Would you ask an amoeba the same thing? A plant? What about an insect? A mouse? Humans are capable of thought that cows are not. Chickens are not.
For example, cows cannot conceive of object persistence. Human infants do not until 2+ years, some parrots do, etc. So what you have to ask yourself, is would the animals even be aware they are captured? And do they have the intellect to care? Or do they entirely live "in the moment", and thus, are happy if healthy, fed, and not being hunted or fearful of a wolf nearby?
Or maybe you might want to ask yourself, would you prefer to be eaten alive? For an animal like a bison, death seldom comes instantly. Death comes while pieces of your body are ripped off of you, as you mewl and scream and cry and bleed to death slowly. Passing out, waking up again only to see you're still being eaten.
Trying to make a choice based upon your mind, your body, your reality is frankly unfair. An example being, there are pack animals and animals that live solo.
By your metric, that is by measuring happiness for an animal by how you would want to live, you'd take those animals that hate living together, and try to force them to? Because that's what you're asking...
What would I want?
So I ask you instead, if we shouldn't interfere, should we then ensure we don't succor or help wild animals in any way? Let's say we stop eating all meat. We do so because "it's wrong to keep an animal captive, even if they are happier and healthier". OK.
So, then by what metric do we have to help animals in the wild? If they have a plague, should we not care or try to help? We have helped wild animals in the past with such things.
Would the animals understand the question asked? Would a cow understand vaccination? Eradication of bot flies?
I think you're missing a key part of the argument. The question is, do you support inflicting excessive suffering on beings that are capable of suffering? Factory farming intentionally forces billions of animals, each capable of feeling pain and suffering, to more of that pain and suffering than is necessary, all in the pursuit of profit.
It is not a question of eating meat or not. It's about inflicting more pain and suffering than is necessary, for money. Some pain and suffering is inevitable for all animals, but there is absolutely no need to add to it because you like the taste of the results.
Just a quibble - children learn object permanence at around six months of age. Also, I don't think the jury is quite in on cows - I've seen papers that argue both ways.
One way we could quantify cow happiness, if we were interested in doing so, is in the amount of stress hormones they produce.
b112|4 months ago
For example, cows cannot conceive of object persistence. Human infants do not until 2+ years, some parrots do, etc. So what you have to ask yourself, is would the animals even be aware they are captured? And do they have the intellect to care? Or do they entirely live "in the moment", and thus, are happy if healthy, fed, and not being hunted or fearful of a wolf nearby?
Or maybe you might want to ask yourself, would you prefer to be eaten alive? For an animal like a bison, death seldom comes instantly. Death comes while pieces of your body are ripped off of you, as you mewl and scream and cry and bleed to death slowly. Passing out, waking up again only to see you're still being eaten.
Trying to make a choice based upon your mind, your body, your reality is frankly unfair. An example being, there are pack animals and animals that live solo.
By your metric, that is by measuring happiness for an animal by how you would want to live, you'd take those animals that hate living together, and try to force them to? Because that's what you're asking...
What would I want?
So I ask you instead, if we shouldn't interfere, should we then ensure we don't succor or help wild animals in any way? Let's say we stop eating all meat. We do so because "it's wrong to keep an animal captive, even if they are happier and healthier". OK.
So, then by what metric do we have to help animals in the wild? If they have a plague, should we not care or try to help? We have helped wild animals in the past with such things.
Would the animals understand the question asked? Would a cow understand vaccination? Eradication of bot flies?
Refreeze5224|4 months ago
It is not a question of eating meat or not. It's about inflicting more pain and suffering than is necessary, for money. Some pain and suffering is inevitable for all animals, but there is absolutely no need to add to it because you like the taste of the results.
fwip|4 months ago
One way we could quantify cow happiness, if we were interested in doing so, is in the amount of stress hormones they produce.