig and keeping them in an enclosure.
I understand that this would be logistically difficult, but if it is possible, it is something that we should do because it would reduce the amount of suffering in the world.
@@saturnray1260 what about all the fish, cetaceans, newts, beetles, dragonflies etc. Things which aren't terrestrial and we already aren't able to track and monitor completely?
I think number one issue to focus on (after the abolition of animal farming and fishing) is the trapping of wild animals by hunters and farmers. The suffering of an individual is immense - they don't just yank their limbs in pain and huge stress, waiting to be killed; many non-humans would chew off their trapped limb to free themselves, only to die from blood loss or hunger hours/days later. Similar suffering extends to birds caught in glue traps. Only when we stop all non-human suffering caused by human (farming, hunting, "sport" killings, trappings) and when we set up the infrastructure to alleviate herbivorous hunger, water shortages and diseases in the wild environment - only then we should move on to consider "predator - prey" relationship in the nature. There is also a risk of anti-predator sentiment to be hijacked by anti-nature interests, like hunters (advocating for cull of predators) or urban developers (advocating for removal of "cruel" nature) etc.
I guess we talk less about wild animal suffering because trying to intervene in nature mostly goes wrong (invasive species and such, ecological collapse) Its just to hard to predict what would happen If we did something. While we cause the suffering in factory farms and can stop it without letting ecosystems collapse and cause more suffering
Wow! I'm so glad to see others talking about this I thought I was the only one thinking about wild animal suffering. The way I argue with people I know I advocate for the following: Technology in the form of drones would be deployed into the wilderness to sterilize every creature capable of pain and/or sentience. This would mean perhaps leaving insects and some sea creatures alone. This would bring about the extinction of most animals without killing any of them. (I could also argue for the drones to painlessly kill them but no one I argue with would be receptive to that). The ecological consequences of this would be dramatic, resulting in the largest extinction event in recent geological history. Because of this, climate-controlling technology would need to be developed to sustain human life via filtering CO2 like flora does for us now, in case most or all flora goes extinct. This could very well lead to the extinction of virtually all non-human life on earth. Paired with an antinatalist philosophy the climate control wouldn't even be necessary, as we'd do what we did with wild animals with humans, leaving earth free of all life (this would be necessary to ensure bugs or other life doesn't evolve into sentient life later on) which would probably mean setting up a system to automatically nuke the planet leaving no traces of life. I'm not sure if I'm anti-natalist though so I never say that part out loud. Is this what true animal ethics looks like? Vegan philosophy taken to its logical conclusion? While I can defend it and believe in it, I am still disturbed by it, as it seems so counterintuitive and radical. Regardless, this type of philosophy is always the most interesting to me.
I think Alex is assuming that predation is not unethical inherently, although he should. In his hypothetical preventative methods, he assumes that carnivores continue to eat meat, rather than eliminating them. Consider why the hundreds of prey needed, are less valuable to feed one prey.
I notice Alex said to protect spiders from suffering by letting them out the door, but I thought insects were a different category from animals. I know there are factory insect farms and some vegans consider ground crickets and meal worms as a vegan protein alternative. The main argument I've heard is that insects are unable to suffer the same way other sentient animals do. Do you consider reducing insect suffering to be similarly as important as any other animals suffering? I know cricket farms are also much more efficient at protein per feed, water, and land area used. From an environmental standpoint replacing livestock with insects would significantly help, considering livestock farms take over 1/3 the habitable land on earth.
I see absolutely no reason to expect a cricket doesn't suffer provided anyone outside of me suffers. The same arguments of simplicity and indifference apply. In fact given how greatly children suffer from their emotions a simpler mind may suffer more. So the happiness of an insect larva might be much more important than that of a human.
When it comes to the population control... how good do we think we are discerning which individuals should breed and which shouldn't? Genetics are still way over our heads and if we reduce a population artificially too much in a wrong way [and not knowing the 'right way' is quite plausible], their genetic fitness will decrease. Which also means more suffering and [for those who care - ] possible extinction.
@@christophergama5434 Depends what you care about. You might want to preserve some beauty of parts of it, preserve it for further research of genetics that we still barely touched, plausibly find in all that information new cures and other applications. And in far future maybe even elevate some species into better well-being. And if you think that aware states and the capability for rational thought are valuable - for instance, because it's the only thing that can actually work to alleviate suffering, which without us trying to ease it would happen anyway - it's probably a good idea to keep around at least some of the species [especially social ones] that could plausibly evolve into tool-makers and eventually take our place if we ever got extinct for reasons beyond our capacity to deal with. That's arguably a lesser evil for now.
@@christophergama5434 I don't think it's passing the responsibility. I think it's ours. But we have to consider contingencies, like the possibility of our extinction. If we're extinct, life will continue in its mass-suffering state. And only an intelligent enough species could address that. So the choice might be between shorter and longer time to suffering reduction. On the other hand, now that I think about it, it's a gamble too - it could be that the following intelligent species would be carnivorous by nature and have much less choice in diet than we do as well as values pointing in a different direction - no qualms at all about the suffering of other species and exploitation. But we should also consider the topic of animal rights. Do we have the right to mass sterilize them? Assault their bodily integrity? Isn't it the case that they have instinctual goals and emotions having to do with having babies or subsequent to sterilization lack of them? Not to mention health issues after we amputate parts of their hormonal systems. By analogy to humans, even among those of us who are in principle nihilist, most people seem to want to procreate and continue living. The instinctual drive in those directions in animals is probably generally even stronger, as they don't have our capability to rationalize our way out of things. So on a pragmatic level, I don't think you'd have an easy way to convince most people of antinatalism, and similarly convince most of the people sympathetic to animal causes that we can harm them that way. (I don't believe there's some objective "ought to" here). Either way, I don't think we can ever not harm aware animals one way or another, not in the foreseeable future. Even in the production of plants and plant based foods. I'm not clear where the optimal solution would be in all that mess.
I actually first subscribed to Alex from Cosmicskeptic when he hit 100k subscribers and mentioned in that livestream that he found it hard to defend eating animals and that he was open to veganism.. I subbed bc I liked his content but also so I could forever bug him until he went vegan lmao maybe it worked
What if we breed masochistic cattle and sheep, which we can guarantee to wish suffering upon themselves. So much so actually that we would increase the distorted pleasure they experience by upping the suffering before slaughter? A devilish idea, but if pain can become pleasure by genetic engineering or something, would it not solve the ethical problem of factory farming and our diets including ethically sourced meat?
That is a very good question :D However, breeding and killing animals also has negative effects on world hunger, slaugherhouseworkers, climate, antibiotics and health. So mayve still not ethical. And when we say killing is unethical regardless of if it causes pain or not, then we have to say killing the masocistic cows is also unethical. Not beating them but killing.
No, because you should then make animals that experience maximal pleasure continuously. Failing to do so would be worse than anything humanity has done so far. Not to bring an orgasm-cow into existence would be like the holocaust every single day.
