goulo: vegetalismo / veganism

russ (

goulo) wrote,
@ 2005-04-19 23:37:00

vegetalismo / veganism
Eble taŭgas mencii ke mi ekmanĝadis vegetale antaŭ kelkaj semajnoj, kiam mi decidis ne aĉeti pli da fromaĝo kaj ovoj en la nutravarejo. Mi ne certis ĉu la provo sukcesus aŭ ne, sed ĉar mi ankoraŭ sukcesas manĝi tiel, indas mencii ĝin nun, ĉar ĝi ŝajne daŭras. Mi pripensis vegetalismon dum kelkaj jaroj, sed ĉiam kredis ke ĝi estus tro malfacila. (Ironie, mi havas similajn pensojn pri vegetarismo antaŭ ol mi vegetaraniĝis antaŭ proksimume 18 jaroj, sed ĝi fakte facilis.) Sed mi pasigadas tempon kun kelkaj vegetalanoj lastatempe kaj diskutis ĝin kun ili, kaj de ili inspirite mi decidis provi ĝin. Kaj ja vegetalisma manĝado pli malfacilas ol vegetarisma - ne pro iu deziro por fromaĝo aŭ ovoj (iom surprize, mi ne vere sentas la mankon) sed simple ĉar multaj antaŭpreparitaj vegetarismaj manĝoj havas ovojn aŭ fromaĝon aŭ lakton, mi trovas. (Parenteze, mi ne certas ĉu oni diru "vegetalismo", "vegetaĵismo", aŭ "veganismo" Esperante. Estis iom da diskuto pri tiu temo en la yahoogroup E-istajVegetaranoj. Ŝajne "vegetaĵismo" ne tre popularas, laŭ tiu diskuto kaj laŭ google, sed ne klaras al mi kiu elekto inter "vegetalismo" kaj "veganismo" pli taŭgas.)

Guess it's time to mention that I started eating vegan a couple weeks ago, when I decided not to buy more cheese and eggs at the grocery store. I wasn't sure if the attempt would work or not, but since I'm still successfully eating vegan, I guess it's worth mentioning it now, since it seems to be lasting. I thought about veganism for several years, but always thought that it would be too difficult. (Ironically I had similar thoughts about vegetarianism before I became one approximately 18 years ago, but it was actually easy.) But I've been spending time with a few vegans lately and discussing it with them, and inspired by them I decided to try it. And indeed vegan eating is harder than vegetarian - not from some desire for cheese or eggs (somewhat surprisingly, I don't really miss them) but simply because many pre-made vegetarian foods have eggs or cheese or milk, I'm finding.

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	nugget 2005-04-20 04:33 am UTC (link)
	What are your motivations to eat vegan? (Reply to this)(Thread)

goulo
2005-04-20 04:44 am UTC (link)

My 3 reasons for vegetarianism (animal cruelty, environmental damage, health) translate into veganism.

1. Cheese and eggs as we normally get them are sufficiently cruel to animals that I feel uncomfortable about it. E.g. there is a lot of misleading advertising about "free range" eggs which makes it sound idyllic for the chickens when it's not. So note that in principle I'm not opposed to eating eggs per se, but I'm troubled by being complicit in the way that eggs actually reach me at the grocery store in real life.

2. Environmental impact of factory farming still comes into play, though of course to a much smaller degree than with inefficiently slaughtering animals for meat. But the large amount of animals needed to produce today's typical diet of animal product still causes a lot of damage.

3. The health effects of veganism are admittedly murkier, and one must be more conscious of what one eats to get nutrition, but it does seem the difficulty is exaggerated by people opposed to (or ignorant of) veganism. (By the way, in case anyone reading this wants to start arguing with me about how it's impossible to be healthy on a vegan diet, please don't bother; there are too many walking existence proofs that it's perfectly possible. :)

To a lesser extent it ties in a bit with some of the murky russlike buddhism, in an ineffable way.

