Commenter Zaleriana says:
The one that always confounds me is vegans not eating honey, but happy to eat produce pollinated by captive bees. How is that rationalized?
I have no idea. Probably, like me, they never thought of it before.
« Should vegetarians wear leather? | Main | Another good question » Good point23 Jan 2008 12:32 pm Comments (48)
It's not obvious that bees are 'captive'. Unlike a cow, a swarm can fly away at any time and choose a new residence. Which raises the interesting legal question: if a swarm from one of your hives decides to reestablish itself in, say, a tree on my property, do you have any claim on the bees - do I owe you something? Did you really own them in the first place, if you couldn't control them? There is a long tradition of legal debate on this, going all the way back to ancient Rome. 
Do vegans slap mosquitoes that land on them?
Honey? You mean bee spit? What about manure from captive cows? Should Vegans not support petroleum-based fertilizers?
Ugh! All this thinking about the consequences of my actions is making my brain hurt!!!!1 I better just take glee in the mass slaughter of sentient animals, its just sooooo much easier.
All this thinking about the consequences of my actions is making my brain hurt RickM: Maybe if you tried thinking more often, it would hurt less.
Lampwick: Most of the bees used to pollinate commercially are most definitely captive--they get trucked around the country to pollinate whatever is in season. I guess it would be possible to have "bee-safe" almonds, apples, pears and whatnot, but since I've never heard of even vegans being concerned about it, there probably isn't a market.
I better just take glee in the mass slaughter of sentient animals, its just sooooo much easier. Impressive. You've managed to both ignore the logical extension of your moral precepts, and simultaneously be preachy about those of others. Sweet man.
Zaleriana - The fact that their hives are transportable is besides the point. While its workers are out foraging, a colony can form a swarm and leave at any time, taking up residence in some other shelter. They don't do this often, but it happens, and it's hard to stop them from doing this without closing up the entrances to the hive.
Freddie and Rob- I was mocking those people who act like a pig in shit spared from the slaughterhouse when they point out the alleged hypocrisy of vegans and vegetarians. As if fastidiously adherence to a moral position is more important than being correct about a moral position. I've seen glimpses of it in the comments of this blog, but head over to any discussion on animal welfare over at Hit N' Run, and you'll be slathered in it.
How about silk? Do vegans wear silk?
As far as I understand vegan theory on the subject, they won't eat honey because it's stealing ("exploiting") the production of the bees, and their own food, and kills larvae in the harvesting process. However, pollination is merely a byproduct of the bees' own feeding, and involves no man-caused bee-death and thus not a moral issue for them. (The more I think about it, the more I see parallels between ethical-veganism and Marxism, if only in the quasi-redefinitions of terms like exploitation that they seem to use.) Rick: If it helps - which I doubt it will - most of us (I cannot speak for all, of course) mock "ethical" vegans because we believe they're being ridiculously sanctimonious and that we are, in fact, holding a (not the only, but a) correct moral position by happily eating meat and raising animals.
Which raises the interesting legal question: if a swarm from one of your hives decides to reestablish itself in, say, a tree on my property, do you have any claim on the bees - do I owe you something? Anyway, the Court held that as bees are ferae naturae (of a wild nature) and thus the plaintiff only had a qualified property in them. When the bees swarmed away he only had that property in them "so long as they were in his sight and so long as he had power to pursue them." Once the bees crossed over to his neighbour's land he no longer could legally pursue them and thus he lost all property in the bees.
lampwick: And cattle on public land (prevelant in the West) can do much the same thing, minus the taking up residence part. The legal issue w/r/t the swarm is does the owner of the bees obtain ownership of whatever the bees chose for shelter. Sigivald: Thanks. But if honey is "exploitation," how is managed pollination involving captive bees not also "exploitation"? Okay, there is the killing of larvae, but is that the only reason? If not, I truly fail to see the difference.
