Chimps are vicious bastards—but smart
Mar. 9th, 2009 10:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
haggholmA chimp in a Swedish zoo has been observed not only to use rocks as weapons by flinging them at zoo visitors that annoy him, but also stockpiling stones and using rocks to break off bits of concrete to use as projectiles. The real significance is that
while many apes have been observed collecting stones for nut cracking or other planning behaviour, it has been unclear whether the ape was doing the work to meet a current or future need: that is, is the ape looking to crack nuts because he is hungry now, or because he expects to be hungry?
Santino's stone-gathering however, is a clear case of planning for the future, [a researcher] said, since the calm manner in which the chimpanzee collected the stones differed from the agitated state in which he later hurled them.
Given all of the above, I also think that Santino is a very appropriate name…
Seriously, though, I find this rather fascinating, and it serves to strengthen my conviction that the difference between human and non-human animals, in intellectual terms, is quantitative, not strictly qualitative. It may be a very great quantitative difference, mind—I’m under no delusion that they’re just like us
; but notions that the intelligence of animals
has some strict limit where we set up a qualitative criterion to differentiate ourselves from them—such notions have a consistent tendency to fall apart.
Their suffering is justified, we're taller than them
Date: 2009-03-09 06:47 pm (UTC)In fact any characteristic believed to be uniquely human will exist in varying degrees among us, and in every case there will be some non-humans who possess that characteristic to a greater degree than do some humans. Justifying our exploitation of non-humans based on such a characteristic is inconsistent since most often those doing the justifying do not believe that exploiting humans who do not possess the chosen characteristic is justifiable. In the end our use can only be justified based on species, since non-humans are not members of our species we can treat them in anyway we see fit. Therefore, the act of suffering is of no concern unless those who are suffering are human.
The case of Santino is incredibly disturbing to me. Here we see an undeniable case of a non-human suffering. They are literally throwing stones at those that imprison them. We cause Santino harm because we want to profit from their confinement; because we derive pleasure from caging them and using them as entertainment. It's a pretty bleak world where their suffering can be brushed aside because they are not members of the dominant class.
Sorry for the rant, this stuff pisses me off...
no subject
Date: 2009-03-09 07:19 pm (UTC)I frequently wonder where the line should ethically be drawn. We have to recognise that, as with almost every moral or ethical quandary, we’re dealing with a continuum of grey shades. We do, after all, have to kill things in order to live, and just as we can place, say, humans and chimpanzees on an intellectual scale with humans but not without overlap, so we can place chimpanzees and rhesus monkeys, rhesus monkeys and pigs, pigs and dogs, and so forth, all the way down to animals so unintelligent that they are no more self-aware than plants. (If we attempt the argument that , that’s just moving the arbitrary species centricism a few steps farther, past genus, family, and kingdom to phylum; a somewhat more distant relative—again a quantitative, not qualititive difference.) At no point on this continuum will there be a clear case of . (More precisely, if we include enough species, we can construct a continuum such that no such point exists. I doubt we’d even need a very large fraction of all living species.)
—And we cannot survive without killing plants at the very least, so we must place an artificial delineation somewhere on this spectrum and say ; or we must set aside a wide grey area. But all these distinctions are to some degree subjective and arbitrary—even before we review the linear hierarchy we have constructed and realise that it, too, is artificial, because intelligence is not a scalar quantity, and even our opinion on what constitutes relevant intelligence tends to be very human-centric.
Of course is also a concept with grey areas; maintaining an endangered species for conservation in large, natural-looking enclosures in a modern zoo is not the same as caging a lion in a small steel cage; keeping free-range chickens is not the same as running industrial chicken farms; keeping lab animals under the ægis of an ethical review board, with veterinary overseers and a legal requirement to euthanise any mouse that suffers unduly, is not the same as unbridled animal torture. Nor are all objects the same: Saving millions of people from painful death of cancer or pathogenic disease may well be said to deserve greater sacrifices than developing a more smear-resistant form of makeup.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-09 07:19 pm (UTC)What all of the above is leading up to is not, of course, a notion that humans have a right to viciously torment and unboundedly exploit every form of life. Mostly, I just like to raise the questions, because I think they are interesting, important, and very difficult. For the sake of completeness, however, I feel I should append my own current opinions and conclusions—though I will insist that the relevance of the questions does not in any way hinge on the quality of the conclusions I draw from them.