(Reply to this)(Parent)

	elgrande 2005-04-20 06:05 pm UTC (link)
	At first, I thought you were using that pic in order to provoke. Only then did I read your username. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	nugget 2005-04-20 08:10 pm UTC (link)
	haha. Oops! In retrospect, it was a dumb choice of icon to use for this particular comment. :) (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	goulo 2005-04-20 09:45 pm UTC (link)
	I'm so used to your chicken nugget icon that I totally tuned it out and didn't notice the irony in this context. :) (Reply to this)(Parent)

	sonjaaa 2005-04-20 04:37 am UTC (link)
	Laŭ PIV2 vegan estas "vegetaĵano/vegetaĵismo", sed vi pravas ke neniu uzas tion. "Vegetalano/vegetalismo" estu la vorto do, ĉar la radikoj estas sinonimaj! Tamen, mi ofte aŭdas kaj persone akceptus "vegano/veganismo" (sed ne "vegismo"). (Reply to this)(Thread)

goulo
2005-04-20 04:48 am UTC (link)

"Veganismo" ŝajnas iomete tro angleska al mi, ĉar ĝi ŝajne devenas de la angla "vegan", sed "veganismo" havas "an" en la mezo, kvazaŭ oni estas ano de vego. Ĉar oni diras "vegetarismo" anstataŭ "vegetaranismo", "veganismo" aspektas kurioza al mi, kaj "vegismo" povus esti konsiderata pli logika. Aŭ oni diru "veganano" anstataŭ "vegano", se la radiko ja estas "vegan"!

En la retpoŝtlisto, iu proponis ke vegetalismo rilatas specifie al dieto, kaj veganismo estas la pli granda vivmaniero kiu ankaŭ evitas ledon ktp.

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	mywornoutmasks 2005-04-20 12:40 pm UTC (link)
	Good luck on your new dietary choices. venaja will be disappointed. I suppose I'll have to be the one to take her out for bar-be-que now! : ) You're not the kind of vegetarian/vegan to criticize and/or complain to others who do eat meat, are you? I've known quite a few like that in my life. (Reply to this)(Thread)

goulo
2005-04-20 01:34 pm UTC (link)

Well I've been vegetarian for years, so I wouldn't have eaten barbecue in any case. :)

I am not that kind of vegetarian/vegan; although I believe it is better (in a big picture ethical helping the world sense) to be vegetarian (for the reasons of animal cruelty, environmental damage of factory farming, and health), I also know that it's mostly useless to try to change anyone's mind on the subject; indeed I myself took several years to actually become vegetarian after I first started considering it (but then I was surprised how easy it turned out to be).

By the way, the stereotype of vegetarians being strident is rather unfairly one-sided, because I have encountered a VERY large number of carnivores who want to complain at or mock vegetarians. E.g. way more times than I can count I have listened to crap like people telling me in all sincerity that it is impossible to survive without eating meat (gee, so why aren't I and millions of other people dead?), or disputing the facts of environmental damage without having done one minute of research on the subject, or making lame repetitive jokes like waving their meat at me and sayng "Mmmm! Don't you want some?" (or "Mmmm! Doesn't this gross you out?") or "I should sneak some meat into your food!", or acting like vegetarianism is some freaky bizarre thing that only 3 people in the world do, etc etc etc.

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mywornoutmasks
2005-04-20 05:58 pm UTC (link)

I'm sorry you've encountered extremist carnivores! Extremists of any kind who force their unsolicited views on others and then attack them should be ________ (fill in blank will appropriate punishment ; ))

My attitude has always been "live and let live"-- that's what America is all about (or should be) anyway, right? But of course there are plenty of people who claim to have that attitude but don't practice it. I guess I had the unfortunate experience of meeting rabid vegetarians before I met many decent ones, and that set the stage for my current cautiousness. But I know that that is an involuntary, gut reaction and not intellectually reasonable. I have to make a concerted effort to trust that every veggie I meet isn't going to yell at me and threaten to leave me stranded at a restaurant if I order meat (this actually happened to me once!).

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austingoddess
2005-04-20 09:33 pm UTC (link)

This is more typical of someone who's just become veggie. Like any other life change where you feel better about your change, you want to go evangelize to others. You get over it, but even I was a veggie who had to throw in frequent comments on the benefits of being veggie into conversations with carnivores. Converting to a new religion has the same effect most times. Common human behavior. But if you're sincere about your change, you get over the snark.

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But what about Tex-Mex Food????

zainybrain
2005-04-20 01:24 pm UTC (link)

Man. What occurs to me now is 1) how hard it will be to find mutually agreeable restaurants to eat at; and 2) how much more (even more) eating out with Russ will be driven by when & where he wants to eat; and 3) how now there are even more (!) foods for Russ to reject. And it feels like there are already many things in this world that Russ has rejected (pets, children, mainstream movies, meat, ...) .

So I guess one must get used to it. Eating Tex-Mex at Serranos is a thing of the past.

