Plants having no nervous system is being challenged with the idea that the plant itself is its central nervous system.
They react to stimulus, they emit sounds (different ones when in “pain”), and communicate with each other.
They don’t have consciousness in a way we understand
I dont mean this as a “dunk” but more of a how neat is that
It's always funny to me how people eat up the concept of a distrubuted neural network in tech but scoff at the same idea applying to something like a tree or a fungus.
Pando is the largest organism by area, and the Humungous Fungus is the largest by mass. The idea that those organisms don't "think" in some way is laughable.
"In some way" is doing A LOT of heavy lifting there. ... although in the general sense, agreed.
Especially given how many outright wrong or otherwise assinine conclusions some "thinking" animals come to... Perhaps communicative consciousness is overrated on the intelligence scale.
because humans invent things from scratch that nature has already created and optimzed, it's why we're seeing a lot of optimizations on current tech that comes from nature itself.
It's a really weird problem to have.
Go find that video of a slime mold optimizing Japan's rail system by finding oats in a maze
isn't this similar to or equivalent in concept to letting water pathfind through a maze for example?
No. The slime mold doesn't just solve the maze. It figures out the optimal path and grows only where it needs to reach the goal. It's a fascinating thing to watch in time-lapse. The "water in a maze" idea is that if it fills every passage, the only drain would be the exit.
obviously, but the flow path of the water is going to be a direct path to the end of the maze also. You just have to wait for it to fill up first lol.
You should read the book "entangled life" if you haven't already. It's fascinating.
I'll trade you. I'll read ur book if you check out the ender quintet, or at least speaker of the dead. The hierarchy of foreignness is a concept that has REALLY stuck with me. Also pequininos are bros.
It always seems lime some excuse in a counter response by vеgаns
The number of times I've responded to them telling them that plants probably process pain in a different way to us has always been shot down by them
Tell them that brains extremely simplified are just on and off responses to certain stimuli / information just like plants have specific reponsonses to stimuli and computers having 1's and 0's that respond to information
A mycelium network could be counted as a brain
If you actually believe harming plants causes them pain and that that is bad, you should be vegan. Animal agriculture harms far, far more plants than any plant agriculture ever could.
But then you're still causing plants pain by farming and eating them. Isn't that argument no different than saying if you believe that harming animals causes them pain, you should be in favor of eating the ones that are hunted because farming them causes more pain?
I really don't know if plants can cause pain and I think the environmental arguments for not eating meat are far more compelling than the ethical ones, but regardless, I think this is a poor argument for veganism.
But then you’re still causing plants pain by farming and eating them. Isn’t that argument no different than saying if you believe that harming animals causes them pain, you should be in favor of eating the ones that are hunted because farming them causes more pain?
If you insist on animal abuse then you should do it through hunting rather than factory farming precisely because of the diminished amount of suffering caused. But it's still more suffering than would be caused by just eating plants so I'm not sure I understand your point
I'm talking about an argument for veganism though. If you are saying that it's acceptable for people to eat hunted meat, you're not saying they should be vegans. And you're encouraging a massive increase in hunting.
What part of my reference to it as animal abuse sounds like an endorsement of the practice? I'm not sure about you, but personally I consider animal abuse to be unacceptable.
Okay, then I think you're completely missing my point, which is that arguing that causing less pain is good is a bad argument for veganism. Causing no pain would be the ethical argument, wouldn't it? Causing less pain would still be unethical, right?
It's sort of like trying to convince someone committing genocide they should stop by telling them they should slow down.
It's not sort of like that though because the practicality of the matter is that humans have to eat to survive but they don't have to genocide to survive. Reducing suffering as much as possible being the goal rather than eliminating it completely is not a new concept in philosophy considering eliminating suffering completely is impossible.
If it is only about reducing suffering as much as possible, would harvesting the meat from euthanized pets be acceptable?
I don't really have an answer to that, it is an interesting question. For me personally I don't hold any attachment or feelings to the bodies of the deceased. When I die I'm getting one of those mushroom suits that decomposes you and quickly returns you to nature. But some people are much more attached to the bodies of the deceased whether for spiritual reasons or otherwise and I can't really speak for them. Would eating the euthanized pets cause suffering to their previous owners, I really have no answer for that, I assume there would be some people who would suffer from that and some who wouldn't mind. The quality of the meat I think would be very low though considering it would mostly be very senior animals with many health issues.
If the only animal corpses anyone ate was euthanized pet remains and the practice was somehow free of influencing the unnecessary euthanization of more pets, I can't say I care. Same way I don't really care if people eat roadkill or animal products from a dumpster. I'm not going to do it, I don't see these things as food. And I think there's a minuscule harm done in the proliferation of the perception of these things as food. But that harm is negligible in the face of animal agriculture which is my primary concern.
Huh, neat.
I dont mean this as a “dunk” but more of a how neat is that
It's truly shameful that disclaimers like these feel necessary in this age of shitting on everyone else online. Lemmy users suck too.
