Read "An Animal's Place" by Michael Pollan in Presence (page 204-221). Respond by listing one of the claims Pollan makes and a piece of evidence he uses to support it.
The claim i chose is " There's a schizoid quality to our relationships with animals, in which sentiment and brutality exist side by sisde." Pollan is talking about how we treat different species differently even though they are both animals, and are capable of the same things. The evidence he uses to support this statement is "Half the dogs in America will recieve christmas presents this year, yet few of us pause to consider the miserable life of the pig- an animal easily as intelligent as the dog- that becomes the christmas ham. He's saying that both the pig and the dog are equal, but we favor the dog because the pig wouldn't make a good house pet, or maybe because it tastes better.
on page 217, Micheal Pollan states that, "if America were to adopt a strictly vegetarian diet, the total number of animals killed every year would actually increase." although vegans do not eat the meat of animals, the grain that they eat is harvested with a combine that destroys mice and potentially leads to the killings of woodchucks and songbirds. the safest way to avoid killing the least amount of animals possible would be to eat the greatest number of animals that can live on the least cultivated land. since killing animals is ultimately unavoidable, the most sensible thing to do would be to choose the method that kills the least animals.
Here's one: Toward the bottom of page 208, Pollan tries to counter an assertion by Peter Singer that farm animals would be better off if they were free. (Singer's quote is: "The life of freedom is to be preferred." Pollan claims that domesticated animals cannot survive in the wild; "in fact, without us they wouldn't exist at all." As evidence, he uses a quote from a 19th-century political philosopher (whom he doesn't name): "The pig has a stronger interest than anyone in the demand for bacon. If all the world were Jewish, there would be no pigs at all." The point is a good one, but many readers wouldn't trust an unnamed source. If you google the quote, you'll discover the philosopher's name was Leslie Stephen. (If you google the philosopher, you learn he was the father of Virginia Woolf -- small world.) Pollan expands on his point -- that domesticated animals essentially trade their lives for their species' continuation -- in his book, "The Omnivore's Dilemma."
on page 217 like kelsi above, vegitarians still kill animals no matter what. to farm all organic food or products causes deaths in ways that is not seen to the human eye. small animals caught in farm equipments way will parish. if animals were not killed or hunted, the food chain will go crazy. more animals would die because of too many mouths to feed do to high numbers of animals and not enough food supplies.
On page 211, the claim is: "That said, it can be argued that human pain differs from animal pain an order of magnitude. This qualitative difference is largely the result of our possession of language and, by virtue of language, an ability to have thoughts about thoughts and to imagine alternatives to our current reality."
Evidence: "The philosopher Daniel C. Dennett suggests that we would do well to draw a distinction between pain, which a great many animals experience, and suffering, which depends on a degree of self-consciousness only a few animals appear to command."
He has made his claim and then backs his claim up with evidence a philosopher had said.
On page 212 Pollen is talking about Amercian Farms "it's not easy to draw lines between pain and suffering in a modern egg or confinement hog operations." Pollen in the next paragraph describes that these are the worst operatoins. He goes on saying "Beef Caddle in America at least still live outdoors, albeit standing ankle deep in their own waste eating a diet that makes them sick." Pollen states facts about hens and more animals that are being suffered in the meat industry. It's funny how Pollen goes on saying "It was certainly wasn't inention to ruin anyone's breakfast. But now that I porbably have spoiled the eggs." When I was reading this I was having my breakfast,a yummy egg and sausage sandwich.
on page 205 pollen says " That animal liberation is the logical next step in the forward march of moral progress is no longer the fringe idea it was back in 1975". Pollen goes on saying in the next sentence that many strong viewed activists are convinced that the moral struggle of our time will be for animal rights. In the next paragraph Pollen says that all across Europe they have already started changing animal rights. changing the status of animals from "things" to "Beings". If already part of the world is changing the rights of animals than in America we must be on the horizon.