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Re: But what about Tex-Mex Food????

goulo
2005-04-20 01:40 pm UTC (link)

That's not true - most of our usual restaurants have plenty of vegan options.

Forsaking cheese enchiladas is indeed a big step. :) But fear not, there are still black bean and rice type things at Serrano's, so I would certainly not call eating there with you a thing of the past! (Unlike, say, how you and I never go to pizza places any more, speaking of food limitations...! :)

And what is up with this bogus meme that I reject mainstream movies? I see plenty of them. I simply often prefer non-mainstream movies...

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There was Milto's

zainybrain
2005-04-20 05:21 pm UTC (link)

We went to Miltos even after my wheat allergy, where you'd eat pizza and I'd eat Greek salad. We went to a pizza joint in SanFran also and I just ordered salad there too. However, pizza is no longer something you'll get to eat anyway. Ironically, I myself will still go to Miltos for the salads. (Just went there a month ago in fact.)

On the movie thing, that's mostly about your interdiction about movies that are popular and so have crowds. You've complained about them in almost every crowded movie we saw, with the comment "this is why I don't like seeing popular movies."

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	Re: There was Milto's goulo 2005-04-20 09:48 pm UTC (link)
	Au contraire! I have already eaten pizza (without cheese) in the past couple weeks and enjoyed it! Dislike of crowded movies != dislike of mainstream movies. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	Re: But what about Tex-Mex Food???? (Anonymous) 2005-04-20 05:42 pm UTC (link)
	>there are already many things in this world that Russ has rejected (pets, children, mainstream movies, meat, ...) I too miss playing Tichu with Russ. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: But what about Tex-Mex Food???? willyumtx 2005-04-21 03:59 am UTC (link)
	Has he rejected Tichu as well? Heaven forfend. When did this occur? (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: But what about Tex-Mex Food???? (Anonymous) 2005-04-21 03:25 pm UTC (link)
	I think it occured when he played Tichu partner with Richard Hutnick. Perhaps it was his partner that caused this life-changing affirmation. (Reply to this)(Parent)

Re: But what about Tex-Mex Food????
(Anonymous)
2005-04-21 02:52 pm UTC (link)

Russ is quite an interesting fellow. We have developed a very unusual and most platonic cyber friendship (I am a happily married orthodox catholic.) I wonder what he will reject next. Perhaps he should read the following article:
Scientists Prove Plants Feel Pain, Vegans Face Starvation
DALLAS--Research scientists at Baylor Medical Center have proven that plants, including vegetables, feel pain when subjected to trauma such as being yanked out of the ground, peeled, cooked, and eaten. "Veggies and plants initiate a massive hormone and chemical barrage internally when they suffer any kind of injury," says professor Barry Lindzer. "This response is akin to the nerve response and endorphin release when an animal is injured. We cannot ignore the similarities." When Tarnish asked professor Lindzer and his research team what they thought this finding might mean, they responded unanimously, "Nobel prize, baby!"

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	goulo 2005-04-21 02:58 pm UTC (link)
	Ah, the old "plants feel pain" joke... never heard THAT one before... :) (Reply to this)(Parent)

Re: But what about Tex-Mex Food????
(Anonymous)
2005-04-21 08:14 pm UTC (link)

Russ, my friend, plant pain is no joke. You actually stand to cause less pain by eating cheese and eggs. Here is yet another article supporting this premise.

Feel the parsnips' pain
Patrick West
Monday 2nd August 2004

Patrick West, a vegetarian, argues that if we concede rights to animals, we must also allow them for vegetables

With a construction company forced to pull out of building a vivisection research lab in Oxford, and with Jerry Vlasak, a leading American animal rights campaigner, due to address 300 young militants at a training camp in Kent in September (provided the Home Secretary doesn't ban him), there has never been a better time for animal rights.

But what about vegetable rights? No, don't laugh - and you won't if you have read Samuel Butler's satirical novel Erewhon (1872), which envisaged a world where people had tried to ban eating vegetables as well as animals. Or if you have read Roald Dahl's short story "The Sound Machine" (1949), in which a man invents a device to hear the shrieking of roses being pruned. It is harder than you might think to distinguish between vegetable pain and animal pain.