Heh, the whole bees thing has kind of amused me. For so long, I didn't even realize that they had to use bees to make a lot of produce. Then when I found out they did, and then there was the whole Colony collapse disorder, my reaction was: "Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaait a second. The *whole* time, these bees were giving you a valuable, free gift, that you came to completely rely on, but during that immense time, you never bothered to figure out the mechanism by which bees persist and decide to pollinate *your* fruit, or in any way develop any hedge against the possibility that this free gift would stop being hurled at you like manna from heaven? Goddamn, you guys are like the Big Three automakers and oligopoly-price-funded pension plans!" In any case, even where the bees are free to fly away, it still sounds like rationalization: "Hey, *I'm* not exploiting the bees. I'm just relocating them to a place near my fruit, which just happens to be necessary for their existence. If they want to risk death by choosing a farther-away food source, that's between them and their god, or the queen, as the case may be." Also, I thought organic producers relied on existing bees in the area and didn't have to import any or otherwise have to alter existing freely-chosen bee patterns? Guess we're not so "in tune with nature", are we?
As if fastidiously adherence to a moral position is more important than being correct about a moral position. Funny thing is, I agree. So I'll remember you feel that way that the next time a "values" Republican or evangelical pastor turns out to be gay or adulterous. Do vegans wear silk? Hugo Pottisch, our resident animal-rights extremist (where has he been?), doesn't.
Oh: and one day, I play to set up shop next to someone using bees, and find some way to attract them, so they prefer the stuff on *my* land, then trap them. Hey dudes -- tough luck, but the bees happened to choose to come to *me*. Sorry your business model relies on animals making the right decisions, but for now, you're out of bees.
Most of the bees used to pollinate commercially are most definitely captive--they get trucked around the country to pollinate whatever is in season. You naive fool! One species wanders great distances hauling the other to one supply after another of rich food sources and you haven't yet figured out who is in charge? I think the case is quite clear that bees are exerting mind control on beekeepers.
"Sorry your business model relies on animals making the right decisions, but for now, you're out of bees."-Posted by Person Excellent! Now is the time for me to begin marketing my patented laser bee branding iron. You'll be hanged as a bee rustler in no time.
When the bees swarmed away he only had that property in them "so long as they were in his sight and so long as he had power to pursue them." Am I the only one amused by the image of this guy running around "pursuing" his bees?
Many of these questions are ridiculous, because they imply that there is a Supreme Vegan Church somewhere or an International Treaty of Veganism. Vegans, or more generally, "veg*ans" (thanks, Megan, Roger Maris, or whoever for the term), are simply people who want their diets to be as free as possible from the abuse of animals. There is inevitably disagreement about just what constitutes animal abuse and how far one is obligated to go in distancing oneself from this abuse. It is doubtful, based on science, that insects are sentient, and even more unlikely that they have a sense of self or see their lives as a narrative. So to answer one question, no, I have no problem with slapping mosquitoes. (I also have no problem with defending myself by whatever means necessary against dogs, bears, or human beings, all of whom are sentient.) Modern civilization has been built on the exploitation, often brutal, of both humans and animals. We are all up to our ears in both kinds of exploitation. It is unrealistic to demand that anyone live a life utterly free from the exploitation of others, but it is not unrealistic to demand that everyone try to be conscious of how they live and to do what they can in their own life and in the public arena to lessen the abuse of humans and (other) animals. For anyone who is seriously interested in the moral status of animals, there is a large philosophical literature out there, comprising hundreds of books and essays written by philosophers over the last thirty or so years -- pro and con, and from a variety of ethical positions: Kantian, modified Kantian, utilitarian, contractarian (both Hobbesian and Rawlsian), feminist, Catholic and non-Catholic. Here's a place to start looking: http://www.shabkar.org/download/pdf/Animals_Ethics_Rights_Law_Bibliography.pdf
they imply that there is a Supreme Vegan Church somewhere Wait, there isn't? With all the proselytizing, it didn't seem like such a crazy assumption...