5:30 Some data around this would be really helpful. It's my understanding that 60% of mammals are livestock. Even that stat is problematic too; just because they're mammals doesn't necessarily mean they matter more... I also am not sure about this but, maybe the suffering experienced by one pig on a factory farm might outweigh the suffering experienced by several wild boars. So I think it's hard to measure.
Permaculture! Look into it! We have the understanding to help steward diverse ecological communities while simultaneously achieving all our needs. Unfortunately veganism is not as accepted in this area but it is surely growing.
Maybe he did the calculations, but like it seems as though there is absolutely no way that the amount of suffering per square meter is higher in nature than in a dairy farm. I'd like to see the proof for that. If it is true then maybe but like c'mon.
a few points: the fires in Australia are only natural to a small degree: 1. climate change is currently man-made according to scientific consensus and is exacerbating the problem of drought there (also some forest clearance / animal agriculture) . There are more extreme conditions happening now which are making it much harder for animals who are dependent on habitats which are also increasingly being destroyed by humans. A few species adapt to more man-made environments but most don't. To repair as far as possible would enable more life, at least, and probably more good feeding per head, thus less suffering. 2. if you remove the struggling prey from the jaws of another animal, then it is +1 -1. The predator goes hungry. 3. biodiversity matters for well-being of ecosystems, so an act of kindness can also be trying to maintain biodiversity, which often requires managing and even eliminating introduced invasive species for the benefit of the whole (without going to the hunting lobby for advice ;)) 4. A hungry animal that dies becomes food for another. Should it be saved? Perhaps only put out of its misery. A few instances would have little impact. If we had the technology to do it on a grand scale, it might alter the bacterial populations that break down bodies and also serve - in an albeit unpleasant (our anthropocentric view) way - to control populations size. If you immunize certain species of animals then their numbers might explode or they might not become carrion so often. Then you are choosing between say, Wildebeest and vultures. How can you possibly be intelligent enough to be sure you are not favouring some species instead of others with your limited knowledge of ecology? It is very complex in nature but the bottom line is, nothing goes wasted and is mostly in fairly static balance or slow transition, not withstanding truly natural disasters. Human interference brings so much out of whack in terms of industrialization and globalization. That is what needs to be addressed. There is enough work to be done to deal with that i.m.o. without worrying about natural suffering, although the subject is interesting. The principles to follow are: less suffering on the whole, keeping biodiversity up, no big intrusions, recreation of biomes. Definitely do not introduce more exotic species unless 99.9999% sure it is necessary. Reintroduction of original species can and often does work to restore balance - e.g. wolves in yellowstone park
The thing is, this argument leads to the ultimate conclusion that we should just neuter every animal in the world and just let them die out. Even in the case of it damaging ecosystems, we'd still have to do it. If you say we should neuter all animals except those which would lead to an ecosystem collaspe then you're inadvertently contradicting veganism by asserting that animals who suffer, but support the eco system should be maintained for human benefit.
why don't you discuss with an ecologist? I think you (Alex) are a bit out of your depth on this one, but love both your channels and what you are doing for the vegan movement
I really wish I could talk to Alex about this. He definitely needs to hear the arguments from the perspective of an environmental scientist. I study Environmental Biology at UFT. I have definitely cried because an individual tree was cut down. That is the whole reason I got into this field to begin with.
The idea of consumer dairy to reduce wild animal suffering initially seemed to be logically sound, given the presumptions you discuss. But I’d like to see anyone making this argument setting up a charity, donating to any business that destroys natural habitats. And actively destroying natural habitats as they go through parks, woods etc. Until you’re stamping on grass as you walk are you being consistent or just using it as a convenient excuse?
What's the argument against slowly transitioning natural wildlife into uninhabited areas free of suffering, dedicated to stabilizing the atmosphere for human beings... in a sense just getting rid of nature, I can't seem to find an argument against turning earth into an artificial environment created for humans and and non human companions
I mean, if this was able to be done without significant drawbacks, then sure? But the idea you're presenting here is not one I've ever heard discussed at all, much less practically. It sounds like science fiction set in the year 5530.
@@RetryAgainAgain obviously the technology that stabilizes our atmosphere is science fiction, but we already destroy nature and clear forests for ourselves .. we essentially turn nature into an area for just us ... what's the argument against continuing that trend until nature essential doesnt exist?? Obviously theres the issue of needing forests and wildlife to maintain our atmosphere but we may very well develop a way around this and simply do geo-engineering, and so this is why I initially said we could transition these areas into places that do essentially the same job without the sentient beings inside
48:35 I think it’s legitimate to compare the death of an insect when it dies by being crushed by a human or when it’s not crushed and dies of natural causes. What would be better in terms of the experiences?
the case of wild animal suffering is very interesting to me. i think there is no way to meaningfully distinguish the worth of the wellbeing of a wild vs a farmed animal. the conclusion in principle should therefore be very clear: we should try to minimize the suffering of wild animals. in practice however its a very different story. whenever we intervene in nature there seem to be adverse effects we didn´t predict. we defenitly should still try to find ways to help wild animals, but right now the best way to reduce suffering of all animals seems to be the policy of "just don´t fuck with them if not necessary".
1:04:00 Alex: "To prefer something is to predict that it will bring you more pleasure." I think this is a limiting way to consider preferences. Think about an extremely rudimentary chess AI which works as follows: When it's your turn 1. consider every possible move, 2. score the current board state by counting up all of the individual pieces' values (yours positively, the opponent's negatively), 3. select the move which leads to the most positive result. I don't think it is weird to say that the AI prefers certain board states over others. After all, if an amateur human player would use the same strategy, you wouldn't have a problem with expressing their behaviour that way. I *do*, however, think it is weird to say that the AI experiences *pleasure*. (Note: I am not generally opposed to the idea of technical systems being able to experience things, but I would argue that this most likely is not the case in this instance.) Or take an even simpler example: A robot - so-called Braitenberg Vehicle - on two wheel equipped with one or two light sensors and a sensor-wheel-coupling such that it turns away from light sources and moves away from them. Surely we wouldn't assume that the robot is experiencing anything, and yet it seems to 'prefer' being in the dark. Now, you might say that actually, using the word 'preference' this way is unintuitive and doesn't make a lot of sense and we should use a different word. That's fair. But in that case, why would we use 'preference' regarding the ants, but not the robots? It seems we would smuggle in unjustified assumptions this way - namely that the experience (if present) of pleasure and pain differs between robots and ants.
Head over to Cosmic Skeptic’s channel to hear our discussion on antinatalism! I would highly recommend watching his content and subscribing to his channel: th-cam.com/video/ZUCenKvOzhI/w-d-xo.html
I hope you can bring Oscar Horta, Eze Paez and others to your podcast! I'm glad you are sharing stuff from B. Tomasik. :)
If you want to convince people of wild animal suffering. It may be effective to make an Earthlings style video that shows the injuries, disease, predation etc. of wild animals.
