"Animals don't have rights!" Veganism Debate

All right. Hello. Um, okay. I mean, I guess I can do like a short introduction. I'm hamsters. Um, I'm just going to be arguing for animals do have rights under the non-aggression principle. Um, sort of the reason why we're doing this is cuz, um, I guess you and Dick had like a little argument on Twitter, right? And then I interjected and derailed the entire conversation. Um, and then we had like a little back and forth in that random Twitter group chat. So decided to set up a time um and then you know I did write a short like introduction just cuz like I imagine you and your audience are like super familiar with vegan ethics if that's fine.

>> Yeah, absolutely.

>> Okay, sure. Um and actually if it's fine I also want to address one of your this guy in the comments like marine right? Um, he said, hold on. He said, "All right. Uh, he said, 'Even if veganism were true, that they ought not be aggressed upon, our biology does not allow us to eat um and be healthy at the same time.'"

So, um, I don't imagine we're going to be talking too much about like the health benefits, but um, generally that's not true. There's like a really good meta-analysis I'll link right here um going over like vegan diets and you can definitely be very healthy like on par with normal diets even if you're on a vegan diet. Um and the main objection is usually uh a lack of vitamin B12 which is usually just supplemented in animals. You find that in bacteria, right? So uh and a lot of like Impossible Foods are now putting B12 in their meals. So it's not too much of a not too much of an objection. And even if it was the case that like it did uh I don't know stunt human flourishing to some extent. Uh if you do believe in like argumentation ethics, you wouldn't just say that you can start violating people's rights uh to like pursue your own like flourishing, right? Like if in the case of you had like some debilitating disease um and the only way to like get rid of it would be to have sex with a woman, obviously you can start raping women uh because you're like a communist chud, right?

>> Okay. So yeah. Okay. So I guess I got that out of the way. Um yeah. So I wrote a short opening statement and I guess just to like off the cuff to preface a few things. You know, vegan ethics is obviously not like some sort of environmental ethic. Um cows and like factory farming does like emit a lot of methane gas and stuff, but that's obviously not the reason why people are vegan. Um vegan ethics is also not like primitivism. Like we don't reject capital goods. We don't reject higher order capital goods. And it's definitely not antihuman at all. Um, like the existence of humans and animals are not like exclusive to each other.

Um, okay. So, with that out of the way, I guess I'll just start reading off of my thing I prepared before. Uh, okay. So, human action as described by Ludvig von Misus is purposeful behavior directed towards attaining certain ends. Each year, more scientific research shows that sentient non-human animals also engage in purposeful action, possessing intentions, beliefs, ethical reasoning, and the capacity to plan. Uh, for example, in Degrazia 2008, uh, by the way, I'll link you all these studies in a bit. Um, argues that when your dog heads towards the kitchen upon hearing food being poured, they do so with a belief that eating will occur not merely as a reflex, but as an intentional act grounded in both desire and belief. U, that is, they display purposeful action and cold cognition, i.e. the ability to reason and plan in the same way an infant could. Uh, similarly, birds such as chickies and blue jays determine uh sorry, demonstrate this same purposeful action, having been shown to uh remember thousands of cash locations with pinpoint accuracy, intentionally retrieving food from correct catches, which has historically demonstrated a higher efficacy for sustenance.

Um and then this is just from the New Yorker. Um, furthermore, there's a plethora of studies such as Marino 2016 and Jelling 2011 demonstrating that a pig has cognitive abilities uh on par to that of young children. And I know you have like some like proprietary uh definition of children, but I'm just using this in like the colloquial sense of like under 18.

>> Um, so demonstrating emotional intelligence, social deception, and play, all of which are purposeful actions to attain ends.

Um, and of course you might be inclined to deny that non-human sentient creatures like pigs, cows, and birds are not actually purposeful actors. That they're just robotic meatags acting upon their own evolutionary moldings. Um, that they cannot suffer. They cannot reason in the same way a young child or mentally disabled person can. Um, but in any case, um, it is more parsimonious to go with the theory that they are uh they are functioning and sentient much like ourselves. After all, how do I know that the qualia and another person's subjective experience are like mine? How do I know that they suffer? Of course, I abduct from evidence, which uh is just that the theory, uh that everyone aside from me is non-scentient, unfeilling meat bags, and that theory is just very implausible.