I'm with Njarl - it's hard to call bees "captive" when you are building them a home which they are free to leave and driving them around to choice food supplies. It sounds like a voluntary and pareto-efficient transaction to me.
Mignheer, What definition of "sentient" do you use?
still a repugnant conclusion issue for ethical vegans, because there are free bees, too (so adding the unhappy captive worker bees can't be worse)? http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/repugnant-conclusion/
mijnheer: Sooo, I take it you are a vegan who has no problem with honey. Fine. No problem with drawing the line at insects. My question is different--why a problem with honey, but not with managed pollination? Both exploit bees. No one has an answer.
Jacob K wrote: Anyway, the Court held that as bees are ferae naturae (of a wild nature) and thus the plaintiff only had a qualified property in them....Once the bees crossed over to his neighbour's land he no longer could legally pursue them and thus he lost all property in the bees. A term that is also applied to many forms of game animals, and which originated in English Common Law IIRC. However, it does not apply to... zaleriana wrote: And cattle on public land (prevelant in the West) can do much the same thing, minus the taking up residence part. Cattle are not normally considered wild and the rightful owner can still assert a property right. He or she could also be held liable for harm to person or property caused by the animal. And I would imagine that failure to clearly identify the property (e.g. a registered brand mark, or a tag) might weaken the property right. Couldn't comment on specific precedents, though, as I mainly just buy 'em from the grocer.
Because if you do choose to eat honey, you get to hear the following, all the time: "So bees don't count as animals?! You hypocrite!!" If you do choose to go vegan, you have to deal with stuff like that from a load of people who are trying to discredit your choices via nitpicking and minutia (instead of, you know, having a mutually respectful big-picture discussion about animal/food issues.)
Sentient: 1. That feels or is capable of feeling; having the power or function of sensation or of perception by the senses. 2. Conscious or percipient of something. (Oxford English Dictionary) Being sentient typically means being at least able to say "ouch!" (or the mental equivalent). That's why the term "sentient" is often used to indicate the capacity to experience pain or pleasure. Sentience does not require a sophisticated mental level, such as required to talk, do calculus, or write a poem. It does not even require that one be self-conscious to any significant degree. Peter Singer's utilitarian position requires only that one be sentient in order to "count" morally. Tom Regan's modified-Kantian rights position requires that one be the "subject of a life", which suggests at least a minimal level of self-consciousness.
So, patients under general anesthesia are fair game, then? That will certainly revolutionize the law of medical malpractice.
The best anyone can come up with is "meat-eaters are mean"? Seriously? I wasn't prepared to mock before (I mean, who cares what you eat? Unless you sit down at a restaurant, say "I'm a vegetarian" and proceed to order the shrimp appetizer and the salmon entree--that's ridiculous), but now I am.
Rob Lyman: Did you notice the word "typically" in what I wrote? We can also science-fictionally imagine conscious and even self-conscious beings who are unable to have sense experience of the world, but for whom life could go better or worse. It's the subjective going-better-or-worse that is the key here. Those asleep, in comas, or under anesthesia may be temporarily out of it, but ask yourself whether you have any objection to someone killing you in your sleep tonight. Many posters on these threads could benefit from actually reading what philosophers and scientists have written.
mijnheer: So, for a mosquito dead=alive, on a "better or worse" scale? Or am I misunderstanding your point?
ask yourself whether you have any objection to someone killing you in your sleep tonight. Of course I have an objection. The question is, do you? I'm not the one using sentience as a criterion here. You offered a dictionary definition which excludes those undergoing major surgery, and then fuzzed up the boundary to an unknown extent with "typically." The fact that your definition puts a rather obvious case of murder in an apparent gray zone is a problem with your definition, not with my failure to read enough philosophy.