Are you proposing to go against survival of the fittest? If you are, it would seem to me that this would disrupt the natural equilibrium and cause more suffering. It has been proposed that life on this plant would flourish to a higher degree if humans were removed from the planet.
@rgwg sdgfsdfg,
If there are no humans on the planet, how could humans act against survival of the fittest on the planet?
yet more insanity!
Thanks for this, Jack!
And thank you for convincing me to go vegan a mere two months ago.
CosmicSkeptic I’m a long time subscriber, It was great to witness you make the change over to a vegan lifestyle. I can see you doing great things for the movement.
You never talked about the 50 billion bees thats killed for your almond milk. Your just trying to sound intelligent bit come across as a typical vegan hypocrite
@@davidsheridan6323 have you even looked at animal deaths per calorie of food? Veganism isn't about perfection. it's about doing your best to avoid abuse and exploitation towards animals. But yeah i avoid almond milk since oat/soya are the most sustainable and ethical ones im currently aware off. Honey has a bigger negative impact on bees for example than almonds does. How is it hypocritical to suggest we minimise our harm?
@@justroberto5052 Veganism is killing far more animals you have no defense your cult religion is a joke you poision many rodents with rat poision shoot for cabbage and spinach plantations. Shoot deer to protect your orchards. Dogs tear up rats and mice to plant potatoes and all the crop death. The runoff from your herbicides and pesticides leak into rivers and kill many fish. Not to mention all the deaths through transporting your foods all over the world. Get off your high horse thinking your doing something righteous. Veganism malnurishes people and kills more animals the death cult
I’m my experience, non-vegans aren’t opposed to ending suffering in nature like they are opposed to giving up meat. Probably because one requires no behaviour changes and one does. I generally don’t talk about it that much though just because theoretically we could have animal liberation tomorrow, people just need to stop paying for animal products. Whereas right now we don’t have the knowledge and technology to end all natural suffering. But I agree it’s worth talking about. I’m only 1/3 of the way through but so far great discussion.
" Whereas right now we don’t have the knowledge and technology to end all natural suffering " .
yes , we would have spaying neutering ways . or at least special reservations for a particular specie . 1:08:48 "talking about turtle "condoms" " .
it's a important subject , esp as prep. for when corpsivores will try putting "natural" as a killing excuse .
well, that was sneaky... those few non-vegans, that you know, do not represent the opinion of the most non-vegans and they are probably just kind to you. in my experience, you have no idea what you are talking about.
my empty assumption about her empty assumption is capable of providing concrete evidence, but only after her empty assumption provides at least any evidence. since you haven't even tried to provide any evidence either that makes you equally useful. @ichew gum
you no proof. nada. @ichew gum
btw, did you know that most of the chewing gum aren't vegan? just sayin. @ichew gum
It is always fascinating to listen to Alex, he is such a deep thinker especially at such young age, brilliant young man.
Yes, Alex is a very intelligent person.
@CastAirLead
I remember that podcast. It was with Earthling Ed. They were talking about moral dilemmas.
Of course I don’t agree with everything he says, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that he is extremely intelligent.
My sincerest admiration to both of you, for discussing highly controversial topics that are sure to lose you more subscribers than you gain from them. You are the true ethical leaders of our time, and you demonstrate that with open-mindedness and the courage required to upset your otherwise core audience.
Cruel is consciously causing the harmful act, callous is conscious inaction in regard to the act, ignorance is being unaware of the act or its impact, and compassionate is intervention on a personal or broad scale. It's great to see you guys discussing the black, white, and grey of this.
Wow Humane Hancock getting to places, first Vegan Gains and now my other favorite TH-camr Cosmic Skeptic! Good times :D
One of my favorite Philosophers and one of my favorite Vegan Activists in one place! Yeeeey!
Catholics have Aquinas and Aristotle, Atheists have ComicSkeptic. God help you all.
Love and respect to both of you 💚
My own opinion is that we should tackle the issue we are directly responsible for - man-made animal agriculture / factory farmed bred, exploited and enslaved animals - before concentrating on reducing the suffering of wild/free animals. We are still way too far from achieving the former to direct valuable activism time and energy away from this necessary first step in human compassion.
IMO of course! 👍
crumbsandchums I agree
I agree with you. I think Its like if you're a murderer, maybe you should try to stop murdering before thinking about donating to charity. But if you're not a murderer, maybe you should start thinking about/donating to a charity right now.
Hello fellow human.
I support Humane Hancock for all else he does but his head off into this weird area that we can not yet do anything about is wasting his time, once there is an issue, not until.
And I think he is totally wrong in his thoughts on it.
I do not agree we should intervene with wild animals as that is natural biodiversity, only where we come across suffering that we can do something about without affecting a species population or its biodiversity.
@@amelijaceica9617 This sounds like whataboutism, I think. Murdering doesn't get in the way of donating to charity at all. "But there are worse problems" is actually an argument that I have heard against veganism a lot.
The first commenter pointed that the discussion of the topic shouldn't happen because it's a use of time and energy that is gonna lead nowhere. I disagree with that too because I don't believe activism focus has such a direct correlation with results, but that's maybe more complicated.
The entire planet earth is under our care as a species, and we have been careless for far too long!
true .
the illusion is mental food for the ignorant.
the awkward combination of words you picked arbitrarily, just because you think they look offensive makes no sense. I recommend deleting those before anybody else can read them. I swear I'm not going to tell anyone. go. @ichew gum
deal, you first. @ichew gum
This really got me thinking. At times I disagree with either one of you or both. But it made me reflect on WHY I want to disagree.
I have some more thinking to do.
Bravo guys 👏
bravo vegan tina .
Two of my favorite TH-camrs in the same video. Pure Gold.
Alex is great! Thanks to both of you for what you do!
Two of my favorite vegan Animal Rights advocates in one video :)
Excellent content and though-provoking discussions! Keep up the brilliant job, Jack!
Damn, Jack. You are making some serious moves. Keep up the momentum!
Great to have this conversation between the two of you! You both are doing great work in this world!
Thank you for advocating for animals!! (Both of you). I respect Alex more, now!
About the eating dairy to reduce wildlife suffering argument:
So im no philosopher so feel free to point out where im wrong, but if industrial farming is a big contributor to climate change, which is also hurting wild life, then wouldn't eating dairy (contributing to the farming industry) not *necessarily* reduce animal suffering? I understand that this can't be precisely measured, but still i feel like its a necessary thing to point out.
