Spend the same $4 on fresh foods and they will go bad in days
That's not true at all. Modern science, man. Among other things, I bought a bag of apples for the UFC fight just over a month ago, when GSP fought. I put them in one of the fancy yellow produce saving bags that grocery stores have now. I forgot they were in my fridge and went to eat one last weekend, expecting it to be soft and gross. It might as well have just come off the tree, as crisp and juicy as when I bought it.
It's true that McDonald's food can "live" in the fridge for a suspiciously long time without getting noticeably worse (which is rather difficult), but fresh food can also last quite a while and still remain fresh.
No it shouldn't. "Bad for you" does not automatically mean "poison".
Are you sure about that?
In the context of biology, poisons are substances that cause disturbances to organisms, usually by chemical reaction or other activity on the molecular scale, when a sufficient quantity is absorbed by an organism.
If a "sufficient quantity" of HFCS would "disturb" your body, wouldn't that make it exactly a poison? It's sort of like alcohol. Most people can drink a little alcohol without a single noticeable negative effect. But if you drink enough then you become, well, "intoxicated", disturbed by the toxin. I think it's fair to say that HFCS can be classified as a toxin. Let us know if you're in the habit of chugging it straight though, so that we can study you.
No party kills off something that is a clear success, simply to snipe at the competition.
Exactly right. And no politician would dare do something as stupid and damaging as shut down the federal government just to score some political points by trying to blame everyone except them. Because, as we all know, politicians have our absolute best intentio...
I'm sorry, I just can't finish. I've hit my sarcasm quota for the day.
Maybe this corn used for ethanol can be used for food again?
Or, at the least animal feed, so the price at the grocery store isn't as bad, and farmers/ranchers are not as pinched as before.
Grain isn't used as food for people. It could be used as food for people, but at least in the United States, it's not. It's used to feed livestock, which is used to feed people and make the people fat.
Here are some numbers. Per capita, each person in the US consumes a total of 1,763 pounds of grain per year. Only 220 pounds of that is for direct food, in the form of bread, pasta, raw grains, etc. The remaining 1500 pounds of grain per person per year is used to feed livestock, and then the people eat the animals.
Contrast that with India, where the average person consumes 440 pounds of grain per year and has very little meat in their diet, almost all of that grain is used directly for food (a little over a pound per day). If 440 pounds of grain can feed a single person for a year, then the 2 billion ton worldwide annual grain harvest can feed a little under 10 billion people. That means that today, right now, we are capable of feeding the entire planet with plenty left over just from grains.
If you want to end world hunger and drive down food prices then it's that simple, everyone would just need to convert to a plant-based diet. But people don't want to end world hunger enough to give up their meat, so this is where we are.
Okay so explain this to me - as I understand it Satanist = worshiper of Satan.
All of the Satanists that I've known do not "worship" Satan, or frankly anything else. Satan is seen as an abstract idea or concept (among the athiestic Satanists, anyway), rather than as some sort of diety. There is typically no worship at all involved in Satanism like you would see in something like Christianity, where a group of people get together to worship their god. That sort of thing doesn't happen with the Satanists I've known, they have drawn their strength from their humanity rather than through worship of a diety. From my experience, the people who claim to be "Satan worshippers" don't know what they're talking about, they just want to make someone angry. That being said, like I mentioned there are definitely quite a few brands of Satanism, I'm sure that the theistic ones do try and involve some sort of ritual worship like you would see in a Christian church.
I don't know for a fact that plants do not "feel" pain or suffering, I assume that they do not because they lack all of the systems which animals use to feel anything at all. I do know for a fact that animals can feel pain and suffering.
