Thanks, Sindark, "Oryx and Crake" is on my reading list, but I have been keeping it at arm's length, the same treatment I am giving to Cormac McCarthy's "The Road."

As for cloning: I thought its defenders were now saying that all the old problems associated with Dolly and her generation were fixed, and we have nothing to worry about, nor will the baby cloned animals, they will be just fine.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

As if eating it sparingly makes the dead pigs feel any better. Demand for pork--even demand from those who only eat it occasionally--is what drives these sick experiments, not that you, or any flesh eater, should be held complicit. The meat machine is just too big, and growing every day as feedlots pop up in countries that now emulate our Standard American Diet. SAD, indeed.

I also recommend Oryx & Crake, Atwood is stellar.

BW,
Tom Philpott has written frequently and forthrightly in the cause of the humane treatment of farm animals, and I am very grateful to him for that.  And that is why I try not to nag him acidly over his persistent carnivory. : )

(I do not nag anybody, I hope; that would be quite counter to how I believe ethical evolution should work.)

That said, you make (implicitly) a very good point in your first sentence.  It makes no sense that he should apologize to vegans for his pork-eating habit (if apologizing is what he actually was trying to do); it is the pigs who deserve the apologies.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

And yet, would pigs even exist anymore if we did not eat them?  

It is Michael Pollan, I believe, who makes the argument that chickens (and pigs, and tulips, and apples) made an evolutionary bargain with humans in order to propagate their species: they are yummy.  And tulips are beautiful. And dogs and cats are loving companions (or suffer us to live, depending on whether you are a dog- or a cat-person).

I just finished reading Matthew Pearl's Poe Shadow (not quite as gripping as his Dante Club, but not a bad read) and I was interested by the description of bands of pigs, roaming the streets of downtown Baltimore, as it was their "job" to clean the streets by eating all the garbage thereon.

I'm more often struck these days about how difficult it would be to live a truly "sustainable" (there's that word again, Canis) life without animals within our 'loop.' Chickens can forage for grass and bugs and turn it into eggs & nitrogen-rich fertilizer for us; in turn we provide them shelter, grain, and propagation of the species. Certainly, it seems like a poor deal in the end if we turn around and eat them - but if you're truly dedicated to living a local & sustainable life, what are you supposed to eat in February in New York? (Yes, yes, I know, potatoes and apples and squash. Strawberry season seems oh so very far off.....)

My point is not that it is perfectly OK and ethical to eat meat - obviously killing any animal carries a certain amount of ethical weight.  My point is that we should not feel too badly for the pig. Look at it as a bargain struck; we will raise you healthily and happily, let you forage in woods and pasture, let you roll in mud and play, feed you healthy food and give you love and attention - in return you will lay down your life, early, in order to feed us.  Your species will survive; your life will be short, but happpy.  I think that some creatures in the wild would take us up on this bargain.

The true tragedy comes in when we rob the pig of our part of the bargain: the happy, healthy (albeit short) life.  The bargain looks distinctly the worse when you say: we will stuff you into pens with 10,0000 of your friends & family; you will live on top of reeking manure pits, be subject to disease, be pumped full of drugs, hardly be able to move, or sit, or think. Then we will kill you.  Your species will survive; your life will be short, but miserable.

Therein lies the reason that those of us who are Carnivores with a Conscience choose to eat sparingly of humanely-raised, heritage breed, small farm, happy pigs.

Why not just get omega 3s straight from the plant source?  Walnuts and hemp and flax seeds have lots of omega 3 fatty acids and are a lot cheaper than meat. This kind of technological manipulation of animals is sickening.

kmp-
"Look at it as a bargain struck; we will raise you healthily and happily, let you forage in woods and pasture, let you roll in mud and play, feed you healthy foodfeed you healthy food and give you love and attention"  

Wow, you are naive.  Those kind of conditions exist on an extremely small number of farms. And even on small farms, cruelty exists. Visit a local farm animal sanctuary and talk to the owners and they can tell you some stories about the family farmers near them. While many of the animals they rescue come from factory farms, a significant number are coming from these family farmers who we all like to think are so much more humane.  It's often an illusion.