From that argument i was feeling like proactively ending all life on earth should be the best thing lol
I think the net impact of climate change on wild-animal suffering is itself unclear, but yes, that's another important factor. I'm pretty uncertain about the overall net impact of dairy, and I discuss various considerations in this (not super well written) piece: reducing-suffering.org/vegetarianism-and-wild-animals/
My full answer on being lacto-vegetarian is the top reply here: www.reddit.com/r/wildanimalsuffering/comments/9s617n/why_isnt_brian_tomasik_vegan/
@@shkhrvarshney you should watch their antinatalism video. I've been questioning and thinking about a lot of things after that lol
@@amelijaceica9617 Yeah, I watched that one first. Tbh, I can see the arguments for antinatalism, but i feel if i ever get married, I'll want at least one kid. It's purely selfish though. A good method might be to have 1 kid of your own and adopt another. It has been shown that mothers have a better maternal instinct towards other young ones that are not their own kids. 2 to 1 would mean you aren't contributing to population growth either. 🤷🏻♂️
Yea no idea what planet theyre on tbh, Dairy fucks the environment and obviously the cows and calfs killed for it.
And alexs obsession with factory farming should have been a bit of a red flag....
This is the best day of my life
Then you have a sad life ...
@@markokrstic3164 I want to stress that their life is worth continuing.
You got married or your first child is born? Congratz anyway! :-)
One who is having the best day of there life is by far the richest man. Congrats. I’m learning to live my life as everyday being the best day. Cheers!
HH is getting some great guests AY, Vegan Gains and now CosmicSkeptic. Alex is truly a great addition to Vegan activism.
Except Ask Yourself. He's causing more problems than helping. He's became a embarasment.😉
@@theprimevegan5410 I get what you mean he thinks he's a great debater but he comes across as a child. His etiquette is awful. It's not just people hating on Vegans who think that either. He had a meta-ethics debate and even though I agree with his position, the comments section ripped into him, because Issac won't let other people talk and presses the same point to death.
Theres difference between being right and being convincing. It's hard to convince people when you yell No repeatedly at your opponent.
wtf! jhunt , when you see ad hom attacks from corpsivores , then we're knowing what scares shitty corpsivores and what threatens pos ( pos feeling threatened by ay ) .
That's what I respect Alex for. Instead of just laughing of the argument about reducing suffering in nature by eating diary, the first think he does is honestly consider it without assuming anything just because it might sound silly. His reaction is so different than what you might expect from most people. I've never in my life met anyone so open minded and intellectually honest in a sense that they not only logically consider every posibillity but also activily seek the most logical conclusions as a way to form opinions instead of forming opinion first, and looking for reasons later. I find most people I know insufferably absolutely not like that. Plus I always get criticised for having this kind of attitute in conversations and assuming that things people say and think should have some reasons other than feeling or thinking something, as in "I just feel/think it is true".
I completely agree.
English is not my mother language.. can you please help me understand (in a nutshell) the argument of why consumption of dairy minimizes suffering?
@@marceloarandia by eating dairy, you reduce the space available for wild animals, so overall there is less suffering because the potential wild animals are not born.
Great discussion, thanks for the upload.
*My favorite guest on your channel thus far!*
Hancock next guest should be a therapist as he's lost his mind
You so much want to duck these two, are you jetting off now
Yeah , Alex is great but I'd love to see Michelle Lowe on next .
@@isupportthecurrentthing.1514 yep and if she's honest she will say what a load of bollox
@@trollkinglouisgedo2041 She doesn't agree with Hancock on this so ,she will but probably more politely .
Absolutely love this video. Everything I hear from Alex's mouth makes me respect him more.
Applying the drowning child analogy to wild-animal suffering is something I hadn't thought of before! Neat.
Silence is violence
I, for one, am glad that Alex began talking about animal rights because after watching his content I reconsidered what I was doing by supporting animal agriculture, I came to the conclusion that I simply couldn't continue doing that. I've never made a better decision than to go vegan and I'm so thankful that he helped me make that decision :)
I've been following CS since the beginning. Great talk.
Could never understand at all why people started hating on cosmic skeptics was because his entire content he provides is him going over the facts and using logic as a basis for all of his outcomes. He literally went over all the main arguments for why being vegan is morally the right thing to do step by step and couldnt find a single flaw in the facts put forward of why people should go vegan.
There isn't a flaw in his reasoning as long as there is no right or wrong answer. You could come to another conclusion without any flaw in your reasoning, this is the essence of philosophy I think.
Dylan!
I always imagined that in the future, we will have tiny mosquitoes that can inject something like morphine into wild animals that are dying/suffering.
Won’t that turn the predators into opiate addicts lol
Ultra-based.
I watched cosmic sceptic before he became vegan ... And I was like this guy makes do much sense and so logical , how come he is not vegan ..
And then that video about veganism came out I was like ofcourse !!!!
Nice discussion! I agree wild life suffering is a blind spot, and I'm happy you guys point my attention to it. The only person whom I've ever heard defending it before is in face Peter Singer in a discussion video somewhere on TH-cam.
I do wish you could provide sources that backup some of the factual claims. I find it hard to believe there's more wild life (excluding insects) than factory farmed animals and would really appreciate if someone could back that up for me.
Lastly I wanted to comment on Alex's description of natural selection around 36:05, which I hope Alex he didn't mean literally. He said that "Nature is breeding these animals with the express purpose of suffering", and mentions "... because it [nature] knows", and finally "that's why the principle [natural selection] has been developed in the first place". Just to make sure no one misunderstands: nature does not likely have any purpose, let alone to let animals suffer. It does and can not 'know', and to say that the principle of natural selection is 'developed' is highly questionable and certainly not an orthodox view held by scientists. Am I interpreting Alex the wrong way or does he seem serious about this? I find myself in agreement with him on so many things that it would surprise me that he would hold such an 'off' view on evolution.
Great content, thanks guys.
A quick google came up with this article. mercyforanimals.org/study-60-percent-of-all-mammals-are-farmed
Keep in mind that's only mammals. Even just including reptiles would tilt the numbers towards wildlife.
The other article I think people have been incorrectly extrapolating from is: www.ecowatch.com/biomass-humans-animals-2571413930.html
Keep in mind that this is also only mammals, but that 'biomass' is completely different from simply the number of animals.
Yes, I believe Alex was taking some shortcuts with his language there assuming that most viewers would know exactly what you are saying. I think he would fully agree with everything you said. No need for concern.
@@RetryAgainAgain Thanks :). That's a nice start.
Really respect these two, Loved the discussion!
So excited to watch this! I’ve been thinking about this topic for so long.
Thanks to both of you for speaking up against injustice and cruelty! It`s sad to here, that CosmicSkeptic faced a lot of backlash from his subscribers. Veganism unfortunatly isn`t a popular position YET. Because of people like you, that will change. I subscribed to CosmicSkeptic`s channel as soon as I saw his video "A meat eaters case for Veganism". :) I wish you both the best for your future!
Wild animal suffering is a known topic that vegans do care about, but currently I think our options to mitigate that suffering are limited, so we choose to ignore it. In the future, I think we might have better tools to help wild animals.
Extinction works rather well.
