Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

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cookiedivine
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Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

Post by cookiedivine »

Hi guys! I'm new here - behold, my first thread:

Is it immoral to kill animals painlessly, so long as there are no witnesses?

The first part seems pretty obvious - most people would simply respond 'well, is it immoral to kill humans painlessly?', to which I'd suggest that its only considered immoral because of the effect it has on other humans - those who witness the death, those who were close to the victim and those who become fearful that they too could be killed at any moment (so long as its painless) - but the victim himself/herself is not harmed.

While animals might have the cognitive ability to understand death when they witness it (and suffer the trauma and fear that comes with that), are they able to 1. mourn the death of an animal they know or 2. become suspicious and thus fearful of an impending (painless) death?

(This might all be really obvious, in which case pls take it easy on me, I'm new :P )
Last edited by cookiedivine on Tue Jan 23, 2018 10:23 pm, edited 1 time in total.
vdofthegoodkind
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Re: Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

Post by vdofthegoodkind »

Depends on the kind of moral framework you judge it from. If you define immoral as "has a potential to cause or effectively causes harm", then no, it's not immoral.

However a lot of people on this forum will probably say it IS immoral and cite a definition of morality along the lines of "if it violates someone's preferences/interests, it is immoral".
Which in my opinion is completely innaccurate, because those people are just projecting their own interest/preference in living onto another creature that doesn't possess the necessary capacity for reason to comprehend its own mortality. The default preference/interest to assign to it would be just pure indifference, which results in it being morally acceptable.


As for if animals mourn the death of an animal they know. Some of them definitely display behavior that one could reasonably suppose to be mourning yes.
As for animals becoming suspicious and fearful of an impending (painless) death. Depends totally on the circumstances in which you kill them. For example I'm sure a cow/pig being sent to a slaugtherhouse, smelling blood and death everywhere, has a decent level of awareness that it's not in a particularly safe place. However if I dig a hole in the ground, take out my gun, tell my dog in a cuddly voice to jump in the hole, then shoot the dog, he most likely had no idea whatsoever what was coming.
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cookiedivine
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Re: Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

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However a lot of people on this forum will probably say it IS immoral and cite a definition of morality along the lines of "if it violates someone's preferences/interests, it is immoral".
Interesting. If someone could explain this in more detail that'd be swell, as I've never thought about this in depth.
Would the person's preferences/interests change if they're suddenly killed without warning? It seems like this would only have an effect on the preferences/interests of OTHER humans who realise they're now vulnerable to being killed at some point, no?
As for animals becoming suspicious and fearful of an impending (painless) death. Depends totally on the circumstances in which you kill them. For example I'm sure a cow/pig being sent to a slaugtherhouse, smelling blood and death everywhere, has a decent level of awareness that it's not in a particularly safe place. However if I dig a hole in the ground, take out my gun, tell my dog in a cuddly voice to jump in the hole, then shoot the dog, he most likely had no idea whatsoever what was coming.
Well, I guess what I'm asking is is it possible for us to kill animals painlessly without ANY of them knowing they're going to be killed? If the killing process was taking an animal away from the group and killing it painlessly (with ZERO warning of any kind (so no smell of blood etc.)), would the remaining animals be smart enough to realise they're being killed one by one?
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Re: Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

Post by cookiedivine »

The film 'The Island' comes to mind.
If, in the film, the harvested humans were killed painlessly and without any warning, and the two main characters hadn't discovered the truth, would that kind of human harvesting be immoral?
I suppose there'd be an effect on the staff members who kill the clones, in that they'd question their own reality and grow fearful of their potential death, maybe? But then that's part of that key difference between humans and animals

I realise this is all quite trivial, as a system like this (where loads of animals are killed painlessly without any warning or witnesses) would be v difficult to impossible to utilize irl. Its also v hard to impossible to gauge if an animal is feeling fearful (you'd need to make absolutely sure)
Last edited by cookiedivine on Tue Jan 23, 2018 7:50 pm, edited 4 times in total.
vdofthegoodkind
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Re: Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

