Why an Ethical Approach?
To be or not to be; is a choice. Like any choice which can translate into utilization of moral values for decision making, ethics relate to the moral values which govern our decisions. In this article, we shall take this ethical approach, utilizing moral principles to examine the moral case for vegetarianism or veganism as the path to your dietary, physical and philosophical life. Here are the top things for you to consider as how you define morality
- Will you feel bad knowing being the cause of lethal harm to a fellow human being?
- Can you curtail certain activities if you are sure to know that abstaining from a certain activity will change a particular outcome of lethal harm to a fellow human being?
- Is there a question of “ought to” that comes in your mind, when you think about doing or not doing any activity?
When you ask yourself these questions, it becomes pretty evident that one or more answers to these questions, warrant the answer “Yes”. What you have done is utilized your own principles of morality to answer these questions. Our objective here is to reduce the morality principles into the written word and use logic in their application in the future.
To answer the third question, we should understand that human beings, are sentient, self-conscious and possess high order thinking skills that enable them to debate on the merits of an activity( such as the one we are doing right now). This enables us to put a burden of doing the right thing on our shoulders. This is a self-imposed burden of proof that is the by-product of possessing consciousness. Morality itself is the product of conscious logical thought.
THE CURIOUS CASE OF SENTIENCE IN VEGETARIANISM
The grass stands tall; the fish lay eggs; some birds fly; Most animals love their offspring.
If I were to ask you to find an odd one out, some of you would definitely choose grass. Rest belonging to animal kingdom in biology. But there is also a difference of ‘sentience’. Beings that are aware at some level of their existence can be considered as sentient. But let’s take a scientific definition of sentience here1. the ability to be aware (feel, perceive, or be conscious) of one’s surroundings or to have subjective experiences. Sentience is a minimalistic way of defining consciousness, which is otherwise commonly used to collectively describe sentience plus other characteristics of the mind.
What we can reasonably conclude that all living beings show some level of sentience but animals not only show sentience, they also show sapience and self-awareness2
Once, sentience is established, people can make a case that one can feel or “ought to” feel bad for being the cause of demise of a sentient being. So we can reasonably conclude that the answer to the first question came as “yes” in our minds as it pertained to the killing a sentient being such as ourself!
THE ABSOLUTE GOOD: IMMANUEL KANT’S APPROACH TO ETHICS
Kantian ethics refers to a deontological ethical theory ascribed to the German philosopher Immanuel Kant. The theory, developed as a result of Enlightenment rationalism, is based on the view that the only intrinsically good thing is a good will; an action can only be good if its maxim – the principle behind it – is duty to the moral law.3
In plain words, if thing ought not to be done, you shouldn’t do it. This is a principles based approach very much like the religious teachings of “thou shalt not kill” being laid down as a moral principle that should be followed come what may. Once there is moral principle, it should be followed
(Fun fact: Batman is a stickler for Kantian moral philosophy, as he refuses to kill joker even though joker may kill a million people. Taking one life away is just unacceptable)
A friend of mine observes “ Vegetarianism is the easiest way to change one’s life. When one realizes that all is one, one also realizes that there can be no killing within the one. There is no one to kill, as all is in harmony”
This friend of mine believes in Kantian philosophy of principle based ethics where people ought not to kill. When animals possess sentience, there is enough case being made to change a lifestyle as to not kill, much less eat animals!
So Kantian ethics advise people not to kill ( a sentient being) as what makes you, you also makes the animals. So you are as they are and they are as you are. (Imagine if you are dog/cat/pet lover and some person asks you if dog tasted good?)
In summary “ No one has the right to take a life”.
THE UTILITY BASED APPROACH TO ETHICS
Utalitarianism, is the moral approach of maximizing the good that you can do. It is the best moral action that maximizes utility4.
Let’s take the example of Batman here. If Batman were a utilitarian, he would kill Joker and save an expected million people from death. A utilitarian would calculate the end utility as u=(10^6 – 1) lives saved.
Another friend of mine observes: “ Animals, including fish, show sentience and awareness in higher level as compared to plants and minerals. Thus, in order to minimize the harm I do, I should minimize the amount of harm made to sentient beings starting from the descending order”
She, in essence, makes a case where she has concluded that she will not kill animals while continuing to consume plants as way to supplement her diet all the while minimizing the harm she does and maximizing the good by letting the animals be.
WHY VEGETARIANISM?
There are numerous reasons as to why a person should vie to follow an agrarian diet.
But that is a curtailed definition of vegetarianism. Vegetarianism is a way of life much like veganism. Vegetarians, in my opinion, would also change their buying decision if it involves the killing of any animal ( so lets say Vegetarians just don’t buy leather and leather made products)
But let’s first explore – Why Vegetarianism?