The focus shouldn't only be on the death of the animal. Either by human hands or by natural predators, the prey will die. However, when it comes to factory farming, there is a plethora of suffering and torture being inflicted before the moment of slaughter. This is the truly unnecessary aspect of humans killing an animal; they have to be bred and raised in horrendous conditions. To me, this is where the vast majority of the immorality takes place. In the actual moments of demise, we know that the body releases endorphins to help mitigate the pain of dying. Many people who have been at death's door due to an unforeseen accident report feeling numb and detached as they are being attacked. The moment of death is somewhat cushioned by merciful biological adaptations. I would imagine that the same is true for animals. The major difference is that factory farmed animals endure years of torment by living in poor conditions and having their families separated. In a way, this is my main issue with the trolley problem. You have a trolley engineer, someone who designs the rail system, and a construction crew ignorant of the trolleys schedule. These issues have nothing to do with the person in front of the lever. The fault/blame shouldn't be placed on the passerby. However, when it comes to consuming or not consuming animals, the lever puller is more like a fully cognizant trolley engineer who can avoid all suffering because he/she is in control of the situation.
Alex is the reason I'm vegan today. I'll always be grateful to him.
I guess there’s a difference between actively causing factory farming by buying meat and allowing suffering in the wild?
Lovely discussion, thanks to you both. Per the argument for eating dairy based on reducing wild animal suffering- we also need to consider that it is reducing wild animal pleasure as well. I think animals have many moments of pleasure as well as suffering throughout their lives, and you can put them on a scale with suffering being in the negative and pleasure being in the positive. The first assumption behind his argument is that the suffering of wild animals outweighs the pleasure. I do not think this is true. But if it is true, then it becomes an ethical act to actively destroy the environment with no ulterior motive. Then going on dairy consumption, the amount of NET suffering you are reducing (after accounting for pleasure reduction) by destroying the environment X amount has to outweigh the suffering you are causing by factory farming Y amount. Given the density of suffering in animal agriculture, combined with all of the wild animal pleasure you would be reducing, I think that it seems like a clear negative to consume dairy. But I agree that in the end it is nearly impossible to tabulate.
Wild animal suffering is why I went vegan... but I did work at a BBQ for my first job so I was heavily programmed!
I don't understand how eating dairy reduces animal suffering. Can someone please explain?
Is anyone claiming this?
Animals don't consent to anything. Glad to see Alex figured that out. That is my favourite "trait" to name, btw: Animals are beings from whom we can't obtain consent. And if we deal with humans who can't consent, we also make decisions of life and death for them - automatically. There is no other way. Whenever a being can't consent, it is necessarily dependent on other people making decisions for them.
Of course they can consent. My cats express their wishes all of the time. That doesn't mean it's optimal to act on those wishes.
I'm for ending all animal suffering but 1st the industry!
With technology literally anything is likely possible
Fascinating to watch this now that he isn't vegan.
I was following Alex as an atheist, I always skipped his animal rights videos based on the titles, until I watched by mistake one on “cognitive dissonance” because I thought it would be related with religion. As a person who is anti-bullfighting I couldn’t get myself arguing against it without feeling an hypocrite and turned vegan on the spot, no transition period, it would be impossible for me to eat meat after agreeing with his reasoning on that video.
I love the collab. Cheers to u both!!
Fantastic video!
Really...total bollox giving vegans a bad name
You are AMAZING! Keep it up!
This was a fantastic talk. I never hear anything about wild animals though we humans effect them as well.
Maybe I misunderstood but they both agreed on a fundamentally wrong assumption; that there is more animal suffering in the wild.
There are more animals overall in agriculture than in the wild. So this can’t be...
Also, humans are not responsible or accountable for the wild animals who suffer at the means of other animals..
When the world is fully vegan, this will be an attainable goal and we will decide whether or not to go through with policing the wild.
Your statement could be true if we only talk about macroscopic animals, you are not accounting for insects, shellfishes and microscopic fauna, they outnumber anything we could even imagine to breed.
@Sergio How do you know that ? It has been shown that flies experience fear, which is a form of suffering. If flies do, then why not krill and tardigrades ?
@Sergio How do you know that ? ^^
@@sekishudai insects and microscopic fauna are included and related to domestic animal killing as well. So i'm not sure how we would measure that. Either way it doesn't make sense to me to focus on injustice outside our species influence before we focus on the harm humans are causing first.
@@calvinbailey4756 I would have stopped your last sentence at "our species influence", but yeah I agree ^^
Love it when a conversation breaks my brain
What's the argument for dairy reducing suffering again? Is it because it destroys nature so there's less nature to suffer? Isn't that destruction causing MORE suffering overall and at an accelerated pace even?
The idea is that the displaced nature prevents huge amounts of animals from reproducing and suffering in the future
Depends on what you build that farm on. If it's a desert then the farm is worse, if it's a jungle, the farm is probably better.
A parking lot would be best.
Such a great talk 🌱
I really can’t express how reassuring this video was as a vegan who favors animal sterilization. I always feel totally alone in this, and to hear two folks talk about species extinction as a gesture of mercy is beyond refreshing. Thank you.
I would love to hear you both discuss the ethics of gradual climate change through an antinatalist lens. I think there’s a lot of nuance to that topic beyond the knee jerk reaction of “global warming bad.”
1st, you're not alone
2nd, I agree
Great stuff, thought provoking indeed. My first thought is that we should stop breeding domestic cats, allow them to go extinct, given that they all needlessly kill wildlife when allowed to venture outside?
I came here via CosmicSkeptic and this is a great example of how I can get frustrated with activists and philosophers. 5 min into the video I'm sold...I care about animals in the wild but then you need to come to me with what changes I should make to show that care then I can debate if I agree with those actions, until then my default is step back and do no harm. As an example lets say their are people in the middle of a desert that are starving to death and you come to me and convince me I should care which is an easy task, so then you drop vitamins and saltine crackers to them. Yeah we might have solved them starving but now they are dying of thirst. The point is convincing me I should care but then not giving me options to show my care is a pointless endeavor.
Hey, thanks for watching and I understand how you feel. Towards the end of this video I discuss what we can do as individuals to help: th-cam.com/video/XjCp6bUp__M/w-d-xo.html
Thank you for talking about such an important topic! 🙏
I'm not sure if I can agree with your statement of "there's nothing worse than life in nature", indicating that life in a factory farm would be a better option.
Disease, stress and terrible health conditions are common in both worlds. Long and conscious deaths often occure at the slaughterhouses as the methods are not perfect (let's not talk about the workers...). Also, billions of animals die while being babies like calfs, lambs or the male chicks who die on their first day through maceration. And after seeing documentaries like "Factory: the industrial exploitation of pigs" I don't think I will ever see something worse in my entire life...
Both worlds are terrible and full of suffering. But personally, I would rather experience a life in the wild with lots of suffering but also a small glimpse of "life", like being able to move, run, see the sunlight or fulfill my primal instincts. Even if that's only a tiny part of my existence, it's better than nothing. I mean, that's how humans have lived for millions of years, right?
