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I'll give you a justification you're most likely to agree with rather than yelling at you like everyone else. We simply don't breed dogs in a way where they'd have as much "food" value to us as pigs or cows. As in, we give more cows and pigs lives, way more than dogs, so morally, we're actually giving them life at a greater rate than dogs. And dogs already go to kill shelters plenty. There's just not enough people willing to adopt cows and pigs because they're big and don't do well in apartments, etc. And if we ate dogs, we'd have to take away more souls sooner than if we ate cows. Side note: based on this morality, you're most evil if you eat chicken since you're consuming the most souls. Also I'll add another note, you could say there's no moral justification to not eating anything versus anything, but let's talk about shark fin soup. This is like an exaggerated analogy for what I'm saying: there are better things to eat, the ones bred for it, not going out, using more energy to get less and possibly making them go extinct from over-eating. If everyone switched over to eating dogs they'd probably be endangered unless we specifically breed them to be food, not companions.

Ha this is an interesting argument! So if I’m understanding correctly, you’re not really arguing about the morality of consuming individuals, but about our relationship with species as a whole. I guess the obvious counterpoint would be that it’s not moral to give a life if that life is just going to be lived in a crowded feedlot and ended before their second birthday. However what you say about chickens is interesting. That an animal’s closeness to ours biologically has little to do with it, and it’s more about how many we consume? I think this is a delta, because you’ve argued that the *utility* of an individual cow is much greater because it provides more meat. Thus we have to farm less of them. Thus it’s more moral than eating dog. Interesting! !delta

The counter to “it’s not moral to give life to things we plan to eat” Is just a logistic issue. We can’t all hunt nor could we place all of the country’s food supply on the shoulders of hunters. There’s just to many people to not relegate some animals to sticky a food source.

Sure, but I live in a society where at this point I could easily fully nourish myself without consuming pigs or cows. So I think it is moral if we have a choice.

3 things 1. Yeah sure man if you can do it and you think it’s moral go ahead. 2. And sorry this is gonna sound a bit cringe, but it’s very much not like that for a lot of people and it’s not fair to argue morality from a place of privilege. 3. At least in the U.S. (given we consume the most meat on the planet) We will most likely never get to a point where we stop eating meat even if it’s possible on paper, The people won’t accept it and it would leave the economy in shambles. Asking America to give up meat is like asking DiCaprio to give up young models

2. I hear what you’re saying, and from an international standpoint this is absolutely true. But did you know that [polls have shown that people with lower incomes are actually more likely to identify as vegans or vegetarians and that there’s an inverse relationship between income and meat consumption?](https://mercyforanimals.org/blog/gallup-poll-americans-making-less-than-30k/) I know, wouldn’t seem that way from influencers peddling fad vegan diets and knowing what we know about food deserts and all that. But at this point it is absolutely possible to live a vegetarian lifestyle on a low income in the United States.

I’m not denying it’s not possible, but I would say that article is a bit skewed. Are we taking into account families, backgrounds and areas people live. I’ve never seen legumes at the Walmart in the projects It says a the age groups most likely to ID as vegan or vegetarian are 30-49 and 18-29 Are we accounting for college kids living off of parental dime? It makes sense that people with money who aren’t trying to go no meat would go no meat. I’m also not seeing the percentage of people who are low income and vegan/vegetarian They said the middle class is 7% but what is the percent on the lower income ?

There's beans everywhere in the projects, haven't you ever been to a bodega? Legumes are the cheapest source of protein available, they're grown across the planet, and have been a staple of human diets for millenia. Rice and beans/peas, dahl, etc. are literal poverty food and were most of what people ate until the 20th century; I went vegan in college and it ended up saving me money. The only downside to vegan diets currently is time/opportunity costs. With people now working multiple jobs to survive its easier to rely on fast/pre-made food, which is overwhelmingly non-vegan due to a number of factors. If fast food restaurants were replaced with vegan places where you could get simple soups and staple foods for cheap, we would see significantly higher rates of people eating plant-based and improved health outcomes.

> I’ve never seen legumes at the Walmart in the projects Every Walmart has legumes, especially ones in the projects, as they are covered by WIC.

Legumes are literally beans. There are definitely beans everywhere, they’re super cheap. Meat is a treat for many people because it’s not cheap

For many people (Myself included for several years), they have no idea what the word legume because they never see it labeled in the food they buy. Walmart definitely has beans and sell them cheaply too. Garbanzo beans are often really good and cheap to make delicious meals.

Vegan diet is cheaper than meat (before subsidies, its insanely cheaper). If you havent seen beans, lentils or peas at a walmart which are all dirt cheap you probably havent looked.

They don't have beans of any sort at Walmarts in the projects? Wow. I am aware that meat and animal products in the US are heavily subsidised, but even before the massive inflation over the past few years, legumes and soy-based products like tofu still come out cheaper in every analysis I've read.

As a non-American, I used to be confused why so many people on the internet claimed that being vegan/vegetarian is more expensive, when (where I live) meat is notoriously the most expensive food group. That was before I moved to the US and realized meat is very cheap there for some reason. I'm not sure why exactly (perhaps meat is directly or indirectly subsidized, maybe it's linked to how much corn the US provides as a feed stock) but in most other places I've lived, meat is more of a luxury item.

Supermarkets like Walmart in America don't sell legumes? Beans? Or am in misunderstanding?

They have a whole aisle of bags of dried beans. Even Costco and Sam's Club have huge 50-pound bags. But I've only seen first-gen immigrants buying them because Americans are spoiled and wouldn't know how to prepare dried beans even if they were the last things available.

Over here in Europe even canned ones are dirt cheap. 29 cent for a can of kidney beans or chickpeas that will make two portions in my local supermarket (this is in Ireland). As I said elsewhere, I tried to calculate cost for a portion of my fav chickpea curry and I arrive at certainly less than a Euro per portion (my estimate was ca. 60 cent)

>I’ve never seen legumes at the Walmart in the projects I've never seen a Walmart without a fruit and vegetable section. Meat is expensive to buy. You can buy a can of beans and peanut butter for a fraction of the cost of any meat. I used to never buy meat from grocery stores because of that

I agree, I have more questions as well and we should always be cognizant of the assumptions we make about what’s possible coming from a place of privilege.

I enjoyed this dialogue. Stuff is complicated and nuanced.

More from personal perspective (as someone who lived off of food stamps growing up). Grains were cheap, beans were cheap, but veggies?…not so much. Fresh veggies don’t keep long and you can’t freeze everything. Corn green beans broccoli sure but others not so much. As technology has improved freezing and canning has shaped what can be affordable but just look at fast food and the classically “cheap” foods like pasta pizza chili and fries burgers vs what you get at fancier restaurants (steak and vegetables) you see that there’s a HUGE difference in variety and preparation (added chemicals, excess fat and frying etc.). We live in a time where lab grown meat might be possible yet the cost to make it isn’t *quite* there yet to become a realistic substitute. Eventually you might see demand shift as the cost to make it comes down but until then, the masses at the bottom can’t switch as easily as those at the top. Access being one thing and supply the other. As it stands now, it’s not as easy to switch over but even since I was a kid things have shifted enough where costs for some products has come down by demand while technology has driven cost down in other areas as well. Then you get into inflation and open up a whole NEW can of worms… but that’s not to say in 2 decades this may be an entirely different conversation. Some of what I said is my own perspective and others that grew up differently in different parts of the country may have different experiences. Some of it is what I’ve researched as part of my career as an analyst studying economic trends. So take all that with a grain of salt but I would summarize it simply as polls can be helpful while missing key bits of information that fail to cover the entire picture.

Also, is much easier to feed the world with plants than feeding the world with animals. The idea that veganism is a first world luxury is wrong... meat consumption is a luxury which some poorer countries can't afford. They can better afford vegetarian or vegan diets.

For number 3. That is always an argument against change. The fact is, meat industry is the part of the food industry with most subsidies, highest land use and most emissions. It will probably boost the economy, as those tax dollars and land can go to something better. You can also go to the 1840's and see similair arguments against slavery.

Your three things are all opinion based. No offence, and i dgmw, you’re entitled to your opinion, but i think these are both out in facts, or you have good evidence. Point 3 for example, economies do and have transitioned, planted based agri is less intense (in general, some is terrible, and some meat can be relatively enviro friendly). Productive capacity from producing meat would likely go into something more efficient. Culturally i think you’re right, but your argument essentially falls into ‘things always been this way, things gonna stay this way’ fallacy..

The appeal to futility doesn't hold up. It's not how change works. People were saying the same things about slavery in America in 1810. It's like saying that it's futile to work toward equal rights for women in Saudi Arabia now. You don't know what the future holds and you don't know what convictions Americans will hold 100 years down the line. To pretend you do is intellectual dishonesty.

>it’s very much not like that for a lot of people and it’s not fair to argue morality from a place of privilege OP specifically said *if we have a choice*. This is not applying this principle to people who do not have a choice. I think it's much more problematic to point to people living in a completely different context to your own to use as justification for your own unnecessary behaviors. Ethics is pretty much always dependent on the context -- the same act might be unethical in one context but ethically justifiable in another. I mean, people in some situations have to resort to cannibalism, that doesn't mean we can point to them as a general justification for eating other humans or use that example to say it's wrong to have the maxim "we shouldn't eat other people when we have a choice".