Why is it necessary for domestic pigs and other domestic animals to exist at their current levels?  Currently 50 billion domestic animals are killed each year on this planet for meat. So I don't think there's any danger of running out of animal fertilizer any time soon, so that is not a legitimate excuse for you not to give up meat. Everybody who gives up meat or eats much less of it contributes to reducing the over-breeding of domestic animals and that is vital.  

Domestic animals, most of whom live miserable lives on factory farms and feedlots, are causing huge amounts of environmental damage, including climate change (cows and sheep produce huge quantities of methane which is many times more harmful than CO2), rainforest destruction, soil erosion, and air and water pollution and are contributing to the spread of diseases such as bird flu.  We do a favor to these animals and to the environment when we just don't breed them in the first place. Better to not breed an animal than to breed an animal and cause it to suffer and  damage ecosystems.  Lets use our resources on protecting and re-populating rare wild animals, not domestic animals.  

I feel all meat products sales will fall off sharply. The high price of corn and other grains because everyone are switching to corn from growing other grains.

A poor choice for ethanol in the first place and now the price of any food corn based is rising right along with the price of gas.

A straight to grain to human consumption makes more sense. The middle stage of feeding a hog or cattle for consumption may soon be a luxury we can't afford.

Would it not be great if they made the ethanol out of sugar cane and just raised the price of sugar through the roof. Less sugar in the diet, more vegtables and grain with the pork cut out, having to walk and bike more to save energy.

You would probably get some kind of planatary shift when 300,000,000 million fat Ass americans lost on average of 50# each. Health care cost cut in half and the only hogs left were in petting zoo's.

The eons of time and nature was good to us down here. It was not until we become civilized that destroying our habitat become fathomable or fashionable.

it's been a long time since I was called naive. Maybe never?  It gave me a laugh for sure.

I believe I stated that factory farming of any animal, pigs included, is a tragedy. I did not mean to imply that many farms are living up to our end of the "bargain" with pigs; just that they should do so.  However, simply because humane and happy farms are few and far between, does not mean that I am naive to suspect that they exist.

In fact, I know that they exist. I buy my pork from one farm, and one farm only. I've met the farmers and I trust them.  They are raising happy pigs, they are keeping the Large Black, Gloucestershire Old Spot and Tamworth breeds from extinction, and they are providing me with truly superb, healthy pork.  In the meantime they have carved out a life for themselves in the hills of the Adirondacks, doing something they love to do.  If I could not buy my pork from them, or other farmers like them, I likely would stop eating it entirely; but since these farms do exist, I get to enjoy the luxury of eating pork once or twice a month, and they get to live where they want, do what they love, and make a living at it.

Eating meat is a privelege; not a right, not a mandate, and not a necessity. I eat meat because I like it, not because I don't know that I can get protein, or iron, or omega 3's elsewhere.  (Actually I don't eat fish, because I don't like it, so any omega 3's I get come from flax & walnuts).  I was simply pointing out that, without being a farmer, I realize more and more these days that animals have a significant place on a farm - it would likely be impossible to run a completely self-sustaining farm without them. Granted, there doesn't appear to be a necessity to kill the animals on the farm... but then, in the words of the immortal Vincent Vega, "Pork chops taste good."

I eat meat because I like it, not because I don't know that I can get protein, or iron, or omega 3's elsewhere.

This is usually how this kind of discussion ends (when it is with an educated person, at least).

Awareness of the alternatives. An understanding of the cruelty--even at your tiny local farm there is, indeed, cruelty--and a knowledge of the severe environmental degradation that demand for meat perpetuates; but in the end it's a matter of taste. "I do it because I like it." I would suggest that this is a poor way to defend any decision you make in you life.

Two additional comments:

"Carnivores with a Conscience" is one of the most ridiculous oxymorons I've ever heard. As is the idea that a pig can somehow be happy while getting fattened for slaughter and then, ultimately, being slaughtered.