Um, also, uh, you know, I'm not too sure how you feel about like insects or whatever, but and there's also similar studies demonstrating this for fish. Um, right now, I'm going to like kind of take an agnostic stance on bugs and insects. Um but you know I'm very certain that we should not aggress upon certain animals like you know pigs and like these factory farmed animals.

Um and then I wrote a little about factory farming as well. So you know against this backdrop of objective scientific convergence the sheer scale and cruelty of factory farming uh is morally untenable. Globally tens of billions of land animals are slaughtered each year. Uh estimates range from 80 to over 90 billion including chickens, pigs, cows and turkeys. Uh most of these animals endure life in factory farms. In the US, uh nearly 99% of chickens and turkeys, 98% of pigs, and 75% of cows are raised in intensive operations.

Um and I can give you the parameters for what they deem as like an intensive operation. Uh so worldwide, poultry alone accounts for more than 60 billion slaughtered annually. So these conditions are anything but benign. Battery cages restrict chickens to smaller spaces than an A4 sheet. barely enough room to move. They spend their lives deprived of normal behaviors, social contact, and even natural postural comfort. Um, gestation uh creates confined pregnant ses to a space of just 2 by 6 feet uh for most of their lives. And that's just going to be like a pig. Um, denying movement and causing immense physical and psychological harm.

Um, all right. So, additionally, acclud cruelty includes debeaking and mutilations without pain relief, overcrowded facilities, and slaughter methods that can fail, such as botch throat slittings that result in animals being scalded alive. So, like the the way that they kind of just like kill chickens, right, is they like put on a conveyor belt um and then they slit the chicken's throat and then they drop in like boiling water. So yeah, given animals capacity for suffering and intentionality, these practices are not only morally wrong, that they are also aggressive violations of the non-aggression principle. If we accept that cruelty towards conscious beings is categorically impermissible, then supporting or consenting to factory farming. It is an ethical assault. Subsidies and legal protections that shield large-scale aggra business from competition amplify this harm, entrenching, deeply institutionalized animal suffering and economic bias. Such systems contravene core principles of cap both capitalism, fair competition, and ethics. And even if I don't like fully convince you, um I guess for those like aligned with animal welfare intuitions that cruelty is like inherently negative, uh this, you know, this evidence is pretty compelling in suggesting that the only consistent moral responses, veganism, uh at least until industrial systems are dismantled or reformed to fully respect animals as purposeful sentient beings. Abstaining from animal products is not just preferable, it's a moral imperative.

>> All right. Sorry that was a bit long, but

>> no worries ramble too much.

>> Yeah. So, um I'm curious on like this uh this point of Okay. Well,

>> oh, let me think.

>> Yeah. So,

>> sorry. Go ahead.

>> Um you're saying that like um dogs and whatnot that these somewhat higher animals that they are capable of reason, right? That they are analogous to humans in that way.

>> So would you consider that like a dog could be evil? Like could a dog be evil if it did, you know, certain untoward things?

>> Um I mean it's possible, but I I guess you'd have to give me some scenarios to like

>> like let's say

>> generally they're

>> like it's a big Doberman and then he starts, you know, raping a little Chihuahua. Like would that be an evil dog?

>> Oh, that's a hut. Of course. I mean, I I would say I'd say like their actions are purposeful. Um I have a Hold on. I mean, so purposeful action is just going to be like a subset of like cognitive capabilities, wouldn't you say?

>> Um in the sense that

>> in the sense that there are some cognitive things you're doing which aren't purposeful. Is that what you're meaning?

>> Well, I I think I think all purposeful behavior is probably, you know, based on your level of cognition, right? Like if you do purposeful behavior, then you're like cognitively like uh you're doing like purposeful action. You're deploying some like level of cognition, wouldn't you say?