• As a way to Reduce Animal Cruelty
• As a way to positively affect the Climate Change scenario
• Positive effect of Land-use Substitution
• Pursue principle-based morality for a Happy Conscience
REDUCING ANIMAL CRUELTY
You would have asked your elders one day “ why should I eat non-veg?’ and have gotten the reply: “if you don’t eat them, the food chain goes off balance and their population will grow beyond control”. Well you can politely tell your loving aunties and uncles who think they do big social service by eating non-veg that there is a term called “factory farming”
Hey I am just kidding! Not about factory farming though!
So here’s a tid bit on factory farming:
factory farming, is a production approach towards farm animals in order to maximize production output, while minimizing production costs.Intensive farming refers to animal husbandry, the keeping of livestock such as cattle, poultry, and fish at higher stocking densities than is usually the case with other forms of animal agriculture5.
The problems with factory farming is just too many when we talk about the pains inflicted on the consciousness of sentient beings. On today’s factory farms, animals are crammed by the thousands into filthy, windowless sheds and stuffed into wire cages, metal crates, and other torturous devices. These animals will never raise their families, root around in the soil, build nests, or do anything that is natural and important to them. Most won’t even feel the warmth of the sun on their backs or breathe fresh air until the day they’re loaded onto trucks headed for slaughterhouses.6
Much more is the problem with use of disinfectant in factory farms, where these animals are given drugs like colistin7, which may even translate to the birth of a new breed of superbugs. The practices employed at factory farms just make meat too dear a commodity to be smelled, much less consumed given its hazardous risks. To add to this problem, this practice is rampant in India which is the sixth largest exporter of meat.
In essence, these animals don’t live a life. They are raised to be slaughtered, literally. they are genetically modified to increase fertility and “production rate” as well as given strong antibiotics to counteract against the unhygienic conditions ( read as general cesspool of poop strewn across the facility) in the factory farm. Their aim is decided before they were born, that is to end up in our feet, waists, clothing, or plates. 1kg of meat not consumed results in 600gms of meat not “produced” by means of factory farming in the mid term.
REDUCTION OF CLIMATE CHANGE (REDUCTION OF GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS)
In 2006, the UN calculated that the combined climate change emissions of animals bred for their meat were about 18% of the global total – more than cars, planes and all other forms of transport put together.8 This figure has been revised to upwards of 51% in 2009.9
Your table habits, and consumerism habits in this regard can make a much much larger impact on the climate change problem than say, switching off the microwave while you go to sleep or sacrificing that international vacation to Spain. After offsetting your carbon footprint, reducing and eventually eliminating your meat intake is the single most effective way in reducing greenhouse emission10.
Animals farmed also are the largest source of methane, which is about 21 times more harmful to the ozone layer as is CO2.
POSITIVE EFFECT ON LAND USE SUBSTITUTION
To switch from a meat based diet for one year, is to feed another person for two years. This is not some pipe dream, land use pattern studies11 in the US show that there is a positive substitution effect when people switch to plant based diet. Roughly 80% of the arable land in the US is used for meat production, that only feeds 30% of the population’s total food intake by weight. Plants on the other hand, feed 70% of the population in only 20% of the arable area cultivated.11
Now imagine the surplus food production if everyone stopped eating meat for 10 years – This is where 1 million people die of famine in the world every year.
PURSUE PRINCIPLE-BASED MORALITY FOR A HAPPY CONSCIENCE
Simply put, why take another life? Who has given anyone the right to take life and why should anyone be the ultimate decision maker to the life of these sentient being?
What not taking any life for your plate, is simply living a life of non-violence that translates to goodness in heart, purity of will and a whole lot of satisfaction to you in the long run.
Using Utalitarianism to take action
If any of the points made forth resonate with you, you will have chosen to reduce and ultimately eliminate the existence of meat and animal products out of your lifestyle.
It is a big decision, in the sense that a lot of sacrifices will appear to be made initially, but the payoff is big. So here’s a suggested action plan that you can undertake in any order. What this makes you do is help you take meaningful steps in bite-size pieces to eventually transform you into a vegan or a vegetarian as you may choose.
• If you care about reducing animal cruelty, stop eating chicken, eggs, pork, beef and other meats, in this order as eliminating the first three from your diets can make a meaningful difference to the cause as a first step.
• If you care about climate change and land use patter substitution, forego beef, pork, chicken, eggs in this order
• Stop eating dairy and dairy based products
• Stop wearing/ using animal and animal derived products
• Advocate people to act upon this path, familiarizing them with an ethics based approach to vegetarianism and effective altruism
• [free space to be added as any good Samaritan proposes a good plan of action]
While this is not exhaustive, if you are from the Kantian ethics side of things, you can definitely consider doing all of them at once.
Conclusion
The object of this article was to ignite a small light of curiosity in you, the reader, in taking meaningful steps to change your lifestyle which makes you into a better equipped, responsible human being. Lot many people say that you cannot change the world and that may be true when you evaluate an activity as something performed by a person instead as that performed by a community. Concerted actions indeed change the world and we hope you will make the right choice.