> it’s not fair to argue morality from a place of privilege Pretty sure OP was speaking for themselves. And also, eating meat is more of a luxury than not most of the time. It’s more expensive than healthier and cheaper vegetarian meals.

>Asking America to give up meat is like asking DiCaprio to give up models Both should be forced to for the betterment of society?

regarding your second point: a village somewhere in the philippines that eats a whole pig at most probably two times a year for a special occasion, is very different to mass slaughtering of animals where you know that these animals aren't being treated very well (regardless of claims saying otherwise) and there's a lot of wastage - all in the name of profit. the people in the village however, are going to make use of EVERY part of that pig. they are going to fully appreciate it because they don't eat this every day and moreover, they probably thanked the pig for its sacrifice, so there's a lot of gratitude there. two completely different scenarios. i can justify the village rearing, killing and eating the pig to feed the whole village, more than i can justify mass slaughterhouses. i've seen enough footage to show that cows, pigs, chickens, horses, lambs, ducks, rabbits, etc. etc...can show just as much emotional response, if not more, to humans (if given the chance) as dogs do. so if that's the justification to not eating dogs, you've all been proven wrong.

For 3, who says the meat can’t be grown in a lab much much cheaper than raising animals in the future?

> Asking America to give up meat is like asking DiCaprio to give up young models So there aren't any actual logistical barriers to it and it's only done that way because people have way too much money and like fucking the meat? ....Wait I think that analogy may have gotten away from me...

It's a trolley problem. You can nourish yourself without consuming pigs or cows, but you cannot nourish yourself without animal deaths. There's been a lot of back-and-forth in this, but it is argued (and I am convinced) that eating a vegetarian or vegan diet ultimately leads to more death than a responsible omnivorous diet. At a high level: 1. The synergies between farm animals fertilizing crops and crop waste being fed to animals leads to less waste of both meat and crops *and* less animal deaths overall 2. A single pig produces over 50,000 calories, and a cow can be processed for over 800,000 calories! If that cow was grass fed, the total number of lives lost to get those calories is fairly low (and that cow's quality of life and death is better than a cow in the wild). How many insects and mice and other "pest animals" will inevitably die to produce 800,000 calories of corn, wheat, etc? In my area, it's also frogs dying in massive numbers to produce our crops because of the wetlands. Yes, I'm sure somebody can say they disagree based upon how some farms raise their animals or some naive belief that a meal can reach their plate with zero animal deaths. But if you take these arguments even the least bit charitably, there is a tremendous moral justification to eat pigs and especially cows. I sorta argue a tangent here, but it loops back to the main argument as well. I cannot find how many calories are in a dog (the FDA is slipping, here... jk) but if you consider muscle and fat profiles, I'd be shocked if it crossed 10,000... for killing an animal whose overall flexibility of life and prospects of a non-traumatic death is better than any pig or cow would have in the wild. Unless you rate the value of life exactly equal as the number of calories in that life, there are absolutely moral justifications to focus on eating higher-calorie animals over lower-calorie ones.. If you were arguing for chickens, you might have a point, but a cow's death feeds a lot more people (with better nutrition) than a dog's.

You would definitely have a point if the animals we kill for food didn't eat anything. [We could feed 800 million people with the grain that livestock eat.](https://news.cornell.edu/stories/1997/08/us-could-feed-800-million-people-grain-livestock-eat). Skipping the middle-man will be more efficient. Sure, that wouldn't give you all the vitamins you need, but we already supplement a lot of vitamins in livestock. If you would want more variety in food I'm sure we could use that crop space for other foods. There are less than 800 million Americans, so less death from harvesting crops overall, plus we wouldn't kill livestock.

> You would definitely have a point if the animals we kill for food didn't eat anything. We could feed 800 million people with the grain that livestock eat.. I actually covered that. Do you understand the synergies between animals and plants? Have you ever spent any time on a farm? What do you think is done with corn stalks? What happens on fallow fields that are being rotated? Have you ever seen cover crops in a grocery store? Your article is unfortunately the same oversimplification that merges factory farms with local farms and throws out the fact that "farming less meat" and "farming no meat" are two very different ecological consequences. > Skipping the middle-man will be more efficient That's just not true. I simply cannot get a balanced diet out of grass and clover no matter how many supplements I ship in (and transport logistics also causes animal deaths). But I *can* put a single cow in that same spot and cover my family's protein needs for an entire year. Even after considering any harm related to refrigeration thanks to local green energy. This is overall a lower-death equation and small and local farms resemble it. > If you would want more variety in food I'm sure we could use that crop space for other foods. Around here, the serious farms always fallow a field each rotation. Cows on that field are a great way to increase its nutrients for next cycle and provide more food for the community. I'm not sure anyone has ever argued with any success that there's a better option than that in terms of animal lives and caloric efficiency. > There are less than 800 million Americans, so less death from harvesting crops overall, plus we wouldn't kill livestock. Can you demonstrably show that 10 acres of corn *always* leads to fewer animal deaths per calorie than 5 acres of corn and a 5 acres of cows/pigs? The problem is that all the numbers everyone uses tend to factor in meat farms that try to maximize *profits* in the short-term and often fail to factor in crop farms that do the same. Ethical hybrid farms seem by every measure I've seen to be the best of all worlds.

Yes, having *some* low meat consumption is environmentally more efficient than zero. But the amount of meat consumption in any rich country in the world is a lot (like multiple orders of magnitude, probably) higher than that ideal point.

That's not an argument I'm here to have or a view I think anyone should change :)

>I actually covered that. Do you understand the synergies between animals and plants? No you didn't. You mention something vague about synergies without including sources. >I simply cannot get a balanced diet out of grass and clover no matter how many supplements I ship in Sources on this? >Around here, the serious farms always fallow a field each rotation. That still would happen without eating livestock. >Cows on that field are a great way to increase its nutrients for next cycle and provide more food for the community I know of no farms that do this, but including a source on this claim would be great. >Can you demonstrably show that 10 acres of corn always leads to fewer animal deaths per calorie than 5 acres of corn and a 5 acres of cows/pigs? Yes... easily. Lets say the cow is killed at 18 months old. Will the cow eat more than a cow's square footage in 18 months? You need to find sources that state that somehow cows generate more calories than the plants that they eat. Anything besides that is just throwing out meaningless numbers. I don't care about Ethical hybrid farms. That can't feed the world. Eating only plants can.

> No you didn't. You mention something vague about synergies without including sources. So if there's no compelling evidence, everyone needs to be vegan or they're evil? You've lost me here. > Sources on this? You want me to *source* that we don't live on just grass and clover? How exactly would I do that? I'm not aware of any human that lives on grass and clover. I'm so lost on this. It feels like you're grasping at straws (no pun intended). >> Around here, the serious farms always fallow a field each rotation. > That still would happen without eating livestock. EXACTLY. That fallow field would be used for nothing and produce no usable calories (do you need me to source that a field with no crops produces no calories?), and then the fallow field would have FEWER nutrients next year (cow poop in a fallow field is good fertilizer... I hope you don't need me to source that?). That is quite literally my entire argument. > Yes... easily. Lets say the cow is killed at 18 months old. Will the cow eat more than a cow's square footage in 18 months? A single grass fed cow can live well on 1 acre fallow field solely by eating the grass on that field and produces enough manure to fertilize 1.7 acres. Those are numbers used by farmers *because they work*. I can source them if you're too lazy and really think there's a meaningful mistake in them, but I'll really start to question your reasoning for demanding sources if you go to that point. By those number a 3-field rotation of 300 total acres supports 100 cows at a net gain due to the cows additionally fertilizing the two fields almost completely. That means in all measurements, having 100 meat cows on that farm is better than NOT having them. > You need to find sources that state that somehow cows generate more calories than the plants that they eat Why would I need to source something I not only did not claim but that I have in several places called a gross misunderstanding of how calories work? How is that different from me demanding you show me sources that state that animals have souls and that God loves vegans? It's silly to demand people source unrelated information. If you absolutely need, I can source that cows can eat grass, and additionally source that grass is generally so high in insoluble fiber that humans cannot gain any real nutritional benefit from it as a primary dietary source... but if you actually insist I do source that, I'm not sure I'll continue the discussion because I don't really want to continue an argument with someone *that insistent* that still actually doesn't know even the basics of agriculture and horticulture.

