Animals feel pain?

I wonder why PETA was not all over this one from the very beginning...

There is no painless way to slaughter an animal.

Even a needle to end the life of an animal brings pain.

Who decided that the whole world should be painless? Is it humanity's goal to return to the frickin' womb?

I didn't say it should be painless. I wish it was...but it isn't.

Just commenting that unfortunately slaughter, hunting, ritual slaughter or even euthanasia is not without some degree of suffering.

There are smaller operations who try to do it better and with minimal discomfort.

You just will never see that with a industrial slaughterhouse. Time equals money. Animals are rushed thru and the people are rushed as well.

I was agreeing with you.

I know it does, and always will, and trying to achieve a world without pain for animals or otherwise is just silly.

I can appreciate reasonable efforts to decrease it, but some people go too far...

Ending life will always be unpleasant. It's just unnatural. You can't do it without feeling at least a little messed up somewhere along the line.

Which is funny really, if you're an atheist. What would be the evolutionary gain of feeling remorseful about killing another creature that isn't even close to human?

Interesting point. Perhaps to prevent over hunting and thus maintaining a more lasting food supply? Just a thought, probably not right.

Yeah could be...That implies an incredible amount of environmental awareness though. Most like to think that only recently we've attained that. Unless maybe you count Indians? I guess you could make that case.

If you're a catholic what is the gain of feeling remorseful about killing another creature?

Perhaps I misunderstand the question, but what does being an atheist have to do with it? Atheists may believe we evolved, but isn't an evolution also one that creates 'highly evolved' and 'smarter, more compassionate' human beings?

There are a great number of religios people who believe in evolution. God put us here and we evolved from there. Science and Religion are not mutually exempt from eachother.

Yeah that is true. I guess you can be religious and believe in evolution. My apologies.

However, Christianity and an origin resulting from evolution are incompatible.

I'm just saying, I don't know what natural force would have driven us to dislike killing, especially when being good at killing usually ensures survival.

On the first point, I have never met a Christian who wouldn't believe in evolution. While evolution denial isn't quite a fringe point of view, especially in the US, most flavours of Christian faith I'm familiar with accept evolution without much conflict.


Most animals don't kill for fun. They kill mainly for food, self defence and territorial disputes.

I think our habits of remorse and pity for deaths of unrelated species come as a side effect of other evolutionary advances rather than as an advantageous trait by itself. We tend to extend some levels of emotion we feel for fellow human suffering to pets and other animals. We anthropomorphize pet feelings and emotions, and extend that to other creatures as well.

Evolution isn't a road trip of improvement after another. It doesn't have a goal. It's a string of somewhat random changes, not all of them necessarily beneficial, or sensible as such. Natural selection cleans it up a bit on the way, but even with that, there's a lot that doesn't need to make much sense.

Also, religious or no, witnessing death reminds us of our own mortality. We don't tend to like solid finality like that.

Nice reply. I enjoyed it, it was well thought out and satisfies my question well. I read it all.

Well, you should talk to more Christians. I myself believe in natural selection, but not evolution, the difference being the creation of new, unique genetic information rather than unique combination or copying of it.

And I was very specific in the way I phrased what I said.

You cannot accept an origin due to evolution as a Christian who believes the Bible is true.

If you that life arose from nothing spontaneously, and then evolved to humanity, then that means there could be no Adam or Eve, and no original sin, and hence, no need for Jesus or Christianity at all.

You could say the Genesis is simply a metaphor, but read plainly it is clear that it is not.

You could also say that maybe God designated the first humans that evolved as Adam and Eve, but man, c'mon, what a cop out. It also conflicts with Genesis anyways.

The point is, if you pick and choose and throw out a true, literal Genesis, then there's nothing to stop you from doing that to the rest of the Bible and the whole religion.

Which arguably, is the origin of many sorrows...misused religion...wouldn't you say?

So we've come full circle. People who don't absolutely cling to their Christian faith and instead water it down with secular principles (Crusades, Taliban), or those who mix religion into secular principles (Hitler, Mengel) are largely responsible for the world's woes.

lol...

True...hope is hard to kill.

what i'd like to know, does it hurt more at a religious ceremony? maybe becoming veal hurts less?

Apart from the that evolution doesn't necessarily give an explanation of the origin of life. But the point you raise is good lol, there's no need for jeesus or Christianity at all :)



I can dream I suppose. lol


Yep, take the bible literally and follow it ALL to the letter and you'll be fine. Now excuse me while I go stone my baby girl for being disrespectful to me

brb

As a molecular biology grad student, I'm a bit baffled as to how you would arrive at such a conclusion...?

Perhaps because we've "evolved" to such a degree that we know the suffering/killing is unnecessary?

Although I believe in many or most atheist ideals, I do feel the need to point out that Buddhism, overall, probably the most atheistic of religions, holds that suffering is universal -- Something from which none of us can ever escape.

We could call it "Ancient wisdom that actually makes some sense from back then."

There's a great amount of folk wisdom contained there -- much more than in the more organized religions, for my part.

Yet, there is sadness when a goat, or a calf, or a human dies, whether on a Jewish, Christian, Hindu, Mayan, or Buddhist altar (or barbecue grill). The point is, as I've seen it, to acknowledge the sacrifice, and move past it, to the nourishment of our kin.

Dis-acknowledging the implications of suffering itself is the height of complacency.

We live that other organisms may suffer and die, for our nourishment, from our own measures, whether by blunt instrument or blade, and we die by the same measure by those who direct those instruments upon ourselves.

Not to color the idea with too much religiosity, but a kill is a kill, whether a white hart, or a head of lettuce. And a meal is a meal, whether acknowledged or a McDLT.

Sorry to cloud the issue with s**t from our past, but accepting this idea of "the end of suffering" just seems misguided.

I think the whole point to the article was, is that for a long time, ritual slaughter was professed to be more humane than a regular slaughter operation. Or at least many were led to believe.

Agriprocessors

An interesting read.

Althought the meat from an animal that suffered more than it should have in slaughter is still considered Kosher, the religious laws have been broken.

If done to the letter, it seems like a better way to slaughter an animal than what most go thru.