I understand that plants have responses to various stimuli, such as light. Slime molds for example will avoid light and will re-connect if separated. Other plants will grow towards a light source. Venus fly traps will shut their trap to catch an insect, but I would not consider that intelligence because if their pad is touched at all by anything (even something they can't eat), they will still close. I've also seen plants that rapidly close their leaves if you brush by them. I see all of those as primitive response to stimuli, or a reflex. Even with those examples I don't see evidence that a plant would necessarily "feel" anything. When I brush by a set of leaves and they close, only those leaves close. Other leaves on the plant, even those right next to the ones that closed, did not close because they were not touched. That is a response by the individual leaves, not a decision taken by the larger organism. If it were, then it would also close nearby leaves for the same reason. A plant does not have a nervous system, and therefore I don't see evidence that it can feel pain or suffering. I know for a fact that animals will feel pain though, there's no question about that.
If it is immoral for a human to kill an animal, then it would be likewise immoral for an animal to kill a human, yes.
I don't agree with that. I don't see any correlation there.
My position is that known species of animals are not moral agents, they are incapable of moral right or wrong, their actions are not subject to our morality. It is not part of their world.
I agree with that. Animals most likely do not understand morality, and so their actions towards us are not subject to morality. I don't believe the opposite is true though. We understand morality, therefore whether we like it or not our actions towards other species are always subject to morality, because we understand it. Choosing to say that we don't need to act morally towards a particular species because that species does not understand morality is burying your head in the sand. As moral creatures, it is our obligation to respect morality towards any other sentient creature.
Except plants are alive too... you poor thing, however shall you eat?
Like I said elsewhere, I don't see any evidence that plants are capable of feeling suffering, and therefore I see no problem with eating them. The same is not true of animals. Causing another animal to feel suffering is not moral, that's the end of it. Quite frankly, causing another animal to feel suffering is a sadistic trait.
After all, what makes any more deserving of not being eaten than ?
Put simply, the apparent lack of capacity to suffer. Animals are capable of suffering, I don't know of any species of plant capable of suffering. From what I can tell suffering requires a nervous system, even a basic one. The best a plant can do is grow branches towards the light, and roots towards the water. If you injure any animal, it will feel suffering and will attempt to escape beyond some sort of basic reflex response.
Are you a Jain? Do you walk barefoot and sweep the sidewalk as you walk to avoid stepping on a bug?
I do not, but that doesn't mean that I'm not conscious of the moral paradox. I also don't go out of my way to purposely walk on bugs. If I notice a bug on the sidewalk then I'll avoid it.
Then file murder charges against a wolf. Or an alligator, a bear, a bull, I dont care. The next time a nonhuman kills a human in your area put him on trial for murder... come on. You really cant see how silly that is?
You are arguing that it is not immoral for an animal to kill a human, and I am arguing that it is immoral for a human to kill an animal. I would also say that it would be immoral for a more advanced species to land on our planet and, unable to communicate with anything for whatever reason, proceed to exterminate all life on the planet. I don't have a social contract with those hypothetical beings, but that doesn't mean that the lack of a social contract makes it OK for them to kill everything. I don't have a social contract with lambs, and I don't feel like I need a social contract in order to make it immoral to kill and eat My Pretty Girl. It's the moral paradox that many people are aware of and which we suppress - the thought or knowledge that it is not morally right for us to kill and eat other animals, but we do it anyway because we think of the animals as less than ourselves. That line of thinking would make it justifiable for any species more powerful than us to kill and eat us.
"All animals do in fact have some moral standing."
On what basis do you assert thant?
On the fact that they are alive. Anything living animal has some moral standing. I don't see any reason to assert otherwise.
It is wrong to torture an animal because of the ill effect it has on "you" (the torturer) and possibly on others around you. This does not imply that the animal has any legal rights.
That's a pretty awful and selfish stance. The reason why rape is illegal is not because of the trauma that might be inflicted on people witnessing the rape, it is because of the trauma inflicted on the victim. That sentence is correct regardless of the species of the victim. I'm not talking about legal rights. It is objectively wrong to rape another animal, just as it is objectively wrong to kill one for pleasure.