Post by vdofthegoodkind »

cookiedivine wrote: Tue Jan 23, 2018 7:32 pm
Interesting. If someone could explain this in more detail that'd be swell, as I've never thought about this in depth.
Would the person's preferences/interests change if they're suddenly killed without warning? It seems like this would only have an effect on the preferences/interests of OTHER humans who realise they're now vulnerable to being killed at some point, no?
In principle there's not really that much of a difference between defining morality through 'harm caused' versus through 'interests violated'.
Only difference is in some edge cases. For example, in the framework of 'harm caused', it would be moral for enormously advanced aliens to kill all of humanity painlessly in one fell swoop if they had that kind of technological capability. (An edge case which I personally am totally fine with :lol: )

Well, I guess what I'm asking is is it possible for us to kill animals painlessly without ANY of them knowing they're going to be killed? If the killing process was taking an animal away from the group and killing it painlessly (with ZERO warning of any kind (so no smell of blood etc.)), would the remaining animals be smart enough to realise they're being killed one by one?
That's definitely possible yeah. Would be a hell of a lot less cost-effective than the current practices, but there's definitely ways to do it without the animals having any clue whatsoever.
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Re: Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

Post by vdofthegoodkind »

cookiedivine wrote: Tue Jan 23, 2018 7:45 pm The film 'The Island' comes to mind.
If, in the film, the harvested humans were killed painlessly and without any warning, and the two main characters hadn't discovered the truth, would that kind of human harvesting be immoral?
I suppose there'd be an effect on the staff members who kill the clones, in that they'd question their own reality and grow fearful of their potential death, maybe? But then that's part of that key difference between humans and animals

I realise this is all quite trivial, as employing a system like this irl (where loads of animals are killed painlessly without any warning or witnesses) would be v difficult to impossible. Its also v hard to impossible to gauge if an animal is feeling fearful
Among other things (such as the direct limitation of freedom of the prisoners which causes suffering), it would be immoral because of the potential of those humans finding out. There's nothing fundamentally different about the capabilities of the humans who are in charge of that facility in the island and the capabilities of the "prisoners" there, and those humans in charge are far from infallible and omniscient. They in no way, shape, or form can guarantee that the prisoners wont find out. Whereas due to the fundamental lack of reasoning capabilities in animals, such a thing can be guaranteed in the case of a super benign form of animal agriculture.
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cookiedivine
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Re: Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

Post by cookiedivine »

In principle there's not really that much of a difference between defining morality through 'harm caused' versus through 'interests violated'.
Only difference is in some edge cases. For example, in the framework of 'harm caused', it would be moral for enormously advanced aliens to kill all of humanity painlessly in one fell swoop if they had that kind of technological capability. (An edge case which I personally am totally fine with :lol: )
Hmm, I guess I'm still struggling to understand this 'preferences/interests' approach to morality.
To me, that alien example would be totally fine - an interest violated is only immoral if it causes harm (e.g. fear) but an instantly wiped out human race can't feel anything, so...
That's definitely possible yeah. Would be a hell of a lot less cost-effective than the current practices, but there's definitely ways to do it without the animals having any clue whatsoever.
Yeah like I said this is all kind of hypothetical and probably not possible (or at least v difficult) to do on loads of animals
Among other things (such as the direct limitation of freedom of the prisoners which causes suffering), it would be immoral because of the potential of those humans finding out. There's nothing fundamentally different about the capabilities of the humans who are in charge of that facility in the island and the capabilities of the "prisoners" there, and those humans in charge are far from infallible and omniscient. They in no way, shape, or form can guarantee that the prisoners wont find out. Whereas due to the fundamental lack of reasoning capabilities in animals, such a thing can be guaranteed in the case of a super benign form of animal agriculture.
Yeah I guess having the prison run by humans AND some of the prisoners feeling imprisoned to some degree is where the Island analogy is lacking.
But the whole 'potential of harm' thing is interesting - surely that means the system only has the potential to be immoral, and isn't inherently immoral? That is, something being risky doesn't necessarily make it immoral.
Reminds me of the 'lying to promote veganism' issue - the act of lying only becomes immoral when people discover the lie, but an undiscovered lie could be morally justifiable if it results in a greater good
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Re: Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

Post by vdofthegoodkind »

cookiedivine wrote: Tue Jan 23, 2018 8:08 pm Hmm, I guess I'm still struggling to understand this 'preferences/interests' approach to morality.
To me, that alien example would be totally fine - an interest violated is only immoral if it causes harm (e.g. fear) but an instantly wiped out human race can't feel anything, so...
It's just an arbitrary preference whether or not you base your morality on 'harm caused' or 'interests violated'. (although again some people on this forum will falsely assert it's not arbitrary, without providing any actual evidence for their claim)
Yeah like I said this is all kind of hypothetical and probably not possible (or at least v difficult) to do on loads of animals
On an industrial scale it's impossible yeah. But for small scale farms it's easily doable.


