How vegan are you - 2

[Nekodaiden]

There is a thread called “How vegan are you?” that asks this question given a certain situation. If asked given that situation I’d answer the same as I did there, possibly expounding on it since having learned some things. But essentially the answer would be the same for that context. This thread is along similar lines but gives a different context:

You are on a ship at sea, deep in the ocean away from all land. This ship runs on wind power alone, so it is from at least a century past. Consequently you are not likely to see land for months.

All the food supplies are gone. The reason for this is irrelevant – it could have been a miscalculation for the passengers, it could have been damaged in some way and spoiled, or dropped into the ocean intentionally by someone who was concerned that perhaps the fish might be hungry (lol). Like I said, the reason doesn’t matter.

No food, lots of humans to feed and the ship has fishing gear. You are a Vegan, without months of fat to keep you alive and thus cannot survive long enough before land is found.

Do you partake in the hunting and killing of fish for your survival? Or do something else (describe).

 

[mavrick45]

what if you were marooned on an alien planet, you're in a spaceship, you cant leave the spaceship because there is no air to breathe outside. the food replicator has been destroyed and all the supplies and passengers were lost to a fire (which you managed to contain because you're super awesome in this scenario). you managed to save your 1 month old child.

you send a distress beacon and a rescue ship will pick you up but you'll die of starvation exactly one day before they arrive.

do you eat your own baby?

 

[Jamie in Chile]

I think these kind of questions do actually have some value because they get to the heart of what is really behind vegan philosophy in a way. So I don't think we need to be so dismissive of them.

When they come from meat eaters or trolls maybe, but this is more of a philosophical discussion. I think the poster is already vegan or vegetarian and probably not trolling.

OK the discussion doesn't have much practical value in our world, and doesn't really affect any real world decisions, and is therefore more of a curiosity.

I don't know what I'd do in this situation though.

 

[TofuRobot]

I'm always willing to entertain a plausible hypothetical situation, but this scenario is not even remotely possible.

(I'll bet the omnivores would for sure be eating any seaweed that passed by, though, if they got hungry enough. )

 

[Nekodaiden]

For those who think this implausible:

https://www.680news.com/2015/05/15/...arvation-at-sea-un-warns-of-floating-coffins/

http://phuketwan.com/tourism/horror...rd-boatpeople-perish-thirst-starvation-17607/

https://cdnc.ucr.edu/?a=d&d=SFC18900404.2.15&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN--------1

Here’s another as early as 2001 (some died of starvation even though the boat was carrying fish, others survived on the fish for a short while. )


http://www.pireport.org/articles/2001/11/13/samoan-survivors-tell-starvation-sea

Implausible isn’t therefore an answer. All but one of these is from more recent times, and it was basically a few minute search.

 

[TofuRobot]

Implausible isn’t therefore an answer. All but one of these is from more recent

I'm sorry, I thought it was a legit question you were asking of us - what would WE do. (I don't use Google to search my soul.)

Your story said "it's at least from a century past." That part makes it implausible. (Unless you know of a legit time machine?)

 

[Deleted member 3018]

what if you were marooned on an alien planet, you're in a spaceship, you cant leave the spaceship because there is no air to breathe outside. the food replicator has been destroyed and all the supplies and passengers were lost to a fire (which you managed to contain because you're super awesome in this scenario). you managed to save your 1 month old child.

you send a distress beacon and a rescue ship will pick you up but you'll die of starvation exactly one day before they arrive.

do you eat your own baby?

I can't remember where I read this, or if this was a real story or fictional. But there was a mother and a child trapped under a rubble in a way that they still could move. The mother would feed the child with her own flesh and blood, so that the child would survive.

 

[Lou]

I can't remember where I read this, or if this was a real story of fictional. But there was a mother and a child trapped under a rubble in a way that they still could move. The mother would feed the child with her own flesh and blood, so that the child would survive.

True story. Football team stuck in an airplane wreck in the Andes. They ate their own dead.

 

[Deleted member 3018]

This is fun and scary to think about. And I really don't know what I would do, but I have come up with a story, just for fun. But I don't know though.. the idea wasn't to come up with a story, you asked specificly what I would do... But I don't really know, it depends on so many different factors.

 

[Forest Nymph]

As others pointed out, in these desperate situations, people even eat other humans to survive ...it doesn't make them philosophical cannibals.

Although others have politely skirted around it, this is a blatant troll question. It's only real value is to ruminate on how humans began to eat animals in the first place. There's another version of this story well over a century ago. It's called Noahs Ark.

 

[Deleted member 3018]

To me, this wasn't a troll question... Actually, I got inspired. But I'm probably minority. Ouch.

 

[Forest Nymph]

To me, this wasn't a troll question... Actually, I got inspired. But I'm probably minority. Ouch.