I disagree, on the basis that moral rules apply only in interactions with moral agents, and moral agency requires the ability to think abstractly (in order simply to comprehend moral obligations.) If you have a rationale for your contrary assertion it is not apparent.
An interaction with a moral agent does not require that both agents have morality. If I stomp on a cat's head and crush it, that is not a moral thing to do regardless of whether or not the cat has any concept of morality. I know that it is not moral. What the cat knows is irrelevant.
And that relates to moral agency how?
It is an illustration of the possibility that abstract thought might not be restricted to humans.
However, what if one of us is not mentally capable of understanding this? It would be absurd, in that situation, for one party to be expected to respect the 'rights' of a being who is not capable of understanding that respect or returning it.
That is absolutely not absurd. Brooke Greenberg was not capable of understanding morality, even at 20 years old. That does not make it moral for me to sexually abuse her, does it? She would even be of the legal age, but what would happen to me if I was found having sex with her? Is she capable of consent? No, she's not, because of her lack of mental capacity. The lack of mental capacity does not mean that she loses her inalienable rights. I am suggesting that it is true that animals also have inalienable rights to life, liberty, and happiness. I see no compelling justification for why that should not be the case, other than the fact that the animals have no representative among themselves to assert those rights in a way that we can understand. The animal is alive, so what exactly gave you the authority to kill it? You do not have that authority, it was never given to you and it is not something that can be taken or simply asserted. When someone asserts the authority to kill another animal then they are looking directly at a moral paradox when they expect others to not assert the authority to kill them.
they still clearly lack language, abstract thought, and thus moral agency.
I don't agree, see my replies above. All animals do in fact have some moral standing. It is not OK to torture an animal, for example. Moreover, language and abstract thought are not requirements to have moral standing. Plenty of animals have a wide range of thoughts, certainly more than we're aware of (since we can't communicate with each other). Elephants exhibit PTSD, for example. A young elephant that witnesses its mother being shot and killed will exhibit many of the same symptoms in later life that are associated with PTSD in humans.
I should have included this with my post above, but that article relates to your comparison with racism:
A little more than five years ago, I encountered for the first time Peter Singer’s concept of speciesism, which I have discussed on the blog before. Basically the speciesism argument goes that we think it is okay to eat the meat of various animals because we believe they have lower moral standing because they are fundamentally, permanently, and definitely different than we are. Cows, while indeed sentient beings capable of suffering that have some moral standing (we shouldn’t abuse them, they should be well cared for, etc.), do not have a high enough moral standing to outweigh even our interest (it is not a need) in cooking (most often) and eating their flesh. The danger of speciesism, Singer argues, is that speciesism is no different than racism or sexism, which were based on the same belief in the lower moral standing of the subject based on what were believed to be at the time identifiable differences. It is speciesism above all else that interrupts me because it is so clearly the true ground for my meat eating justification. A pig is not a person. In fundamental and permissive ways, a pig is less than a person. In light of speciesism, with it, in fact, constantly tapping on my shoulder in an effort to get my attention, I make a reverse Pascalian wager and act as if the threat of speciesism will never come to pass. That threat being, recall, that we will discover one day, just as we did with racism and sexism, that there is no difference there and that animals of different species have equal moral standing.
Like I said, that cow will never be able to tell us what it wants or what it thinks. It's just not going to happen. The burden is not on the cow, it is on us.
In a human dominated society that currently doesn't recognize other species as persons, the burden of proof is on the other species.
I'm not sure I agree with that. Maybe it should be our responsibility to change how we think, to change how we perceive other living animals. We are the more capable animal, so maybe the burden is on us. Maybe one day we will come to consensus that it is not ethical or moral to kill another living animal and eat it, for example, and that our history of doing so will be seen as barbaric. Maybe one day we will be of the mindset that all living animals, regardless of their intelligence or communication capabilities or anything else, deserve the right to life just as much as we do. A chicken will never be able to speak to us, but maybe one day we will have evolved enough to realize for ourself that the chicken does not want to be killed and eaten, and that we shouldn't do such a thing to another animal. That burden is on us, not the chicken.