>> Uh, yeah, I mean, it's purposeful behavior doesn't happen for like rocks. You Yeah, you do need some level of cognition.

>> Yeah. Okay. Um, so like I mean I guess we got that out of the way. Like the thing I'm really just like

>> so and so

>> right. So like the argument

>> if if if you're considering then that animals can be good or bad and you think it's bad to eat sensient beings are are carnivores like just in their being necessarily evil like embid with this like original sin?

>> I mean, I don't want to say like original sin that seems like a religious thing but um I'd say that you know they are like predisposed to have like uh you know bad behaviors you know like there are some people who are like predisposed and like they have these dispositions to commit uh like aggression right like there are psychopaths who just like have a lot of fun killing people.

Um and I'd say like they are predisposed in the same way some uh animals are going to be predisposed to evil. But I mean, it's it's literally like not possible if it's a cat. It's not possible for it to not be a carnivore. Like it can't

>> wait that

>> eat vegetables, right?

>> No, that actually I don't find that to be true. I talked to Dick about this. Like he has a cat and he feeds his cat vegan food and it's like super healthy. There's a YouTuber named Vegan Gains who feeds his cat vegan food.

Um and the we do have like a lot of vegan cat food.

Um, and it is the case that, you know, there are like a good amount of studies, not like longitudinal studies that do demonstrate that there's like uh not super high negative effects on like a cat's well-being.

>> So, is it is it the case that there's no such thing as a carnivore? Like, could a lion, for instance, you know, just eat grass instead?

>> I mean, not grass, but I'm sure they I mean, I don't see why they wouldn't be able to do the same thing as like a cat. Well, I'm not sure what that is. Like, you know, perhaps you can make u vegan cat food with like a really intensive industrial process,

>> but like, you know, if you're just in nature, I don't know what vegan how would the vegan lion go about his day. I mean, I I think we probably should not let the line be, you know, just murdering other animals around, but I'm not too sure. Like,

>> but the point is you're you are saying that that is that is murder.

>> Um, so but then if it's impossible

>> Oh, yeah.

>> for the lion to ever do anything else like it's not possible for the given its nature, it's not possible for it

>> to I don't I don't think it's possible for it to make choices.

>> We

>> you do think it's making choices. So you think it is like what what is the alternative choice?

>> Do you think it's the I mean, there might not be an alternative choice if it's the case that a lion can't survive without eating meat. But you do you think it's the case that you don't have any choices when you're like when you have like this debilitating disease that forces you to have sex with a woman, but you're like a communist ugly chud and you can't have sex with another woman, so you have to rape another woman to like survive. Like that seems very much analogous to the situation we're going.

>> But that's right now, right? The difference there is that um human beings aren't by their nature um aggressive. Like we do have choice. We can choose to you know, be be peaceful, be non-aggressive. So if if it were the case that humans were like vampires where you literally had to eat other humans blood in order to survive um then I think there is no sense in which rights make sense at all. I don't think you can have non-aggression cuz I think for for there to be rights between A and B first both parties need to be able to have valition. They have to be able to choose and second both of them have to be able to avoid conflicts with each other. But if if every human was a vampire well it's not possible for vampires to avoid conflicts with each other. That that is it's not in their nature. It's not possible for them. That that just isn't the door is no longer open for that. by by their nature that is it's not just like oh they're in like an emergency situation so now I can't now I can't make these choices anymore that the difference is that like if you have this race where by their nature necessarily no matter what right they are in this state where they've got to be eating uh flesh then like I don't think I don't see how you can if if you think it is evil to eat flesh like that

>> then do you think that the lion is necessarily evil?

>> Yeah, sure. I mean, I don't I mean, evil does evil entail like men's rhea like a guilty mind or I'm not sure exactly what you mean by evil, I guess.

>> Well, I mean, I don't think that lines can have guilty minds because obviously I don't think that they're rational, but so that would be kind of uh on you like you think that you think it would be evil for a human to do the things that

>> Well, I mean, I just don't know what you mean by evil. I'm just like asking a clarifying question, I guess.