But the whole 'potential of harm' thing is interesting - surely that means the system only has the potential to be immoral, and isn't inherently immoral? That is, something being risky doesn't necessarily make it immoral.
Reminds me of the 'lying to promote veganism' issue - the act of lying only becomes immoral when people discover the lie, but an undiscovered lie could be morally justifiable if it results in a greater good
An analogy that might make it easy for you to understand... Take cheating on your girlfriend/boyfriend for example. Is it moral as long as you don't get caught or is it immoral because there is a reasonable enough chance to assume you will get caught?

As for the 'greater good' thing. Yeah, from a consequentialist morality point of view that's completely accurate. Suppose for instance tomorrow some super advanced aliens come to earth, use their super powerful nanotechnology on us to make everyone except the citizens of Norway feel excrutiating pain for one hour.
After the hour is over, they say "either we give you part of our nanotechnology and you use it on Norway for an hour a day for the rest of their lives, or we use it on the rest of the world for an hour a day for the rest of your lives".
From a consequentialist point of view it would be totally acceptable for the rest of the world to turn on Norway and cause them excrutating pain for an hour a day for the rest of their lives.
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cookiedivine
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Re: Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

Post by cookiedivine »

Take cheating on your girlfriend/boyfriend for example. Is it moral as long as you don't get caught or is it immoral because there is a reasonable enough chance to assume you will get caught?
I would say it has a high risk of becoming an immoral act, but isn't inherently immoral from the moment you do it.

(And yeah I suppose this is all coming from a consequentialist approach. That is the general standpoint that most ppl on this forum hold, right?)
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Re: Killing animals painlessly without witnesses?

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cookiedivine wrote: Tue Jan 23, 2018 6:40 pm Is it immoral to kill animals painlessly, so long as there are no witnesses?
Usually.

If you did so at the end of the animal's life, without any good days or happiness to come, it may be a mercy kill (something we grant other humans too, if we're civilized).
There are also non-sentient animals.
cookiedivine wrote: Tue Jan 23, 2018 6:40 pmThe first part seems pretty obvious - most people would simply respond 'well, is it immoral to kill humans painlessly?', to which I'd suggest that its only considered immoral because of the effect it has on other humans - those who witness the death, those who were close to the victim and those who become fearful that they too could be killed at any moment (so long as its painless) - but the victim himself/herself is not harmed.
There is harm -- even hedonistic harm, if you're a pleasure and pain counting utilitarian -- in the way of opportunity cost.

If you're a negative utilitarian (arbitrarily only counting pain and ignoring pleasure as having positive value) then there is no harm, but that's a very misinformed position with a lot of serious problems.

The better position to take is one of preference consideration, though, not just consideration of experienced pleasure and pain.
We don't kill people because they don't want to be killed. You can consider the golden rule.

vdofthegoodkind wrote: Tue Jan 23, 2018 7:11 pm Depends on the kind of moral framework you judge it from. If you define immoral as "has a potential to cause or effectively causes harm", then no, it's not immoral.
Only if you define "harm" very very narrowly. As negative utilitarianism (non-preference based).

It is literally a physical injury to be killed.
Likewise, it may be a harm to interests (Yes, we do also consider that a kind of harm).
vdofthegoodkind wrote: Tue Jan 23, 2018 7:11 pmHowever a lot of people on this forum will probably say it IS immoral and cite a definition of morality along the lines of "if it violates someone's preferences/interests, it is immoral".
Correct.
vdofthegoodkind wrote: Tue Jan 23, 2018 7:11 pm Which in my opinion is completely innaccurate, because those people are just projecting their own interest/preference in living onto another creature that doesn't possess the necessary capacity for reason to comprehend its own mortality. The default preference/interest to assign to it would be just pure indifference, which results in it being morally acceptable.
Incorrect. Most interests require being alive to fulfill, so even if a being has no concept of death it is harmful to its interests to kill it if it wanted to do anything at all.

The only being it's arguably not harmful to kill is a suicidal one, although we could talk seriously about opportunity costs and the kind of idealized interests that would say being suicidal may be based on bad information.
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