To the question of what to do with all these man-made (or at least, man-modified) species? It's not a hard answer: let them live out the remainder of their lives in peace until they are all extinct (I can hear the gasps now). Cows, pigs and chickens are miserable creatures bred for one purpose only: to live, be tortured, die and have their flesh feasted upon. They are a shadow of their genetic forebears. They would not and could not exist without us. Their species are already extinct, you see? Let them rest in peace.

Thanks, Mill-luhn.  The discussion of genre is interesting: sci-fi vs. fantasy vs. whatever.

(Where by the way does "sindark" come from?  Sin + dark?  Which rather reminds me of something that I think Balzac said: "Je prends mon café noir et amer, juste comme ma pauvre âme est noire et amère.")

Kaela,
I like Michael Pollan a lot, but I do not think that even so thoughtful a writer and researcher as he is to be believed, when he says that chickens and the rest "made an evolutionary bargain with humans in order to propagate their species."  It is certainly true that there are lots more chickens (and the rest) than there would have been had their wild ancestors been left to do as they please, generally ignored by us, in the forests of South Asia (and wherever the rest come from).  But it is important to emphasize, first, that the first chickens (and the rest) to be domesticated were completely vulnerable, helpless and without choice in the matter of their domestication; and secondly, that the great numbers of members of a species are of no obvious direct advantage to the individual members themselves; often quite the reverse.  Only a Catholic-oid ethics would demand that chickens be grateful that there are billions of other chickens alive in CAFOs everywhere.

Nevertheless, though I do not trust Pollan on the subject, I agree that the co-evolution of human beings and some animals is a good thing, conditions being good, for the animals as well as for the humans.  At present, I get the impression that dogs have been perhaps the only animal truly necessary for human survival in many regions, climates and terrains; and usually -- by no means always! -- humans have not wanted to eat their dogs.

Also, I am not sure that raising animals for meat always condemns them to a life that is shorter than the one they would have enjoyed in nature.  That is true very often, but not always.  Humane confinement of animals offers them many benefits: a reliable food supply, and protection from predators and ailments.

As for "I eat meat because I like it": Ethicists would not consider that an end of any kind, whether edifying or not.

One's enjoyment in eating meat is indeed a positive value, with the kind of value that we call "aesthetic," and such values are not at all to be denied or made of little account.  But the life of the animal whose meat is to be eaten is associated with values of a different kind, called "moral": the good of the animal, according to the animal's own interests, in staying alive (which tends to be more recognizable to us in the case of pigs than in that of, say, snails); and our own good, in being true to our responsibility to respect the interests of sentient beings.  So ethicists ask, Which value is more weighty: that of the human carnivore, who says, "I eat meat because I like it," or that of the to-be-eaten animal, who might say, "I have a life, and I am keenly interested in not losing it," allied with that of the human being who says, "My good depends in part on my acting morally, which includes respecting the interests of sentient beings"?

And as you must see, asking such a question is just the beginning of a whole new great discussion.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

A corollary to that is "Vegans without a Superiority Complex". Now that is THE most ridiculous oxymoron. Why is it that damn near all vegans think that their s#it don't stink?

"Economics will save the world!"

-"No, it won't!"

"Veganism will save the world!"

-"No, it won't!"

I don't know why I jumped in this time - sometimes I just can't help myself.  

I admit that the "I eat meat because I like it" is a bit glib, but, in reality, that's what it boils down to.  Maybe, to be a bit more expansive, that statement includes, in my mind: "I eat meat because I like it, and I find it morally acceptable to do so, as long as my meat eating does not contribute to undue suffering for the animal."

Those two little words, "undue suffering," encompass the bulk of the argument, in my understanding.  Those who eat no meat, or no animal products of any kind, tend to think that those of us who do partake are complicit in the entire spectrum of meat-production-for-human-consumption, (even the ridiculous omega-3 sickly pigs of Tom's original post), e.g. "If no one ate pork, there would be no need for any pig to ever suffer." Frankly, I call that assessment naive and overly simplistic.  No one eats humans, but there sure is a lot of human suffering.  Very few people are indulging in coakroach souffle, but that doesn't stop millions of them from being poisoned each year. (Well, I'm guessing here - I have no idea how many coakroaches are wiped out each year... but you get my point).