>> Um I don't know. I don't think I don't think we need to stand. Yeah. If I could just say one thing. Um like I don't think we're like obligated to save gazels from lions or like I don't think you know we're obligated to like donate to charity as well. You know what I mean? So it's not the case that I'm like advocating for lions to have rights. Um it's more I'm advocating for like these uh non-aggressive sentient uh non-human animals to be granted rights. Right. But sort of the problem we kind of face here um is what does the category of aggression even entail if it's if this line is necessarily no matter what it's going to be supposedly aggressing on other animals. Like I I don't think it's possible to have like evil being

>> I mean a psychopath can choose to not go with their urges. the great documentary Dexter showed us this, right? Um, a psychopath that is

>> it's like a serial killer who kills other serial killers, basically. So, like a psychopath, they could choose to not murder. It's just that they they might want to murder. They might really want to murder, but it's not in their nature to murder. Whereas for a lion, it is in its nature to eat like gazels and stuff like

>> we shouldn't. I mean, yeah, of course they're like an evil creature. Is that what you're saying?

>> Yeah. I'm I'm asking if they're an evil creature cuz I I think either way you go with this, it gets a little bit problematic.

>> I'm not sure if it matters too much to me like whether they're evil as in like they're doing anything with like a guilty mind or whether they're actually doing an evil act. So I think that you know even in the case where you're not like I don't know let's say you're like sleepwalking and you're like a sleep murderer right I wouldn't say that you know you have any guilty mind yet you're still committing like very evil acts that is murder right or aggression under your world worldview um but I'm not sure like how's this too relevant to like I don't know like name the trait I guess

>> well, I I actually think that that's a very good analogy to the line is the sleepwalker because the sleepwalker isn't any longer a rational being.

>> so so the relevance I see here is I think either way you go with this question on carnivores if they are doing wrong by their nature it's like okay well then that's a strange thing to have where you can't choose to be good like you are necessarily sinful I believe that is very a very religious attitude um so I don't know how that would be rationally defensible that a person or a lion could be necessarily evil so that's problematic or if it's fine for the lion to do it then the question becomes, well, why is it fine for the [ __ ] lion to do it but not me?

>> Why I mean, why would I say it's fine for the lion to do it? I never I never

>> That would be That's what I'm saying. Either way you go with the line question, I think they're problems.

>> I don't think there's Okay, wait. So, sorry. What was the first problem again? Let me I probably jot this down so I don't

>> Yeah. So, um on the line question, either lions are necessarily evil. They're evil in their being. in which case we've got kind of like an intrinsicist view of morality where morality isn't like a guide to action. It's rather like the line is painted with sin by its nature like ontologically evil. Like I don't think that's a valid way of talking about ethics.

Um or in the alternative case where it's fine for the lion to do it. So maybe you don't have you do have morality being a guide to action. But then the question becomes, you know, it just becomes name the trait again. Why is it fine for the lion to eat gazels but not for me?

>> Well, I mean, I don't think it's right for the lion to eat gazels. And I don't I'm not too sure what you mean by like the lion is evil in its being. I mean, like certain people are predisposed. Like I'm not sure if we're going to get into like a free will debate. Hopefully not. But um like obviously serial killers or like very deranged people might be predisposed like regardless of what action you take upon them or like try to help them, they're still going to be predisposed to like killing other people.

Um such that we'd still label them as evil by like virtue of their actions, right?

>> Sure. Um sorry, just

>> I think there's like a really big delay going on.

>> No, I was just uh vaping there. Sorry. Um so for the case for the case of the serial killer,

>> yeah, we can say by their actions they're evil, but that's cuz they had a choice in the matter. If they truly didn't have a choice, well then they've just become an animal beast in Hopper's words, right?

Uh either they're a dangerous one in which case we got to take them out or they can be tamed, right? If if there truly was like some sort of disease which like you know like a parasite which infected your brain and made you you have no choice about the matter, you got a murder, then yeah, this would be a danger that wouldn't be a human anymore.

