Question As a veggie, I am continually conscious that I have made a moral choice which does not fit with society's morals on the issue (in general). I believe that in this world of choice, I can have an adequate diet without the need to kill animals. What does the panel feel about this issue?

Accepted:
November 18, 2005

Comments

For those of us fortunate to live in industrially advanced Western countries, your claim about being able to have an adequate diet without meat is obviously correct. That doesn't speak to the moral issue. I'm with you on that one too: I no longer eat meat (I occasionally eat fish, guiltily). If you ask me to offer a defense of this position, I'm not sure I could do it. It's odd: I have a colleague who is quite convinced by some of the arguments for vegetarianism -- yet he eats meat. I find all those arguments quite unconvincing -- and yet I don't. The relationship between philosophical reflection and daily life can be a complicated thing.

I'd like to add to what Professor George has said. A year ago, I led an overseas study program from my college to East Africa, and saw first-hand how not everyone has the kinds of choices we enjoy about nutrition. But this observation also raises questions about what kinds of moral considerations "trump" others (and why, or on what ethical grounds), and whether or not those who don't have our choices are forced at best to choose between evils (and thus cannot really choose the good in their lives).

The fact that animals can suffer is clearly morally relevant. But I am not at all confident that this is the only morally relevant consideration in this or any other moral judgment--plainly, the fact that they suffer does not seem to be decisive evidence for the claim that no one should ever eat them, or we would condemn even those who do so because they have to. So, at best, the fact that animals suffer is what philosophers call a prima facie ground for not willingly causing them to suffer. Before this kind of consideration merits vegetarianism, however, I think careful consideration of what kinds of other considerations apply--and what their moral status might be--is in order. I doubt that you will find general agreement among philosophers on this subject, because of the complexities of the considerations that come in at this point.

One further thought on this for now. In a recent post, someone asked about whether torture could be justified in a "ticking bomb" scenario. I believe that these kinds of situations are precisely designed to lead to judgmental paralysis (often because they result in a conflict between several important strands woven into the fabric of some concept). Philosophers are very good at constructing such situations in their attempts to work out what's central to some concept. So that can be a good thing theoretically, but, practically, it can be a disaster because it can encourage us to lose our confidence in our judgments about the vast majority (all?) of real world situations that we face.

So, can we imagine circumstances in which so many important considerations in addition to animal suffering are in play that we're not quite sure what to say about eating animals? Yes, surely. But does that mean that we can't be confident in calling the system of factory farming as it exists right now in the United States a moral outrage? No.

There is a story about someone who came up to a well-known moral philosopher in a restaurant and asked him what he thought about the arguments for vegetarianism. "I've actually thought quite a bit about some of those arguments, and I'm half-convinced by them", he replied. "So I don't eat meat for lunch."