Problem with utilitarian argument for veganism?

[let_dias]

Hi let_dias

thanks for your reply.

the problem with the voting analogy, is that it isn't exactly comparable to the situation I was in. With voting in an election, it's extremely unlikely that your vote is going to make a difference to the outcome, but your vote does still get counted. You still have 1 vote out of 100 million (or whatever the number is). The problem was that I thought my 'vote' was counting as literally 0, not just as 1, because of the way animal products are produced on massive scales (but if you read over the other comments, you'll see this was a mistake).

Now, I do think my 'vote', as far as what I choose to eat, does counts for something (which is good!), and the situation is actually better than it is with voting in an election. In an election (if it's 'winner takes all' as in the recent US presidential election) your vote really is not going to make a difference to who wins, but when it comes to what you eat, you can actually make a small but actual difference to how many animals are put through the farming process.

Wow, I never thought about it that way, thanks for the explanation (:
Wish you the best in your journey!

[wesley]

Don't think of it in terms of a tiny chance of you making it happen 500 years earlier (even if it were, morality is about probability, a small chance of doing an astronomically large good is still very very good), but a large chance of you making it happen days or hours sooner. How many animals are killed a day? How many an hour? That's still very large. Even if we break it down by seconds, you save many many lives.

The reason I mentioned having a big impact in 500 years time was just to emphasize that our actions affect other people's actions not only during our lifetime but also once we're dead! So it really is possible that we can influence a lot of people. But you're right that we should not overlook the positive effect we're having in the short-term.

[wesley]

How many animals are killed a day? How many an hour? That's still very large. Even if we break it down by seconds, you save many many lives.

You have to try to think in terms of rule consequentialism to avoid errors in reasoning like this.

Just to be clear though, are you saying I will save many lives per second if I am a vegan? You have convinced me that I'll save a small number of animal lives if I'm vegan (which is much better than zero), but are you also arguing that I could take credit for the efforts of the whole vegan movement by being part of it?

[brimstoneSalad]

The reason I mentioned having a big impact in 500 years time was just to emphasize that our actions affect other people's actions not only during our lifetime but also once we're dead! So it really is possible that we can influence a lot of people. But you're right that we should not overlook the positive effect we're having in the short-term.

What I'm saying is you don't need to make the odds so dramatic and improbable.
The tipping point of critical mass isn't just an IF question, but a when.

It's actually possible in theory (although I'm sure extremely unlikely) a single individual choosing to be vegan or not today could be the difference between the whole world being vegan or most people still eating animals in 500 years from now!

My point is that, in such a scenario, it's much more likely that the point of tipping would be arrived at earlier or later by a few years or even days. Not so much a dramatic success/fail proposition.
It's very probable that your influence could make the world reach the tipping point a day earlier, and that without it the world would reach the tipping point a day later. A day may not seem like much, but how many animals are killed in a day? Something like 20 million. Even if you speed things up by a single minute, you've saved some 15 thousand.

Even just shifting the time of the tipping point one day or a minute makes a big difference. You don't have to be the person who decides if the movement succeeds and fails over centuries. We can assume it will succeed, and that each person just speeds it up a bit.

Much less dramatic and more probable way of looking at it.

Just to be clear though, are you saying I will save many lives per second if I am a vegan?

Your influence on shifting the tipping point one second and making most of the world vegan a second earlier would save many animals.

but are you also arguing that I could take credit for the efforts of the whole vegan movement by being part of it?

No, just for speeding things up a little. You only get credit for the earlier tip, based on the tipping point idea.
And you get a piece of the whole movement, based on your contribution to reducing demand before said tipping point.

[wesley]

No, just for speeding things up a little. You only get credit for the earlier tip, based on the tipping point idea.
And you get a piece of the whole movement, based on your contribution to reducing demand before said tipping point.

ok thanks for the clarification. I think I see now why you brought up the number of animal killed per second.

Anyway, the main conclusion from this conversation is that my decisions about what to eat do make a difference to how many animals are killed.

Thanks for your time!

[brimstoneSalad]

Anyway, the main conclusion from this conversation is that my decisions about what to eat do make a difference to how many animals are killed.

It also saves human lives.

[wesley]

It also saves human lives.

Which human lives are saved?

[brimstoneSalad]

It also saves human lives.

Which human lives are saved?

Mostly people in developing countries, whose food security is threatened by global warming, but also people in coastal regions and beyond who are threatened by extreme weather. Rising sea levels flooding cities are a concern too, and may result in significant displacement, but the others are more immediate and pressing.

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs266/en/

Key facts

• Climate change affects the social and environmental determinants of health – clean air, safe drinking water, sufficient food and secure shelter.
• Between 2030 and 2050, climate change is expected to cause approximately 250 000 additional deaths per year, from malnutrition, malaria, diarrhoea and heat stress.
• The direct damage costs to health (i.e. excluding costs in health-determining sectors such as agriculture and water and sanitation), is estimated to be between US$ 2-4 billion/year by 2030.

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-07-11/climate-change-causes-death-study-confirms
etc.

The effect is both real and measurable on human beings.
Meat eating isn't necessarily the biggest contributor to global warming overall, but it is the largest contributor that's easy for us to personally stop (it's less easy to cease heating and cooling your home, or stop going to work, etc.).

[wesley]

Maybe the environmental impact of animal agriculture will be what eventually forces governments to intervene with policies to limit? Concerns about animal welfare have been around for a long time and many people are aware of those but ignore them. But hopefully governments will not be foolish enough to ignore the environmental impacts of animal agriculture? Although, I wouldn't be all that surprised if they do ignore it until it's too late.

[brimstoneSalad]

Maybe the environmental impact of animal agriculture will be what eventually forces governments to intervene with policies to limit? Concerns about animal welfare have been around for a long time and many people are aware of those but ignore them. But hopefully governments will not be foolish enough to ignore the environmental impacts of animal agriculture? Although, I wouldn't be all that surprised if they do ignore it until it's too late.

Well they ignored public smoking for a long time, and still ignore wood burning fireplaces, despite people dropping dead from cancer caused by other people's actions.
It's pretty easy for people to be indifferent about starvation, displacement, and disease in developing countries. And pretty easy to ignore deaths from heat stroke and storms in their own countries as bad luck rather than take responsibility for their actions.