Animal Science and Technology

As most of us have, unfortunately, been forced to admit, the animal protection community is rife with infighting.  For some time, I’ve been unable to understand why people who are theoretically working for similar—if not identical—goals would be so openly hostile and defamatory toward others.

Some potential explanations are beginning to surface, though.  For instance, one part of the problem seems to be a struggle between authenticity and purism.

Authenticity

When a person behaves with authenticity, he or she stays in touch with the values that brought him or her to the animal protection cause in the first place. The compassion, empathy, and reasoning that originally connected the person to other animals remains intact and pervades his or her daily actions and interactions with others.

In this place of centeredness, a person’s ego is subordinated to both the outer goal of changing society’s treatment of animals and the inner walk of simply being a living embodiment of these values.  The ego’s desires for beating others, being right, taking credit, gaining adoration, controlling others, and acquiring power are seen as counterproductive with respect to the outer goal and disruptive with respect to the inner walk.

Purism

When a person in the animal protection movement fixates on purity itself, the entire focus shifts away from the goal and the walk.  The new focus becomes a game of competing for who can be “more pure” than others in the movement (“I’ve been vegan longer than you,” etc.).

Control and credit are the “rewards” for winning the game, and these rewards may accrue to the benefit of a given individual.  But the movement itself loses, because the goal of societal change gets forgotten in the never-ending power struggle, and the inner walk of being the change is abandoned in favor of self-serving calculations and maneuvers.

Awesome rabbit pic by Vanessa Sheldon

Every day at lunchtime, another generation of school children—from small country schools to big city ones—is gradually indoctrinated into a culture of violence.

Not only are school kids served the dead body parts of brutalized cows, pigs, chickens, and others, but these children are taught to be thankful for the products of unmitigated violence.  Truly, no Nazi propagandist could rival the animal-killing industry’s skill.

So long as schools are not vegan, schools will be a primary mechanism through which violence is cultivated and perpetuated in our modern society.

For each cat or dog that you rescue but do not take vegan, you condemn dozens of animals per year to death, namely, the cows, pigs, turkeys, and others who are raped, tortured, and killed to become that cat’s or that dog’s meal. Each of these condemned beings is just as smart, just as loving, and just as worthy of protection as the one for whom you brutalized and killed them.

That’s why the so-called “No Kill” movement—when not coupled with veganism—produces an exponential acceleration of the killing.  One life saved produces, say, 24 killed.  It’s a meat industry bonanza.

And one of the most extreme perversions of people’s good intentions that modern culture has to offer, since its effect is the exact opposite of “No Kill.”

I advocate calling it the “Rape-and-Kill” movement or the “Over-Kill” movement so that people can at least go in with open eyes. Very few things are scarier than wholesale, unmitigated savagery in the name of good.

You can live in a fully cruelty-free household, even if you have family members who are feline.

Vegan Cat Food from Evolution

Vegan Cat Food from Evolution

Delicense, Arrest, Prosecute, Convict

When most people see animals being tortured, they recoil in horror. But vivisection has nonetheless survived through the massive dollars and influence that universities, pharmaceutical companies, and medical lobbying groups wield.

In an effort to rally resources to stop animal torture, here’s a proposed acronym:  DAPC.

DAPC stands for “Delicense, Arrest, Prosecute and Convict.”  These are basically the four steps that need to be taken to eliminate vivisection. Specifically, “doctors” who torture animals must be stripped of their medical licenses.  Obviously, torture is not part of the healing profession and is fundamentally contrary to the vows to which legitimate medical professionals adhere. Those who commit vivisection must then be arrested, prosecuted, and convicted for felony animal abuse.

Thus, the project in whole would be called “DAPC: Vivisection.”  Just a thought.  Here’s a little graphic that you are free to use for any anti-vivisection purpose.

DAPC: Vivisection | Delicense, Arrest, Prosecute and Convict

Once again departing from the theme of this column (although I’m sure we can figure out a way to make eating great food a science!), this post features Carol Glasser’s vegan cupcakes.

Many folks live under the impression that people who don’t kill others have to sacrifice some of the finer things in life.  Like cupcakes.  Thank you, Ms. Glasser, for dispelling that myth in a most delicious—and aesthetically pleasing—manner.

Vegan cupcakes by Carol Glasser. Photo by Christopher Marcum.