It's a common form of trolling ethical vegans, there's even a trope or meme referred to as "but mah desert island tho." It's a reference to this type of extremely unlikely event, and the behavior that humans engage in under this type of need to survive ...whether it's a plane crash or ship wreck or whatever...if temporary cannibalism doesn't make someone into Hannibal Lector, I doubt eating a fish to survive would make someone into a meat eater. If anything I'd think the person would be so traumatized they would be even more likely to be vegan again once they got home. I know someone who went from vegetarian to vegan after being involved in a war bombing, and many holocaust survivors became vegetarian afterwards.

But the real point is nothing you do in this type of highly implausible circumstances makes anyone less vegan or disproves veganism in any way. The very title of this thread is misleading.

 

[Lou]

These types of hypothetical questions do have their uses. In psychology, they are often posed to people to find out how ethics works in our brains or in our culture. See The Trolley Problem. One interesting study uses an MRI to determine which parts of the brains are activated when a subject is asked different variations of the Trolley Problem.

They are also pretty good conversational starters when trying to get to know a few people quickly. Although it can be risky. And of course, they are a great way for Freshman to waste time late at night in their dorm rooms. Especially if you have a psych and/or philosophy major and a couple of blunts.

But in this context, their main use is by trolls. They are gotcha questions. Vegan traps.

IRL, under life or death circumstances, with no other viable options, most vegans wouldn't have to deliberate for very long and go join the people fishing off the stern.

Then the troll comes out from under the bridge and yells, "You're not a real vegan." or something about how really ethical people would choose death instead of betraying their values.

Let's not play this game here.

 

[TofuRobot]

Honestly I believe the only truly honest answer to this type of question is "I don't know." Human beings living in the comfort of their own homes have literally zero idea what they would do in an extreme life-and-death situation (unless they've actually been in one).

And honestly - being just a year & 1/2 outside of having been pescatarian, if eating a few bits of fish became the deciding factor that would allow me to live just long enough to survive so that I could see my child again (assuming he was back on land somewhere), I'd probably eat the fish. So what. It doesn't matter because this situation is 99.99999% ridiculous, so it's a moot point anyway. I know I have a higher chance of being struck by lightening and living to tell about it (I have a friend who was and did).

The reality is the vast majority of us are waking up in the morning with a choice, not stranded out at sea in some perilous situation.

And, that's not what veganism is about.

 

[Lou]

How ridiculous the situation is is beside the point. The point of these types of thought experiments is to pose a moral dilemma. To investigate and explore the ethical systems of thoughts.

And usually, in this type of investigation, an answer of I don't know is not allowed. The trolley is quickly approaching the baby on the track. What do you do?!

However, I don't know if the OP's question has any practical or even theoretical value.

it turns out that the trolley problem now does have some real-world value. When programming an autonomous vehicle, what kind of morality should it have? It if had to decide to steer away from a group of people only to hit one. or how about steer away from a crowd but into a wall and kill its passenger?

Oh, one final note.

You are a vegan, trapped on a desert island with nothing but a chicken, some vegan food, and a trolley traveling at 20mph. The trolley is about to destroy your vegan food. if you pull the lever your food is saved but a chicken dies. Do you pull it?

 

[Forest Nymph]

"Trapped on a desert island with a moving trolley" lol! It is an interesting question but if there's an operating trolley on the island there might be a grocery store or at least more people and possibly a farm, or a telephone.

 

[TofuRobot]

You are a vegan, trapped on a desert island with nothing but a chicken, some vegan food, and a trolley traveling at 20mph. The trolley is about to destroy your vegan food. if you pull the lever your food is saved but a chicken dies. Do you pull it?

*Yikes* Not even going to go there, LOL

 

[TofuRobot]

"Trapped on a desert island with a moving trolley" lol! It is an interesting question but if there's an operating trolley on the island there might be a grocery store or at least more people and possibly a farm, or a telephone.

Maybe someone on the trolley just came from the grocery store and has a bag full of veggies

 

[Nekodaiden]

To me, this wasn't a troll question... Actually, I got inspired. But I'm probably minority. Ouch.

Thank you. I wouldn't be too concerned what other people think. This is a message board, and all we can see from people's lives is what they share here. Not everyone is honest, and after a while you can pick up things from what they say. Be careful what ideas you adopt just out of fear or favor of *perceived* public opinion. There are at least 2 people on this mb who do not like me and try to use group think to influence public opinion.

 

[Sax]

How ridiculous the situation is is beside the point. The point of these types of thought experiments is to pose a moral dilemma.

What's ridiculous is that it isn't even a moral dilemma.

Honestly I believe the only truly honest answer to this type of question is "I don't know."

You don't know if you'd rather starve to death than kill fish?


I agree with Forest Nymph...obvious troll. Killing animals in a survival situation doesn't make you less vegan and choosing to starve to death doesn't make you more vegan. It makes you an idiot.