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Your_Trash_Daddy t1_itn9e88 wrote

Reply to comment by Meta_Digital in Lab-grown meat could let humanity ignore a serious moral failing by phileconomicus

But it's generally the considered consensus in evolution that our brains became large because our archaic ancestors started eating meat.

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Meta_Digital t1_itnab2c wrote

I think this line of reasoning is still contentious. It might have been correlative rather than causal. It might have been coincidental or accidental. After all, plenty of pea brained animals also eat meat.

Even if it's true, it's still not a very convincing argument for meat consumption being ethical.

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Your_Trash_Daddy t1_itndtb3 wrote

Is it more ethical when the animals are hunted, rather than farmed?

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Meta_Digital t1_itne4l7 wrote

As I said in another reply, if you're hunting for survival then you're engaging in an activity too primordial for the preconditions for ethical behavior to even exist.

If you're killing animals just because the taste and texture of their flesh gives you pleasure, then you're going to have a hard time finding an ethical argument for doing so.

That being said, hunting is significantly better than factory farms.

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Orel_T t1_itpf9rv wrote

Neuroscientist here, This line of reasoning is not contentious at all. We are the only species that in a short amount of time (evolution terms) changed so drastically and it is generally agreed upon that it is because we learned to hunt and cook meat, extracting way more calories from that. That also cleared out schedule enough to be more social and inventive.

No other animal cooks meat.

After thousands of years of evolution eating meat and relying on it for many vitamins and minerals it is not so simple to remove it entirely without consequences. Plant protein, and some vitamins and minerals do net get absorbed efficiently. Studies have shown the possibilities of health issues. That sound like a moral argument to me. harm to animals Vs. harm to self.

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