This comes to mind, a very thought-provoking essay:
All human beings are persons. All persons are human beings. There is no gray area or sliding scale. It is as simple as that.
The law doesn't agree. See "corporate personhood". If a corporation can be recognized as a legal person in the eyes of the law, why not an intelligent animal? Chimps are good candidates, so are dolphins or elephants. Guess which animal is next on the list of intelligence: pigs. Imagine what would happen if pigs had civil rights all of a sudden, where killing a pig would bring a murder charge. A lot of money would be thrown at politicians to make sure that would never happen. Regardless of how intelligent they are, pigs also happen to taste pretty good so they're damned. Chimps are lucky we don't eat them.
How do you know they're not communicating and standing up for things like that? Maybe you just don't understand their communication any better than a wild chimp understands your speech.
In the end, the court did the right thing. Animals, no matter how intelligent are not persons under the constitution.
Why is it then that intelligent animals don't deserve personhood, but corporations do? A sentient intelligent creature is not a person, but a legal entity is? That's pretty inconsistent.
That's a rhetorical question, by the way. The answer is obvious: money and corruption.
NewYorkCountryLawyer used to submit stories here quite often about cases where the RIAA was suing people. I admire his work, much of it he did for free. This is his blog:
I've been looking at it for a while, and I have to ask. Why did you use quotes there? Do you think that penises don't actually exist? And why didn't you quote "religion"?
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Spend the same $4 on fresh foods and they will go bad in days
That's not true at all. Modern science, man. Among other things, I bought a bag of apples for the UFC fight just over a month ago, when GSP fought. I put them in one of the fancy yellow produce saving bags that grocery stores have now. I forgot they were in my fridge and went to eat one last weekend, expecting it to be soft and gross. It might as well have just come off the tree, as crisp and juicy as when I bought it.
It's true that McDonald's food can "live" in the fridge for a suspiciously long time without getting noticeably worse (which is rather difficult), but fresh food can also last quite a while and still remain fresh.
Ah. Living alone with multivitamins it is, then.
No it shouldn't. "Bad for you" does not automatically mean "poison".
Are you sure about that?
In the context of biology, poisons are substances that cause disturbances to organisms, usually by chemical reaction or other activity on the molecular scale, when a sufficient quantity is absorbed by an organism.
If a "sufficient quantity" of HFCS would "disturb" your body, wouldn't that make it exactly a poison? It's sort of like alcohol. Most people can drink a little alcohol without a single noticeable negative effect. But if you drink enough then you become, well, "intoxicated", disturbed by the toxin. I think it's fair to say that HFCS can be classified as a toxin. Let us know if you're in the habit of chugging it straight though, so that we can study you.
No party kills off something that is a clear success, simply to snipe at the competition.
Exactly right. And no politician would dare do something as stupid and damaging as shut down the federal government just to score some political points by trying to blame everyone except them. Because, as we all know, politicians have our absolute best intentio...
I'm sorry, I just can't finish. I've hit my sarcasm quota for the day.
Maybe this corn used for ethanol can be used for food again?
Or, at the least animal feed, so the price at the grocery store isn't as bad, and farmers/ranchers are not as pinched as before.
Grain isn't used as food for people. It could be used as food for people, but at least in the United States, it's not. It's used to feed livestock, which is used to feed people and make the people fat.
Here are some numbers. Per capita, each person in the US consumes a total of 1,763 pounds of grain per year. Only 220 pounds of that is for direct food, in the form of bread, pasta, raw grains, etc. The remaining 1500 pounds of grain per person per year is used to feed livestock, and then the people eat the animals.
