Anti-vegan arguments are weak. [video]

[knot]

A great (but long) video that goes over all arguments against veganism and explains why they're bad

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ueqDkY3aNAY

Is there something he gets wrong, or any arguments he left out?

Personally I only disagreed with his statement that "no one has ever died from a vegan diet", because I think there has been at least 1 case of raw vegans killing their child with a shitty diet

[miniboes]

Seems pretty thorough to me. Of course all the arguments are not perfectly rebutted, but that's fine.

[brimstoneSalad]

Looks like a pretty good video. Voice is pretty clear and understandable, and seems reasonable.

I haven't been able to watch all of it, though (I may not be able to, I'll try)

Based on what you said, he probably could have clarified that nobody has died of a properly balanced vegan diet, but then what about allergies? Peanuts are vegan, and if part of the vegan diet of somebody who was allergic and died from them, it could be blamed on that particular diet.
How about choking? Etc.

It's just not a very clear statement. The problem is that there is no one "vegan diet", but many diets -- some very healthy, some not -- are technically vegan.

[brimstoneSalad]

Since palm oil is fungible, there's not really any such thing as sustainable palm oil (since it's not really viable to grow that market), so that's a small error. There was a thread on that a little while ago that EquALLity started, not sure where.

What is that clip around 23:55 with the pot bellied old man who knocks over the table?

[brimstoneSalad]

I'm on my own personal Journey
would we support someone to make a gradual personal journey away from rape or pedophilia? No, those actions are unacceptable.

I don't agree with this; it can be counter productive to reject people who are working on making progress in eliminating animal products. Not everybody does it overnight, and if we reject anybody who isn't perfect, that will tend to mean rejecting everybody. The "vegan police" mentality may do more harm than good.
We need to be encouraging of more change, but still accepting when it is apparent somebody is making a sincere effort, and working to change.

[brimstoneSalad]

Another bad argument. He fails to understand the nature of intelligence and sentience:

the plant sentience argument generally relies on a conflation of intelligence with sentience

Because true intelligence and sentience are closely and inextricably linked.

as if this weren't already obvious we're told that various experiments have surfaced showing that plants have intelligence

Which is bullshit, plants have no true intelligence. Yellow journalism is using the wrong words to describe plant behavior --"intelligent" in the common colloquial sense, like smart phone or computer apps that remember user preferences-- and implying far more than what they can actually do (which has been widely known for centuries).

intelligence being the capacity for information processing

False. There are multiple definitions of intelligence, some much less rigorous and useful than others, but even the one he included a screen shot of does not say this. Mere action-reaction responses (reflexes) certainly do not quality.

Intelligence has been defined in many different ways including one's capacity for logic, abstract thought, understanding, self-awareness, communication, learning, emotional knowledge, memory, planning, creativity and problem solving. It can be more generally described as the ability to perceive information, and retain it as knowledge to be applied towards adaptive behaviors within an environment.

Plants and calculators do not demonstrate true learning, they can merely be sensitized (like a plant not responding to excessive stimuli, or a calculator "remembering" your settings). True learning requires comprehension of information as knowledge (which is contextual in nature and requires understanding of the information), which can be applied to truly adaptive behaviors rather than those which represent only a spectrum of responses or settings (the best example and test of true intelligence is operant conditioning).

the fact that a plant can process information such as the location of the sun and react intelligently by tracking it as it moves through the sky is not a demonstration of sentience

This kind of behavior is not regarded as intelligence in computers or plants.

What is suspect is their limited ability to be conditioned, but there isn't evidence that this is any more than sensitization (which is distinct from true learning).

computers can do this and at present they are not sentient

Computers are not broadly sentient, but some computer programs are.

a calculator is intelligent but not sentient

A calculator is neither intelligent nor sentient. A program running on a powerful calculator could be sentient, though.

there is a huge gulf between information processing and first person subjective experience

Which is represented by the difference between a reflex and actual intelligent behavior -- between sensitization and crude conditioning, and more advanced processes like true learning and operant conditioning.

Some plants have very advanced behavior that may come very close to being intelligent (like quick moving carnivorous plants). However, not all animals are even truly intelligent -- some function purely on reflex, and can not respond to operant conditioning. That is, not all animals are even sentient.

The line that best represents true intelligence (and sentience) is somewhere around worms and small insects, not plants.

Also of crucial importance: Those which pass that mark are only intelligent or sentient in matters of degrees, and this is inherently important as well.
Equating worms to humans in terms of value is absurd.

and in the absence of any good reason to presume plants have the latter, calling them sentient and morally equating them with humans and animals is retarded

And yet he just spent quite a bit of time criticizing solipsism and saying we need to give others the benefit of the doubt there?

Behavior is the ultimate smoking gun here, and plants have not expressed anything like true intelligence or true learning yet -- even lower animals do not.
We also need to stop blindly equating everything that happens to be sentient regardless of degree. Even if plants were as sentient as worms, that's not saying much and it would still be more appropriate to eat them rather than the animals that are fed plants.

Thermodynamics, in trophic levels, is important here.

[Cirion Spellbinder]

Computers are not broadly sentient, but some computer programs are.

Really? Could you show me an example of a sentient computer program?

[brimstoneSalad]

The "invalidity of hypocritical criticism" is pretty bad.

He tries to draw a distinction between deliberate 'murder' and 'justified killing' with regard to moral relevance.

Carnists don't necessarily want to kill animals, they just want to eat meat; killing animals is a necessary step in taking their flesh to eat (like killing pests is a necessary step in farming). I've heard of people who believed meat was harmlessly surgically extracted from cows as children.

A distinction between pleasure and necessity can be meaningful -- since meat itself is not necessary (and is even harmful) -- but then instead goes on to list a lot of things that are pleasurable and result in the deaths of animals. This kind of reflects his defense of palm oil.
Our actions have consequences, and that's what matters.

A carnist using the lesser amount of harm caused by vegans as an excuse to continue eating meat is employing a fallacy; the important part is reducing harm. And we can all stand to be better people in that regard; there's no harm in admitting that. Focusing on the greatest cruelties first, however, makes sense.

[brimstoneSalad]

Computers are not broadly sentient, but some computer programs are.

Really? Could you show me an example of a sentient computer program?

This is only Darwinian (individuals with defined behavior genes), but you can get a general sense for how these systems work:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kupe2ZKK58
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cP035M_w82s
You can find a lot more along those lines on youtube.

Intelligence involves variation in behavior and adaptation over a single lifespan based on true learning, which means the system basically has to try out these behaviors, then revert when one doesn't work better without dying or reproducing to do it. That's harder to find an example of.

[brimstoneSalad]

At 49:48, his arguments against vegetarianism also just contradicted what he said earlier about the "invalidity of hypocritical criticism".

The harm of animals in obtaining milk or eggs may also be incidental, rather than deliberate, to vegetarians. How is it he criticizes honey and ignores all harm to insects as not morally relevant with regard to other farming?

The key issue is necessity, and how these products are simultaneously harmful and not beneficial to humans, but that can also apply to unhealthy plant products like palm oil or sugar too (which he seems ready to defend with his claims about veganism being the moral baseline).

If, however, harm can be eliminated from animal food production (no easy task, and I would say not something that has been done -- so only freegans are probably blameless there), the argument against it becomes no stronger than the argument against vegan junk food.