I wouldn't criticize the vegan community for being more engaged about farming exploitation, specially because humans are fully responsable for it. Anyway, I agree with you, this should a discussed topic and we should make ourselves responsable for wildlife suffering too. Animals can't speak for themselves, and that's why we must speak for them 🌱 My biggest admiration for the two of you for bringing such a controversial topic with so much rationality and interesting arguments
This is genuinely an interesting video to watch, I’m vegan but never thought of wild animals, Obv I wouldn’t go out and hurt them & I’ve rescued owls etc that I’ve found on walks etc. very interesting 🤔
Aren’t the most common natural deaths the most painful ones, since suffering exists evolutionarily to help animals avoid death and injury?
15:00 One thing that needs to be pointed out is the wildfires in Australia weren't actually natural. They're were caused by climate change, which we are at fault for. But even if it weren't human-caused maybe people would still be going out and trying to save the koalas. I dunno.
Bollocks. They were the result of bad forestry.
New science indicate that plants may be more scentient than we have thought. At least we know now that trees in the forest communicate and help each other with nutrients and protection. Is this something they do mechanically, or do they have some awareness about being alive? The question is if plants are "alive". If they are alive and experience being alive, then what suffering is caused by chopping a branch off a tree? What does it mean to be alive, and does it apply to plants? If plants are alive and have some form of experience of it?
Maybe safer to eat the things the plants want you to eat, like fruits, and pick them after the plant itself releases them. The point I am getting at here is where is it comfortable to draw the line about what to eat without causing suffering? I can appreciate coosing a lifestyle of not causing suffering. I do it myself in most regards, and i admire munks that look before they take a step in order to not squash any insects. This lifestyle can help you to feel some elevation from making such an effort not to harm. I fully support it, but the judgement of others living differently seems a bit hasty to me. Also the intellectual defence of one lifestyle as a rule for everybody is not something even the munks are trying to achieve. They know if everybody lived like them it would not work, but in their role in society this effort has to do with purification to achieve a higher experience of life, and the widsom aquired is a gain for the rest of society. So I just wonder how you work this all out intellectually, and where you draw the line for what type of suffering is insignificant.
On ending suffering for wild animals, say saving a gazelle, aren’t you still causing harm by making a lion go hungry? A slow death of starvation.
Any solution is way beyond the ken of these two. All life seems to end in some form of suffering.
@@eightspeach3548 I don't think it's a reason to not try to reduce suffering. I just think reducing suffering in the wild is far more complicated than saving prey from predators.
For that lion to live though, it would require the death of many animals. It's not a one to one situation.
Bree Bell or one Gazelle feeds many lions, followed by hyenas and birds as scavengers, and finally flies and other insects. Trying to weigh up the suffering here is not easy.
@@gazrygames2481 That's true, though for a lion to be sustained throughout it's natural lifetime would require the death of many animals. The ecosystem is very complex because it has evolved to depend on the death of other animals. Preventing the lion from hunting seems like the more ethical stance, but it's hard to take all of the other possitive effects that animals death could have into account.
Appeals to nature can never be valid ought statements, but they are valid is statements. And as such, they describe reality, and thus the limitations on our oughts. Just like you can't get an ought from an is, you also can't get an is from an ought: Just because we think the world ought to be a certain way, that doesn't mean there actually is a possibility for it to be this way. So whenever we want to formulate realistic oughts that are not just based in wishful thinking, we need to resort to "ought implies can". And if the "can" part is disproven, we need to adapt the "ought".
Great Video!
Absolutely fantastic
Is extinction an issue? If not for animals then why for humans? If not for humans then what is the reason of living in the first place?
love you both so much!
Good conversation
Small point but saving the bees isn't a valid example for the "playing god argument", since its seen as undoing an intervention we already did (mainly pesticides, deforestation, monocrop agriculture, destruction of wildflower meadows). You can be consistently anti-interventionist in nature and still want to reverse those kind of changes.
It would apply to attempts to avert extinctions not caused by humans, although with the current rate of climate/biosphere change its hard to find many extinctions where human influence hasn't played a role.
Great discussion.
The views I’m expressing here are only mine, just to be clear, they might be shared by others but I’m not talking for a “collective” if you will.
I'll try to keep it short, which is not easy as the topic(s) are very interesting and quite complicated (which is great but not suited for the platform of TH-cam...)
• As with human animals, I believe we also have the moral responsibility to non-human animals and, whenever needed, utilize our knowledge and apply this as far as possible to all. Having said that, I don’t think we have the obligation to actively intervene and/or actively seek out situations. As your point of us having a moral obligation to help a child with a broken ankle, even if it’s not our kin. A problem is the harm and suffering we cause due to, for example, agriculture when animals (human & non-human) are harmed. This we should try to prevent as far as possible but as with a road we build, we know human animals will die/suffer but that’s not the intent and here’s the difference, which as I said earlier, we should try to improve as far as we can, through technology etc.
• Sterilizing dogs/cats (domesticated animals). The reason is exactly this, they are bread into existence by us and this is something I believe we ought to stop doing. To elaborate, these animals would not have existed without us, this is not (explicitly) the case with “wild animals”.
I'm happy to engage in further discussions.
Maybe we could feed lab grown meat to the carnivorous wild animals so that they won't have to either kill or starve. Simultaneously this would protect the herbivorous animals from the carnivorous ones.
We'd need to control breeding too. The logistics of helping all wild animals is implausible.
dietary and lifestyle needs of wild carnivores are far more complicated than feeding them lab grown ass tissue from a pig and keeping them in an enclosure.
Then we would need groups of trained and equipped people who trek through the wild following predators and dish out their meals .
I understand that this would be logistically difficult, but if it is possible, it is something that we should do because it would reduce the amount of suffering in the world.
@@saturnray1260 what about all the fish, cetaceans, newts, beetles, dragonflies etc. Things which aren't terrestrial and we already aren't able to track and monitor completely?
Given the diminishing returns on experience it is probably worse for 2 people to break 1 finger than 1 person to break 2
I think number one issue to focus on (after the abolition of animal farming and fishing) is the trapping of wild animals by hunters and farmers. The suffering of an individual is immense - they don't just yank their limbs in pain and huge stress, waiting to be killed; many non-humans would chew off their trapped limb to free themselves, only to die from blood loss or hunger hours/days later. Similar suffering extends to birds caught in glue traps. Only when we stop all non-human suffering caused by human (farming, hunting, "sport" killings, trappings) and when we set up the infrastructure to alleviate herbivorous hunger, water shortages and diseases in the wild environment - only then we should move on to consider "predator - prey" relationship in the nature.
There is also a risk of anti-predator sentiment to be hijacked by anti-nature interests, like hunters (advocating for cull of predators) or urban developers (advocating for removal of "cruel" nature) etc.