On page 205 Pollan says " Though animals are still very much things in the eyes of American Law, change is in the air." After stating this claim Pollan goes on to talk about how 37 states have already made laws on some forms of animal cruelty. He also begins to talk about how big companies such as Burger King and Mcdonals are changing the way they slaughter the animals for the food they distribute. He even begins to talk about how on a recent poll 51 percent of Americans believe that primate animals should have the same rights as human children. Then again us humans being the dominant species on this planet need food to survive no matter how we kill them. I'm sure if animals over populated the human race they would kill us all.
On page 219 pollan claims that "People who care should be working not for animals rights but animal welfare" Pollan continues saying that animals on farms should not suffer and the way they should be killed should be held painless. Then a few sentences down he explains jeremy Bentham(philosopher) and the way he describes his way of eating meat. Jeremy says "we are better for it, and they are never the worse." Death of animals are never worse when us humans have to eat. i can see where pollan is coming from and they should change animals death to less painful but no matter what us humans have to eat.I guess people don’t care about animals when they eat them because they really don’t know what goes on in a slaughter house.
On page 212, he claims that egg and hog operations are the worst. He backs it up by saying that cows and broiling hens are allowed outside and room to move around in. Hens are shoved into an itty bitty wire box, piled on top of each other. They get emotional problems to the point of eating one another and/or rubbing themselves against the wire until they are bleeding and featherless. In order to make up for the losses of hens that can't bear that life and simply die, they starve the rest of the hens of food, water, and light to simulate a final bout of egg laying before the die.Piglets are taken away from mothers only ten days after birth commapared to 13 weeks and put on antibiotic fortified feed and have tail-docking done, where there tails are cut off without anesthesia, and are stuck under a metal roof their whole lifes without straw or sunshine or normal healthy food. Any pig that is sick is clubbed to death on the spot.
i chose to talk about the line that reads, "It's one thing to choose between the chimp and the retarded child or to accept the sacrafice of allthose pigs surgeons practiced on to develop heart bypass surgery." (pg211) i found that this was a really interesting line. I liked how before hand he not only talks about how it is wrong to do animal testing on animals for things that are not going to save the humans life, and then leads on to talk about how stupid it would be to not use animals to practice things that could help the human race. I also found that his argument of the animals that are being born and raised in the farms are not used to life outside and how they can not really know that this is suffering if they are only to have experienced life inside the pin.
On page 217 as said above, vegetarians are still killing animals whether they are eating meat or not eating meat. If everyone was a vegetarian, that would mess up the food chain and more animals would die in a variety of ways. Just because animals are being hunted does not mean that is the only way they are being killed. Of course there are animals who eat other animals and live that way. There would be alot more of that going on if everyone stopped eating meat all together. It's not like you can completely avoid killing animals and humans need to eat.
On page 205 Pollan states that "Though animals are still very much 'things' in the eye of American law change is in the air." He continues to prove this by saying "Thirty-seven states have recently passes laws making some forms of animal cruelty a crime."
On the bottom of page 209 Pollan claims: "Animals have never known any other life." He then goes on to back that up by stating that animals know when to wake up, stretch their limbs, excersize, and eat. Of course he also goes on to agree that making an animal suffer is wrong. However, humans surely come before animals. I agree completely. Animals can feel physical pain like humans do, and do not deserve to be tortured. But humans do come first and thats why we need to kill animals to feed the world.
I chose the claim..."So far the movement has scored some of its biggest victories in Europe." Pollan backs this up by stating things that have happened in Europe for this movement. Such as "Earlier this year, Germany became the first nation to grant animals a constitutional right: the words 'and animals' were added to a provision obliging the state to respect and protect the dignity of human beings. The farming of animals for fur was recently banned in England. In several European nations, sows may no longer be confined to crates nor laying hens to ''battery cages'' -- stacked wired cages so small the birds cannot stretch their wings. The Swiss are amending their laws to change the status of animals from 'things' to 'beings.'"