Tell the cats in laboratories and
calves in crates that
Someone hears them.

Tell the salmon in nets and
chickens in cages that
Someone loves them.

Tell my friends,
with bark and moo and oink, that
Someone remembers them
misses them
needs them and
comes for them.

Today.

And tell them one more thing:
I am one such Someone, and
I am not coming alone.

__________________________________

If vivisection be not evil, then there is no such thing as evil.

__________________________________

~  Shelley Harrison

1. Naturalist Fallacy

The naturalist fallacy is a well-known flawed method of reasoning in which it is argued that, since something occurs in nature, that thing is morally acceptable. An example of the naturalist fallacy would be:

Rape occurs in nature. Not only do humans commit rape, but other species commit rape as well. Therefore, rape is acceptable.

While few people would hazard the above argument in polite society, millions of modern citizens use the exact same argument in a different context:

Killing and eating animals occurs in nature. Not only do humans kill and eat animals, but other species kill and eat animals as well. Therefore, killing and eating animals is acceptable.

In technical terms, this fallacy consists of an unwarranted shift between descriptive premises (e.g., rape occurs) and a prescriptive or normative conclusion (e.g., rape is okay). The argument is accordingly invalid. A way to undermine a naturalist fallacy argument is to point out that mere occurrence of an event does not make it right. For instance, in the first example above, the argument is undermined by pointing out that our society has almost universally agreed that rape is unacceptable, even though it occurs.

2. False Dichotomy Fallacy

The false dichotomy fallacy is a well-known flawed method of reasoning in which two alternative conclusions are assumed to be the only two possible conclusions.  An example of the false dichotomy fallacy would be:

John is not an atheist. Therefore, he must be a Christian.

The reasoning is flawed because there are many more than two philosophical or religious positions available to a person. In the context of justifying and perpetuating inhumanity, the false dichotomy fallacy is used in a variety of ways, such as:

Going without protein is not healthy. Therefore, we must eat animals.

In technical terms, this fallacy consists of an unwarranted assumption that there is a disjunctive (i.e., “either/or”) relationship between two terms (e.g., one must either be Christian or atheist). The argument is accordingly invalid. A way to undermine a false dichotomy argument is to point out that there is a third possible conclusion, one which can occur without either of the first two possible conclusions occurring.

For instance, in the first example above, the argument is undermined by pointing out that it is possible for a person to be neither an atheist nor a Christian but rather a Muslim.

3. Name-Of-God Fallacy

The name-of-God fallacy is a well-known flawed method of reasoning in which it is argued that, since a seemingly atrocious act is committed in the name of religion, patriotism, science or some other cause, the act is acceptable. An example of the name of God fallacy would be:

The World Trade Center was destroyed and thousands of people died, but this action was committed in the name of God. Therefore, this action was acceptable.

This form of reasoning is unfortunately common in its usage today. The reasoning is flawed because a person’s motivation for committing an act is not sufficient to justify the act itself. Other examples include:

These dogs were intentionally drowned, but this action was committed for the advancement of science. Therefore, this action was acceptable.

These prisoners were intentionally tortured, but this action was committed in the name of patriotism. Therefore, this action was acceptable.

In technical terms, this fallacy consists of an unwarranted shift from descriptive premises (e.g., the subjective intentions of a perpetrator) to a prescriptive or normative conclusion (e.g., a seemingly atrocious act is not atrocious). The argument is accordingly invalid. It may actually be worse than a bare ends-justify-the-means argument, since the name-of-God fallacy may be used even in the absence an “end” worth pursuing. A way to undermine a name-of-God argument is to point out that an atrocious act remains an atrocious act even when committed by someone who thinks that he or she is serving a cause or ideal.

4. Irrelevant Distinction Fallacy

The irrelevant distinction fallacy is a well-known flawed method of reasoning in which it is argued that, since a difference between two cases can be perceived, different treatment of the two cases is justified. An example of the irrelevant distinction fallacy would be:

Women and men have different chromosomes. Therefore, the legal system should treat women and men differently.

The reasoning is flawed because a mere scientific difference is not by itself sufficient to justify institutionalized legal discrimination. Other examples include:

These people are from a different culture. Therefore, they are inferior to us.

Humans are generally smarter than other animals. Therefore, only humans deserve rights.

These animals were intentionally burned alive, which would be a crime if committed at home. But these animals were intentionally burned alive in a university laboratory; therefore, this act was not a crime.