I can sympathize with the vegan/vegetarian position; I was a vegetarian for years back in my college days.  I have great respect for people who abstain from animal flesh on moral grounds, or environmental grounds, or religious grounds (or whatever grounds they choose), and would never try to denigrate that choice.  I have less respect for those who denigrate my choice, and in fact my very ability to choose (Canis is a noted exception here, as he generally approaches discussion with us wayward carnivores with respect). Carnivores and vegetarians will always disagree about the moral acceptability of killing an animal an eating it; no big surprise, as various peoples have been disagreeing about moral rules for millenia.

As for Mr. Pollan and the evolutionary advantage of a species becoming a diet staple - I'm sure his contention was a bit tongue-in-cheek; I believe he states it "Are we using them or are they using us?"  You are absolutely correct when you state that the propagation of the species does nothing for the chicken that is destined to be Sunday dinner; that is exactly the point.  Evolution is not designed to benefit the individual, it is designed to benefit (i.e. propagate) the species, often to the detriment of the individual. Note that it is not "survival of the happiest" or "survival of the most loving" it is "survival of the fittest." Evolution is all about adapting to the environment you are living in in order to ensure the survival of the species; perhaps somehow chicken DNA read the writing on the wall and decided to thrown their lot in with the two-legged apes who seemed to be running the show.

The point is not whether chickens were evolutionarily adapted to become dinner or whether omega-3 pigs would never be produced if we all stopped eating meat: the point is that this is an unwinnable argument from either side of the fence.  I don't expect, nor want, to change any vegetarian's mind about eating meat; I just expect the same respect in return.

You wrote: What if I stop? What will change? - Tom, change occurs with one person at a time. Every week you bring us this horrify stories, surely by now, you would know that is not good!

Industries are create dthrough demand. Demand is created through poeople. If people stop a demand for product x and want more of product y, those industries are going to investment in Y more.

Consumers are 100% responsible for causing demand. So why don't you stop one less demand!

I dare ya!

JavaEarth:- The happy vegan!

La mère, la mer, l'amer. The mother, the ocean, the embittered one. Oh my america! My new found land!

The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.

Now you are just being silly. - If you think most vegans feel we are better than other people, maybe that something to do with how you feel, and nothing to do a vegan!

Maybe when the topic of eating animals comes up you feel outof sorts. But please do nto take it out on vegans. We are not sub/super humans, we are just people trying to our best in a less than perfect world. My actions as vegan, aims to reduce cruelty, but before you start pointing fingers, how about you ask yourself a) what are you doing to reduce cruelty and b) is it enough?

Ps. Next time you meet a vegan try not to not pre-judge.

"Demand for pork--even demand from those who only eat it occasionally--is what drives these sick experiments, not that you, or any flesh eater, should be held complicit."

Absolutely not...that's completely against common sense.

I'd never knowingly eat a GMO animal.  Never buy it or try it.  Thus, no market.  Given that most consumers prefer labels, it's just as wrong to assume that "because you eat meat, you are driving these sick experiments."

It is the nature of our industrial paradigm that is driving these disturbing experiments, not meat eaters.

It is the nature of our industrial paradigm that is driving these disturbing experiments, not meat eaters.

The difference, I suppose then, is that some of us are actively trying to remove ourselves from that paradigm (veganism being only one such way) while others are content to accept it.

I'm not happy simply hoping for change, I'm going to live the dream to the best of my ability, and educate others as I go.

There's a market in Houston (Central Market) where they were offering Iberico ham at $150/lb when I was there visiting family over the holidays.

It isn't entirely surprising, but a bit disheartening perhaps to find this friction between non-meat eaters and even those who want to bring about a more humane method of meat production. Yes, we've all looked at this through the prism of morality (I'd like to think) and for whatever reason we've all reached different points where we feel we can balance dietary needs, gustatory pleasure, and our own individual sense of morality.

Almost amusing how fervently we stake out our various moral grounds in this corner of the dietary world that so minuscule compared to the vast swathes of Hormels and Pudues in the world.