>> Um but

>> I mean the danger is all there if if that's the case with like some sort of serial killer or like I don't know some sort of psychopath, right? And I wouldn't even consider that person evil. Like if they had this parasite, I wouldn't say that they're evil for doing the murder. I I'd say they're just they just become an animal at that point.

>> And that's that's the category I think the lion is in.

>> I mean, do I mean this kind of circles back to like humans? Obviously, humans don't need to eat meat and like uh sentient uh sorry, sentient non-human animals also don't need to eat meat. So like why would it be permissible to aggress upon them?

>> Well, I don't think that's aggression because I don't think um that they have rights, right? Because for them to have rights, we have to both have valition. I don't think that these animals have valition.

>> Um I don't think that's ever been demonstrated.

>> Um and also we have to be able to conflict.

>> Exactly.

>> I I don't know how like free will, the ability to choose.

>> Um it's basically related to your concept formation faculty.

>> I don't think that these these things can form concepts. You know forming concepts is very much related to language.

>> Um and no there it's been tried many times with some of the smartest non-human animals ever and nobody's ever been able to teach them language. Like there's something in that. I think the reason why you're not teaching naming language or

>> it's it's concept formation. It's it's a two-tier trait really.

>> Um first you'd have to show

>> Okay.

>> or like some conjunction are these like uh so they're necessary conditions or

>> yeah so in the first case for there to be rights between A and B pardon me

>> you know between me and a cow

>> um I would both of us would have to have free will I we can both form concepts I don't think that's the case for the cow

>> um but even if if it could be shown that the cow can form concepts

>> well then we have to be able to avoid conflicts with each other after that. Like this is the thing with the um sorry a [ __ ] fly is bothering me.

>> Um that that's the thing with the with the vampires. I can't avoid conflicts with a vampire or a zombie.

>> So even if even if they might be able to form concepts so there is no sense of rights between me and the zombie.

>> Um I I don't know how to avoid conflicts with a cow. Like a cow can't say sign a contract or anything.

>> Right. Sure. Um, so I'm like not exactly opposed to animal uh sorry, predator callulling, but you said so rights between A and B uh forming concepts. I guess we kind of have to go more into like the empirical evidence of forming concepts.

>> Let me just look at my notes really quickly. Okay, so I mean, I do have a I did annotate a few studies I can link. I mean, so I mean, would you count this as like forming concepts here? Hold on. So I can go over the study. So like when I say cognition I just mean like um the capability to know, understand, reason and like you know partake in some sort of like purposeful action.

>> Um and usually I do I distinguish it between like cold cognition and hot cognition. So cold cognition would just be like logical non-emotional reasoning and planning while hot cognition is going to be something like a emotionally charged decision-m and uh you know low time preferences. So like in the case of Friday and Cruso say that Friday had like only unlocked cold cognition and uh Cruso unlocked cold and hot cognition, right? So, you know,

>> can you can you just redefine those terms so I can note them down?

>> Oh, yeah. Yeah. Uh, cold and hot cognition or or cognition itself.

>> Cold and hot cognition.

>> Yeah. So, cold cognition I just mean by like logical non-emotional reasoning and planning. And then hot cognition would just be like emotionally charged decision-m uh pro and processing uh and you know long-term planning. So, like a low time preference. So say Friday and Cruso on like the desert island had uh cold cognition and hot cognition respectively.

>> Friday would be like more predisposed to just fishing every day and not really creating higher order capital goods. While on the other hand, Cruso would be more predisposed to do this just because you know they have like a lower time preference and they've unlocked higher uh levels cognition. And from what I've read, it seems like hot cognition usually uh you know deploys around like 14 years old. So, it seems to me that a lot of animals do have like this level of high cognition, like a squirrel like planting their acorn and waiting like months during the winter to grab it when it's going to be worth more to them.

>> So, they really have like this concept of goods, right?

>> Um and they have like these time preferences. So maybe a good is uh worth more to them in the future than it is now.