It is wrong to eat cats or dogs. But cows have hooves rather than paws. Therefore, it is not wrong to eat cows.

In technical terms, this fallacy is simply one of relevance, i.e., the argument assumes without warrant that the premises offered have probative value with respect to the conclusion. The argument is accordingly invalid. Arguments employing fallacies of relevance are particularly easy to shoot down by following the irrelevant premises to some bizarre conclusion. For instance, in the first example above, the argument can be undermined by pointing out that if a mere chromosomal difference were enough to require legal distinction, then every unique individual (except for genetically identical twins) would have to have a one-person legal system made specially for them. Such a situation would render the notion of a “legal system” largely meaningless.

5. Appeal to Tradition

The appeal to tradition fallacy is a well-known flawed method of reasoning in which it is argued that since a seemingly atrocious act is part of a tradition, the act is not an atrocity. An example of the appeal to tradition fallacy would be:

Female genital mutilation (euphemistically called “female circumcision”) seems like an atrocity. But since female genital mutilation is part of the African tradition, female genital mutilation is not an atrocity.

The reasoning is flawed because the mere fact that an act has become a tradition does not make that act acceptable. Other examples include:

Torturing a trapped bull to death seems like an atrocity. But since bull “fighting” is a Spanish tradition, bull “fighting” is not an atrocity.

Torturing an animal to death seems like an atrocity. But this form of torture is part of our religious tradition. Therefore, this form of torture is not an atrocity.

In technical terms, this fallacy is simply one of relevance, i.e., the argument assumes without warrant that the premises offered have probative value with respect to the conclusion. The argument is accordingly invalid. Arguments employing this fallacy can be easily shot down by demonstrating that many traditions have already been abolished because they were, despite being traditions, obviously immoral. Human slavery would be a classic example.

6. Perfect-Voting-Record Fallacy

The perfect-voting-record fallacy is a flawed method of reasoning in which it is assumed that a small set of issues that were expressly considered represent all possible issues that could have been considered. An example of the PVR fallacy would be:

The terrorist regime of Q commits thousands of acts of terrorism every year, but only once has the Q leadership considered a limitation on terrorism.  This limitation—which provided that suicide-bombers should not eat garlic—passed unanimously.  Therefore, the terrorists of Q have a perfect voting record on terrorism.

While most people would not be duped by the above argument, many well-meaning activists go for the following argument and even use it themselves:

The meat-eaters of political party J kill and eat several thousand animals each year, but only a few limitations on animal-killing have been considered.  These limitations—which provide that animals to be killed must not be caged in veal crates—have been unanimously supported by the meat-eaters in political party J. Therefore, the meat-eaters in party J have a perfect voting record for animals.

In technical terms, this fallacy consists of reliance on an unrepresentative sample.  Specifically, the argument ignores the potentially thousands of issues that could have been addressed but were not.  The argument is accordingly invalid.

A way to undermine a perfect-voting-record argument is to point out that one cannot be said to have a “perfect voting record” on a subject when one has simply failed to vote at all on the major issues pertaining to that subject. For instance, the ancient Sumerians probably never held a vote on the militarization of space, but to conclude that they therefore had a “perfect voting record” on the militarization of space would be bizarre.

7.  Misplaced Burden Fallacy

The misplace burden fallacy is a flawed method of reasoning in which the burden of persuasion is initially placed on the wrong side of a debate or legal battle. An example of the MB fallacy would be:

The plaintiff bears the burden of proof and persuasion in the American legal system.  But, today, we’re going to pretend that the burden is on the defendant anyway.  And since the defendant hasn’t proven his case, he loses.

No lawyer would allow such nonsense to slip by in court of law, but many well-meaning citizens, even animal rights activists, fail to confront this commonly held view:

Torturing and killing of the innocent is universally recognized as wrong.  But, today, we’re going to pretend that torturing and killing of the innocent is right anyway.  And since those who oppose such torture and killing haven’t proven their case, they lose.

In technical terms, this fallacy consists of replacing a premise known to be true with a premise known to be false.  Specifically, the argument places the initial burden on party A, even though it is known that party B actually bears the initial burden.  The argument is accordingly invalid.

Make no mistake:  the burden of persuasion belongs on those who favor killing and torturing of the innocent, not on those who oppose it. And that burden will never be successfully carried. Which is why the global transition to veganism is not only desirable but inevitable.