I write as a vegetarian of eight years' standing. I am concerned about the meat industry, and how we rear animals under cruel conditions for our consumption. Over a lifetime, the average Briton consumes 550 poultry, 36 pigs, 36 sheep and eight oxen. Over the same period, the number of foxes killed by hunting works out at 0.02 per head of human population. Show me a meat-eating anti-vivisectionist, or a carnivorous anti-fox-hunting campaigner, and I'll show you a hypocrite. Animals should not be treated cruelly, but it is nonsense to suggest they should have the same rights as humans.

Animal rights supporters argue that, if an organism re- acts negatively to any exterior influence, and seeks to avoid further contact, then it is in pain. "Fish feel pain," it was announced in May. Scientists at the Roslin Institute and the University of Edinburgh had placed electrodes in the brains of trout and made recordings as they poked the fishes' heads. They discovered that the trout brains fired reactive neurones. When acid or bee venom was applied to their lips, the trout rubbed them on the gravel in their tank.

On the same basis, it can be argued that plants also feel pain. They, too, recoil from detrimental sensations. Research by Alan Bown of Brock University in Canada showed that, ten seconds after an insect crawls on to a leaf, the plant secretes a paralysing agent (called gamma aminobutyric acid) that attacks the intruder's nervous system. Bown explained that plants distinguish between harmless contact from raindrops and the action of caterpillar feet. Not only that, but having been attacked by insects, plants repair their wounds by releasing the chemical superoxide, which helps to prevent infection.

This is not new: botanists have known for a long time that plants have defensive mechanisms. But in June 2002, researchers in Bonn found that plants emit ethylene gas when under attack. The scientists also attached microphones to the vegetation and observed that whereas the plants normally emitted a bubbling sound, under attack from insects, they gave off piercing screeches. Scientists at the Baylor University Medical Centre in Dallas have measured the chemical response of plants to being pulled up, peeled, cooked and eaten. The results, said Professor Barry Lindzer, showed that "plants initiate a massive hormone and chemical barrage internally when they suffer any kind of injury". He continued: "This response is akin to the nerve response and endorphin release when an animal is injured. We cannot ignore the similarities." Scientists from Michigan State University say that plants have a rudimentary nerve structure that allows them to feel pain. "The nervous system is undeveloped, but it is there."

Taken to its logical conclusion, the idea that we should protect anything whose reactions seem to resemble pain forces us all to become fruitarians, waiting for the proverbial apple to fall from the tree - as people did in Butler's Erewhon before they found they were starving to death.

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goulo
2005-04-21 10:40 pm UTC (link)

Here is yet another article supporting this premise.

The first article was just a parody of course.

The second article seems to simply be saying that animal rights are different from human rights, and using a reductio ad absurdum to make its point.

I have yet to see any serious argument that plants feel pain in the sense that animals and humans do.

You actually stand to cause less pain by eating cheese and eggs.

You are joking, right? Especially given the amount of plants killed to feed the animals to make those cheese and eggs.

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ivo
2005-04-22 09:26 am UTC (link)

The second article seems to simply be saying that animal rights are different from human rights, and using a reductio ad absurdum to make its point.

That comment segways into this thought: See, if I were to become inspired to worry about animal cruelty, I would first start with fighting the practice of euthanizing thousands and thousands of pets each day in animal shelters around the world. But I'd need a good steak to get the energy to pursue such quest.

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	(Anonymous) 2005-04-22 12:55 pm UTC (link)
	Oooops. Forgot about all the vegetation required to feed the cattle. Dang it. Now you'll really have to starve. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	austingoddess 2005-04-20 09:29 pm UTC (link)
	It's gotten much easier for vegetarians to get pre-made food, but when I went lacto-ovo in 1993, I had to learn to cook much more often. Which was a good thing. Paying more attention, putting more focus on what you put in your ~~mouth~~...~~body~~...digestive tract is a good thing. Sucks being in a hotel room alone, in case you couldn't tell. :/ (Reply to this)

	(Anonymous) 2005-04-21 02:30 am UTC (link)
	CHEESE?! CHEESE?! YOU GAVE UP CHEESE?!! WHO THE HELL CAN LIVE WITHOUT CHEESE?!!! I understand the basic animal cruelty objection to meat and eggs. But how does cheese making hurt a cow or goat? (Reply to this)(Thread)

	goulo 2005-04-21 10:34 pm UTC (link)
	Making cheese per se of course has no effect on an animal. But the conditions in which animals are kept so that they can be milked are another question... (Reply to this)(Parent)

	Different Topic - Food intake (Anonymous) 2005-04-22 12:39 am UTC (link)
	Russ, being a vegan, what is the proportion of your intake of carbohydrates, proteins, and fats? (Extra credit, also break down simple versus complex carbs, poly versus mono saturated fats). (Reply to this)(Thread)