My personal opinion (strongly held) is that there are animals sufficiently intelligent that we should do all in our power not to exploit them or cause them any suffering, and that there are animals that we can exploit without feeling too much guilt about it, though that exploitation should never be heartless and never cause undue suffering (e.g. I do not object to slaughter, but I do object to kosher and halal meat, and any other method of slaughter that is not designed to kill as quickly and painlessly as possible). The same goes for medical research. But while this is a strongly held opinion, my opinion of where we should draw the line is not strongly held. There is too much evidence of the remarkable intelligence of, to take some famous examples, chimpanzees and dolphins for me to feel comfortable treating them as less than sentient; but I do not object to the raising of beef cattle, nor to experimenting on mice (again—under ethically reviewed conditions and not for trivial purposes).
It should also be admitted that I don’t lead a lifestyle that’s strictly ethical even according to my own criteria. I eat meat very frequently. (I might reconsider this if I weren’t allergic to so many vegetarian alternatives; with my allergies, vegetarian options aren’t viable, but I won’t pretend to know what I’d do if I had the choice. After all, I’ve never had to face it.) I don’t go out of my way to buy free-range meat. Perhaps—no, probably—I should. (I do applaud the idea of vat-grown meat, and hope that I will live to see it on the market.)
We're smarter and taller
Date: 2009-03-09 09:05 pm (UTC)Intelligence is not morally relevant --at least not directly-- to the question of suffering. I would submit that if a being can suffer in a conscious sense, i.e. the being is sentient and has direct cognitive interest in not being caused harm, then we should strive to not harm them. To quote Jeremy Bentham 'The question is not, can they reason, nor can they talk, but rather can they suffer.'
Line drawing is difficult and you're right that there are a lot of open questions involved whose answers we may never know. However the goal is not to be perfect, as you point out, that's impossible. Instead the goal is to do our best, and the very least we could possibly do is stop intentionally causing harm to non-humans for our own pleasure, be it for food, fashion or entertainment.
I find it a bit odd that you seem to defend the current arbitrary line, which is horrendously cruel to non-humans, by arguing that any line would be arbitrary. The vast majority of non-humans we exploit are undeniably sentient, they can feel pain and we cause them harm no matter how free-range the label claims them to be. [As a side-note I want to point out that free-range does not mean non-intensive or non-industrial. Free-range chickens are usually farmed in extremely dense sheds with limited access to a small outside enclosure. They suffer many diseases due to their confinement and are in much pain both physically and emotionally. Chickens are extremely social beings and are not able to live in a healthy social environment, the many stresses they endure cause mental problems that often manifest themselves as aggression and even cannibalism.]
Sentience exists --in an evolutionary sense-- to avoid death, there are, of course, other strong motivations for sentience and emotion, but the avoidance of death (at least long enough to procreate) plays a key roll. Sentient beings that are self-aware and conscious have a clear interest in continuing to live, and even if killed 'humanely' suffer from their death, just as killing a human 'humanely' would be seen as a violation of the person's interest in life. We may have a particularly complex conception of life and death, but even if we consider humans that do not, such as babies or the mentally disabled, we still conclude that they have an interest in life.
Re: We're smarter and taller
Date: 2009-03-09 09:05 pm (UTC)I think you see what I'm getting at. It's awfully easy for us to impose a sacrifice on others who have no power to stop us. We want nothing more than to justify this use as a necessary component of human health. However science is more resilient than that, and we don't need to harm animals to do science, the alternatives are left largely unexplored at the moment and it's impossible to say what knowledge we could or could not have without vivisection. What is clear to me is that we are far too entrenched in our current mode of operation to take an objective stance and really question the consistency of our beliefs.
I don't know what allergies you have, but I'm fairly certain that you don't require non-human flesh and/or secretions to live. It may be more convenient for you in this society, but it's almost certainly not necessary. There is a plethora of vegetables and fruits available and even if you are allergic to wheat gluten and legumes (including soy) there remain thousands of options.
I feel like this might have been a bit scattered, hopefully it makes some sense. As for who I am I thought you would have figured that out from my computer info, though I assumed that it had my domain listed as phas.ubc.ca.
-JonBen
no subject
Date: 2009-03-09 09:42 pm (UTC)I won’t pretend to have a good answer for this. Infants and the cognitively impaired fall on one side of my arbitrary line (by emotional and psychological connection, conspecific affiliation, and so forth), while lab mice (and pre-sentient human embryos) fall on the other.