Yeah, but on the other hand I’m old enough to know that when I get excited about something I can talk about it in a way that “clobbers” so I like to disclaimer myself when I know I’m exhibiting that kind of behavior.
Plants having no nervous system is being challenged with the idea that the plant itself is its central nervous system.
They react to stimulus, they emit sounds (different ones when in “pain”), and communicate with each other.
They don’t have consciousness in a way we understand
I dont mean this as a “dunk” but more of a how neat is that
It's always funny to me how people eat up the concept of a distrubuted neural network in tech but scoff at the same idea applying to something like a tree or a fungus.
Pando is the largest organism by area, and the Humungous Fungus is the largest by mass. The idea that those organisms don't "think" in some way is laughable.
"In some way" is doing A LOT of heavy lifting there. ... although in the general sense, agreed.
Especially given how many outright wrong or otherwise assinine conclusions some "thinking" animals come to... Perhaps communicative consciousness is overrated on the intelligence scale.
because humans invent things from scratch that nature has already created and optimzed, it's why we're seeing a lot of optimizations on current tech that comes from nature itself.
It's a really weird problem to have.
Go find that video of a slime mold optimizing Japan's rail system by finding oats in a maze
isn't this similar to or equivalent in concept to letting water pathfind through a maze for example?
No. The slime mold doesn't just solve the maze. It figures out the optimal path and grows only where it needs to reach the goal. It's a fascinating thing to watch in time-lapse. The "water in a maze" idea is that if it fills every passage, the only drain would be the exit.
obviously, but the flow path of the water is going to be a direct path to the end of the maze also. You just have to wait for it to fill up first lol.
You should read the book "entangled life" if you haven't already. It's fascinating.
I'll trade you. I'll read ur book if you check out the ender quintet, or at least speaker of the dead. The hierarchy of foreignness is a concept that has REALLY stuck with me. Also pequininos are bros.
It always seems lime some excuse in a counter response by vеgаns
The number of times I've responded to them telling them that plants probably process pain in a different way to us has always been shot down by them
Tell them that brains extremely simplified are just on and off responses to certain stimuli / information just like plants have specific reponsonses to stimuli and computers having 1's and 0's that respond to information
A mycelium network could be counted as a brain
If you actually believe harming plants causes them pain and that that is bad, you should be vegan. Animal agriculture harms far, far more plants than any plant agriculture ever could.
But then you're still causing plants pain by farming and eating them. Isn't that argument no different than saying if you believe that harming animals causes them pain, you should be in favor of eating the ones that are hunted because farming them causes more pain?
I really don't know if plants can cause pain and I think the environmental arguments for not eating meat are far more compelling than the ethical ones, but regardless, I think this is a poor argument for veganism.
If you insist on animal abuse then you should do it through hunting rather than factory farming precisely because of the diminished amount of suffering caused. But it's still more suffering than would be caused by just eating plants so I'm not sure I understand your point
I'm talking about an argument for veganism though. If you are saying that it's acceptable for people to eat hunted meat, you're not saying they should be vegans. And you're encouraging a massive increase in hunting.
What part of my reference to it as animal abuse sounds like an endorsement of the practice? I'm not sure about you, but personally I consider animal abuse to be unacceptable.
Okay, then I think you're completely missing my point, which is that arguing that causing less pain is good is a bad argument for veganism. Causing no pain would be the ethical argument, wouldn't it? Causing less pain would still be unethical, right?
It's sort of like trying to convince someone committing genocide they should stop by telling them they should slow down.
It's not sort of like that though because the practicality of the matter is that humans have to eat to survive but they don't have to genocide to survive. Reducing suffering as much as possible being the goal rather than eliminating it completely is not a new concept in philosophy considering eliminating suffering completely is impossible.
If it is only about reducing suffering as much as possible, would harvesting the meat from euthanized pets be acceptable?
I don't really have an answer to that, it is an interesting question. For me personally I don't hold any attachment or feelings to the bodies of the deceased. When I die I'm getting one of those mushroom suits that decomposes you and quickly returns you to nature. But some people are much more attached to the bodies of the deceased whether for spiritual reasons or otherwise and I can't really speak for them. Would eating the euthanized pets cause suffering to their previous owners, I really have no answer for that, I assume there would be some people who would suffer from that and some who wouldn't mind. The quality of the meat I think would be very low though considering it would mostly be very senior animals with many health issues.
If the only animal corpses anyone ate was euthanized pet remains and the practice was somehow free of influencing the unnecessary euthanization of more pets, I can't say I care. Same way I don't really care if people eat roadkill or animal products from a dumpster. I'm not going to do it, I don't see these things as food. And I think there's a minuscule harm done in the proliferation of the perception of these things as food. But that harm is negligible in the face of animal agriculture which is my primary concern.
Huh, neat.
It's truly shameful that disclaimers like these feel necessary in this age of shitting on everyone else online. Lemmy users suck too.
Yeah, but on the other hand I’m old enough to know that when I get excited about something I can talk about it in a way that “clobbers” so I like to disclaimer myself when I know I’m exhibiting that kind of behavior.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hm3JodBR-vs