I think the typical animal-welfare moralist argument against eating meat has more to do with the conditions of the animals' lives rather than the circumstances of their deaths.
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Replying to @danlistensto @Locus_of_Ctrl
an interesting variant on Ort's original premise might be, instead of vat-grown meat, suppose that you had the option to live in a community where ALL of the available meat was from hunted wild animals. is vegetarianism morally superior in that situation?
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Replying to @danlistensto
Assuming hunting carries no risk at all of bringing the hunted species to extinction (unlikely with humans numbering in billions), a "species ethicist" should see as morally equivalent to farming.
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Replying to @Locus_of_Ctrl
what's the underlying virtue behind privileging preservation of number of species in the world?
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Replying to @danlistensto
I dunno, but I would rather live in a world with many animal species than with few, because it would be more interesting from my (human) perspective.
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Replying to @Locus_of_Ctrl @danlistensto
The point though is that most people (frequently the same people who are concerned about welfare of domesticated animals) consider environmentalism to be good and morally justified. It is difficult to imagine environmentalism that doesn't have as its goal preserving species.
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Replying to @Locus_of_Ctrl
difficult in that I've never seen it because all of the environmentalists I've heard from are committed to biodiversity. not difficult in that I can easily imagine ways of measuring ecological health that are independent of number of species.
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Replying to @danlistensto
Not all environmentalists are absolutely committed to biodiversity though. Many consider "invasive" species to be bad even if their impact on local environment is fairly benign. So there is a big element of "preserving the fence that was built for a reason you don't know yet"
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Replying to @Locus_of_Ctrl
it cuts both ways, right? in many cases an introduced ("invasive") species is a preferred pest control solution to chemical spraying.
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Replying to @danlistensto
I think we know how internet threads like this end -- someone will bring up the example of gorillas that die off when winter comes.
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the solution, clearly, is to start meat-farming gorillas so they'll never have to worry about staying warm in winter
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