I have been trying to prove that none of us has a logically rigorous reason for consuming what we consume. The only exception is the cannibal, who has decided to eat any living thing he chooses. But for those of us who find cannibalism immoral (that would be me and everyone I have ever met) draw a line in the sand: “I am comfortable eating X, but I am not comfortable eating Y.” And I have tried to show in the last blog that there is no logically rigorous way to discriminate between X and Y.
So let me end this blog series by stating my own conviction on the matter. I am a pescartarian (yes, that’s officially a word as of last year – apparently not yet in Microsoft Word, because my software underlines it!), which means that the only meat I eat is from fish. This suggests two questions: why I am uncomfortable eating mammals, and why am I comfortable eating seafood?
My reason for abstaining from mammals is straightforward: it seems to me as though cows, for instance, have at least one important in common with me. No, they don’t reason abstractly, but they can feel pain, and this is significant. I believe this because 1) they instinctively move away from the source of a pain, and 2) they make noises to show their dissatisfaction with the pain. So when I watch videos of a slaughter house, it is disturbing to see animals behave like I do in response to pain. That’s all there is to my reasoning there. Things are just the opposite in the case of fish and shrimp. I have seen shrimp and fish being caught and skinned, and they just don’t remind me of myself. Does this prove that ‘fish don’t have feelings?’ Of course not, but you have to draw the line somewhere, and that is where I have chosen. It doesn’t seem like fish feel pain, at least the way I do, but it does seem like cows feel pain exactly the way I do.
To the skeptic who believes that my reasoning here is absurd, let me say two things. First, I will remind you that your level of comfort (“I will eat X, but I will not eat Y”) is just as arbitrary as mine. The only exception is a cannibal – he has a logical consistent position: “I will eat anything that provides nourishment to me.” I will close with an analogy. Do you think that it is icky when two siblings get married? Yeah, me too. How about first cousins? Still pretty gross. Well, how about 16th cousins? That’s not so gross, is it? But where is the logical cut off point? Of course there isn’t one - we have to make one up. My personal statement is this: “I will eat fish, but I will not eat mammals.” My statement is not logically rigorous, but then again, neither is yours. The best we can do is to ask ourselves the tough questions, which is what I am trying to do.