Hunters are pro nature through and through. They are among the prime supporters of conservationism, because that secures hunting grounds.
@@MrCmon113 You are right, I shouldn't have said "anti-nature" about hunters. Still it doesn't make them any less evil.
It is so good to live vegan!
I guess we talk less about wild animal suffering because trying to intervene in nature mostly goes wrong (invasive species and such, ecological collapse) Its just to hard to predict what would happen If we did something. While we cause the suffering in factory farms and can stop it without letting ecosystems collapse and cause more suffering
Thank you! :)
Jack plz discuss the point that farming animals for us to eat reduces overall suffering
Wow! I'm so glad to see others talking about this I thought I was the only one thinking about wild animal suffering. The way I argue with people I know I advocate for the following:
Technology in the form of drones would be deployed into the wilderness to sterilize every creature capable of pain and/or sentience. This would mean perhaps leaving insects and some sea creatures alone. This would bring about the extinction of most animals without killing any of them. (I could also argue for the drones to painlessly kill them but no one I argue with would be receptive to that).
The ecological consequences of this would be dramatic, resulting in the largest extinction event in recent geological history. Because of this, climate-controlling technology would need to be developed to sustain human life via filtering CO2 like flora does for us now, in case most or all flora goes extinct. This could very well lead to the extinction of virtually all non-human life on earth. Paired with an antinatalist philosophy the climate control wouldn't even be necessary, as we'd do what we did with wild animals with humans, leaving earth free of all life (this would be necessary to ensure bugs or other life doesn't evolve into sentient life later on) which would probably mean setting up a system to automatically nuke the planet leaving no traces of life. I'm not sure if I'm anti-natalist though so I never say that part out loud.
Is this what true animal ethics looks like? Vegan philosophy taken to its logical conclusion? While I can defend it and believe in it, I am still disturbed by it, as it seems so counterintuitive and radical. Regardless, this type of philosophy is always the most interesting to me.
I think Alex is assuming that predation is not unethical inherently, although he should. In his hypothetical preventative methods, he assumes that carnivores continue to eat meat, rather than eliminating them. Consider why the hundreds of prey needed, are less valuable to feed one prey.
I notice Alex said to protect spiders from suffering by letting them out the door, but I thought insects were a different category from animals. I know there are factory insect farms and some vegans consider ground crickets and meal worms as a vegan protein alternative. The main argument I've heard is that insects are unable to suffer the same way other sentient animals do. Do you consider reducing insect suffering to be similarly as important as any other animals suffering? I know cricket farms are also much more efficient at protein per feed, water, and land area used. From an environmental standpoint replacing livestock with insects would significantly help, considering livestock farms take over 1/3 the habitable land on earth.
I think, and I think cosmicskeptic would as well think that it all depends on the main argument you put forward. To what degree can they suffer?
I see absolutely no reason to expect a cricket doesn't suffer provided anyone outside of me suffers. The same arguments of simplicity and indifference apply. In fact given how greatly children suffer from their emotions a simpler mind may suffer more.
So the happiness of an insect larva might be much more important than that of a human.
this two men have massive brains
actually HH is either a manipulative narcissist or an idiot. His argument is almost entirely fact-free.
When it comes to the population control... how good do we think we are discerning which individuals should breed and which shouldn't? Genetics are still way over our heads and if we reduce a population artificially too much in a wrong way [and not knowing the 'right way' is quite plausible], their genetic fitness will decrease. Which also means more suffering and [for those who care - ] possible extinction.
@@christophergama5434 Depends what you care about. You might want to preserve some beauty of parts of it, preserve it for further research of genetics that we still barely touched, plausibly find in all that information new cures and other applications. And in far future maybe even elevate some species into better well-being.
And if you think that aware states and the capability for rational thought are valuable - for instance, because it's the only thing that can actually work to alleviate suffering, which without us trying to ease it would happen anyway - it's probably a good idea to keep around at least some of the species [especially social ones] that could plausibly evolve into tool-makers and eventually take our place if we ever got extinct for reasons beyond our capacity to deal with. That's arguably a lesser evil for now.
@@christophergama5434
I don't think it's passing the responsibility. I think it's ours. But we have to consider contingencies, like the possibility of our extinction. If we're extinct, life will continue in its mass-suffering state. And only an intelligent enough species could address that. So the choice might be between shorter and longer time to suffering reduction. On the other hand, now that I think about it, it's a gamble too - it could be that the following intelligent species would be carnivorous by nature and have much less choice in diet than we do as well as values pointing in a different direction - no qualms at all about the suffering of other species and exploitation.
But we should also consider the topic of animal rights. Do we have the right to mass sterilize them? Assault their bodily integrity? Isn't it the case that they have instinctual goals and emotions having to do with having babies or subsequent to sterilization lack of them? Not to mention health issues after we amputate parts of their hormonal systems.
By analogy to humans, even among those of us who are in principle nihilist, most people seem to want to procreate and continue living. The instinctual drive in those directions in animals is probably generally even stronger, as they don't have our capability to rationalize our way out of things. So on a pragmatic level, I don't think you'd have an easy way to convince most people of antinatalism, and similarly convince most of the people sympathetic to animal causes that we can harm them that way. (I don't believe there's some objective "ought to" here).
Either way, I don't think we can ever not harm aware animals one way or another, not in the foreseeable future. Even in the production of plants and plant based foods. I'm not clear where the optimal solution would be in all that mess.
I actually first subscribed to Alex from Cosmicskeptic when he hit 100k subscribers and mentioned in that livestream that he found it hard to defend eating animals and that he was open to veganism.. I subbed bc I liked his content but also so I could forever bug him until he went vegan lmao maybe it worked
What if we breed masochistic cattle and sheep, which we can guarantee to wish suffering upon themselves. So much so actually that we would increase the distorted pleasure they experience by upping the suffering before slaughter? A devilish idea, but if pain can become pleasure by genetic engineering or something, would it not solve the ethical problem of factory farming and our diets including ethically sourced meat?
That is a very good question :D
However, breeding and killing animals also has negative effects on world hunger, slaugherhouseworkers, climate, antibiotics and health. So mayve still not ethical. And when we say killing is unethical regardless of if it causes pain or not, then we have to say killing the masocistic cows is also unethical. Not beating them but killing.
No, because you should then make animals that experience maximal pleasure continuously. Failing to do so would be worse than anything humanity has done so far.
Not to bring an orgasm-cow into existence would be like the holocaust every single day.
Doesnt sound like a bad idea, but replace the words "cattle" and "sheep" in your sentence by "humans", and see how awful it looks actually
5:30 Some data around this would be really helpful. It's my understanding that 60% of mammals are livestock. Even that stat is problematic too; just because they're mammals doesn't necessarily mean they matter more... I also am not sure about this but, maybe the suffering experienced by one pig on a factory farm might outweigh the suffering experienced by several wild boars. So I think it's hard to measure.
