The Vegan Pagan: Interstice the Second

You call that an argument?

Every vegetarian or vegan has probably heard someone lament the feelings of plants.  Coming from meat-eaters, it’s hard to understand the point of this claim.  It is a classic tu quoque fallacy.  Vegans, generally, say, “Animals are capable of suffering.”  Then an omnivore might respond, “Well plants have feelings too!”  It’s the you’re-no-better-than-me defense.  (It’s also referred to as the ad plantarum fallacy.) Most of us reasonable vegans think we should be attempting to reduce animal suffering as much as possible.  Are we forgetting the suffering of plants?  If we are so are meat-eaters.  Later I will show why the “plants have feelings” hypothesis is an argument for veganism.

Do plants have ‘feels’ though?  Plants don’t “see” because they don’t have eyes; they do, however, track the sun’s movements, defend themselves against predation, and respond to environmental cues.  This makes perfect sense from an evolutionary perspective–ancestors of modern plants that developed this ability were better at capturing the sun’s energy and passing along their genes, and the ones that didn’t weren’t.  This is a far cry from saying that plants have what philosophers call a “phenomenological” concept of the sun; it is hard to see how plants could have a concept of the sun from a first-‘person’ point of view that is familiar to ours.  Not everyone agrees but I think that animals have some sort of subjective experience.  It’s hard to see how plants could form the idea of “sun” without any kind of central nervous system.  They respond to stimuli whether it be photons or a caterpillar eating their leaves.  Anyone who has pets is likely more sympathetic to the idea of animals having some sort of inner mental representation of external reality.  With a healthy wariness toward anthropomorphization, we can ask if a house cat when chasing the red dot from a laser pointer sees the dot “in its head” or is just responding to the a stimulus like a plant.

The difference between plants and cats (and us) is brains.  Ultimately brains respond to stimuli, but they excel in model-building.  This is probably the human species’ greatest ability.  Non-human animals do this too, but at varying levels of sophistication.  Descartes would disagree, he infamously considered animals as mere automatons and man as the rational animal.  To him, animals were just complicated plants and only humans had an immortal soul capable of mental experience.  So burning cats alive was totally okay.  I think few of us today agree with Descartes–even the most ardent meat-eater wouldn’t torture a pet for the hell of it.

A brief aside on loving science

I Fucking Love Science is an incredibly popular Facebook page, with nearly 17 million “likes” (or ‘flikes’). The page was founded by blogger Elise Andrews. My appreciation for the page has waned in recent months. As its appeal grew the topics covered have become less hard-hitting from my anecdotal experience. Sure there are still posts criticizing anti-vaccine and creationist views, but much of the content seems to be “Here’s a cool picture of space! Science is cool!” or “Here’s an interesting scientific factoid! Science is cool!” The overall boon to science from the page is unclear to me.  Posts criticizing anti-science views have numerous comments angrily arguing against the consensus view.  It seems many people fucking love science when it supports their beliefs, but when it doesn’t, science must be wrong.

I fucking love the scientific method and the process of scientific reasoning more than I love science as a body of facts or the current interpretation of those facts. There are many things that we know because of science that are rather unfortunate—it looks like I won’t somehow develop superpowers, for exampl–but the methods of science allow humans to uncover aspects of the natural world that before we could only speculate on. That is what I fucking love.

“Sorry vegans”?

A while back, they shared a post titled “Sorry Vegans, Plants Can Hear Themselves Being Chewed.” [The title was changed at some point] My first thought was Not this again… 

Can plants hear? Not in a way similar to how animals do. They don’t have any ears obviously, but they also do not have the accompanying brain systems associated with hearing that we and other animals have. They do sense and adapt to their environments. But saying they “hear” is like saying plants “see” because they respond to and track the sun. Again, it’s really not surprising that plants do this. A plant that doesn’t respond whatsoever to predation wouldn’t do as well as one that could initiate some kind of defense when being eaten. The plants that were more effective at fending off predators tended to leave more offspring, then at some point, most plants would have such defenses.

But let’s imagine that the “plants have feelings” hypothesis is true, that plants have some sort of pain-like inner experience when they are chewed, pruned, trimmed, or damaged (not as advanced as a cat’s but non-zero).  What implications would this have for an ethical diet?  The straw version of vegans that many carnists espouse would (should) become a fruitarian.  Most people would be a bit more practical though.  Advocates of “humanely-raised” “cruelty-free” meat might start buying vegetables labeled with similar marketing buzzwords.  The first thing we should do if the “plants have feelings” hypothesis had any inkling of being anyway true would be to eat less meat.

Straw vegans

People have the idea that vegans eat more vegetables than meat-eaters.  So if the “plants have feelings” hypothesis were true (nevermind how incredibly unlikely that is and also how unlikely it is that the mythical plant feelings would be similar to an animal’s feelings), vegans and vegetarians would be causing more plant suffering directly.  What is forgotten here is the inefficiency of raising meat.  The numbers vary but 2 to 5 times more grain is required to produce the same amount of calories through livestock than directly through grain.  So meat-eaters are causing more plant suffering overall than vegans.