The claim i chose is " There's a schizoid quality to our relationships with animals, in which sentiment and brutality exist side by sisde." Pollan is talking about how we treat different species differently even though they are both animals, and are capable of the same things. The evidence he uses to support this statement is "Half the dogs in America will recieve christmas presents this year, yet few of us pause to consider the miserable life of the pig- an animal easily as intelligent as the dog- that becomes the christmas ham. He's saying that both the pig and the dog are equal, but we favor the dog because the pig wouldn't make a good house pet, or maybe because it tastes better.
ReplyDeleteon page 217, Micheal Pollan states that, "if America were to adopt a strictly vegetarian diet, the total number of animals killed every year would actually increase." although vegans do not eat the meat of animals, the grain that they eat is harvested with a combine that destroys mice and potentially leads to the killings of woodchucks and songbirds. the safest way to avoid killing the least amount of animals possible would be to eat the greatest number of animals that can live on the least cultivated land. since killing animals is ultimately unavoidable, the most sensible thing to do would be to choose the method that kills the least animals.
ReplyDeleteHere's one:
ReplyDeleteToward the bottom of page 208, Pollan tries to counter an assertion by Peter Singer that farm animals would be better off if they were free. (Singer's quote is: "The life of freedom is to be preferred."
Pollan claims that domesticated animals cannot survive in the wild; "in fact, without us they wouldn't exist at all."
As evidence, he uses a quote from a 19th-century political philosopher (whom he doesn't name): "The pig has a stronger interest than anyone in the demand for bacon. If all the world were Jewish, there would be no pigs at all."
The point is a good one, but many readers wouldn't trust an unnamed source.
If you google the quote, you'll discover the philosopher's name was Leslie Stephen. (If you google the philosopher, you learn he was the father of Virginia Woolf -- small world.)
Pollan expands on his point -- that domesticated animals essentially trade their lives for their species' continuation -- in his book, "The Omnivore's Dilemma."
on page 217 like kelsi above, vegitarians still kill animals no matter what. to farm all organic food or products causes deaths in ways that is not seen to the human eye. small animals caught in farm equipments way will parish. if animals were not killed or hunted, the food chain will go crazy. more animals would die because of too many mouths to feed do to high numbers of animals and not enough food supplies.
ReplyDeleteOn page 211, the claim is:
ReplyDelete"That said, it can be argued that human pain differs from animal pain an order of magnitude. This qualitative difference is largely the result of our possession of language and, by virtue of language, an ability to have thoughts about thoughts and to imagine alternatives to our current reality."
Evidence:
"The philosopher Daniel C. Dennett suggests that we would do well to draw a distinction between pain, which a great many animals experience, and suffering, which depends on a degree of self-consciousness only a few animals appear to command."
He has made his claim and then backs his claim up with evidence a philosopher had said.
On page 212 Pollen is talking about Amercian Farms "it's not easy to draw lines between pain and suffering in a modern egg or confinement hog operations." Pollen in the next paragraph describes that these are the worst operatoins. He goes on saying "Beef Caddle in America at least still live outdoors, albeit standing ankle deep in their own waste eating a diet that makes them sick." Pollen states facts about hens and more animals that are being suffered in the meat industry. It's funny how Pollen goes on saying "It was certainly wasn't inention to ruin anyone's breakfast. But now that I porbably have spoiled the eggs." When I was reading this I was having my breakfast,a yummy egg and sausage sandwich.
ReplyDeleteon page 205 pollen says " That animal liberation is the logical next step in the forward march of moral progress is no longer the fringe idea it was back in 1975". Pollen goes on saying in the next sentence that many strong viewed activists are convinced that the moral struggle of our time will be for animal rights. In the next paragraph Pollen says that all across Europe they have already started changing animal rights. changing the status of animals from "things" to "Beings". If already part of the world is changing the rights of animals than in America we must be on the horizon.