Contrast that with India, where the average person consumes 440 pounds of grain per year and has very little meat in their diet, almost all of that grain is used directly for food (a little over a pound per day). If 440 pounds of grain can feed a single person for a year, then the 2 billion ton worldwide annual grain harvest can feed a little under 10 billion people. That means that today, right now, we are capable of feeding the entire planet with plenty left over just from grains.
If you want to end world hunger and drive down food prices then it's that simple, everyone would just need to convert to a plant-based diet. But people don't want to end world hunger enough to give up their meat, so this is where we are.
Okay so explain this to me - as I understand it Satanist = worshiper of Satan.
All of the Satanists that I've known do not "worship" Satan, or frankly anything else. Satan is seen as an abstract idea or concept (among the athiestic Satanists, anyway), rather than as some sort of diety. There is typically no worship at all involved in Satanism like you would see in something like Christianity, where a group of people get together to worship their god. That sort of thing doesn't happen with the Satanists I've known, they have drawn their strength from their humanity rather than through worship of a diety. From my experience, the people who claim to be "Satan worshippers" don't know what they're talking about, they just want to make someone angry. That being said, like I mentioned there are definitely quite a few brands of Satanism, I'm sure that the theistic ones do try and involve some sort of ritual worship like you would see in a Christian church.
I don't know for a fact that plants do not "feel" pain or suffering, I assume that they do not because they lack all of the systems which animals use to feel anything at all. I do know for a fact that animals can feel pain and suffering.
I understand that plants have responses to various stimuli, such as light. Slime molds for example will avoid light and will re-connect if separated. Other plants will grow towards a light source. Venus fly traps will shut their trap to catch an insect, but I would not consider that intelligence because if their pad is touched at all by anything (even something they can't eat), they will still close. I've also seen plants that rapidly close their leaves if you brush by them. I see all of those as primitive response to stimuli, or a reflex. Even with those examples I don't see evidence that a plant would necessarily "feel" anything. When I brush by a set of leaves and they close, only those leaves close. Other leaves on the plant, even those right next to the ones that closed, did not close because they were not touched. That is a response by the individual leaves, not a decision taken by the larger organism. If it were, then it would also close nearby leaves for the same reason. A plant does not have a nervous system, and therefore I don't see evidence that it can feel pain or suffering. I know for a fact that animals will feel pain though, there's no question about that.
If it is immoral for a human to kill an animal, then it would be likewise immoral for an animal to kill a human, yes.
I don't agree with that. I don't see any correlation there.
My position is that known species of animals are not moral agents, they are incapable of moral right or wrong, their actions are not subject to our morality. It is not part of their world.
I agree with that. Animals most likely do not understand morality, and so their actions towards us are not subject to morality. I don't believe the opposite is true though. We understand morality, therefore whether we like it or not our actions towards other species are always subject to morality, because we understand it. Choosing to say that we don't need to act morally towards a particular species because that species does not understand morality is burying your head in the sand. As moral creatures, it is our obligation to respect morality towards any other sentient creature.
Except plants are alive too... you poor thing, however shall you eat?
Like I said elsewhere, I don't see any evidence that plants are capable of feeling suffering, and therefore I see no problem with eating them. The same is not true of animals. Causing another animal to feel suffering is not moral, that's the end of it. Quite frankly, causing another animal to feel suffering is a sadistic trait.
I should rephrase that. "Suffer" should be "feel suffering".
After all, what makes any more deserving of not being eaten than ?
Put simply, the apparent lack of capacity to suffer. Animals are capable of suffering, I don't know of any species of plant capable of suffering. From what I can tell suffering requires a nervous system, even a basic one. The best a plant can do is grow branches towards the light, and roots towards the water. If you injure any animal, it will feel suffering and will attempt to escape beyond some sort of basic reflex response.
Are you a Jain? Do you walk barefoot and sweep the sidewalk as you walk to avoid stepping on a bug?
I do not, but that doesn't mean that I'm not conscious of the moral paradox. I also don't go out of my way to purposely walk on bugs. If I notice a bug on the sidewalk then I'll avoid it.