Anyway, the Court held that as bees are ferae naturae (of a wild nature) and thus the plaintiff only had a qualified property in them. When the bees swarmed away he only had that property in them "so long as they were in his sight and so long as he had power to pursue them." Once the bees crossed over to his neighbour's land he no longer could legally pursue them and thus he lost all property in the bees. That's horrible! What happens if your dog runs away and your neighbor decides to keep it? Are dogs ferae naturae? How about parrots? And haven't bees have been domesticated for thousands of years? Even if they don't fetch the newspaper, those bees hardly seem wild to me.
Are dogs ferae naturae? No What happens if your dog runs away and your neighbor decides to keep it? You sue him for conversion. Watch out for the trespassing countersuit, though. Your neighbor can be made to return the dog. How the hell can he be forced to return the bees?
Hmmmm... I missed the comment by anony-mouse. Well, it seems like beekeepers should brand their bees so that they don't have anything to worry about. This would also eliminate legal complications from the bee-rustling problem.
... Or maybe brand and tag them just to be sure. The tags can read in microscopic print, "My name is Bee [#1654]. If found, please return to Twenty Oak Farms, 16 Riverview Drive, Looper's Point, ND 10157."
I'd like to associate myself with mijnheer's comments in this thread, particularly his post of 2:02pm, which expresses my own views quite well. I would add that the single most effective thing most people can do to improve the treatment of animals is to stop buying factory-farmed meat. If that is too great a sacrifice to ask, at least reduce your consumption of factory-farmed meat. As Megan has pointed out, even if you really enjoy the taste of meat it isn't a huge sacrifice to significantly reduce your consumption of it if you just put a small amount of thought and effort into it. And it will have all sorts of other benefits in addition to improving the lives of animals.
Oh, I'm sure if I fiddle around enough with some measuring devices I'll see something affected when I chop a carrot in half. How far down the chain do vegans go? What about something like a sea cucumber? Or a sponge?
Thanks, Mixner. Grumpy realist: I think your carrot-chopping is an example of logic-chopping. The basic moral intuition is really quite simple: It's not rocket science. Yes, there are grey areas, but do you really believe a carrot might be "someone" rather than "something"? No? I didn't think so. Neither do I. Do you think a dog is someone? I do. I can write essays justifying my position, but my three-year-old nephew knows the answer just as well as I do.
What the bees do on their own time is their business. Also, do vegans believe in benefiting from the various organisms that live in their digestive systems?
I've always seen three types of vegans. PETA-vegans, Enviro-Vegans, and Health-vegans. There is some scientific evidence and theory that supports vegan eating as less intrusive on the environment. There is also some scientific evidence that eating vegan is much healthier than the general American diet. You can probably move any of the distance towards 100% enviro- or health-vegan and get the desired benefit (i.e. eating one non-meat or dairy meal a week will help your health and the environment if only slightly). PETA-veganism (and it is an -ism), I've always found sort of hard to justify and it is the only one of the three that demands 100% adherence. I'm not going to tell people what to eat, but there is just too many contradictions to the animals = people philosophy. I think the honey thing comes from this. Once you start down the slippery slope you have to exclude honey. However, when viewed by non-vegans, the honey thing is what gets the most ridicule. I was a vegan for awhile, but never gave up honey (which I consider much healthier for you than table sugar or high fructose corn syrup). My favorite contradiction with PETA-Veganism is its anti-hunting stance (hunting = murder). Ask any farmer what would happen if hunting were outlawed. Millions of whitetail deer are hunted and killed in this country every year. Still, there are millions of them. If we stopped killing them by the millions, they would quickly reproduce and consume every crop planted and about everything else they can digest. Therefore, hunting is integral to the farming that supports meat and non-meat eaters alike. In other words, you can't be a vegan unless millions of deer die every year. If someone out there reading this is living off a self-foraged vegan diet, I apologize for lumping you in. However, I doubt such a person exists in this country.