ReplyDeleteOn page 205 Pollan says " Though animals are still very much things in the eyes of American Law, change is in the air." After stating this claim Pollan goes on to talk about how 37 states have already made laws on some forms of animal cruelty. He also begins to talk about how big companies such as Burger King and Mcdonals are changing the way they slaughter the animals for the food they distribute. He even begins to talk about how on a recent poll 51 percent of Americans believe that primate animals should have the same rights as human children. Then again us humans being the dominant species on this planet need food to survive no matter how we kill them. I'm sure if animals over populated the human race they would kill us all.
ReplyDeleteOn page 219 pollan claims that "People who care should be working not for animals rights but animal welfare" Pollan continues saying that animals on farms should not suffer and the way they should be killed should be held painless. Then a few sentences down he explains jeremy Bentham(philosopher) and the way he describes his way of eating meat. Jeremy says "we are better for it, and they are never the worse." Death of animals are never worse when us humans have to eat. i can see where pollan is coming from and they should change animals death to less painful but no matter what us humans have to eat.I guess people don’t care about animals when they eat them because they really don’t know what goes on in a slaughter house.
ReplyDeleteOn page 212, he claims that egg and hog operations are the worst. He backs it up by saying that cows and broiling hens are allowed outside and room to move around in. Hens are shoved into an itty bitty wire box, piled on top of each other. They get emotional problems to the point of eating one another and/or rubbing themselves against the wire until they are bleeding and featherless. In order to make up for the losses of hens that can't bear that life and simply die, they starve the rest of the hens of food, water, and light to simulate a final bout of egg laying before the die.Piglets are taken away from mothers only ten days after birth commapared to 13 weeks and put on antibiotic fortified feed and have tail-docking done, where there tails are cut off without anesthesia, and are stuck under a metal roof their whole lifes without straw or sunshine or normal healthy food. Any pig that is sick is clubbed to death on the spot.
ReplyDeletei chose to talk about the line that reads, "It's one thing to choose between the chimp and the retarded child or to accept the sacrafice of allthose pigs surgeons practiced on to develop heart bypass surgery." (pg211) i found that this was a really interesting line. I liked how before hand he not only talks about how it is wrong to do animal testing on animals for things that are not going to save the humans life, and then leads on to talk about how stupid it would be to not use animals to practice things that could help the human race. I also found that his argument of the animals that are being born and raised in the farms are not used to life outside and how they can not really know that this is suffering if they are only to have experienced life inside the pin.
ReplyDeleteOn page 217 as said above, vegetarians are still killing animals whether they are eating meat or not eating meat. If everyone was a vegetarian, that would mess up the food chain and more animals would die in a variety of ways. Just because animals are being hunted does not mean that is the only way they are being killed. Of course there are animals who eat other animals and live that way. There would be alot more of that going on if everyone stopped eating meat all together. It's not like you can completely avoid killing animals and humans need to eat.
ReplyDeleteOn page 205 Pollan states that "Though animals are still very much 'things' in the eye of American law change is in the air." He continues to prove this by saying "Thirty-seven states have recently passes laws making some forms of animal cruelty a crime."
ReplyDeleteOn the bottom of page 209 Pollan claims: "Animals have never known any other life." He then goes on to back that up by stating that animals know when to wake up, stretch their limbs, excersize, and eat. Of course he also goes on to agree that making an animal suffer is wrong. However, humans surely come before animals. I agree completely. Animals can feel physical pain like humans do, and do not deserve to be tortured. But humans do come first and thats why we need to kill animals to feed the world.
ReplyDeleteI chose the claim..."So far the movement has scored some of its biggest victories in Europe." Pollan backs this up by stating things that have happened in Europe for this movement. Such as "Earlier this year, Germany became the first nation to grant animals a constitutional right: the words 'and animals' were added to a provision obliging the state to respect and protect the dignity of human beings. The farming of animals for fur was recently banned in England. In several European nations, sows may no longer be confined to crates nor laying hens to ''battery cages'' -- stacked wired cages so small the birds cannot stretch their wings. The Swiss are amending their laws to change the status of animals from 'things' to 'beings.'"
ReplyDelete