Member Of Species

@robbensinger A deontological prohibition against increasing demand for meat seems like it might forbid a lot of economic activity.

@robbensinger Difference between direct and indirect effects on demand probably smaller than e.g. species differences in calories per life.

@robbensinger I think that a lot of support for deontological prohibitions comes from intuitions that require the violence to be "personal".

@robbensinger With meat eating, it's not as though you're hurting the animal you're eating. The harm is statistical.

@robbensinger That doesn't make it less real from a utilitarian pov, but from a utilitarian pov, it's a small issue as per Paul C's points.

@robbensinger I can wrap my mind around deontological prohibitions against personal violence or law-breaking,

@robbensinger but not against contributing causally to undesirable phenomena that don't affect the utilitarian calculation much.

.@MemberOfSpecies Cf. slavery/meat-eating analogy. If slavery helps me do EA, is legal, is common, I don't attack anyone, etc., is it OK?