I am no longer a veggie.
Back in 1989, when I was 16, I stopped eating the flesh of land and air animals. In 1991, when I was 18, I stopped eating sea creatures. Years later in 2003 or 2004, I stopped eating eggs and dairy products. My primary motivation at the time was a belief that eating meat makes a person spiritually or ritually impure. I also believed that drinking alcohol made one impure and I had decided at the age of 15 not to drink alcohol. During my life I have gone through periods when I drank alcohol and periods when I abstained from alcohol. Last year after a seven year period of abstinence I decided to start drinking alcohol again. Now I have decided to pursue an omnivorous diet.
The funny thing is that during my veggie years I didnt even miss eating meat. As a child I was quite fussy and I would often spend ages dissecting any meat that was put before me because I did not want to eat any windows (i.e. bits of gristle or fat). I also prefer soya milk to dairy milk!! I never really liked the taste of milk and found the smell a bit unpleasant.
I dont believe that what a person puts in their mouth can make them spiritually pure or impure. I think that spiritual purity (in so far as the term even has any meaning) comes from your thoughts. For example, if a person thinks hateful thoughts then this makes them impure.
Many veggies are motivated by animal rights considerations. This wasnt my primary motivation but I came to accept that eating animals was morally wrong, that animals had rights. However, over the years I have stopped believing in such things as rights. If animals, or even people, have rights I wonder where these rights come from.
Rights certainly do not come from Nature. Nature is an amoral place, a place where the strong eat the weak. This fact alone makes vegetarianism seem quite silly. If animals eat other animals in Nature, who are we to say that it is wrong?
Perhaps rights come from God. Perhaps a god, or gods, created the universe and perhaps the god, or gods, decreed a set of rights and wrongs. Even if, for the sake of argument, we accept the existence of God, this does nothing to answer the question of who has rights and which rights they have. Many people believe in a god, or gods, and there are many religions each with their own sacred scriptures and an even greater number of religious sects each with their own interpretation of the scriptures. Many religions allow the consumption of animals and some do not. How is one to know which religion is true? How is one to know which sacred scriptures to believe in and which interpretation of the scriptures is the correct interpretation? I havent noticed God coming down to Earth any time recently in order to clear up any misunderstandings (that said, in the Bible Saint Peter is alleged to have had a vision in which God told him to eat all types animals, both those that were considered clean and those that were considered unclean, but that was a long time ago).
Perhaps rights are eternal, immutable logical Truths which can be known because of the existence of a flawless philosophical proof. I have yet to see such a proof of the existence of rights.
Some people try to argue for animals rights on grounds of consistency. They try to argue that humans and animals are very much alike and that, if humans have rights, so do animals. The problem with such an approach is that it fails to first address question of where human rights come from. Human rights may not exist at all or, if they do exist, they might be based on some very specific characteristics which would preclude an extension of such rights to animals. If someone wishes to use a consistency argument to argue from the existence of human rights to the existence of animal rights, they first need to prove that humans have rights and that human rights are based upon characteristics which allow said rights to be extended to animals.
I hold a meta-ethical position called Moral Anti-Realism.
An anti-realist holds that, for a given area of human enquiry, there can be no truth of the matter. All utterances in a given area of enquiry (such as killing is wrong or it is hot today or force equals mass multiplied by acceleration) are without truth value. In other words, they are neither true nor false and are not even capable of being true or false.
Some people hold that we can have no truth in any area of human enquiry. This position is called global anti-realism.
Other people hold that some particular area of human enquiry is one where we can have no truth (localised anti-realism). For example, some people maintain that utterances concerning past events cannot have truth value. Some people hold that aesthetic utterances are without truth value. For examples of aesthetic utterances consider the following, Mozart was the greatest composer, The Pre-Raphaelites are just sooooo dull, Abstract Expressionism is the only art worth bothering with, Chocolate ice-cream tastes better than strawberry ice-cream and Football is a better form of entertainment than poetry.
Moral anti-realism is another example of a localised anti-realism. For me, moral utterances are neither true nor false and are simply expressions of emotion, attitude etc. Moral utterances express the wishes, aspirations or desires of the speaker. When people say that such and such an activity is wrong they may think that they are making a statement about the world (and, indeed our language is structured in such a way as to mimic a statement of fact, since statements of fact tend to take the form "X is Y"). However, moral utterances only serve to tell us about the psychological state of the person making the utterance. If someone says, "killing is wrong" this tells us only that they feel that killing is wrong. Their assertion of the wrongness of killing tells us nothing about killing itself.