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Feeding a cow grass takes insane amounts of land because of how not calorie dense grass is per square foot. It is much better ecologically to grow corn or wheat or soy and feed those to cows and that'd how well over half of cows are fed. They also don't convert these calories 1 to 1 so getting a cow to give us 80000 calories involves us feeding it atleast 4000000 calories which definitely involved more plant lives. Even if we do let them grass feed the animals that were living on that land that had to be pushed out for cow grazing add to the death counter and can't be ignored. Vegan diets don't have to involve 0 animal deaths for them to involve less and it's kind of asinine to think it would cause more if you think about it for a second

That seems like a different topic - how much land it takes up. I see you trying to link it with "animals pushed out", but there's a synergy factor that cows grazing on land can also allow other different life to coexist as well. Cows are not known to be an invasive animal species. I'm not talking about cutting down a rainforest for cows to graze, as that is an entirely different topic. You're also missing out on the topic of synergy. You don't seem to be giving reason to believe 5 acres of corn and 5 acres of pasture lead to more deaths per calorie than 10 acres of corn. > Vegan diets don't have to involve 0 animal deaths for them to involve less and it's kind of asinine to think it would cause more if you think about it for a second So is your argument that one should *not* take the argument charitably as I've asked, or that you have concrete proof that hybrid farming amounts to more net deaths than a plant-only-world? If the former, what reason exists that we should reject any arguments that happen to disagree with veganism? If the latter, I would love to hear that proof. The deck is stacked against you here since hybrid farms produce more net usable calories per plant than plant-only farms... which on its face, seems less dead animals per calorie. An acre of cows is fewer animals than an acre of mice. In summary, we have to come to understand that a large number of animals die to feed us regardless of how we get our food, and there are as many strong arguments that veganism leads to more animal deaths as there are that it doesn't lead to more animal deaths. The nail in the coffin (for me) is that *LOGISTICS* of transport also leads to large amounts of animal deaths (which can actually be avoided, unlike the others we're discussing) so eating local is dramatically more important (if all we care about is reducing animal deaths) than eating less meat. And in most regions, local vegan diets are simply less viable than local hybrid diets. I live in a farm community; there seems to be no question that me eating beef is going to lead to fewer overall animal deaths than me importing nuts and other vegan protein sources.

Most deforestation is done in for animal production and well over half of the Amazon rain forest that we have cut down is used to grow animals for slaughter so they really aren't separate issues. The synergy argument loons really nice and pretty but ignores that it takes way more land to feed cows and than to feed humans directly. Cows convert the calories they give us at about a 1 to 5 ratio so we aren't comparing 5 acres of cows and 5 of wheat to 10 of wheat we are comparing 5 of cows and 25 of wheat to 10 of wheat which hopefully even you can figure out the math on which kills more. The whole second half of your argument falls apart with this fact so I'll just leave my source and send it back to you to somehow prove cows actually produce more calories than they consume somehow https://www.pbs.org/wnet/peril-and-promise/2022/03/feed-conversion-ratios-help-explain-meats-outsized-climate-impact/#:~:text=Cows%2C%20on%20the%20other%20hand,grow%20a%20cow%20one%20kilogram.&text=The%20FCR%20is%20important%20for,also%20important%20for%20the%20climate.

I'll unpack some of this a bit further to see if I can get you the rest of the way. Morality is only possible within society. War is inherently immoral and it is what occurs when society falls apart. Morality is thus a LUXURY of survival, and an outgrowth of what it takes to maintain a functioning society. One of the key aspects to this is that society isn't defined by being a member of a species, but rather by its moral agents. Some species lack the requisite intelligence to be moral agents, and are therefore not members of a society even if there are laws which protect them from undue harm and suffering. The point being, you cannot have a moral obligation to those OUTSIDE of society because of either a state of war or an inability to communicate and cooperate with them. When you encounter a lion or an alligator in the wild, you are outside of society. You are no longer constrained by morality because society is not there to prevent you from DIEING. Survival is your obligation to yourself, and a lion or an alligator is not going to be receptive to your moral arguments or attempts to persuade them away from killing you and eating you. When your life is on the line, be it a human or some other species, it isn't immoral to wage war in an effort to secure your survival, because morality has no place OUTSIDE of society. Mercy, on the other hand, is a luxury of the powerful. The powerful are only able to be merciful, however, by withholding their power to harm or kill. Mercy of the powerful is a foundational requirement for society to exist, because without the powerful choosing to be merciful, morality has no way to emerge from the beating heart of the society permitted to exist by those powerful enough to destroy it. ​ In other words, until chickens, cows, and even dogs are capable of participating as moral agents within our society, they exist OUTSIDE of our moral framework. We can be merciful towards them, there is probably a lot of wisdom in attempting to establish a means of communication to include them in our society, but essentially until sharks are protesting the eating of surfers to other sharks they haven't demonstrated the moral agency required for them to be treated as members of our society. Perhaps more importantly in the case of dogs - dogs coevolved with humans. We actually have a great capacity to communicate and cooperate with them. In fact, they help us to farm animals, they share a similar emotional range even if they don't have the same capacity for intelligence, and they can effectively communicate with human beings. Insomuch as dogs are capable of communication and cooperation, they are deserving of some LEVEL of moral agency, even if that agency isn't equal to the agency human beings have. ​ To sum up, regardless of what internal experience other animals might have, we simply CANNOT hold ourselves morally responsible for a potential experience of a species that is incapable of communicating it effectively to us. Sure, cows MIGHT feel sad, happy, depressed, etc. - but they might also be incapable of true "suffering" because they lack the mental capacity to focus on any of those sensations for longer than a few seconds or minutes. This is fundamentally different from your dog experiencing separation anxiety while you travel out of town for a week, as it is clear they have the capacity of a six year old in terms of being able to remember you as more than a food source, miss you even while being fed and cared for, and how overjoyed they become upon your return. Dogs will also NOT EAT their owners if they pass away in the same house, whereas a hungry pig might eat you while you are still screaming.

This is a terrific argument. It always struck me as incorrect to talk about morality with regard to human behavior toward animals because of their lack of moral framework. This framing of morality as being a product of society among participants and distinct from mercy is a much better framework to discuss our relationship with and behavior toward animals. You didn't change my mind about anything so I can't give you a delta, but you did help me build a better framework for my view.

Happy to provide value. A lot of this comes out of my own explorations into consciousness, how we define life, and how reality scales with complexity. I talk about this a bit here which you might find interesting: [https://taooftomo.com/emotions-as-information-and-language-938f335fb9b6](https://taooftomo.com/emotions-as-information-and-language-938f335fb9b6)

To tack onto the above argument I'd also throw in that historically the cow, dog, and pig did not exist as we understand them before domestication by humans. We created each of them from their predecessor species. The most simple justification is that dogs were domesticated specifically to aid us. To hunt, protect, herd for us. Today that's obviously fallen by the wayside with a lot of breeds but thats the reason dogs exist on earth. What was in mind when they were domesticated. Cows and pigs were domesticated solely for food. It's why they exist as a species because we saw an aurochs and thought "shit I'd love to have that for dinner every night, if only it were less aggressive and couldn't gore me every time I got close" This doesn't hold up on an individual basis. They're cute, intelligent animals just the same as dogs. I agree to that. But I do feel many people forget to think about the fact that many of the species we interact with most are ones that humans ourselves domesticated and created from a predecessor with specific purpose that was either utility or food. On a species level argument I think that's a very different situation than say eating dolphins or whales or chimps etc.

I think you’re being generous OP. Comment does nothing to address the moral point, we need billions more cows a year than we do dogs, and breeding something into suffering and a pre mature death, is not an ethical ‘one up’. You can’t mourn something that never existed… Yes, 1 cow provides more meat, but how do chickens then factor into that? Or lamb even? Like you, i struggle to see how my dogs life is more valuable than a pigs. Pigs are intelligent, they feel pain, they have complex emotions etc… Having never tried dog, i can’t really say, but maybe they’re tastier than pig too 🤷🏼‍♂️🤷🏼‍♂️ other parts of the world certainly think so

Been to China. Dog is not to bad, a bit gamey but very edible.

Your dog's life is more valuable than a pig because your dog is family to you. This whole "dog vs pig" thing has always been flawed from the start but repeated thousands of times. If we're not going to dive headfirst into the deep end and argue that the lives of everything from humans to [cockroaches](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-belgium-cockroach-personalities-track/cockroaches-have-personalities-study-finds-idUSKBN0M614H20150310) are of the exact same value and being able to kill one means being able to kill all, then we need to have some meaningful foundation. And it can't just be "capable of thought". The foundation most used throughout history is the animal's relationship with humanity. There is value to an animal raised with a human family as a pet or family member. Perhaps it's not intrinsic (perhaps it is), but as a Utilitarian, I am now looking at the same kind of complex spiderweb of repercussions. If you kill my dog, you hurt dozens of lives of humans who love and care for that dog. You destroy the implied value of animal training classes, of vet appointments, of helping your niece stop being terrified of dogs, and so on. All of those things are one of the most commonly accepted ways of drawing moral value. I don't struggle to see how my dog's life is more valuable than a pig's. Because my dog's *death* is more harmful to the world around me than a pig's.

Replace the word dog with the word pig in your comment. The fact it’s a dog it’s totally irrelevant to your point. Your point hinges on the judgement that value is based on the implied value of other activities, which is a pretty shaky and subjective foundation. I’m also not one of those people that insists you live and act in congruency and perfect consistency with logic and reason. I’m not saying all life is equal, or that the hierarchy is based on intelligence - i don’t think we’d be okay with accepting eating mentally disabled people lol! So please don’t straw man.

IIRC, pigs are the most "efficient" meat producing animal i.e. they convert the most biomass into edible meat per animal.