For my part I believe that there is a way to do meat production morally, humanely, kindly. I was raised in a family that did not hide from itself the fact that in order for us to eat meat an individual had to die. To those who disagree I say that I understand you position and in fact have shared your position for a number of years in my life. I just don't happen to now, and am not likely to budge in my dotage.

I've expressed my assumption that there does exist a method of producing meat that is, in fact, not only humane, but more to the point it is needed in order to provide an alternative to the industrialized feed lot production of meat. I also hold with the idea that it is immoral to ignore the fact that a creature an individual in no way less worthy to live than myself, had it's life taken from it. To address the issue candidly, I suppose I am able to accept this unpleasant reality because I tend to a. look at the continued survival of the species/breed rather than the individual and b.) i honestly can't think of an animal(humans included) that lives forever. Not an apology, but that's what I have to work with; awareness of my own mortality and moral shades of gray.

If all eaters were forced into black and white polarities along moral stands regarding meat consumption (vegan vs. meat eaters) with no allowance for shades of acceptable animal product consumption in between then what viability can there possibly for a farmer/rancher who seeks to do things "the right way"? Clearly, none. For some of you, granted, such a thing simply does not exist; "moral" and "animal production" simply do not jibe, but i wonder if you can agree that there is a world of difference between the way meat is mass produced via industrial channels and the way  Iberico pigs are brought up roaming the hillsides and grazing on acorns.

I simply don't see that it is feasible for the majority of people in this country to leap directly from darkness and into the blazing light  of vegan existence. Some of is, in fact, felt the need to step back into some bit of shade. We perhaps need to build the smaller steps where some consensus might be built to counter the darker and decidedly unhealthy practices of our "food" industry.

Luckily, the spectrum is wide ranging, and luckily people are likely able to move along the moral spectrum. I happen to like diversity of thought. My only real point is this: some of us who do eat meat do not do so only because we lack awareness of the moral implications. Some of us do so directly because of concerted deliberation on the matter and not simply "because we like it". We may consume meat infrequently, and we may acquire our meats from a very limited number of trusted sources, and pay a high monetary premium because of it. But please be assured of our very real conviction that to not ensure the viability of our trusted, humane (yes, by our estimation) producers (and possibly the viability of certain breeds of animals) could very likely count as a greater crime in the big picture than the occasional act of killing an animal in order to consume its flesh.

I see a lot of excuse and lack of personal accountability. There are so many healthy food choices, and yet we continue to chose death. I am very puzzled at that.

Its funny, people pray and cry and reach out to the heavens for peace and love in this world. Christ we even have "useless" governments to make sure there is peace. Well exactly how much peace and love are you giving?

It is so easy to say "my" choice to eat animals, "my" right to eat animals, "my" views to eat animals, "my" health to eat animals. And we wonder why this society has got so selfish.

If there were no choices, sure eat animals, eat anything you can. But there are choices, and yet you chose death.

You can have your PHD, and your science and your facts. But the final result is the same you are killing innocent animals - for what. Cause your selfish!

And yes, everything comes to an end. But that does not mean we have the right to take a life.

You can take your factory farming, so called humane "slaughter house", your chemicals, your pump up hormones, your Mad cow disease, your marketing spin for "free range". You can take the grains from the dying people of this world and feed them to animals, and be overweight, you can do whatever you want. But the fact remains, every time a animal dies for your consumption, you are being selfish.

Wendell Berry, Chief Oren Lyons and others say it much more eloquently than me...

But, so I agree, it is of paradigm...but eating meat, as Jazgar eloquently writes, is a choice arrived at after much moral deliberation and thought.

Personally, if I did not grow up in a community of shared agrarian and relatively non-industrial values, I'm not sure where I'd come out.  But seeing farmers, whose children I grew up with, treating animals better than they often treated themselves, in terms of health care, and even intra-family relationships, maybe I would not advocate that eating meat fits an agrarian and ecological perspectve.

For Javaearth, calling me selfish could provoke the easy reply that you're essentially being intolerant, of not considering alternative farming methods which, paradoxically, created the industrial agricultural system.