I accepted moral anti-realism many years ago (and aesthetic anti-realism, for that matter) but I did not apply it to my own life. Over the past few years I have evaluated my life in the light of anti-realism. Because of this, I began to doubt the validity of vegetarianism several years ago. However, stubbornness and inertia prevented me from abandoning my commitment to vegetarianism. I kept on telling myself that everyone has doubts and that, if I stick with it, my doubts will fade away. Consequently, for several years I have lived as a vegetarian, abstaining from foods made from animal products, while no longer really accepting the validity of vegetarianism!!
For me morality has no truth value. It derives not from nature, from God or from logic but rather is merely a matter of human convention. Human societies created rights, traditions, customs, laws etc. When large numbers of people live in close proximity, disputes are bound to arise. In a world where resources are scarce and a great deal of effort is required to produce desirable goods such as food, clothing, furniture, housing, pots and pans etc people were bound to argue over who was entitled to what. How much easier it would have seemed to some people to steal what they wanted rather than to work for it. Laws and rights were necessary in order to prevent a breakdown of society. Without laws and morality many people would simply steal from each other, kill each other etc. Laws and morality had to be invented in order to keep the peace.
As different societies faced slightly different challenges, the laws and morality which they invented are not identical and have evolved over time.
Does this make mean that the laws and morality of human society are without validity? If someone were to try to persuade me of the absolute truth of our self-made laws and morality I would not accept this. However, if we recognise these laws and morality for what they are, a set of guidelines for keeping the peace then I do accept their validity. I do not believe in morality but I am a pragmatic person and therefore I accept human-made laws. I dont want to live in a society in which people are free to kill, steal etc so I recognise the need for having laws and morality simply in order help to keep people in line. For me there is no morality but the law and the law is subject to change over time.
This is my core belief: pragmatism.
Can vegetarianism have a basis in pragmatism? The notion that it is immoral to eat animals is one which I find meaningless. For me vegetarianism is simply a bit of sentimental baggage which I have chosen to cast aside. However, a diet high in red meat and dairy products is likely to be high in cholesterol and saturated fats when compared to a diet of fish and vegetables. Hence, although I now feel free to eat anything (within the boundaries defined by the law), I plan to mainly eat fish and vegetables and only eat dairy products and red meat like beef on an occasional basis.
Back in 1989, when I was 16, I stopped eating the flesh of land and air animals. In 1991, when I was 18, I stopped eating sea creatures. Years later in 2003 or 2004, I stopped eating eggs and dairy products. My primary motivation at the time was a belief that eating meat makes a person spiritually or ritually impure. I also believed that drinking alcohol made one impure and I had decided at the age of 15 not to drink alcohol. During my life I have gone through periods when I drank alcohol and periods when I abstained from alcohol. Last year after a seven year period of abstinence I decided to start drinking alcohol again. Now I have decided to pursue an omnivorous diet.
The funny thing is that during my veggie years I didnt even miss eating meat. As a child I was quite fussy and I would often spend ages dissecting any meat that was put before me because I did not want to eat any windows (i.e. bits of gristle or fat). I also prefer soya milk to dairy milk!! I never really liked the taste of milk and found the smell a bit unpleasant.
I dont believe that what a person puts in their mouth can make them spiritually pure or impure. I think that spiritual purity (in so far as the term even has any meaning) comes from your thoughts. For example, if a person thinks hateful thoughts then this makes them impure.
Many veggies are motivated by animal rights considerations. This wasnt my primary motivation but I came to accept that eating animals was morally wrong, that animals had rights. However, over the years I have stopped believing in such things as rights. If animals, or even people, have rights I wonder where these rights come from.
Rights certainly do not come from Nature. Nature is an amoral place, a place where the strong eat the weak. This fact alone makes vegetarianism seem quite silly. If animals eat other animals in Nature, who are we to say that it is wrong?
Perhaps rights come from God. Perhaps a god, or gods, created the universe and perhaps the god, or gods, decreed a set of rights and wrongs. Even if, for the sake of argument, we accept the existence of God, this does nothing to answer the question of who has rights and which rights they have. Many people believe in a god, or gods, and there are many religions each with their own sacred scriptures and an even greater number of religious sects each with their own interpretation of the scriptures. Many religions allow the consumption of animals and some do not. How is one to know which religion is true? How is one to know which sacred scriptures to believe in and which interpretation of the scriptures is the correct interpretation? I havent noticed God coming down to Earth any time recently in order to clear up any misunderstandings (that said, in the Bible Saint Peter is alleged to have had a vision in which God told him to eat all types animals, both those that were considered clean and those that were considered unclean, but that was a long time ago).