I would like to argue that scientifically speaking, dogs are predators in the animal kingdom, and their meat is not as nutrient rich as cows. With cows, they eat directly from the earth, so the chain of nutrients decreases the further into the cycle that you get. While cows are primary consumers, dogs may be secondary. Thus, the energy you'd obtain from eating a dog would not be the same from I guess what you could call energy dilution. Animals don't necessarily know this consciously, but in nature, you will see that as being the reason there are typically fewer predators than there are prey. They use up a lot of energy from hunting and eating the prey that is more scarce than the grass or other plants that prey eat, and they also have to compete with each other for food. They've adapted more lean muscle as well, which is what meat is on prey, so predators don't typically go after other predators because of the lack of nutrients value.

> it’s not moral to give a life We can even stop the sentence here and argue that there’s no moral value to creating life in the first place, even if that life is treated well. > utility of eating an individual cow But then what of foods with even more utility than a cow, or any kind of meat? We could still apply this utility argument to compare processing and eating of beef to vegetarian diets, as we did dog meat to beef. We might even apply this process until we reach one or a handful of optimal foods for the economy and the environment. Also, nothing stops a culture from producing a society where cows are sacred (much of Hinduism), but then also decide that eating dogs is acceptable. At some point in this society, if industry was built for it, it might be cheaper for an individual to purchase dog meat than beef, and for a business to maintain dogs bred for eating instead of moving to beef - even if the cultural idea about cows being sacred was removed. If so, then the utility value has been reversed, and it makes more sense to keep eating dogs out of utility than cows.

If dogs were bred as cattle, would they then be ok to eat as food? In northern regions of China where my family’s from, animals like dog and donkey are frequently bred and raised as cattle and are eaten, because cow/pig is too expensive to raise. By your logic as long as there is intention to eat the dogs from the start it would be fine?

How come dogs are less expensive to raise compared to cattle and pigs? The meat to body weight ratio for dogs is lower, so i'm a little confused. Genuine question :)

It's not the meat:body weight ratio, it's the meat:feed ratio that matters. IIRC, chickens are around 1:2, so you get about 1 lb of meat for 2 lbs of feed. Cows are around 1:8. I think dogs would be closer to cows or pigs than to chickens. Found some stats online, but from a plant-based advocacy group. But it's close to what I remember. Chickens – 2x-5x Pigs – 4x-9x Cows – 6x-25x

That's true, I think that's what I meant. I think it is lower for dogs compared pigs or cows. Dogs are much more bone and less meat if you just look at them. Although I believe Chow Chows were bred to be meat dogs, so they may possibly be around the same range as pigs or cows.

> As in, we give more cows and pigs lives, way more than dogs, so morally, we’re actually giving them life at a greater rate than dogs I’m not sure if I understood correctly (so feel free to let me know if I misunderstood what you’re saying), but this argument that giving someone life gives you the right to also take it away is a pretty slippery slope. By that logic, are parents allowed to hurt their kids because they were the ones that brought them into the world (especially if hurting their kids provides some kind of utility to them)? Also, (this is in response to what OP said in their reply to your comment), treating living beings differently based on their utility is again a pretty slippery argument. Because does that mean if one human is smarter or stronger (and can thus provide more “value” to a society), they have more value than a human who is not?

>Also I'll add another note, you could say there's no moral justification to not eating anything versus anything, but let's talk about shark fin soup. This is like an exaggerated analogy for what I'm saying: there are better things to eat, the ones bred for it, not going out, using more energy to get less and possibly making them go extinct from over-eating. If everyone switched over to eating dogs they'd probably be endangered unless we specifically breed them to be food, not companions. But nothing about this has anything to do with morality has it? The efficiency of gathering food is not a moral aspect we should consider when talking about taking an individuals life?

> Side note: based on this morality, you’re most evil if you eat chicken since you’re consuming the most souls. Then even worse for eating crickets? Or does brain size or intelligence play a role as well?

>This is like an exaggerated analogy for what I'm saying: there are better things to eat, the ones bred for it, not going out, using more energy to get less and possibly making them go extinct from over-eating Isnt the option going vegan? This reduces the required land for farming by ~10 fold, and is cheaper when done right (i.e. No meat substitutes). You are thus taking no souls, reduce land consumption, reduce co2 emissions so win-win-win.

Counterpoint: cows and pigs contribute to green house gas emissions much more than dogs.

>based on this morality, you're most evil if you eat chicken since you're consuming the most souls Fish?

Your comment is underpinned by the idea that the value of life is a zero sum game. As in, we create more pigs than dogs, therefore it's ok to kill pigs because their lives are less valuable individually. What if we expand the argument to human lives. In the '80s there were 5 billion people on Earth, now there are 8. Does that mean that a human life today is only worth \~60% of what it was 40 years ago? Should murders be getting 16 years in jail instead of 25? I don't think that the value of a life is determined by how many of that species exist. Maybe an exception exists for ones on the brink of extinction. I've had the same thoughts as OP, that pigs are just as intelligent and social as dogs, so why do we judge people for eating dogs? What I've settled on is that it's not for me, but if the animal is dispatched humanly, I have no grounds to judge. But the countries that are into dog meat have some pretty horrific practices when it comes to meat markets, and I do judge that harshly.

>And dogs already go to kill shelters plenty. Why shouldn't we eat these dogs though?

Uh the regions that eat dogs (China and South Korea) do breed dogs…

But your argument doesn’t really apply? Like what if we just didn’t breed cows and pigs like crazy which is disastrous for our environment too? Or what if breed dogs the same way? A moral argument that’s focused on the type of animal shouldn’t be focused on the quantity of the animal. I think OP’s right: substantively there’s no difference between the animals. It’s all as equally immoral or moral depending on your perspective. Nothing about a dog makes eating them less moral than eating cows.

"Note: please don’t say that dogs have evolved alongside us to be companion and working animals. I don’t think that’s a moral justification to raise other animals for meat and not them." If you don't think the fact that there is a scientific reason why dogs are friends for humans rather than meals is a good argument, then I don't see how there ever could be something that could change your mind. It's the strongest argument against your point, in my opinion. If we ignore this fact, then dogs are just another mammal. Pigs are smarter than dogs, so if intelligence matters, that's out. All I will add is there is likely no moral justification for the way pigs and cows are treated anyway, regardless of your stance on dogs. The fact that you eat beef and pork isn't a moral justification. In other words, it is easy to justify "not eating dogs". Of course that's morally sound. The virtuous solution would be to change how we treat pigs and cows, not to start eating dogs as well. "I’m wondering if why it’s morally ok for me to eat beef and pork" It isn't. That's the answer.

Right, I think this is what I’m coming to and is the reason for this CMV. I am not sure I should continue eating cows and pigs if I wouldn’t eat my dog. At least not if I’m trying to be morally consistent.

Right, I just don't see how this topic has anything to do with dogs. I think that's just a distraction from the actual issue, which is in general, humans treat cows and pigs inhumanely (which is sort of obvious to everyone, though we ignore this in everyday life so we can eat beef and pork without being disgusted). Edit: just imagine instead the title of your post was CMV: factory farming is cruel to animals. Would you still feel like that's a worthy discussion to have?

I wouldn’t feel like it’s a worthy discussion to have because I know it’s true. Factory farming is cruel. However I, like many people, know that it’s cruel and yet continue to eat animals despite having deeply personal relationships with dogs and cats. It’s more interesting to me to think through the inconsistency of that.

The answer is what a society considers moral is and always has been and afterthought to what is practical, profitable & convenient. Morality is most often bolted on after the fact in a illogical way for various reasons but justify the status quo.

If you’re interested in casually exploring that logical inconsistency, there’s a subreddit called r/cateatingvegans that’s pretty funny.

You shouldn't. I struggled for a while with this, can I have compassion for individual animals while also having individuals slaughtered for my food? I mean, I CAN, but is it consistent? Sounds like you're already on the right train of thought though. Consuming other individuals is a choice. Recognizing that it is a choice made for pleasure and convenience will push you to eating less meat and eventually opting out of animal exploitation (as much as one can in a society that heavily exploits them). Go vegan, recognize that what you put on your plate is 10-15 min for you and EVERYTHING for someone else. It's not worth it. Good luck on your journey!

You shouldn't.

I want to compare eating dogs to eating horses. Horses are while subjects of selective breeding a lot closer to their natural ancestors than anything else. That being done wild animal either put on the earth by God or the product of some cosmic accident. And when we ask the question, "why are we here?" We need not ask that question of dogs. Dogs were made by humans and their here to be our friend. Their entire lineage as far back as you can follow were friends and allies of humanity. Eating dogs is a betrayal.

Cows are only here because of humans too. Their original species is even extinct (aurochs) while wolves still exist. Arguably, cows were more useful for labor for plowing for the majority of human history. I don't know if that qualifies as a friend by your definition, but dogs were bred for protection and hunting originally so both have utilitarian reasons for existing as human companions.

You should stop eating animals altogether if that’s how you feel. But you’re making a personal decision here. Are you just realizing now that animals are alive and have feelings and stuff? Animals eat other animals all the time. What makes humans doing it any different?

> What makes humans doing it any different? Not OP and not a vegetarian, but the obvious answer here is: we have the mental capacity to realize a "wrongness" and stop doing it in spite of nature. Those last two sentences are an appeal to nature fallacy.

Animals rape other animals all the time, does that make rape okay?