It’s not as though matters are at a standstill— is not the same thing today that it was a century, or half a century, or even a couple of decades ago. Here (http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/03/animals_in_research_and_medical_training.php)’s a piece on that. In brief, medical science does use cell cultures, computer models, and other non-animal models when they can, but there’s a lot we can’t yet model, and unfortunately we can’t know what it is without comparison to animal models. If you wanted to accelerate or force the process of change—say, by abolishing animal models completely and immediately—you would have to acknowledge that there would be a vast collateral damage in human lives and suffering that would otherwise be averted; perhaps not in the long run (and then again, perhaps so), but at the very least in the process of forced transition. Don’t forget that the drug that costs ten thousand lab mouse lives may save a million people from death from malignant cancer. Is that sufficient justification? That’s not for me to say, but we shouldn’t say without considering the consequences in human suffering any more than we should say without considering the suffering of the lab animals.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-10 04:01 pm (UTC)You have to acknowledge that the same argument, and a much more convincing one, can be applied to the forced use of humans in experimentation. It's more convincing because if we experimented on humans we would get data that are directly relevant to humans and in many cases much more useful in our quest to treat human ailments. A very large fraction of animal use in experiments has no direct link to treatments for human drugs. Therefore your argument doesn't even apply to the majority of animal use in this context.
All of this is beside the actual point! You have yet to address the real issue, which is why do we condemn using humans exclusively as a means to our ends yet we allow such use of non-humans. What, aside from species, makes the use of humans morally unjustified, while the use of other thinking and feeling beings is found to be unproblematic? Distinguishing between sentient beings based on species is the same form of othering that is used in sexism and racism. It's the exclusion of a group based on an irrelevant characteristic. When the question is 'should we cause them harm?' or 'should we use them exclusively for our own ends?' we can not answer in the affirmative based on the colour of their skin, or the nature of their genitals anymore than we can based on the physical manifestation of their DNA.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-09 09:42 pm (UTC)Among other things, I’m allergic to legumes, tree nuts, Agaricus bisporus (portobello/button/crimini mushrooms), and a great many fruits (as well as chicken, though that’s clearly not very germane to this discussion). You are probably right in that I could get by on a vegetarian diet, but it would require a great investment of time and effort. You might very easily and justifiably argue that laziness is no excuse from ethical behaviour, but—while I have no idea what your own position is—I strongly suspect that many of those who espouse your position haven’t made quite so major a lifestyle decision, and it’s easy to moralise when you yourself are easily exempt. (How many people who are now vegetarians or vegans would be otherwise if they couldn’t eat any soy products? —Or legumes, or nuts, or quorn, mushrooms, apples, etc., etc.)
Of course, the above is a form of the tu quoque fallacy and written strictly to defend myself against a perceived position of relative moral awfulness.
Lots, fear not.
A whois only gives me hub.ubc.ca, which is pretty vague… Also, I had no idea you were reading my blog!
no subject
Date: 2009-03-10 04:31 pm (UTC)I am vegan, I strive to eliminate all animal products from my life. I am not perfect, partly because the world I live in makes that very difficult. For example I sometimes watch a movie that may have an non-human in it, rubber used in tiers and asphalt contain some animal by-products and it would be hard for me to avoid walking on the sidewalk or using public transportation.
In the long run it's impossible to live without causing harm to others, and to have zero tolerance on harm would be futile. For example current agricultural practices cause a lot of harm to the environment and do harm to wildlife. I have no doubt that if we tried we could do a lot less harm in these areas, but it's probably not reasonable to think that we can eliminate all harm. Note that we also cause a great deal of harm to other humans, however we recognise a distinction between this --on some level-- unavoidable harm and the intentional exploitation of others.
I'm not allergic to anything so I don't avoid anything, expect of course all form of animal products. I have some friends who largely eat raw food and I often 'cook' dishes to meet their requirements. I've made some wheat free meals for friends who are allergic to gluten, and have gone long periods without soy products for no particular reason. I have no doubt that switching to a plant based diet would require effort for you, any large change takes an initial effort. You would need to find recipes that you like and ensure that you were getting a balanced diet, but after some initial work it would likely be quite easy to navigate your options. It's probably too simplistic to say that it's laziness, after all why would you change your diet when you see nothing wrong with using non-humans to satisfy your pleasure.
If I were told that I were allergic to the same things as you I doubt that I would give up on my moral convictions and start using non-humans again. I suspect that I would figure out what I can eat and tailor a new diet around a set of food that met my nutritional needs and tasted good.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-10 02:05 am (UTC)As a further addendum to this, I would like to revisit the first paragraph:
This gives me the strong impression that you are conflating vivisection with animal experiments in general—which is inaccurate, disinguous, and a rhetorical device I’ve mostly encountered in the screeds of activists who send death threads to .
Vivisection refers to surgery performed on living organisms—for the purposes of our discussion, we may limit it to animals with a central nervous system and a functioning brain (else the issue of is obviously irrelevant). But this is only one form of animal experimentation, and when it is used as though it were a catch-all phrase, it is hard to escape the conclusion that it is used for shock value. In reality, of course, the term can refer from anything to observing how well-fed and kindly treated rats navigate a maze in order to obtain extra treats and rewards (which I know happens, and which I don’t have a problem with) to vivisecting live chimpanzees (which I don’t know actually happens, and will upset me if it does), with a broad spectrum of procedures in between—many of which are harmful to the animals, some of which are not.