>> Um and then in the case of this newborn chick uh study, so like at just 5 days old, chickens can perform arithmetic faster than human babies.

>> Um and then I can go through the methodology. So the study demonstrated this by having chicks.

>> What's chicks?

>> Sorry, what?

>> I was asking if it was chimps or chicks. You said

>> chicks. Oh, no. Uh I mean, chimps are like really smart as well. So I feel like I mean, how do you feel about chimps? Is it permissible to eat a chimp or what? Cuz they do that in Asia a lot.

>> Yeah, I think it's permissible to eat a chimp. I think it's a very bad idea to eat a chimp. Like you're going to because they're so close to us.

>> Why is that?

>> Like biologically like you're just asking to get like a [ __ ] you know, like the monkey brain scene in

>> gross. Yeah. Yeah.

>> You're going to get like a [ __ ] pryion disease off that like

>> diseases.

>> Bad idea. Yeah. You don't want to eat higher things higher up in the food. Like this is why it's also a bad idea to eat dogs cuz dogs already eat other animals. You're just you're just begging to get some sort of like heavy metal accumulation or something. Like dogs are not built bred.

>> I mean, they do that in China and they

>> like like you don't breed a dog for food. It's it's not a good food animal. It's it's much better suited to be a companion animal. So much better suited. But I don't think it's a crime uh to eat dogs.

>> Okay. Well, when you say crime, um we're kind of just getting into law, are we not? I mean,

>> well, yeah. I mean, it's a it's a race question. I'm I mean, in in the natural law sense. So if I if I'm saying something is a crime, I mean that it naturally illegal. Like it's wrong for you to do that. You shouldn't be doing that. You are an enemy of, you know, society. You're an aggressor.

>> Okay. I mean, I don't want to derail too much, but so is everything that is immoral under your worldview illegal?

>> No. No. Uh I think law is a subset of ethics. So everything which is illegal is immoral, but not everything which is immoral is illegal.

>> Not everything. Okay. Um, so what? Okay, actually I don't want to derail too much. Um, so I guess like is it permissible for me to start torturing a dog or what? Like if if I like have fun torturing dogs, is it just like morally neutral to you?

>> It's not morally I think it's it's a very wrong thing to do. You shouldn't be torturing

>> uh dogs just just cuz you have fun for torturing dogs.

>> It's it's it's anti-life. It's it's very much like if I was walking along and I saw this beautiful rose

>> coming out of the coming out of the ground and I stamp this rose into the ground and grind it under my shoe. Like I don't think I'm I am doing something illegal there. I'm not murdering the rose, right? But it's like why why are you so it's nihilist, right? Why are you so hating of life that you do something like that?

>> But you wouldn't say that it's immoral, right? You'd say that's like morally neutral because it's not like actually

>> I think it is immoral to

>> be a nihilist and stamp the rose like that. I think that is immoral.

>> Well, wait. How how does this pertain to nihilism? What?

>> Like I I'm guessing at the motivation that this person is doing when they stamp the rose. I'm assuming that they're some sort of a nihilist. I mean, there could be other motivations, of course.

>> Um,

>> so what if I what if I just want to stamp on the rose for fun? Like I'm just bored and I'm like, "Oh, wow. They would look really good under my shoe."

>> Yeah. The fact that you're doing that for fun is is speaking to

>> ill premises. It's like if you saw like a beautiful painting in front of you, it's like, ah, I want to burn it. It's like, what the what the [ __ ] wrong with you?

>> Like I I think that's a bad bad for your life. You shouldn't be doing that thing cuz it's bad for you to do that type of thing.

>> Well, sure. I mean, I can say things like, you know, watching feet videos is like very bad for you. like it's not very going to be it's not going to, you know, get you to the end of flourishing, right? But I I wouldn't say watching feet videos is like immoral or anything, but I would say that, you know, torturing dogs is going to be immoral. I wouldn't say uh, you know, stamping on a rose is going to be immoral. Would you say stamping like let's uh go into like morality here, I guess. I mean, would you say that stamping on a rose in any cases would be immoral?