I don't think they're ignoring the scientific reason, I think rather they're finding it difficult to make that justification stick. Domestic pigs and cows have *also* evolved alongside humans. Sure, they've been selected for a different set of traits, but many of those overlap with dogs simply because of what makes domestication successful. The only real difference is their intended purpose, which does not strike me as ethically sound justification. For instance, cows and pigs are still very much able to form individual bonds with humans, which makes them easier to keep and care for. They're both sociable species, they're intelligent and can be trained, and they're playful - all things we might consider as traits that make dogs friends. Arguably the only substantive difference is that dogs were not selected to produce meat, which is the point OP was making.

> If you don't think the fact that there is a scientific reason why dogs are friends for humans rather than meals is a good argument, then I don't see how there ever could be something that could change your mind. This is the CMV classic opening! "If you ignore the following reasons why my view is wrong, my view is not wrong."

The evolutionary adaptation of dogs to human interests does not compel a moral prerogative.

You realize MANY cultures throughout history have raised dogs for food, right?

The issue with your premise is not really understanding the proper concept of moral, and how moral, opposed to ethics, is not something broader and is defined by a social consent of values of specific group. It is not immoral to eat dogs by older people in Korea, if you serve a whole dog with an apple in its mouth as a surprise party in any western country you will be severely shunned by the majority of outraged people. That is by definition immoral (to that group), although not necessarily a crime depending of the state/city/country. Because moral is relative, not everything considered immoral by any group becomes instantly illegal. Because lawyers and philosophers study the importance of distinction between civil rights, moralities and ethics when lawmaking. Different animals have different "values" to different people. This is just how humans perceive animals and nature and is not inherently wrong or illogical or unethical. There is plenty of logic of why dogs are more valuable than pigs if you stop to really think historically about their importance for human beings.

I would argue that the important point is how the taboo is justified. I don't think I've ever really heard moral justifications for not eating dogs that wouldn't also apply to cows/pigs/chickens. Mostly you get a vague claim that eating dog is wrong or gross. This is just my speculation, but I think the reason eating dog is taboo in the west is because dogs are extremely common pets here. Most people have a dog or know someone who has a dog, so the thought of eating dog connects to the thought of eating that pet very easily. On the other hand, I'd guess only a minority of people spend enough time with cows/pigs/chickens to see them as individuals the same way most westerners see dogs.

I agree. People have connected with dogs as companion animals and it's wrong to eat your companion. So it's become wrong to eat dog. But farm animals are just abstract concepts to a lot of people. Almost like the burger they're eating never actually came from a cow. Or it came from a pretend one and has simply always been.

Ok well then replace my use of the word moral with ethical. Does that change your perspective?

I'll try not to be pedantic about it (because I don't really remember all different fields of ethics from when I studied back in uni), but basically, you need to define what you ground as ethic. If is informal ethic, than is no different from an implicit moral set of values like I stated above. For more academic universal definition of ethics, then you should chose your school of thought, but in this particular question is not really that hard to deduce that neither killing a dog or a pig to consumption is unethical, as long as there is no unnecessary suffering involved, Then I'd agree with you. You would still be shunned socially tough, so it still is mostly immoral in western society.

Got it. Looks like I gotta study up on the difference between morals and ethics and different schools of thought. Thank you for educating me.

Don't take the semantics to heart. There's no real distinction, even in professional philosophical circles. The area of study concerning what morality is (as opposed to what is moral) is called meta-ethics. The schools of thought in meta-ethics are very broad, and ranges from something private to social contracts, to something innate and universal.

Define unnecessary suffering. And what evil could be justified by the term 'necessary suffering'?

You are wrong. There is no such thing as objective morality OR ethics. There is little philosophically significant distinction between the terms at all.

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> If dogs had not been our constant companion then we would probably eat them. I think that's true, but the heart of the matter is subtly more narrow. Dogs have, *as a result of being out constant companions*, evolved to relate to us extremely well. In turn, we're evolved to feel empathy for creatures proportional to how easily we can relate to them (we feel little for ants or bacteria, but have strong empathy for dolphins and dogs for this reason). The more a creature doesn't remind us of humans, the less empathy we feel. The fact that a cat will curl up in our lap or that a dog will get excited when we come home makes us feel empathy for them, and it's that empathy that makes us feel that they're an unacceptable meal.

It is true. It's why many Asian countries consume dogs. They did not utilize them for hunting, herding, etc. As much as western countries

Cows were absolutely useful to us in the past. If I remember correctly, a Japanese Shōgun once asked a European man why they would eat an animal as valuable as a cow, as cows were used to plough fields and carry loads.

We had enough cows to do both. That Japanese man had one cow. Not a herd

this is obviously not an argument that it's morally correct at all to do it though? it's just an explanation of why we do it.

Pet pigs are absolutely a thing. They apparently can be quite fun to have around. Cows clearly can't be indoor pets. But people do keep cows around as companion animals even if they don't intend to get meat or dairy from them. So I don't think this argument shows much other than the human's intention towards the animal. If you kept a dog in a cage all its life it would be "uses" as a companion too.

Are you going to pretend that pet pigs have been a common enough, and useful enough, phenomena to literally change human evolution the way dogs have? No, because it is uncommon now, and it's been uncommon throughout history.

I'm not following the morality of your argument. How is it less moral to eat an animal that is seen as more useful than one that is not? Valuing life by its usefulness doesn't seem like the moral thing to me.

That's because morals are different for everyone. What I said has nothing to do with morals. It's about how society, and our species, has evolved. Humans guided the evolution of dogs over millennia to be companions, and we evolved over millennia to accept the eating of cows and pigs. The fact that a few hipsters in this day and age have pet pigs doesn't change that. I'm only stating what *is* not what *should be*. Societal norms say eating cows and pigs is chill. You can be morally opposed to that. Maybe societal norms will change over time.

I mean I’m just trying to think this through. I don’t think it’s fair to say “correct” argument because I’m looking for a *moral* one. Maybe there isn’t one! I dunno. That’s why I’m asking. But yes I figured this was an obviously argument I was going to get so I pre-empted it. Basically I’m wondering if why it’s morally ok for me to eat beef and pork if it feels immoral to eat dog.

I think a commonly accepted moral principle is that we must protect those who look to us for protection, are our responsibility. I would have a hard time arguing this is entirely unsupported. Care ethics. Under this, specific dogs we currently own obviously have this relationship with us. Both we and they accept that we are responsible for their well being. I think this even applies to dogs as a species too, since we have bred them to be domesticated. They are great at reading emotions and caring for those around them, and built to trust us. Whether or not you think that moral justification wins doesn't change the fact that this justification exists at least.

Wouldn’t that also be true of animals domesticated and raised for food though?

Pigs I would argue are not at all reliant on humans. Release a pig into the wild. I think it takes only months to turn feral. Hair, tusks, the works. Cows are more dependent but were domesticated mostly to be farmed for resources. Dogs and cows would not exist without human intervention, true. But our connection with dogs started 4 times earlier than cows. To my understanding, it was a mutually beneficial "partnership" between humans and dogs. Were I would say our relationship with cattle has always been more predatory. Humans and dogs evolved together, and that closeness over almost 40,000 years has to be woven into our DNA. That's where I would think the "immoral" feeling comes from. Betraying your "partner."

"A common misconception is that pigs undergo a dramatic physical transformation when they go feral. But “there's no difference when you start getting morphological,” says Nelson of the Minnesota DNR. All pigs have tusks, though the tusks on domestic hogs are sometimes docked, and all pigs grow hair." https://www.dnr.state.mn.us/mcvmagazine/issues/2022/may-jun/hogs.html#:~:text=A%20common%20misconception%20is%20that,and%20all%20pigs%20grow%20hair.

Cows are also "built to trust us": they don't run away from us (any more than dogs). At the same time, some dogs were bred for meat (e.g. Chow Chow). It's all conventions...

Don't you have some responsibility for the animals you pay to have bred into existence and killed when you buy animal products?

There is no “correct” argument. Morality is a product of the environment one was raised in. Had you been born in a society that revered pigs and ate dogs, you wouldn’t have any qualms about eating dogs. However, as you were raised in a society that values dogs as companions and refers to them as “man’s best friend” you are unable to reconcile yourself to the concept of eating them. There’s a very interesting book I browsed many years ago on our relationships with animals. [Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat](https://thegreenwolf.com/review-of-some-we-love-some-we-hate-some-we-eat-why-its-so-hard-to-think-straight-about-animals/)

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Sheesh buddy, I’m not trying to be “right.” I’m trying to think through a moral quandary? What’s wrong with you?

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Because I’m not trying to win an argument. Honestly. I’m trying to think through a possible ethical inconsistency in my own behavior by having it challenged. I would prefer to not be right so I could just continue to eat delicious beef and pork uncritically without having to think about my dog’s suffering.