A Little Culinary Confession

First, let’s make one thing clear:  I can’t cook.  I appreciate good food and truly admire folks who can bring together a fine meal (and sure do like to be invited to their houses—hint, hint!), but I am not such a person.  And that’s putting it mildly. . . .

This reality caused me a bit of concern when I first adopted a vegan diet.  My only motivation for going vegan was that veganism is the ethical choice.  But, like most people in our culture, my eating habits until that time had relied largely upon dead animals (i.e., meat) and animal-exploitation products (e.g., milk, butter and eggs).  Without any real cooking or food preparation skills and without being able to rely upon the same old menu, I remember pouring that last gallon of milk down the drain and thinking, “Wow, I sure I hope I’ll figure out a way to eat enough to survive.” 

Surprise, Surprise

As it turns out, eating well—and eating better than I ever had before—has not been an issue.  A vegan diet—much to my surprise—turns out to be easier, safer and healthier than an animal-based diet.  And one company that is doing its part to make a vegan diet also a convenient diet is Sequel Naturals, which is based in Vancouver, BC, with U.S. offices in Blaine, WA.

Sequel produces a line of vegan convenience foods called Vega.  Formulated by Ironman triathlete Brendan Brazier, Vega offers a wide variety of ready-made vegan meals that come in forms such as an energy bar or a powder that can be mixed with water.  Here’s a quick guide.

Vega Whole Food Energy Bar

Sequel’s Vega Energy Bars condense a whole lot of nutrition into a small package.  The size of a standard candy bar, the Vega Energy Bar includes ten grams (10g) complete raw protein, six grams (6g) dietary fiber, and four-and-a-half grams (4.5.) of Omega 3 and 6 essential fatty acids.  Available in chocolate, berry, and natural flavors, I have thoroughly enjoyed incorporating Vega Energy Bars into my diet as an easy way to get in a good meal while on the go.

My favorite is, of course, the chocolate Vega Energy Bar.  And, since it’s often hard to find any vegan chocolate items, I’ve particularly appreciated discovering Sequel’s chocolate offering as both a yummy and good-for-you way to get my chocolate fix.

Left:  My favorite super-model, Kitty Witty Bang-Bang, showed up at the shoot while I was photographing the Vega Energy Bar. 

Vega Complete Whole Food Health Optimizer

Sequel’s Vega powder is practically a feat of  food engineering.  Coming in a thirty gram (30g) serving that can be mixed with eight ounces of water to form a complete meal, the Vega Complete Whole Food Health Optimizer blows away my previous expectations of what a convenience meal could be.  To wit, this supercharged supplement provides:

• Calcium equivalent to five (5) cups of milk
• Fiber equivalent to seven (7) slices of bread
• Omega 3 equivalent to six (6) ounces of dead salmon flesh
• Potassium equivalent to six (6) bananas
• Iron equivalent to twenty-nine (29) ounces of dead cow flesh
• and a whole lot more

Moreover, two packages of the Vega Complete Whole Food Health Optimizer provide 100% of RDI of vitamins and minerals.   Such is  the power of a convenience food that has been extremely well designed.

Other Offerings

The Vega line from Sequel also includes the Vega Whole Food Vibrance Bar (Green Synergy, Chocolate Decadence, and Wholesome Original flavors), Vega Antioxidant EFA Oil Blend, and Vega Whole Food Smoothie Infusion.  All these products include the same kind of plant-based nutrition that makes the other Vega products special.

My recommendation:  a strong buy.  For more information, visit the Vega website from Sequel at http://www.myvega.com.

The Most Gruesome Photo Album of the Last Century

In 2007, the New York Times, NPR, and other media reported the discovery of a photo album containing what I consider to be the most gruesome photographs from all of the Second World War. But these photos do not depict a single dead or wounded body. They are far more ghastly even than that.

The album belonged to SS officer Karl Hocker, who was assigned to Auschwitz from May 1944 until liberation of the camp by the Allies. The photos show SS guards and their friends frolicking, flirting, decorating Christmas trees—engaging in all manner of activities that a seemingly “normal” human being would do. And all this took place in the shadow of—or in some cases within the actual walls of—a death camp in which these very same frolickers were daily murdering other human beings by the thousands.

