>>It's not a ridiculous statement; you just added a HUGE qualification - consciousness. I never hear anyone bring up consciousness in these arguments - it's always *life*. And there's a huge difference.>>
In these sorts of debates, people often (mistakenly) use "life" as a proxy for consciousness. No vegan would seriously deny that plants are alive. Similarly, the vast majority of ethical vegans base their lifestyle on causing less suffering or abstaining from destroying consciousness.
>>And frankly, I don't see why consciousness should make a difference. Many "lower" animals are barely, if at all, self-aware, so I see no problem with killing and eating them as compared to a plant. >>
1. It could be possible to perceive, and thus experience pleasure and pain, without any sort of emergence of self-hood.
2. This is not an empirical question. We have no real conception of what other species' experiences are like.
>>People put down stray domestic animals all the time, and I don't hear anyone railing about that. If anything, under that logic, people should be a lot more concerned about the dogs at the humane society than the chickens on a farm or the fish in the ocean, because dogs are orders of magnitude more intelligent, aware, and social.>>
1. Higher awareness does not necessarily translate into increased capacity to suffer or experience pleasure.
2. Far, far more animals are slaughtered for food than are euthanized.
3. Some people do politically oppose the euthanization of strays.
>>Granted, sensation of pain makes it more difficult to kill something *humanely*, but to me that doesn't add up to a reason not to kill, just a reason to kill differently.>>
Then what DOES constitute a reason not to kill?
ebola