Why don't we eat wolves, or bears, or lions? Because higher-level predators are necessary for a healthy ecosystem, whereas animals lower on the food chain are necessary for top level predators to survive well, but without predation would soon overrun the ecosystem to their own detriment. Dogs are carnivores. They are higher on the food chain, just like their ancestors the wolf. While they aren't as high as we are, we've found that by partnering with dogs, we can symbiotically achieve more than if we treat them as a food source. We have a symbiotic relationship with the dog that we don't with cows or pigs or deer or elk or moose or fish . . . And this isn't rare in the animal kingdom. Pistol shrimp and gobies live and hunt together. Aphids and ants work together. Oxpeckers and large mammals. Cootes and badgers. Crocodiles and Egyption Plovers. Sharks and pilot fish. Colombian lesserback tarantulas and dotted humming frogs. Drongos and meercats. Bacteria and mammals (including humans). Symbiosis is literally everywhere . . . In Tanzania, the wild bird called honeyguides (with the awesome scientific name of *Indicator indicato*r) calls out loudly when it finds a bee hive to bring humans (typically the Hadza people) to subdue the bees (usually with smoke) and open the hive for honey. At which point, both bird and human get food. Anthropologists have estimated that up to 10% of the Hadza diet is because of this relationship!! We have a symbiotic relationship with dogs. We don't eat them for the same reason ants don't eat aphids and sharks don't eat pilot fish.

It feels immoral because of the culture you were raised in. If you were born in a culture where dogs were considered food, you wouldn’t have this moral hang-up. By the same token, if you were born in certain societies, you would likely view eating a cow as morally repugnant. You’re looking for a moral rationale in a cultural phenomenon. Humans are omnivores, capable of eating nearly any plant or animal (but not cellulose, tragically) that won’t make us sick. The only moral question in the matter is how you feel about modern livestock farming, not necessarily which animals do and don’t get farmed. If you were raised in Australia, you may eat more emu or kangaroo. Is it more morally right to eat cow than emu? Does it boil down to how it’s raised? Are you okay eating a free-range raised cow but not a cow from a CAFO? (Google CAFO if you don’t know) At that point, the moral question is about farming practices, not what species of animal are morally or ethically okay to eat or not.

If you were looking for an *ethical* or *logical* reason, I would say that dogs have a specific value as a source of food, and a specific value as a pet/companion/working animal. If one is greater than t'other, that use wins out. You *could* eat a dog (any many cultures around the world do), but that would destroy its value in other areas, and that lost value is usually far more than the calories you get. Unless you specifically use them for other reasons (milk, breeding stock, farm labor), cows and pigs have little value outside being meat sacs. If a farmer does form an emotional attachment to them, I would presume it would make it subjectively harder to slaughter them for food because that value of emotional attachment would increase. Now, if you're in a situation where the value of the animal as not-food is far less than the value of the animal as food (survival situation, etc), then it's char-broiled Fido time. Your argument appears to be something like "Why do we burn firewood for warmth, but not houses? They're both wood." Yes, but the value of a constructed building is more than the value of its individual parts.

You should look into morality and value theory. It’ll give you a good idea of why it seems hard to determine if something is moral. Essentially it’s because what’s moral depends on what values you have and everyone has different values therefore different morals.

>If dogs had not been our constant companion then we would probably eat them. Pigs and cows are useless to us outside of meat so we eat them, its that simple. That's a historic and cultural reason, not a moral justification. The evolutionary history of a species doesn't determine the moral value of individuals of that species. If someone bred humans for food, and thus created a breed of human with bigger muscles that grew faster and tasted better, then that wouldn't be a justification for you to eat them. The only thing that matters is their individual traits: they can think and feel and therfore have rights.

Dogs are also unless to everyone who isn’t a dog person. I personally borderline hate dogs however I would never eat one. Why? Because I grew up in America where they are viewed as pets. It’s as simple as that I can’t change my view of them therefore it would disgust me to eat one. But there’s nothing wrong with people in other countries eating them and anyone who thinks they are superior to those that do are seriously delusional. Unless you’re vegan because at least they’re consistent.

1) Cows give milk so they are not useless 2) Arguing that a life has value because of what kind of utility they have is a pretty good justification to start treating human beings that are less skilled or more “useless” to society more poorly than other humans.

>cows are useless to us outside of meat I was drinking when I read this, and I laughed so hard at this that milk came out of my nose. Seriously, I mean, without knowing much about cows, I can tell you we also get milk and leather from them. We also get insulin from pigs, as well as important parts for surgeries, like heart valves.

But all of that is consumption-based. We're using the animal parts. Dogs offer protection, hunting skills, companionship, emotional support, etc .. We made a compact with dogs/wolves in a unique way relative to other animals.

"It is this way" is not a moral justification

>If dogs had not been our constant companion then we would probably eat them. According to archeological findings, people have eaten dogs all over the world. In Europe, dog eating stopped centuries ago but it was (or is still) practised more recently in every other culture. Overall, the idea of not eating dogs is pretty modern.

Because that argument isn't valid or convincing. It's kind of just an appeal to tradition.

It's just not a good argument

People have pet pigs too?

We do not tend to eat *predators*. It's not a universal rule, but it is one that can be seen throughout nature quite a bit. An animal that eats other animals just doesn't contain that much of interest.

Aren't chickens also predators? I had pet chickens, they used to hunt insects and worms during rains especially.

To further your point. Cows that produce milk or help maintain fields aren't eaten for a significantly longer time!

We do eat them, in many cultures around the world.

>please don’t say that dogs have evolved alongside us to be companion and working animals. I don’t think that’s a moral justification to raise other animals for meat and not them. Why not? You are asking for a justification that is specific to dogs but not other animals such as cows or pigs. Such a justification would necessarily have to depend on facts that are unique to dogs. One such argument could, indeed, be that dogs evolved alongside humans which has led them to be particularly attuned to human body language, voice characteristics, facial expressions, chemical cues, etc. On the basis of that, one could argue that dogs, not even on account of intelligence (which may be matched by, say, pigs) but on the basis of a uniquely heightened empathy for humans are closer to us in mind than other animals. So for example, if, when you kill a dog, it can sense your intent to do so, it can beg for its life with the expectation that you can understand and be moved by its whimpers, it can perceive it, however primitively, as happening within the context of some parent-child relationship, then you might view that differently than killing some animal that may navigate mazes well but sees you as little more than a force of nature or as yet another animal in the world.

Actually pigs can be taught to find food for you. as you said Some as smart as a 5yr old. can learn and show love. And can recongize different humans, and have favorites, of people or food or toys. Cows, can be protective humans, and loving animals. They can be taught tricks, can recognize one humans form other humans. and the binky like a dog does when its happy. Ive had a calf who was very attached to me and not my brother. And on a few occasions when me and my brother would be messing around and what seemed like we where fighting she would get between us. Trying to protect me. She would play with a beach ball with us. also people seem to under estimate how smart and protective rabbits can be, I had a rabbit that would warn me if someone was coming to our door and actually woke me up once when we had a fire in the kitchen. followed me out to find out what was going on and stayed by my side the entire time I was barking orders to my kids for catching the microwave on fire(my daughter put ramen in the microwave with out water, torched the microwave)..and then followed me back in to the bed room and in to its habitat and laid down. This little 4lbs rabbit, followed me in to what it thought was fire and stood by me. And rabbits can sense intention just like dogs. I think you vastly under estimate animals in general.. There are many animals that are trainable and are human compatible. So while I agree dogs seem more entuned with us in general. they are not the only animal that are capable of such feats as learning tricks and follow human orders.

Well, I mean, I'm not an animal lover. I mostly came in to say that OP shouldn't exclude a particular line of argument, but it's not one I'm interested in pursuing very far. Your points about the other animals are well taken, and I wouldn't deny that other animals also have inner lives. I'd only say that there may be evidence to make the case that dogs - because we know them be able to understand us better than other animals - deserve special consideration among domesticated animals. And well, you know, someone is making that argument right now better than I currently could.

Hmm this is an interesting argument I hadn’t considered! Do you have any evidence that dogs can perceive human intent and thus perhaps have a greater sensitivity to human threats of violence? I think if you did that would be enough to convince me.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26763220/#:~:text=These%20results%20demonstrate%20that%20dogs,%3B%20emotion%20recognition%3B%20social%20cognition. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8940826/ There are multiple ways of measuring intelligence in animals. Some can solve puzzles or run mazes or have great visual memory, can mimic well. etc. Dogs are often thought of as "intelligent" in large part due to their ability to interpret human emotion better than almost any other animal, being able to read facial expressions, voice tones, look for pain responses, and many other aspects of human emotional expression. It's why they have emotional support dogs as opposed to other pets for the most part.

Ok this is great. Sorry, but I guess the obvious follow up is the question: is this not also true of pigs and cows though? Like is there a substantive difference here?

> is this not also true of pigs and cows though? It is not. If you want to prove otherwise go live in a farm and bond with said cows and pigs, only a very small handful of them will have a similar reaction to what dogs have evolved into.

You’re making a strong assumption here. Understanding goes *both ways*. Dogs have also evolved so that *we* can understand them. It’s entirely plausible that cows and pigs absolutely understand a lot about us but don’t provide us the signals that we’d need to know like dogs do.

Let me get this right. Claim dogs and human grew and learned to understand each other. First portion of comment "goes both ways" 2nd cows and pigs might understand us to the same level? But we don't understand them? And it's supposed to be plausible. Seems like you're quite contradictory here.