Perhaps rights are eternal, immutable logical Truths which can be known because of the existence of a flawless philosophical proof. I have yet to see such a proof of the existence of rights.
Some people try to argue for animals rights on grounds of consistency. They try to argue that humans and animals are very much alike and that, if humans have rights, so do animals. The problem with such an approach is that it fails to first address question of where human rights come from. Human rights may not exist at all or, if they do exist, they might be based on some very specific characteristics which would preclude an extension of such rights to animals. If someone wishes to use a consistency argument to argue from the existence of human rights to the existence of animal rights, they first need to prove that humans have rights and that human rights are based upon characteristics which allow said rights to be extended to animals.
I hold a meta-ethical position called Moral Anti-Realism.
An anti-realist holds that, for a given area of human enquiry, there can be no truth of the matter. All utterances in a given area of enquiry (such as killing is wrong or it is hot today or force equals mass multiplied by acceleration) are without truth value. In other words, they are neither true nor false and are not even capable of being true or false.
Some people hold that we can have no truth in any area of human enquiry. This position is called global anti-realism.
Other people hold that some particular area of human enquiry is one where we can have no truth (localised anti-realism). For example, some people maintain that utterances concerning past events cannot have truth value. Some people hold that aesthetic utterances are without truth value. For examples of aesthetic utterances consider the following, Mozart was the greatest composer, The Pre-Raphaelites are just sooooo dull, Abstract Expressionism is the only art worth bothering with, Chocolate ice-cream tastes better than strawberry ice-cream and Football is a better form of entertainment than poetry.
Moral anti-realism is another example of a localised anti-realism. For me, moral utterances are neither true nor false and are simply expressions of emotion, attitude etc. Moral utterances express the wishes, aspirations or desires of the speaker. When people say that such and such an activity is wrong they may think that they are making a statement about the world (and, indeed our language is structured in such a way as to mimic a statement of fact, since statements of fact tend to take the form "X is Y"). However, moral utterances only serve to tell us about the psychological state of the person making the utterance. If someone says, "killing is wrong" this tells us only that they feel that killing is wrong. Their assertion of the wrongness of killing tells us nothing about killing itself.
I accepted moral anti-realism many years ago (and aesthetic anti-realism, for that matter) but I did not apply it to my own life. Over the past few years I have evaluated my life in the light of anti-realism. Because of this, I began to doubt the validity of vegetarianism several years ago. However, stubbornness and inertia prevented me from abandoning my commitment to vegetarianism. I kept on telling myself that everyone has doubts and that, if I stick with it, my doubts will fade away. Consequently, for several years I have lived as a vegetarian, abstaining from foods made from animal products, while no longer really accepting the validity of vegetarianism!!
For me morality has no truth value. It derives not from nature, from God or from logic but rather is merely a matter of human convention. Human societies created rights, traditions, customs, laws etc. When large numbers of people live in close proximity, disputes are bound to arise. In a world where resources are scarce and a great deal of effort is required to produce desirable goods such as food, clothing, furniture, housing, pots and pans etc people were bound to argue over who was entitled to what. How much easier it would have seemed to some people to steal what they wanted rather than to work for it. Laws and rights were necessary in order to prevent a breakdown of society. Without laws and morality many people would simply steal from each other, kill each other etc. Laws and morality had to be invented in order to keep the peace.
As different societies faced slightly different challenges, the laws and morality which they invented are not identical and have evolved over time.
Does this make mean that the laws and morality of human society are without validity? If someone were to try to persuade me of the absolute truth of our self-made laws and morality I would not accept this. However, if we recognise these laws and morality for what they are, a set of guidelines for keeping the peace then I do accept their validity. I do not believe in morality but I am a pragmatic person and therefore I accept human-made laws. I dont want to live in a society in which people are free to kill, steal etc so I recognise the need for having laws and morality simply in order help to keep people in line. For me there is no morality but the law and the law is subject to change over time.
This is my core belief: pragmatism.
Can vegetarianism have a basis in pragmatism? The notion that it is immoral to eat animals is one which I find meaningless. For me vegetarianism is simply a bit of sentimental baggage which I have chosen to cast aside. However, a diet high in red meat and dairy products is likely to be high in cholesterol and saturated fats when compared to a diet of fish and vegetables. Hence, although I now feel free to eat anything (within the boundaries defined by the law), I plan to mainly eat fish and vegetables and only eat dairy products and red meat like beef on an occasional basis.
VIEW 18 of 18 COMMENTS
te dejo un beso! :*