Take a moment to recreate the context of these photographs. A man gets up in the morning, has breakfast, kisses his wife, gives the kids a hug, pets the dog on the head, and goes to work—gassing and cooking people to death, that is.

The Banality of Evil

Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) grasped the general notion as “the banality of evil” in her breakthrough 1963 work Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil. She argued persuasively and influentially that the greatest evils in history, such as the Holocaust, have been perpetrated not by sociopathic demons but by seemingly normal people who engaged unthinkingly in atrocities that were assigned to them by authority figures. The 1961 Milgram experiment at Yale and the 1971 Stanford prison experiment both appeared to reproduce a similar effect.

Compartmentalization: The Walls of Evil

Even if it is true that otherwise normal people—from Auschwitz to Stanford—can be relatively easily influenced to commit gargantuan acts of evil, the question to me that remains is simply this:  how is such a phenomenon possible at the psychological level? How did bank teller, husband and father Karl Hocker make the daily transition from these other roles to that of aiding and abetting mass murder?

I think the answer lies in the psychological notion of  “compartmentalization”. Compartmentalization denotes the process whereby human minds engage in a form of what logicians call “confirmation bias”. The gist of it is this: we tend to ignore, forget or “wall off” evidence that conflicts with our current views of ourselves.

For someone like Karl Hocker, compartmentalization allowed him to (i) accept evidence that reinforced the view of himself himself as a loving, competent bank teller, community member, Christmas tree decorator and family man and (ii) simultaneously ignore overwhelming evidence that he and his SS friends were completely psychopathic, serial-killing monsters. This is confirmation bias at its best (or worst).

In short, rather than integrate information and accept disconfirming evidence, the person who engages in compartmentalization can live essentially two distinct, disintegrated lives. Such a person is never forced to deal with the crisis of conscience that an integrated person would certainly face.

Compartmentalization is the wall that allows evil to run free within the mind of an otherwise seemingly healthy individual.

Pro-Survival Trait

If compartmentalization is indeed the grand enabler of evil, the question remains how compartmentalization ever evolved in the first place, since mass murder of one’s neighbors would seem to be a trait that would get an individual quickly weeded out of the gene pool.

Upon close inspection, however, the positive effects of compartmentalization are not hard to identify. We are all fallible human beings, and each of us endures a large number of losses, setbacks, and injuries in our lives. If we were unable to set these things aside—ignore them, at least for a while—and move on, we would all eventually curl up in a fetal position and just waste away. Our first failure at something would be the last time we ever tried to succeed at anything. Our first romance-gone-bad would be the last relationship we ever undertook. Our first loss on the baseball field would be the last game we ever played.

Walling off information that would hurt or destroy one’s sense of positive self-worth can thus be seen generally as a pro-survival trait. Only problem is that this trait, like many other pro-survival traits, may also have dire negative side effects.

Unthinking commission of mass murder probably qualifies as a negative side effect. . . .

The Most Gruesome Photo Album of the Next Century—Starring You

There’s just one more little thing to cover in this article. It’s a photo album that will be discovered and printed in the New York Times in the year 2109. And it’s the most gruesome photo album anyone has seen since that of Karl Hocker.

Interesting thing about this album: just like Hocker’s, there’s no blood. No gore. No death nor even injury depicted. The photos just depict a happy family person who wakes up, kisses the spouse, hugs the kids, pets the dog, and heads off to work. This normal person in the photo album passes a slaughterhouse on the way to work, inside of which thousands of innocent, sensitive and intelligent pigs are being killed everyday. The star of the photo album never once thinks twice at lunch as he or she eats a piece of bacon.

That person is a master of compartmentalization.

That person is you.

_____________

Resources: “In the Shadow of Horror, SS Guardians Frolic”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/19/arts/design/19photo.html?ei=5088&en=27740491a041f02f&ex=1347854400&adxnnl=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&adxnnlx=1190242524-qvlKU37R0NQ1EEQwO3Jh1w

“Confirmation bias” at Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

“Self-Structure and Self-Esteem Stability: The Hidden Vulnerability of Compartmentalization ”
http://psp.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/33/2/143

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Shelley Harrison teaches law, logic, writing and reading comprehension in Los Angeles, CA. Recipient of seven patents, Harrison is the author of Plutonomics: A Unified Theory of Wealth and a former Managing Editor of the Virginia Law Review.