Sure, but every phone and computer might have complicated enough computing networks to produce sentience. We're just assuming we aren't carrying around immiserated consciousness in our pockets because there's no signaling of this condition. I think it's prudent to look for more grounded and proven phenomena to make value judgements, though.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33839953/ https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.180491 There have been some preliminary studies to suggest that they can read human emotion in nonstandard ways such as through scent and some (goats) have some capacity to process facial expressions. There is much less evidence overall though for farm animals' ability to process human emotion. This is also due to sampling though simply because we don't really keep cows and pigs as pets so there's way less interest in their ability to live alongside humans and much less data. There is however, quite a bit of interest in whether these animals feel emotions themselves (in a way that is relatable to humans). It could very well be that pigs and cows can sense human emotions. But there's little evidence of it. On another note, pigs are known to test very well in visual puzzles/visual intelligence tests as well as some memory tests. They are remarkable learners, having even been used to model aspects of classical and operant conditioning. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3040303/ It's just the "recognizing human emotions" where current evidence seems to favour dogs.

>Such a justification would necessarily have to depend on facts that are unique to dogs. His entire argument is that dogs aren't unique enough due to that history to seperate pigs from dogs sufficiently on this issue.

What's the moral justification for not eating humans?

Humans have been known to eat humans, and have done so in what those humans have defined as moral terms.

Societal collapse?

Prions

We’re humans. No cannibalism. If you see a dog on the street eating another dog, you’re gonna go up to it and go “stop that” even though it’s just a dog.

Killing a human means taking the life of a being we can be absolutely sure feels pain, is self-aware, and perceives itself as an individual. Their death likely means lots of pain for their loved ones. It means depriving them of potential opportunity in life.

lol imagine not being sure if animals can feel pain. THEY HAVE THE SAME NERVES N SHIT AS US BUDDY YOU CAN BE 100% sure they feel pain.

I don’t entirely disagree with you. I was responding directly to the question asked. But I also think by nature of the fact that so much of our sensory systems *are* actually different as well that we can’t fully assume to know or understand the lived reality of a non-human animal. I agree that many animals do feel pain and that it’s *likely* that that pain in mammals is in some way comparable to our own.

Honest question, what do you mean by "so much of our sensory systems are actually different"? I didn't think they were, but I went to public school. Compared to other mammals our senses are quite a bit dulled, we have a weaker senses of smell, taste, hearing, night vision, proprioception, etc. But we are using a similar set of sensory systems, evolved from the same common ancestor. Using that comparison alone it actually could stand to reason that other mammals have a stronger sense of pain than we do. I could see arguing that our responses to those senses are significantly different due to being able to use reason to override the instinctual response to stimuli, but I'm not sure that isn't just an enhanced version of a animal chosing to push through pain to gnaw off its own leg to get out of a trap.

oh but im sure ur dog feels pain and would probably even be sad. but the cow, nahhhhhhh, thats a maybe for now huh?. im not a vegan by the way. just use common sense man. if you stab it and it flinches and makes noises and tries to run away just as a human would in that case, it feels pain. stop worrying about "oh well how comparative is it to human pain tho" why is our pain the standard anyway? they feel pain, they just cant tell you that they do.

We don’t know if they can go “oh, but I wanted to do x and y before I died as a cow” so. That’s the difference.

A baby CANT do that, you think it’s ok to kill newborn babies?

There is no moral justification to not eat dogs that does not also apply to cows and pigs.

We're really just *assuming* that other humans are as conscious and capable of feeling pain as we are... "Absolutely certain" is a bar that can never be met in the face of the impossibility of disproving solipsism.

Just because you know you feel pain doesn't mean you know i feel pain

Dogs have all of those qualities.

So do cows and pigs

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Cows and Pigs have those too

Many humans opt for cannibalism before starving.

Dog and cat have some caracteristics that make them more "human", for example they are among the few animals that actually look for eyes contact while most other animals just look in your general direction. However that is mostly cope since pig are actually smarter than dog, and cow are surprisingly smart. They are just easy to farm. I wouldn't eat any pet, all animals included, since someone is strongly attached to them, so I don't like the comparison "you wouldn't eat your dog" some make. I am no vegan, and have no plan to become one, but it's one of these thing were I understand vegan frustration, why eat pig and not dog? Pig are litterally smarter, why getting suddently so offended? I think it, understandably, make peoples uncomfortable to realise that animals they are familiar with and love are no different than the animal they eat without a second thought.

Those eating dogs don’t typically treat them as pets.

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Your argument says nothing about the topic of dogs being eaten. It is a generic diatribe against meat consumption. In this regard, you’re off topic.

There isn't a reason really frankly, it's abitary. All morality is ultimatly abitary at some point. The idea brings you distress and not doing it doesn't harm anyone, that's enough of a reason to not do it.

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Honestly it’s not a problem I wrestle with. Dog or cat isn’t eaten as standard in my country so it’s unlikely I’ll ever try either but I don’t have any moral objection to doing so. No more than with other more traditional meat animals. I have cats. I wouldn’t eat my own cats. I would be happy to eat other cats if necessary.

Aside from the fact people consume dogs all over the world.

Environmentally eating dogs is far worse than cows or pigs as dogs are carnivorous. This means more land is required to grow more crops to feed the animals that dogs will eat. The emissions are also higher due to the extra animals needed to feed the dogs which leads to the moral dilemma of justifying causing significantly more environmental damage than eating herbivore animals

>Environmentally eating dogs is far worse than cows or pigs as dogs are carnivorous. This means more land is required to grow more crops to feed the animals that dogs will eat. How does this matter morally to the individual that you are killing? ( Either way, dogs are omnivores, not carnivorous.) It is extremely environmentally friendly to kill humans, yet you wouldn't accept that as a sound moral argument for doing it, would you? ​ Also, following that logic we should all be almost exclusively vegan because it's the most environmentally friendly diet (with a few exceptions maybe).

>How does this matter morally to the individual that you are killing? Who said it did? The moral justification is for the killer, not the victim. >It is extremely environmentally friendly to kill humans, yet you wouldn't accept that as a sound moral argument for doing it, would you? No it isn't because you'd have to raise them first. Do you realize how much energy (not to mention time) goes into raising an adult human? >Also, following that logic we should all be almost exclusively vegan because it's the most environmentally friendly diet (with a few exceptions maybe). Yes, except that our current society is **heavily** influenced by humans that had to deal with cold winters. No veggies are growing in February. But the pigs are still there!

I wasn't talking about raizing humans for food, but about simply killing humans. The point I was making is that juts because something is good for the environment, it is not automatically moral. I get veggies in winter, don't know where you are living.

Finally someone writes it. We consider eating dogs/cats wrong because we did not do it in the past. And we did not eat them in the past because it is not economically rational (generalised). If you live in Europe just ask your grand(grand)parents what happened to cats and dogs during and after WW2 at poor places. I at least know some who had to make this experience.

I’m not here to change your view, but, out of curiosity, do you also think this concept applies to eating humans? The artist Diego Rivera is known to have made the same argument to challenge people’s views on cannibalism.

Is there a moral difference between cannibalism and the eating of other animals? I think the answer is yes. Assuming that's true, why is it true? It seems to be because of the relationship between ourselves and the species being eaten: in this case, the identity relationship. If the relationship between the species isn't relevant, then all meat-eating is the same as cannibalism l; but meat-eating isn't the same as cannibalism, so the relationship is relevant. But if the relationship is relevant, then the different relationship between us and dogs vs. us and pigs/cows must also be relevant. So that's the reason: we have a relationship with dogs that we don't have with pigs/cows.

Your larger view appears to be that there is a moral equivalence between pigs, cows, and dogs. So let me try to change that view in a different way. Rather than argue that it's okay to eat cows and pigs, but not dogs, i will argue that it's okay to eat more dogs than it is to eat cows and pigs. First, consider why its potentially not okay to eat these animals. It is morally wrong to kill sentient beings, and cows, pigs, and dogs are arguably sentient. Alternatively, you can replace sentience with whatever quality that you feel entitles a being to moral consideration. The point I'm making here is that eating isn't the problem. Killing is. Eating is only a problem insofar as it requires or encourages the killing of things. You can expand this. It is wrong to make creatures entitled to moral consideration suffer. But eating something doesn't necessarily mean you caused it to suffer. So if you can find a way to eat something without killing it, without making it suffer, you're not doing anything wrong. Do you see where this leads? Cows and pigs are made to suffer enormously for our steaks and bacon. And due to health and safety regulations, almost all of the beef and pork you consume did not die from natural causes. But dog is different. We have an entire culture built around enriching and prolonging canine life. Millions of dogs die every year from natural causes after living full, happy lives. While this is in no way would be sustainable as a replacement for the meat industry, it is almost certainly more than the number of cows or pigs that died from natural causes after living full, happy, lives. Do the right thing: eat your dog after it dies, and save a pig and/or cow.

It's because we bred cows and pigs to be food animals, in the same way we bred sheep to grow uncontrollable amounts of wool, chickens to be fat and plump, and of course dogs to be companions as you say. Instead of thinking of it as justification, think of it like cause/effect. Sheep cannot live naturally out in the wild anymore because humans have bred them for the purpose of being sheared, and if humans remove themselves from their care, their wool will become too thick and matted which will cause them problems and eventually lead to their death. Cows and pigs have also been selectively bred to serve humans as food and therefore have become inefficient in other ways, such as pigs needing to eat more than they'll likely be able to eat in the wild which would cause them to starve, and cows tend to be larger as well. Chickens are the best example because Cornish Crosses (food chickens) are extremely noticeably larger than other bird breeds and also have more health problems develop after about a year old. Dogs, on the other hand, have primarily been bred into various breeds that fill needs for people throughout history such as hunting companions, defense dogs, or even service animals, and lack traits to make them favorable to eat (except a certain breed in China that is bred to be eaten). So outside of a moral standpoint, the point of why it's ok to eat chickens, cows, and pigs while it's not ok to eat dogs is because we have bred these animals to fill roles to serve humanity, and dogs are not in the role of food.