But you seem to go even further, Javaearth.  So a simple question...how is it a matter of choice, yet an absolute moral conclusion as well, for you?

And though this might seem stupid, it applies...what of animals that eat animals?

Lion:
a) no choice of millons of different foods
b) no factory farming
c) no chemicals
d) no horrible years of confinement
e) no pollution caused due to factory/intensive farming

Human animals

...okay... you get my point, we have the greatest ability in choices, yet we chose the worst ones, for our own health, for the health and kindness involved for the animals, and for the planet at large!

BTW. - vegans did not create an "industrial agricultural system". What are you talking about!

By me calling "you" selfish I am intolerant. Just because I used a word. Selfish. So by you commiting the act (which is great than any word)of eating animals what does that make you?

"Lion:
a) no choice of millons of different foods
b) no factory farming
c) no chemicals
d) no horrible years of confinement
e) no pollution caused due to factory/intensive farming"

How about chimpanzees, with a choice but still eating meat?

But you're pronouncing an absolute rule against meat eating, while in the same breath, saying "eat anything" in times of emergency, scarcity or necessity.  What of cannabalism, when no other options exist?  That ok?

Sorry for the fast thought about how our industrial paradigm emerged, and metastasized into our agricultural system.  I'm not blaming that one on the vegans  ;)

Intolerant because the word selfish, defined as "devoted to or caring only for oneself; concerned primarily with one's own interests, benefits, welfare, etc., regardless of others," absolutely mischaracterizes my position of agreement with Wendell Berry and others, writing of farming as a set of ancient values, of stewardship, of morals, of a people on a land.  When done with respect, farming of plants and animals rises to the level of a sacrament (or moral equivalent for those who don't believe in God), but when done badly, as in industrial agriculture, farming and anyone's contribution to the system, essentially is a form of sin (or moral equivalent in relativistic systems).

My point, is that "organic" in a Wendell Berry sense, eliminates the "factory" from the farm, no horrible years of confinement, (almost all) chemicals, etc...

In that way, meat farming returns to the ecological paradigm in which it evolved, and as such, becomes more sacrament than industry.

Thanks CC for your thoughtful civility in this discussion, may it help to calm the sometimes rude intensity of others who post on this raw topic. So far we have seen thankfully little of the worst extremes of virulent anti-veganism and anti-carnivory that often infects these threads. Let us all emulate CC's fine example. and try to maintain the greatest respect for both vegans and thoughtful carnivores alike, and all variations in between.

I myself stopped eating meat in the early 1980's not so much for ethical/religious reasons as because of my growing awareness of the thoroughly untrustworthy nature of industrial meat production. Had reliable alternative sources been available to me at that time I would probably have settled into the Philpott camp and most likely would still be there. As it was, over time  I just lost the habit and the taste for meat (I remember being immediately thankful that I would never again have to eat ground beef, which I suddenly realized I had always loathed without ever being directly aware of it).

For some reason I continued to eat fish, and though I was very aware of abuses in the dairy industry I appreciated the convenience of eggs and cheese too much to give them up (I had always disliked milk though since early childhood). I eventually derived an ex post facto rule for my fish habit (which had never included shellfish or catfish, avoided for reasons of taste): I would eat only active predators. Any kind of farmed fish would thus be excluded, as well as the bottom-feeding garbage hounds, thus neatly justifying my lack of interest in catfish. Any animal though that chased down and ate other creatures in the wild seemed fair game.

Rules are helpful because they offer restrictions: an answer of some kind to the now notorious Omnivore's Dilemma. I like this one because of the moral symmetry (eat and be eaten), because it imposes some fair measure of personal risk on the human participants (ocean fishing is a dangerous occupation, and eating so high on the food chain places a karmic concentration of any stray toxins in the top predator) and because it ensures that I have a self-interest in maintaining a healthy habitat for these creatures.

