Not caring for things that are not smart in a comparable way to us is an intuition I cannot even parse. Making 'intelligence' a qualifier for not being tortured, when capacity for pain isn't an equivalent property, is so arbitrary I don't even know how to rebut the idea. One might as well decide that surface skin area is the determining factor in deciding which suffering creatures count and which do not.
I'm still firmly in the "Not caring about animals because they’re not smart" camp.
Unlike Bentham, I actually do have an intuition that harming plants is wrong. I can't help feeling bad whenever I'm gardening and have to pinch off excess seedlings. I'm not sure how common such intuitions are, but I'm definitely not alone in this. By the same token I even feel bad about "harming" inanimate objects like stuffed animals. I'm pretty sure many children would agree with that particular intuition.
My point is that intuitions can be flawed. The above are not the only flawed moral intuitions I possess. My intuitions also tell me it is wrong to harm human fetuses, or to unplug Terri Schiavo, or to torture dogs or babies, or for there to be billionaires while I am not also a billionaire.
Some intuitions that are widely held are still flawed and I think Bentham is using such intuitions to try to show that factory farming is bad.
I maintain that we don't have to worry about the suffering of non-"smart" animals because it is not *like* anything to be a non-"smart" animal. As far as I know, drugs that can enfeeble the human mind lead to black out well before the mind is reduced to an animal level of function. To me that means there are no experiences to worry about beneath a certain level of cognition.
When are you going to lay out your thoughts on epiphenomenalism? I've read better than half of your articles and your outlook seems to depend entirely on epiphenomenalism being false (Intuitions, seemings, suffering won't cause much if epiphenomenalism is true). The alternative (in light of your dualism) is that most interesting human activity is the result of non physical causes by way of the supernatural. I guess you could give up the commitment to consciousness not being physical, but that's no fun. It's past time, please write the epiphenomenalism article we've been looking forward to!
Not caring for things that are not smart in a comparable way to us is an intuition I cannot even parse. Making 'intelligence' a qualifier for not being tortured, when capacity for pain isn't an equivalent property, is so arbitrary I don't even know how to rebut the idea. One might as well decide that surface skin area is the determining factor in deciding which suffering creatures count and which do not.
I'm still firmly in the "Not caring about animals because they’re not smart" camp.
Unlike Bentham, I actually do have an intuition that harming plants is wrong. I can't help feeling bad whenever I'm gardening and have to pinch off excess seedlings. I'm not sure how common such intuitions are, but I'm definitely not alone in this. By the same token I even feel bad about "harming" inanimate objects like stuffed animals. I'm pretty sure many children would agree with that particular intuition.
My point is that intuitions can be flawed. The above are not the only flawed moral intuitions I possess. My intuitions also tell me it is wrong to harm human fetuses, or to unplug Terri Schiavo, or to torture dogs or babies, or for there to be billionaires while I am not also a billionaire.
Some intuitions that are widely held are still flawed and I think Bentham is using such intuitions to try to show that factory farming is bad.
I maintain that we don't have to worry about the suffering of non-"smart" animals because it is not *like* anything to be a non-"smart" animal. As far as I know, drugs that can enfeeble the human mind lead to black out well before the mind is reduced to an animal level of function. To me that means there are no experiences to worry about beneath a certain level of cognition.
When are you going to lay out your thoughts on epiphenomenalism? I've read better than half of your articles and your outlook seems to depend entirely on epiphenomenalism being false (Intuitions, seemings, suffering won't cause much if epiphenomenalism is true). The alternative (in light of your dualism) is that most interesting human activity is the result of non physical causes by way of the supernatural. I guess you could give up the commitment to consciousness not being physical, but that's no fun. It's past time, please write the epiphenomenalism article we've been looking forward to!