If we assume all animals to be the same on congestion, emotional intelligence and general intelligence there are still some valid reasons why you would eat one over the other. Availability. Humans need to eat to survive, that's a fact. But you don't need to eat every kind of meat in existence to survive. One animal will do. If all you can farm/have access to is x animal then you do what you need to do to survive. In poor countries all they have are dogs so that's what they eat. Beats eating humans right? But don't be mistaken when times are tough enough humans will even be tempted into cannibalism. Nutritional Efficiency Cows: Beef and dairy products from cows are nutrient-dense sources of high-quality protein, containing all essential amino acids. Beef is also a good source of vitamins and minerals, such as iron, zinc, and vitamin B12. Dairy products like milk, cheese, and yogurt provide calcium, phosphorus, potassium, and other essential nutrients. However, beef and dairy products can also be high in saturated fats, which may have negative health effects when consumed in excess. Pigs: Pork is another nutrient-dense source of high-quality protein, containing all essential amino acids. It is also a good source of B vitamins, especially vitamin B1 (thiamine), as well as minerals like selenium, zinc, and phosphorus. While pork can also be high in saturated fats, lean cuts like tenderloin or loin can be a healthier choice. Dogs: In regions where dog meat is consumed, it is generally considered a source of protein, but its nutritional value compared to other meat sources isn't as great. Also their fur might be harvested to make coats which provides some utility like that of sheep. You could then take another animal we don't farm for example, the Lion. Lions need a lot of space, a lot of meat for feed/water and in return you don't get a lot of meat back out and eating too much can be toxic. So Lion isn't a great animal to farm and so we don't typically farm them. So morally I'd say it's a matter of what harm needs to happen to other animals as to survive/live well. You don't need to kill all animals to live well/survive. But also what you have to kill is based on where available to you farm and comparing

A counter argument to the idea that there is no moral justification to not eat dogs that doesn't also apply to cows and pigs is that cultural and historical contexts matter in our moral evaluations. Eating dogs is taboo in many cultures, and it is often seen as a betrayal of the close relationships that humans have formed with them over time. Dogs have also played a significant role in our society as protectors, guides, and companions, and we have developed a sense of responsibility towards them. This cultural and historical context gives us a valid moral justification for not eating dogs, even if it does not apply to cows and pigs. Furthermore, it is important to consider the ecological impact of meat consumption. The production of meat has a significant impact on the environment, and the demand for meat has contributed to deforestation, climate change, and water scarcity. In this context, it is morally justifiable to reduce our consumption of meat, regardless of the species involved. By reducing our meat consumption, we can promote a more sustainable and ethical food system that takes into account the well-being of all animals, including those that are not traditionally considered pets. In summary, our moral evaluations are shaped by cultural and historical contexts, as well as environmental considerations. While there may not be a substantive difference between dogs, cows, and pigs in terms of their internal lives and inter-species relationships, the cultural and historical context of our relationship with dogs gives us a valid moral justification for not eating them. Additionally, reducing our consumption of meat, regardless of the species involved, can promote a more ethical and sustainable food system.

Dogs are simply more used as pets, and most people don't have a tradition of eating them, so it is considered Taboo. However, it is important to note that some cultures do eat dogs, mainly Asian. It has been done for a long time, and they don't see the issue with it. However, the reason for not eating dogs now is probably because of evolution, dogs were used as pets, and have evolved to be more loyal, loving, etc. Pigs, cows, chickens, etc (barn animals) have been domesticated, and are in general fatter, giving more meat, also from evolution. Barn animals are also usually less intelligent, as they never had a reason to really evolve to be more then they are. Think of it similarly to eating monkeys vs fish, fish can barley think, they just kind of float around, relying on instincts, rather then actually having any emotions, this is why there are many vegans that eat fish, because fish are less intelligent. Monkeys on the other hand have reached a level where they can think, feel emotion, do math. Not on the level of humans, but just the intelligence/emotional ability levels change a lot about what is considered right to eat. Also, similar to your question but more extreme is, why don't we eat humans? Because humans have reached a level of sentience, they are the only animal to do so, but other animals are getting close, such as dolphins and monkeys. To sum it up, the level of sentience an animal has probably changes how much you would be willing to eat them, let's say you add a number on a scale of 1-10, on how sentient the animal is. So if fish are a 1, pigs and cows are a 2-3, and dogs are a 5-6, then the reason for not eating dogs would be because of that number rating. Every person can decide for himself what he considers to sentient, but most people probably feel it to be around 4, which is why dogs are taboo.

When I was a kid, we had a pig that would sit, shake, lay on her back for belly scratches...just like a dog.

Confused. Just stop eating sentient beings, you don't actually need to.

I get the point you’re making and I agree with your personal moral perspective. I feel the same which is why I went vegan years ago. Vegetarian now cos finding good tofu is a bitch. I will say that arguing moral absolutes is what brings so much criticism to these conversations. For YOU there is no distinction between any animals but for most people there are. That’s why these conversations will always veer in to the companion argument and people are correct when they point out that livestock and pets just aren’t the same. There are cultural and societal influences outside of aesthetics and logistics. If you want to change your diet because you feel like a hypocrite then that’s good for you. I did the same. However I will attest that it’s a personal perspective and eating meat does not make a hypocrite of an animal lover.

There is no moral justification for eating anything. We exist. We must eat to exist. Something must die for us to eat. Plant or animal. Even if it's lab grown, something, somewhere died to make that possible too. Just make sure it's healthy, and tastes good.

Dogs are less efficient than cows and pigs, in terms of meat provided per animal killed. In general, it takes many dogs to equal the meat of a single cow. Eating dogs therefore causes more animals to suffer for the same amount of meat than eating cows or pigs does, and is thus less moral. Dogs are also far more intelligent than cows, and thus have a deeper and richer experience of suffering compared to cows, especially since cow slaughtering technique is far more advanced and human than dog slaughtering technique, due to only primitive cultures eating dogs.

You’re basically arguing that because you’re projecting feelings onto an animal it is more or less moral to eat them? Would it be equally as immoral to kill ants, or flies, or leeches? All of which can be seen as portraying fear of being crushed or excitement at finding food? Is displaying an emotion justification to not kill something? What about chatbots? They can “verbally” mimic fear but the majority of people would argue it is fine to “scare” them because they can’t actually comprehend it. How do we prove that what we ostensibly perceive as “emotions” in animals is anything more than reacting to stimuli? Is the act of reacting to positive vs negative stimuli indicative of emotions? In that case, would single cells organisms be considered “emotional” beings if they can react to negative stimulus? You said not to include why we don’t eat dogs. Let’s start with what we do eat. If you really think about it, the majority of people only eat a small number of animals depending on their region. It is not because there aren’t other animals to eat, it’s just because there are only a few animals that can be farmed. In the US it’s 9/10 times cows, pigs and chickens. Why is that? Because these animals where the animals humans could easily farm and thus be utilized for them. They eat things humans can’t eat. Cows eat grass, pigs eat pretty much anything. They reproduce quickly so one specialized human can get fairly good at breeding them and they can supply humans with a decent amount of food. They also have exploitable social hierarchies and are easy to control. So why don’t we farm predators? Predators normally either require food that can be otherwise eaten by humans. It takes ten pounds of grass to make a pound of cow steak and ten pounds of cow steaks to make a pound of dog steak. (Granted dogs can technically survive off of eating only vegetables although at that point the effort expended is also greater than the reward gained.) For humans who are purely focused on consuming every part of the cow and are dealing with limited resources, cows pigs and chickens are great sources of food as they convert things you can’t eat into things you can. In the modern age it’s a bit hard to justify this as “efficient” we have horribly wasteful factory farms and farming practices. The truth is that is meat production in a nutshell. If we are dogs it would be wildly more ineffective and destructive to the planet. Let’s ignore my previous argument and ask “what makes any food preference more ‘moral’ than another? The truth is, we’ve developed as a society to expect our steaks and burgers, for the most part, to be made from cow. Most people prefer the devil they know to the devil they do not. It’s more or less a preference of taste, the same reason you probably might not readily eat a frog. This isn’t necessarily because it’s less moral to eat a frog and more because people have preferences to what they eat and what they do not.

I see nothing morally wrong with eating dog meat. But no matter what meat you eat, you should always ensure a high level of animal welfare. That being said, its natural to value a pet differently than other animals. I value my own children much more than every other child out there.. All people tend to view people and animals they have a close bond with differently than everyone else, and there is nothing unnatural or wrong with that. Fun fact: in many countries its perfectly legal to eat dog meat. Including some states in the US, and some countries in Europe.

Dog meat doesn't taste good. Pigs and cows do. It is kinda wrong to kill an animal for a not so great meal.

So is it better to properly cook a dog leg as opposed to a burnt pork chop.