It also gives me a (fairly) straightforward answer to the inevitable questions about why I eat what I eat. And no, I am not obliged by this rule to eat all and any predators. Leopards, cheetahs and hawks have nothing to fear from me. It is not of course an absolute and unchallengeable answer, even for my own internal discourse, and I don't exclude the notion that I may make myself a more or less restrictive rule in the future.

I will also confess I occasionally break my own rule. Recently I sampled some artisanally-raised pork, wondering if it made a difference. Gotta say though that despite the fabled attraction of the forbidden and the stellar reputation of the farmer, it was really nothing special. I think I'd be pretty unhappy if I knew I'd never again taste a perfect pear, a succulent roast parsnip, or a fine avocado vinaigrette. But a piece of hohum grilled meat? Not so much.

Anyway, to return to some vestige of relevance to the OP, I am glad that my own personal line in the sand would seem to keep me well away from the slippy slope of genetic manipulation, of which the excellent Tom Philpott unearthed this gross example for us.

What are these people thinking?

The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.

If an old breed of Spanish pigs can already produce omega-3 fatty acids, then why is a roundworm gene being engineered into pig DNA?? - my guess is so that the pig can be patented - just doing a good "old-fashioned" breeding program with pig varieties would not get the researchers a patented pig.

As we see with cattle, salmon and may other animals - the nature of the fat produced is often closely related to the animal's diet - but you cannot patent a diet either.

Martha Noble Sustainable Agriculture Coalition

Evolution is not designed to benefit the individual, it is designed to benefit (i.e. propagate) the species, often to the detriment of the individual.  kmp

Evolution (per the scientific theory) is not designed nor does it exist for a purpose. Instead it is the consequence of natural (and, perhaps more recently, unnatural) forces.   What causes evolution to occur affects individuals, but evolution itself does not once a set of chromosomes are created and an individual is produced.  

Evolution is likewise not for the benefit of a species, a species being defined in different ways, but ultimately being a collection of gene frequencies that arise, change and pass away over time.  

kmp wrote...

"Look at it as a bargain struck; we will raise you healthily and happily, let you forage in woods and pasture, let you roll in mud and play, feed you healthy food and give you love and attention - in return you will lay down your life, early, in order to feed us."

So, if we stick you in a fenced yard, limit your freedom to what we consider appropriate, select your mates for you, and kill you during the prime of your life, you would consider this a pretty good bargain?

While consuming animal flesh is natural for the human species, there are limits to how far one should go to justify the behavior. Just my opinion. I consume meat, but I'm not about to pretend I'm doing the animals a favor. And I find it frightening that folks can love an animal -- watching is roll in the mud and play -- and then kill it.

By the way, based on the number of feral pigs running about, it looks like the species would survive just fine without our "assistance".

Just a rant...

Genetic engineering and cloning of sentient beings should be banned.

(1) Humans are moving away from the abuse of animals. Why do we want to find a new reason for exploiting them?

(2) It is clear that animals are not the most energy-efficient source of protein under most circumstances. Why use them as sources of nutrients already available from plants?

(3) We already have practical sources of nutrients like omega-3 fatty acids. Aren't there better things to spend research dollars on?

(4) Humans are exposed to various health risks from consuming animals --  due to the nature of the animals and how we raise them. Perhaps eliminate those risks before using the animals for additional purposes.

(5) Genetic engineering and cloning inevitably result in numerous abnormal animals or plants. Imposing this on a sentient creature is cruel and immoral.

I thought I had a few other reasons, but I have to go collect some samples from my genetically engineered plants.

Peace.

Excellent advice, WiscIdea.

The difficulty of keeping farm animals, whom one intends to slaughter, in a familiar, friendly, affectionate sort of relationship, was nearly three millennia ago presented in the Prophet Nathan's poignant parable to King David, about the beloved pet ewe-lamb ("la ovejita," in my Latin American Bible), who somehow got kidnapped, or arrested, or whatever, and was subsequently served for dinner: see 2 Samuel 12.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

CC, I present no argument. As I wrote, it is merely a post hoc justification and like all such is easy to riddle with holes. I just feel worse eating creatures less gentle than myself.

The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.

I feel worse eating creatures gentler than myself.

The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.