In today’s social, cultural, and political climate, I doubt whether many animal researchers actually perform vivisection, at least on animals. (Honestly, I am not very concerned about experimentation on Drosophila—possibly the most common test animal, to boot!—or fish. I am quite confident that they lack the ability to experience suffering in any meaningful sense.) I would be very, very surprised to find researchers at all in any first-world nation performing vivisection without anesthesia on any such animals. (Find some and I can’t imagine not thinking that they deserve to be prosecuted for it.)
no subject
Date: 2009-03-10 05:00 pm (UTC)vivisection: The dissection of, or otherwise experimenting on, a living animal, especially for the purpose of ascertaining or demonstrating some fact in physiology or pathology such as drug testing.
This is a bit broader than you imply, but still more limiting than I realised. Your right that I am really referring to all forms of animal use, and therefore not a subclass of animal experimentation. The above definition still relies on live experimentation, and I would have a problem with deceased experimentation depending on how they became deceased and what conditions they were living under when they were alive. I certainly was not using the term vivisection as a rhetorical device, and anyone who offers death threats or acts in violence 'for the animals' is obviously deeply confused and their actions are absolutely not condoned by me on any level.
We breed non-humans specifically for use in labs, they never know a normal existence and no thought is given to their health aside from the basic necessities, which to you constitute kind treatment. Of course if the experiment is designed to investigate food deprivation or dehydration or elevated stress than experimenters are allowed to do as much harm as they wish, as long as it complies with the goals of the experiment. Not to mention of course that nearly all lab animals are killed before the end of their natural lives, and in some cases maybe used for several experiments before they disposed of.
Here again we see clearly your bias, that intelligent chimps deserve more compassion than do rats. Rats are certainly not as smart as chimps, but absolutely feel pain and they can suffer emotionally as well. The have personalities and have a need for social interactions. You continue to espouse the belief that there is a scale on non-humans based on how you perceive their mental abilities that justifies your use of those lower down on the scale, yet you have failed to illustrate why you can ignore the obvious suffering of these beings.
Fish also have personalities, there was a recent study on that, and it's well known that they feel pain. They also seem to have a social construction and are undeniably conscious. It's much harder to relate to fish than to mammals but don't see how you can be confident that fish, as a beings that feel pain and have interests, can be excluded from moral consideration.
I don't really want to get into an argument over every species on earth, at some point we will be both be discussing things out of pure ignorance. I don't know where the line can safely be drawn, which non-humans are incapable of suffering, however we do know with extreme confidence that some non-humans (including almost all of the ones we use) can suffer. The discussion I'd like to have is whether or not we should be using those non-humans which clearly suffer.
I've already made it clear that I think the moral question should be focused on a being's ability to feel pain and have a conscious existence.
No coffee = typos galore
Date: 2009-03-10 09:08 pm (UTC)I've been transitioning from coffee to tea lately and this was my first day without a morning coffee. It's probably related to my poor typing/reading skills this morning, sorry about that.
Re: We're smarter and taller
Date: 2009-03-09 09:22 pm (UTC)I think our apparent disagreement here is purely definitional: I would qualify that as a dimension or aspect of intelligence. Mere reaction to stimuli cannot productively be used to differentiate between beings that can and cannot feel suffering (else plants, too, can feel suffering, and there’s nothing left we can eat).
That’s not what I am trying to do—rather, I want to emphasise that there has to be an arbitrary line, so that productive debate has to revolve around where to draw it. The brand of activist that shouts takes a stance that’s too absolute to be applicable to reality.
In short, I would hope for much less dissent with the statement than my (much more loosely held) opinion of whereabouts that line should be drawn.
…And yet we find, when we look at things like the Schiavo case, let alone abortion debates, that even in humans the lines are not completely crisp and free of controversy.
I also posit that the psychological interdependence of humans is (or should be) part of our consideration. Killing a baby isn’t just wrong because it denies that baby the right to live; it is also wrong because it causes very great harm to other people. In fact, I would go so controversially far as to say—as someone who has been pretty deep in depression in the past and contemplated his own death—that the harm from the death of an individual is lessened to no small degree if it causes no psychological harm or emotional pain to any other individual. Of course, I do not wish to die, but even applying this argument to myself, I would say that if someone killed me now, painfully, and bereaving the people who love me, that is a vastly greater evil than if someone killed me in a hypothetical situation where no one cared for me and would miss me, quickly, and painlessly.
This argument can pretty easily and obviously be extended to non-humans. It can also be easily seen as a huge, smudgy grey area whence no conclusions can be directly drawn—I’m pondering, not declaring my opinion.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-09 07:33 pm (UTC)