Re: Different Topic - Food intake

goulo
2005-04-22 12:55 am UTC (link)

Ha, I have never paid attention to that sort of stuff, in any time of my life, as an omnivore, vegetarian or vegan! (Many people are into such statistics due to dieting to lose weight, or due to being involved in some hardcore exercise/sport, neither of which applies to me.) I just eat a variety of stuff and seem to feel fine and be healthy. (A lot of carnivores seem to have a particular belief that you can only get enough protein by eating meat, which is not true. E.g. tofu and soy milk also provide protein.) Common sense nutritional diversity seems to have worked fine for me for the past couple decades as a vegetarian.

However I have started reading a bit about additional issues with veganism (as opposed to vegetarianism), e.g. at http://www.vegansociety.com/html/food/nutrition/ which leads me to pay specific attention to B12, as it seems to be the one important nutrient which you don't easily get from just eating a good diversity of healthy natural foods. But I find that the fortified soy milk I drink has me covered in the B12 department, so cool.

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	Re: Different Topic - Food intake (Anonymous) 2005-04-23 12:14 am UTC (link)
	The unexamined diet is not worth eating. (Reply to this)(Parent)

(Anonymous)
2005-04-22 06:12 pm UTC (link)

Russ--maybe you should try to get the cow pope to come to Austin. For more info on the cow pope go to GoVeg.com.

A very long time ago I used to contribute to PETA. I too abhor animal slaughter or experimentation that causes pain especially intentional pain (am all for the international outlawing of bull, cock and dog fighting). However, as a Catholic I don't believe animals have souls and that man was given dominion over the animals. Here I differ greatly from both you and your standard bloggers I'm sure. So I enjoy being an omnivore.

Now, I am seriously trying to understand the PETA/ vegan mentatlity. That said, I have a question. Does the killing of animals by other animals bother you? I ask this because several days ago my PETA type neighbor called and complained that my cat had killed an "innocent mockingbird" in her yard--as if Powderpuff knew she was committing a heinous deed. As a cat lover you know that cats kill in the most excruciatingly slow ways.

BTW, I have rescued countless birds, chipmunks, moles and even a hairless little baby squirrel that I raised to adult squirrelhood. All would have been feline snacks. Oh and I also raised a duck from egg to adult duckiness after the mother duck pushed the egg out of her overpopulated nest. That was really cool because Lucky (the duckling) imprinted with me and followed me wherever I went just like in those films we all saw in college Psych. classes. But I still enjoy Duck L'Orange though I wouldn't ever want to eat Lucky. I also ate squirrel once at this trailer park wedding in Georgia.

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goulo
2005-04-22 06:44 pm UTC (link)

Whether animals (or people, for that matter) "have souls" is a murky theological/philosophical question which I don't really care much about because I think the question is too vague and unanswerable). It does seem apparent to me that people and animals feel pain. It seems like people understand this but choose to ignore it because they enjoy eating meat. E.g. you would not want to eat Lucky, even though you want to believe Lucky is just some object, so killing Lucky shouldn't be logically any different from tearing a piece of paper in half or something, if Lucky is just some soulless object who feels no pain (or whose pain is irrelevant). Why have you bothered to rescue various animals, if you don't think their suffering matters? Why do most parents feel horrified if they find their children torturing animals and tell them not to do that, yet they are happy for animals to be tortured to put meat on the dining table? Why do many Americans get horrified at the idea that some cultures eat cat or dog or horse? There is a willful intentional blindness or double standard.

The killing of animals by animals does bother me (in the sense of feeling sorry for animals that suffer from other animals - I don't generally feel upset at the attacking animals since that's what they seem programmed to do). I actually regard it as an example of why I find it unlikely that the universe was created by an omnipotent omniscient benevolent God. If I was creating a universe, I sure wouldn't set it up so that many animals are programmed to attack and torture other animals. What kind of bloodthirsty lunatic would want things set up like that, where animals are getting slaughtered violently all over the place?

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(Anonymous)
2005-04-23 01:36 pm UTC (link)

In the proverbial Garden of Eden--the world's first nudist colony-- all animals got along smashingly and people only ate fruit (the plant part that doesn't feel pain according to the above "Parsnips" article). So you see God wasn't such a bloodthirsty lunatic after all! We just screwed it up when we ate the wrong fruit.