To break it down.  If the “plants have feelings” hypothesis were true, plants would factor into the ethical calculation.  This would either require not eating plants (except fruits that have fallen off the stem), harvesting plants in a more humane way (I’m skeptical of this being effective and being more than just a marketing label, as I am with these practices in animals), or cutting back on our consumption of plants.  A very effective way to do that would be to stop eating meat, not only would that lessen (hypothetical) plant suffering, it would eliminate (actual) animal suffering.  So the “plants have feelings” gambit is not only the worst argument against veganism, it is an argument in support of it (if the hypothesis were remotely close to being true).

First of all, if you're really serious about this and no amount of scientific evidence will sway you - then it purely comes down to numbers. If a blade of grass is of the same importance to you as a dog, then it makes no sense to feed up livestock on millions and millions of plants, and then kill the animal to eat. This would result in far more plant casualties, which you'd surely want to avoid as a dedicated plants-rights activist. Better to minimize those plant casualties by just feeding yourself on them, rather than feeding many times more to animals, right?

But let's be sensible - plants lack brains and lack anything else that neuroscientists know to cause sentience. Some studies show plants to have input/output reactions to certain stimulation, but no study suggests sentience or an ability to "feel emotions". You can plainly understand the difference between a blade of grass and a dog. Comparisons between the two are completely absurd.

Vegan vegan plants plants… Yeah yeah… But, playing Devil’s advocate, why should I value animals more than plants? Because, eating plants is not the same as eating animals, and here’s why:

Value Animals: Animals Feel Pain

Value Animals

As we mentioned in a previous article, though some animals are meant to consume other animals for food (carnivores and omnivores), humans are not. We are biologically herbivores, or more appropriately, frugivores. Aside from the fact that biologically we are meant to consume plants, the morality behind consuming plants versus animals can be simplified by stating that animals feel pain, while plants do not. In addition, morally, all animals can and should consume whatever their bodies are designed to consume. This makes their food source ethical, as it is their intended sustenance.

Value Animals: Plants Lack a Complex Nervous System

Value Animals

Some might argue that plants definitely have perception, as they appear to grow better when classical music is played, and grow toward the sunlight no matter how a pot is placed. However, the fact of the matter is that plants lack a complex nervous system, which is positively a requirement in the ability to feel pain.

Value Animals: Fishing

Value Animals

To simplify this concept even further, imagine this scenario. You are spending the day fishing on your uncle’s boat. The sun is shining, and the fish are biting. You catch a huge bass and reel it in, then remove the hook. Is it bleeding? You toss the fish into your bucket. Is it writhing? Is it struggling to get out? The answers to each of these questions is an emphatic “yes!” The fish may not be as aware of danger as, say, a human or even a dog would be, but it is aware that it is not supposed to be out of the water, it can feel the pain of the hook in its mouth because fish do have nervous systems, and it is trying to survive.

Value Animals: Gardening

Value Animals

Now imagine this scenario. You have a gorgeous garden in your backyard. You decide that you’d like to make a pasta primavera for dinner, so you head outside to select some vegetables. Walking toward your garden, bucket in hand, you reach down and begin picking tomatoes, zucchini, basil, and perhaps even some lettuce for a salad. Do the vegetables writhe in pain in your bucket? Did they struggle and attempt to get away from your hand as you went to pick each item? Obviously the answer to this question is “no,” and it probably made you chuckle a bit at the thought of vegetables feeling pain or fear. Vegetables don’t have brains. They don’t have nervous systems. Therefore, harvesting vegetables is quite different than raising and slaughtering animals for food.

Value Animals: Morals

Value Animals

Going back to the issue of morality, none of this information about plants lack of ability to feel pain would morally make a difference, if plants were not our intended food source. People eating plants is no less moral than a bear eating fish. Fish are what a bear is designed to eat. Plants are what humans are designed to eat. Therefore, eating animals, because it goes against human biology, is immoral. However, in spite of the fact that fish feels pain, it is, however, moral for a bear to consume fish. In addition, the way in which human beings breed, raise, and treat livestock (as commodities, not as animals) is highly unethical and illogical, as well as a waste of natural resources.

Value Animals: Intended Diet

Value Animals

Animals that are meant to consume other animals do not need anything to hunt them besides their bodies, and they certainly do not raise animals for food. When they are hungry, they go out and they hunt. They do not need to use their brains to build a gun and then point and shoot it. They use their brains to stalk, hunt, kill, and eat – all using what was biologically given to them. Humans can do the same when we consume our intended diet. We need nothing extra to go out and pick an apple when we are hungry.

Value Animals: In Conclusion

Value Animals

Any animal is doing the ethical thing when they consume their intended diet. The sooner human beings realize that our bodies are not designed to consume animal proteins, the better our bodies will function. We must examine the morality of breeding, housing, and feeding animals for the sole purpose of killing them in the end. This is not the circle of life. This is not nature. The sooner we do return to the natural order of things, the sooner the earth will return to this state as well.

Want to go vegan but not sure how? Download Vegan Made Easy

This ultra-modern eBook is divided into 3 parts: What Do Vegans Eat, Vegan Nutrition, and Making the Transition. It gives you the straight-forward information you need to feel empowered to make the switch to plant-based eating and living.  Learn more here