Then file murder charges against a wolf. Or an alligator, a bear, a bull, I dont care. The next time a nonhuman kills a human in your area put him on trial for murder... come on. You really cant see how silly that is?
You are arguing that it is not immoral for an animal to kill a human, and I am arguing that it is immoral for a human to kill an animal. I would also say that it would be immoral for a more advanced species to land on our planet and, unable to communicate with anything for whatever reason, proceed to exterminate all life on the planet. I don't have a social contract with those hypothetical beings, but that doesn't mean that the lack of a social contract makes it OK for them to kill everything. I don't have a social contract with lambs, and I don't feel like I need a social contract in order to make it immoral to kill and eat My Pretty Girl. It's the moral paradox that many people are aware of and which we suppress - the thought or knowledge that it is not morally right for us to kill and eat other animals, but we do it anyway because we think of the animals as less than ourselves. That line of thinking would make it justifiable for any species more powerful than us to kill and eat us.
Pigs make great pets, there's nothing "indecent" about keeping pigs.
"All animals do in fact have some moral standing."
On what basis do you assert thant?
On the fact that they are alive. Anything living animal has some moral standing. I don't see any reason to assert otherwise.
It is wrong to torture an animal because of the ill effect it has on "you" (the torturer) and possibly on others around you. This does not imply that the animal has any legal rights.
That's a pretty awful and selfish stance. The reason why rape is illegal is not because of the trauma that might be inflicted on people witnessing the rape, it is because of the trauma inflicted on the victim. That sentence is correct regardless of the species of the victim. I'm not talking about legal rights. It is objectively wrong to rape another animal, just as it is objectively wrong to kill one for pleasure.
I disagree, on the basis that moral rules apply only in interactions with moral agents, and moral agency requires the ability to think abstractly (in order simply to comprehend moral obligations.) If you have a rationale for your contrary assertion it is not apparent.
An interaction with a moral agent does not require that both agents have morality. If I stomp on a cat's head and crush it, that is not a moral thing to do regardless of whether or not the cat has any concept of morality. I know that it is not moral. What the cat knows is irrelevant.
And that relates to moral agency how?
It is an illustration of the possibility that abstract thought might not be restricted to humans.
However, what if one of us is not mentally capable of understanding this? It would be absurd, in that situation, for one party to be expected to respect the 'rights' of a being who is not capable of understanding that respect or returning it.
That is absolutely not absurd. Brooke Greenberg was not capable of understanding morality, even at 20 years old. That does not make it moral for me to sexually abuse her, does it? She would even be of the legal age, but what would happen to me if I was found having sex with her? Is she capable of consent? No, she's not, because of her lack of mental capacity. The lack of mental capacity does not mean that she loses her inalienable rights. I am suggesting that it is true that animals also have inalienable rights to life, liberty, and happiness. I see no compelling justification for why that should not be the case, other than the fact that the animals have no representative among themselves to assert those rights in a way that we can understand. The animal is alive, so what exactly gave you the authority to kill it? You do not have that authority, it was never given to you and it is not something that can be taken or simply asserted. When someone asserts the authority to kill another animal then they are looking directly at a moral paradox when they expect others to not assert the authority to kill them.
they still clearly lack language, abstract thought, and thus moral agency.
I don't agree, see my replies above. All animals do in fact have some moral standing. It is not OK to torture an animal, for example. Moreover, language and abstract thought are not requirements to have moral standing. Plenty of animals have a wide range of thoughts, certainly more than we're aware of (since we can't communicate with each other). Elephants exhibit PTSD, for example. A young elephant that witnesses its mother being shot and killed will exhibit many of the same symptoms in later life that are associated with PTSD in humans.