" I would add that the single most effective thing most people can do to improve the treatment of animals is to stop buying factory-farmed meat. If that is too great a sacrifice to ask, at least reduce your consumption of factory-farmed meat. " And I in turn would like to associate myself with Mixner's comments here. (There may be something more effective under very specific circumstances - legislation one can support, etc. - but generally speaking . . ). Let me add, though I don't know if Mixner would agree: if this is a specific concern for you, and you have the resources, perhaps one really useful thing you can do - even if you don't wish to go veggie! - is at least sometimes purchase meat and other animal products raised under more traditional circumstances - grass-fed, free-range, (relatively) cruelty-free, etc - thereby helping support such things. ( I'm sure folks here realize it, but the quaint cartoon-model of a farm that many of us hold in our head is often very, very far away from the actual reality.) In some cases - grass-fed meat and milk, for example - they may actually be healthier for you, though I don't know enough to say for sure. They probably also need fewer massive doses of antibiotics, and you can have less of a problem with giant lagoons of waste (not fun for the neighbors). I don't pretend to know what the *most* effective thing to do is, but probably some combination of vegetarians, somewhat less meat consumption by other folks, and supporting such traditional producers would help a lot. "Also, do vegans believe in benefiting from the various organisms that live in their digestive systems?" Ah, buzz off. "So, patients under general anesthesia are fair game, then? Hang on, do you mean to say they're not? Oops. "If someone out there reading this is living off a self-foraged vegan diet," You know there probably is. I've actually considered seeing how I'd do using gathered acorns and walnuts as a chunk of my diet, in terms of money saved . . . .
" even if you don't wish to go veggie! Obviously buying decently-raised meat is something you can only do if you're not a veg*n. I was having some odd trouble phrasing it. (Also, of course, such eggs, milk, etc. are fine for the non-vegans. Although what nice-sounding terms actually translate to can be an issue . . . .)
"Sentient: 1. That feels or is capable of feeling; having the power or function of sensation or of perception by the senses. 2. Conscious or percipient of something. (Oxford English Dictionary)" By this definition, all life is sentient. You have evidently never eaten a raw oyster in a French restaurant. They provide you with the oysters on the half-shell, some rye bread and salted butter, and a small dish containing vinegar and shallots. You take a small spoon and apply some of the vinegar to the oyster. If it does not move (i.e., "react"), then it is not alive, and you should not eat it. Plants all react to their environment. The most fundamental movement involves light, where the first "false leaves" emerge from the seed, and grow up towards the light. Any gardener can tell you that plants grow in the direction of the light. They "sense" it. Put some bacteria in a petri dish and add drops of liquid with a different pH at the edge. They move forward/away, depending on whether they like or dislike the changes environment that they "sense".
lampwick: Perhaps the difference is that you can brand or otherwise mark cattle to establish your ownership of ones that wandered away - and at least in Texas, an unbranded cow on open range belongs to whoever can catch it, although an unbranded calf with a branded cow is the property of its mother's owner. I wouldn't recommend trying to brand a queen bee. Also, our law derives from English common law. In England, cattle were kept in fences, while bees fly over them. Cows do break through fences sometimes, but their owners are responsible for damages caused when they break into someone else's fields. I think beekeepers would rather lose ownership of swarms that fly away rather than be responsible for all bee stings in the area...
You know there probably is. I've actually considered seeing how I'd do using gathered acorns and walnuts as a chunk of my diet, in terms of money saved . . . . The time spent gathering food would go up dramatically, for one thing. Think how many calories you can buy in one 10 minute trip to the supermarket. As for acorns, they are best utilized fed to pigs who are then eaten. But I can see the problem with that on this thread. LOL Most acorns on the ground are actually empty of nuts, having been hallowed out by galls. The good nuts are eaten by squirrels, blue jays, deer, etc. Your best bet for foraging would be dandelions, especially in Spring when there is no fruit.
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How about the pesticides that are used in the production of the large majority of the worlds produce? Hell, even Integrated Pest Management, a certified organic pesticide-free approach to protecting crops, kills scores of insects.
Posted by Freddie | January 23, 2008 12:39 PM