Permaculture! Look into it! We have the understanding to help steward diverse ecological communities while simultaneously achieving all our needs. Unfortunately veganism is not as accepted in this area but it is surely growing.
Maybe he did the calculations, but like it seems as though there is absolutely no way that the amount of suffering per square meter is higher in nature than in a dairy farm. I'd like to see the proof for that. If it is true then maybe but like c'mon.
a few points: the fires in Australia are only natural to a small degree: 1. climate change is currently man-made according to scientific consensus and is exacerbating the problem of drought there (also some forest clearance / animal agriculture) . There are more extreme conditions happening now which are making it much harder for animals who are dependent on habitats which are also increasingly being destroyed by humans. A few species adapt to more man-made environments but most don't. To repair as far as possible would enable more life, at least, and probably more good feeding per head, thus less suffering. 2. if you remove the struggling prey from the jaws of another animal, then it is +1 -1. The predator goes hungry. 3. biodiversity matters for well-being of ecosystems, so an act of kindness can also be trying to maintain biodiversity, which often requires managing and even eliminating introduced invasive species for the benefit of the whole (without going to the hunting lobby for advice ;)) 4. A hungry animal that dies becomes food for another. Should it be saved? Perhaps only put out of its misery. A few instances would have little impact. If we had the technology to do it on a grand scale, it might alter the bacterial populations that break down bodies and also serve - in an albeit unpleasant (our anthropocentric view) way - to control populations size. If you immunize certain species of animals then their numbers might explode or they might not become carrion so often. Then you are choosing between say, Wildebeest and vultures. How can you possibly be intelligent enough to be sure you are not favouring some species instead of others with your limited knowledge of ecology? It is very complex in nature but the bottom line is, nothing goes wasted and is mostly in fairly static balance or slow transition, not withstanding truly natural disasters. Human interference brings so much out of whack in terms of industrialization and globalization. That is what needs to be addressed. There is enough work to be done to deal with that i.m.o. without worrying about natural suffering, although the subject is interesting. The principles to follow are: less suffering on the whole, keeping biodiversity up, no big intrusions, recreation of biomes. Definitely do not introduce more exotic species unless 99.9999% sure it is necessary. Reintroduction of original species can and often does work to restore balance - e.g. wolves in yellowstone park
+
bAlAnCe
Hi Jack, is this also on Spotify as a podcast?
ulozto.net/file/RSzevq7pLWuy/cosmic-skeptic-on-wild-animal-suffering-mp3
plants respond to enviroment and no feel pain... i think cosmic skeptics need read a lot more before talking about what is pain
The thing is, this argument leads to the ultimate conclusion that we should just neuter every animal in the world and just let them die out. Even in the case of it damaging ecosystems, we'd still have to do it. If you say we should neuter all animals except those which would lead to an ecosystem collaspe then you're inadvertently contradicting veganism by asserting that animals who suffer, but support the eco system should be maintained for human benefit.
why don't you discuss with an ecologist? I think you (Alex) are a bit out of your depth on this one, but love both your channels and what you are doing for the vegan movement
I really wish I could talk to Alex about this. He definitely needs to hear the arguments from the perspective of an environmental scientist. I study Environmental Biology at UFT. I have definitely cried because an individual tree was cut down. That is the whole reason I got into this field to begin with.
Hmmm, emotion may be misplaces here. Especially we should probably examine the tree's emotional health and not yours.
The idea of consumer dairy to reduce wild animal suffering initially seemed to be logically sound, given the presumptions you discuss. But I’d like to see anyone making this argument setting up a charity, donating to any business that destroys natural habitats. And actively destroying natural habitats as they go through parks, woods etc. Until you’re stamping on grass as you walk are you being consistent or just using it as a convenient excuse?
What's the argument against slowly transitioning natural wildlife into uninhabited areas free of suffering, dedicated to stabilizing the atmosphere for human beings... in a sense just getting rid of nature, I can't seem to find an argument against turning earth into an artificial environment created for humans and and non human companions
I mean, if this was able to be done without significant drawbacks, then sure? But the idea you're presenting here is not one I've ever heard discussed at all, much less practically. It sounds like science fiction set in the year 5530.
@@RetryAgainAgain obviously the technology that stabilizes our atmosphere is science fiction, but we already destroy nature and clear forests for ourselves .. we essentially turn nature into an area for just us ... what's the argument against continuing that trend until nature essential doesnt exist?? Obviously theres the issue of needing forests and wildlife to maintain our atmosphere but we may very well develop a way around this and simply do geo-engineering, and so this is why I initially said we could transition these areas into places that do essentially the same job without the sentient beings inside
@@alfredogonzalez8735 If this were possible, then I wouldn't argue against it. It would be a good idea. We just aren't there yet, if we ever will be.
48:35 I think it’s legitimate to compare the death of an insect when it dies by being crushed by a human or when it’s not crushed and dies of natural causes. What would be better in terms of the experiences?
the case of wild animal suffering is very interesting to me. i think there is no way to meaningfully distinguish the worth of the wellbeing of a wild vs a farmed animal. the conclusion in principle should therefore be very clear: we should try to minimize the suffering of wild animals.
in practice however its a very different story. whenever we intervene in nature there seem to be adverse effects we didn´t predict. we defenitly should still try to find ways to help wild animals, but right now the best way to reduce suffering of all animals seems to be the policy of "just don´t fuck with them if not necessary".
1:04:00 Alex: "To prefer something is to predict that it will bring you more pleasure."
I think this is a limiting way to consider preferences. Think about an extremely rudimentary chess AI which works as follows:
When it's your turn 1. consider every possible move, 2. score the current board state by counting up all of the individual pieces' values (yours positively, the opponent's negatively), 3. select the move which leads to the most positive result.
I don't think it is weird to say that the AI prefers certain board states over others. After all, if an amateur human player would use the same strategy, you wouldn't have a problem with expressing their behaviour that way. I *do*, however, think it is weird to say that the AI experiences *pleasure*.
(Note: I am not generally opposed to the idea of technical systems being able to experience things, but I would argue that this most likely is not the case in this instance.)
Or take an even simpler example: A robot - so-called Braitenberg Vehicle - on two wheel equipped with one or two light sensors and a sensor-wheel-coupling such that it turns away from light sources and moves away from them. Surely we wouldn't assume that the robot is experiencing anything, and yet it seems to 'prefer' being in the dark.
Now, you might say that actually, using the word 'preference' this way is unintuitive and doesn't make a lot of sense and we should use a different word. That's fair. But in that case, why would we use 'preference' regarding the ants, but not the robots? It seems we would smuggle in unjustified assumptions this way - namely that the experience (if present) of pleasure and pain differs between robots and ants.
The old "lions though" argument is not that bad after all it seems.
The best version of it is correct in so far as the vegan is revealed as a hypocrit if he doesn't care about animals hurt by lions at all.