http://www.elephants.com/ptsd.php
I should have included this with my post above, but that article relates to your comparison with racism:
A little more than five years ago, I encountered for the first time Peter Singer’s concept of speciesism, which I have discussed on the blog before. Basically the speciesism argument goes that we think it is okay to eat the meat of various animals because we believe they have lower moral standing because they are fundamentally, permanently, and definitely different than we are. Cows, while indeed sentient beings capable of suffering that have some moral standing (we shouldn’t abuse them, they should be well cared for, etc.), do not have a high enough moral standing to outweigh even our interest (it is not a need) in cooking (most often) and eating their flesh. The danger of speciesism, Singer argues, is that speciesism is no different than racism or sexism, which were based on the same belief in the lower moral standing of the subject based on what were believed to be at the time identifiable differences. It is speciesism above all else that interrupts me because it is so clearly the true ground for my meat eating justification. A pig is not a person. In fundamental and permissive ways, a pig is less than a person. In light of speciesism, with it, in fact, constantly tapping on my shoulder in an effort to get my attention, I make a reverse Pascalian wager and act as if the threat of speciesism will never come to pass. That threat being, recall, that we will discover one day, just as we did with racism and sexism, that there is no difference there and that animals of different species have equal moral standing.
Like I said, that cow will never be able to tell us what it wants or what it thinks. It's just not going to happen. The burden is not on the cow, it is on us.
In a human dominated society that currently doesn't recognize other species as persons, the burden of proof is on the other species.
I'm not sure I agree with that. Maybe it should be our responsibility to change how we think, to change how we perceive other living animals. We are the more capable animal, so maybe the burden is on us. Maybe one day we will come to consensus that it is not ethical or moral to kill another living animal and eat it, for example, and that our history of doing so will be seen as barbaric. Maybe one day we will be of the mindset that all living animals, regardless of their intelligence or communication capabilities or anything else, deserve the right to life just as much as we do. A chicken will never be able to speak to us, but maybe one day we will have evolved enough to realize for ourself that the chicken does not want to be killed and eaten, and that we shouldn't do such a thing to another animal. That burden is on us, not the chicken.
This comes to mind, a very thought-provoking essay:
http://stonybrookfarm.wordpress.com/2009/11/07/consider-the-slaughterhouse/
So do crows.
All human beings are persons. All persons are human beings. There is no gray area or sliding scale. It is as simple as that.
The law doesn't agree. See "corporate personhood". If a corporation can be recognized as a legal person in the eyes of the law, why not an intelligent animal? Chimps are good candidates, so are dolphins or elephants. Guess which animal is next on the list of intelligence: pigs. Imagine what would happen if pigs had civil rights all of a sudden, where killing a pig would bring a murder charge. A lot of money would be thrown at politicians to make sure that would never happen. Regardless of how intelligent they are, pigs also happen to taste pretty good so they're damned. Chimps are lucky we don't eat them.
How do you know they're not communicating and standing up for things like that? Maybe you just don't understand their communication any better than a wild chimp understands your speech.
In the end, the court did the right thing. Animals, no matter how intelligent are not persons under the constitution.
Why is it then that intelligent animals don't deserve personhood, but corporations do? A sentient intelligent creature is not a person, but a legal entity is? That's pretty inconsistent.
That's a rhetorical question, by the way. The answer is obvious: money and corruption.
and there's a big fat question mark over the latter
those of us who are plus-sized more to love find that discription offensive
Lighten up, Francis. There's just more to love about the question mark.
NewYorkCountryLawyer used to submit stories here quite often about cases where the RIAA was suing people. I admire his work, much of it he did for free. This is his blog:
http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/
JP has the money to avoid that little inconvenience. This will go thru, and the will sue bitcoin.
How does one sue a currency?
Having a huge religion is probably not enough to get you a part in a porn movie, though.
That's a Rule 34 challenge if I've ever heard one.
If you think that religion is like a "penis,"
I've been looking at it for a while, and I have to ask. Why did you use quotes there? Do you think that penises don't actually exist? And why didn't you quote "religion"?