Here's a question for all who blog on this site--don't need your answer Russ because you and I have beat this one to a pulp. How many of you who feel that eating meat is wrong also feel that abortion is wrong?

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(Anonymous)
2005-04-23 07:11 pm UTC (link)

If the pain issue is a serious one for you, you probably should at least consider the possibility of plant pain. The ultimate Garden of Eden diet--fruitarianism--should be a consideration for you since fruit doesn't exhibit any of the elements of a pain response. To be honest, this diet looks pretty interesting to me--especially from a weight loss standpoint. It has a lot of other benefits that you can't get from a vegan diet.

The fruitarian diet consists of RAW fruit and seeds ONLY!

Examples of fruits are: Pineapple, mango, banana, avocado, apple, melon, orange, etc., all kinds of berries, and the vegetable fruits such as tomato, cucumber, olives; and dried fruits such as nuts, hazelnuts, cashews, chestnuts, etc.. And seeds including sprouted seeds.
Hope you don't have a nut allergy!

Of all the food stuff that human beings can eat,fruit has the most beautiful shapes and colors!

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	(Anonymous) 2005-04-22 06:24 pm UTC (link)
	Benedict XVI Condemns Factory Farming Just hours after Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was named Pope Benedict XVI, PETA sent a letter offering congratulations, thanking His Holiness for speaking out for animals, and urging him to lead the way into a new era of compassion for all beings. Read More > (Reply to this)(Thread)

does the church think animals have souls, or not?

goulo
2005-04-22 06:32 pm UTC (link)

http://www.goveg.com/feat/PopeBenedictXVI/ says that

Cardinal Ratzinger was echoing official church teachings, as laid out in the Catholic Catechism, which states clearly that “Animals are God’s creatures. He surrounds them with his providential care. By their mere existence they bless him and give him glory. Thus men owe them kindness. We should recall the gentleness with which saints like St. Francis of Assisi or St. Philip Neri treated animals. . . . It is contrary to human dignity to cause animals to suffer or die needlessly.”

...

Pope John Paul proclaimed that “the animals possess a soul and men must love and feel solidarity with our smaller brethren.” He went on to say that all animals are “fruit of the creative action of the Holy Spirit and merit respect” and that they are “as near to God as men are.”

which would seem to be at odds with your previous comment that "as a Catholic I don't believe animals have souls and that man was given dominion over the animals." Do you know if the new pope and the old pope indeed said these things (so why do many Catholics and other Christians believe it's fine to be cruel to animals since they lack souls and are just given to us by God to use as we will) or are those quotations spurious?

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	Re: does the church think animals have souls, or not? (Anonymous) 2005-04-22 06:38 pm UTC (link)
	Thank you Brother Russ---I'll have to check into JPII's comments. However, I don't think he was a vegetarian. But, heck, could be wrong on that one too. St. Francis adorns my front lawn; I wonder if he was a vegetarian. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: does the church think animals have souls, or not? goulo 2005-04-22 06:47 pm UTC (link)
	I'm not aware of either pope being vegetarian, though it would be nice if they were, given those comments, e.g. "It is contrary to human dignity to cause animals to suffer or die needlessly" certainly seems to me inconsistent with slaughtering animals to eat meat, since eating meat is needless. (Reply to this)(Parent)

(Anonymous)
2005-04-22 07:05 pm UTC (link)

A clarification of JPII's comments by a noted Catholic theologian:

"However", concludes theologian Carlo Molari, "it must be restated that there remains a distinction between the soul of an animal and that of man. According to Scripture the animal is destined to perish. It is mortal by definition, unlike man who continues his existence beyond earthly life. So far as we understand now there is no possibility that we will find other creatures in the Hereafter."

So Powderpuff does have a soul!!!(but not a conscience according to my neighbor.) But I guess she doesn't need a conscience if she doesn't have an afterlife.

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goulo
2005-04-22 07:14 pm UTC (link)

"However," he concluded, "we're better than they are, so it's ok to be mean to them, because their suffering just isn't important." Similar arguments (often religiously supported) are used to justify all sorts of mistreatment (of racial minorities, women, gay people, immigrants, ...)

But I guess she doesn't need a conscience if she doesn't have an afterlife.

The idea that one is really only good because one is worried about going to hell after one dies is truly one of the strange things about most flavors of Christianity, for me. I thought there was supposed to be that whole compassion, "love thy neighbor", golden rule kind of stuff.

(Reply to this)(Parent)

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