Schwitzgebel's "no relevant difference" like NTT (but valid?)

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Re: Schwitzgebel's "no relevant difference" like NTT (but valid?)

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brimstoneSalad wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:21 pm Do you think there could be other cases where it makes sense to err on the side of non-sentience for pragmatic reasons? Perhaps small insects where the probability is low enough, despite apparent reaction (probably reflex, but we don't know for sure), and people might be put off by the idea of having to consider their interests.
Yes. But of course, most of those animals aren't exactly "presenting" as sentient in the first place. (Oysters, for example). Honeybees actually do present as being subjects-of-a-life (in my view), although I still don't make them a focus of activism. That said, I need to do a video, because I've had quite a few requests about honeybees. My personal view is that bees are clearly subjects of a life, that we shouldn't encourage their exploitation (by actually buying honey) and I'd recommend avoiding any product with "honey" in the title, simply because it encourages the use of the product and makes marketers think it's important. But, I'm not going to encourage people to go out of their way to avoid it. I think educating people about the absolute stupidity of natural health claims regarding honey is a lot more valuable.

As for other insects, I think we need a clear plan of attack, and whether its "speciesist" or not, I'm going to focus on broadly better understood animals first.
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Re: Schwitzgebel's "no relevant difference" like NTT (but valid?)

Post by brimstoneSalad »

ModVegan wrote: Wed Dec 13, 2017 5:19 pmThat said, I need to do a video, because I've had quite a few requests about honeybees. My personal view is that bees are clearly subjects of a life, that we shouldn't encourage their exploitation (by actually buying honey) and I'd recommend avoiding any product with "honey" in the title, simply because it encourages the use of the product and makes marketers think it's important. But, I'm not going to encourage people to go out of their way to avoid it. I think educating people about the absolute stupidity of natural health claims regarding honey is a lot more valuable.
That's a good perspective.

Sometimes people are concerned with colony collapse, and excessive honey harvesting might be related to that, but due to bee breeding today it's not a major agricultural threat anymore.
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Re: Schwitzgebel's "no relevant difference" like NTT (but valid?)

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brimstoneSalad wrote: Wed Dec 13, 2017 11:01 pm Sometimes people are concerned with colony collapse, and excessive honey harvesting might be related to that, but due to bee breeding today it's not a major agricultural threat anymore.
It's concerning, though I think most explanations are working off some form of correlation=causation. Kind of off-topic, but I'd love to see more farmers exploring cooperative relationships with bees. I'd love to see more fruit growers, in particular, providing a place for hives. I wonder how feasible that is.
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Re: Schwitzgebel's "no relevant difference" like NTT (but valid?)

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ModVegan wrote: Thu Dec 14, 2017 10:40 am I'd love to see more fruit growers, in particular, providing a place for hives. I wonder how feasible that is.
The trick is that all of those flowers are blooming at once, so they need a huge bee population to pollinate, but the rest of the year they don't have enough flowers to support such a population.

Moving away from monoculture would help in that regard; if we had mixed orchards that bloomed throughout the year it would be no problem for a local bee population to keep up.
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Re: Schwitzgebel's "no relevant difference" like NTT (but valid?)

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brimstoneSalad wrote: Thu Dec 14, 2017 11:51 am The trick is that all of those flowers are blooming at once, so they need a huge bee population to pollinate, but the rest of the year they don't have enough flowers to support such a population.

Moving away from monoculture would help in that regard; if we had mixed orchards that bloomed throughout the year it would be no problem for a local bee population to keep up.
Yes, although bees fly a lot every day. It wouldn't take that many other crops nearby for them to thrive. And they die off in the winter anyway - it's not necessary to have something blooming 365 days a year.
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