I really can’t tell if you’re being serious or not. Poe’s law I guess. But just in case - every fucking cause or belief or whatever will have idiots doing it for illogical, pseudoscientific, ignorant, etc. reasons. I assure you majority of vegans aren’t downright stupid and ignorant. Though some confuse animals with sentience.
I am serious, in every discussion I've had about it some one always says, "but plants aren't living things." ?? Since when!
I don't mean to imply that vegans are stupid or ignorant, they have their valid reasons for being vegans. And I'm on the same wavelength with them about sentience in animals - I think they very much are sentient beings, and the way they are harvested for meat is cruel and extreme.
I also think plants have a degree of sentience - in that they can breathe and communicate (via chemicals) to other plants, the way trees "warn" each other of pests through their root systems.
But we're omnivores, and there's no way I can excuse any of it, it's just what we are. We all eat living things. It's human nature. Even mushrooms contain living larva - most canned mushrooms, for example, have some maggots since they are where flies like to lay their eggs. It's just something we learn to live with even it it's gross and/or unpleasant.
Based on our understanding of biology, a prerequisite for sentience is a central nervous system. Plants have really amazing abilities to pass chemical signals, but they lack any mechanics that would allow them to internalize the signals they receive. For example, I wouldn’t say that my doorbell is sentient just because it can warn me when someone is at my door. Importantly, animals are different from plants in their ability to internalize pain, fear, sadness, etc. This is why animal ethics and welfare are considered important discussions, and why it’s damaging to invoke plant sentience to distract from that discussion.
Okay now you’re the one getting into pseudoscience. What is sentience in your book? People disagree on what sentience is exactly but I think at a basic level it’s the ability to experience feelings or sensations. The process of touch is associated with our sensory organs and nervous system. First our peripheral nervous system or sensory nerves activate to stimuli and send signals to our cns or brain where we process those signals. Of course that’s a basic explanation but “consciousness” or “sentience” requires a complex nervous system to process that information and generate awareness.
As far as we know plants lack that ability to process information. Of course plants react to stimuli as they’re living as you said. For photosynthesis, it does not require any decision making or sentience. This communication you see are non-sentient responses relying on things such as gene expression. So anyways, I don’t understand the purpose of your generalizations on vegans. I’ll say it again, they are ignorant people in every community and in no way does that reflect the whole community.
For your last argument, veganism isn’t about whether or not we’re omnivores and we don’t rely on your opinion on whether or not veganism is unnatural.
tygerprints@kbin.social 3 months ago
Every vegan I've talked to says they don't eat living things. Literally - every one of them.
execia@lemmy.today 3 months ago
I really can’t tell if you’re being serious or not. Poe’s law I guess. But just in case - every fucking cause or belief or whatever will have idiots doing it for illogical, pseudoscientific, ignorant, etc. reasons. I assure you majority of vegans aren’t downright stupid and ignorant. Though some confuse animals with sentience.
tygerprints@kbin.social 3 months ago
I am serious, in every discussion I've had about it some one always says, "but plants aren't living things." ?? Since when!
I don't mean to imply that vegans are stupid or ignorant, they have their valid reasons for being vegans. And I'm on the same wavelength with them about sentience in animals - I think they very much are sentient beings, and the way they are harvested for meat is cruel and extreme.
I also think plants have a degree of sentience - in that they can breathe and communicate (via chemicals) to other plants, the way trees "warn" each other of pests through their root systems.
But we're omnivores, and there's no way I can excuse any of it, it's just what we are. We all eat living things. It's human nature. Even mushrooms contain living larva - most canned mushrooms, for example, have some maggots since they are where flies like to lay their eggs. It's just something we learn to live with even it it's gross and/or unpleasant.
chetradley@lemmy.world 3 months ago
Based on our understanding of biology, a prerequisite for sentience is a central nervous system. Plants have really amazing abilities to pass chemical signals, but they lack any mechanics that would allow them to internalize the signals they receive. For example, I wouldn’t say that my doorbell is sentient just because it can warn me when someone is at my door. Importantly, animals are different from plants in their ability to internalize pain, fear, sadness, etc. This is why animal ethics and welfare are considered important discussions, and why it’s damaging to invoke plant sentience to distract from that discussion.
execia@lemmy.today 3 months ago
Okay now you’re the one getting into pseudoscience. What is sentience in your book? People disagree on what sentience is exactly but I think at a basic level it’s the ability to experience feelings or sensations. The process of touch is associated with our sensory organs and nervous system. First our peripheral nervous system or sensory nerves activate to stimuli and send signals to our cns or brain where we process those signals. Of course that’s a basic explanation but “consciousness” or “sentience” requires a complex nervous system to process that information and generate awareness.
As far as we know plants lack that ability to process information. Of course plants react to stimuli as they’re living as you said. For photosynthesis, it does not require any decision making or sentience. This communication you see are non-sentient responses relying on things such as gene expression. So anyways, I don’t understand the purpose of your generalizations on vegans. I’ll say it again, they are ignorant people in every community and in no way does that reflect the whole community.
For your last argument, veganism isn’t about whether or not we’re omnivores and we don’t rely on your opinion on whether or not veganism is unnatural.