>> Well, not in any case. Like it might be, you know, hey buddy, if you don't stamp on that rose, I'm going to murder your family.

>> Yeah. In in like the standard case of I'm going along and I hate beauty and I see this piece of beauty and I stamp it in the ground. Like Yeah. That that's that's immoral.

>> Okay. Um so why is that? How does that fall under like is that under the non-aggression principle or what? What's going on here?

>> No, no, I don't think it's right.

>> I'm not super familiar with what you're getting at. I guess

>> um it's it's basically like if you are

>> that action is operating on upon premises

>> which are like destructive to your life like the principle of anti-beauty anti-life like that that's terrible like this is just one concrete instantiation

>> suicide is immoral

>> yeah, I think suicide is immoral

>> okay so just because it doesn't get you to the end of like human flourishing

>> yeah, it's Cuz cuz life is the standard of value. Like there there is no way death can't be a value, right? You can't cuz you can't gain death once you're dead. You're you're you're not there to gain anything. You can't gain. So it's operating on this death worship uh premise which is really terrible and destructive. Like it's it's terrible because it's wrong, right? It's it's incorrect that death uh is something to be gained. like that's incorrect and if you operate on incorrect premises like that we call that immoral behavior.

>> All right. So, can you explain how then sorry incorrect premises? So what's the incorrect premise here and like I don't know maybe you can give them the syllogism or

>> well for for the for suicide or for the rose

>> uh for for either

>> I mean, I think they're like probably the same right and it's on the premise of flourishing. So for um suicide the incorrect premise is that death is something which can be gained. Um that you can you can achieve death. That's the incorrect premise. It's a very destructive premise to have.

Um uh for the rose it's that beauty is is in some way bad that it's it's it's you know talks about this in Alice Shrug I believe. I can't remember uh the name she sacred and profane right. Yeah, that's it. Uh so they are if you're if you're treating the rose example, you're treating the sacred beauty as the profane. It's it's a moral inversion. That's the incorrect premise. Immoral.

>> Okay. Wait, I think I need more clarification on that. What you said? So it's a moral inversion because you're doing something that doesn't pertain to like flourishing or something that's not in your self-interest. For example, death is not something to like

>> Yeah. It's it's more over that for the for the case of the rose, you're actually placing yourself in opposition to flourishing. You're in opposition to beauty, to the good, to like you're on an active war against the good when you're doing that. This is this is it's a terrible thing.

>> Okay. So, I mean, why why why should we all not so under your world worldview are we all pursuing our own like human flourishing? And then you know for animals should they also be pursuing their own like type of flourishing cuz

>> I'm not entirely sure what this is.

>> I think everyone every human should pursue their flourishing. I don't think every human does. I think most humans don't in fact.

>> Um but for animals I don't think it's even a valid question to ask what they should or shouldn't do. I don't think that they can choose.

>> Okay. Well, I mean, okay that was a bit of a tangent, I guess. Um, wait. So, you said it would it would be more immoral to torture dogs.

>> Yeah. Not because it's bad for the dog, by the way. Because it's bad for you to do that.

>> But if it was the case where Wait, it's bad by virtue of, you know, it's probably like indicative of like not human flourishing or

>> Yeah. Yeah. You're you're operating on the premise that life is bad and to be snuffed out and destroyed. that suffering is something to be sought after.

>> The human life is bad, but not the dog's life.

>> Life in general. Uh that that that's what it's indicative. Like if I

>> care about the dog's life

>> as it as it pains to I'm saying the moral valuation for the torturer. It's bad for the torturer to be doing that. It's bad for him to do that because it's operating on the premise it's bad for suffering is good. Yeah. Okay. So, I mean, if it was the case I was driving down a street, right, and there's like a billion puppies on the sidewalk. Just pretend this is like true. Okay.

Um, and I did not know, but like another person, I guess, could like stop them or, you know, they could divert them slightly, right? you would just like say it would be completely fine for them to just go about their day and just trample over all these puppies because, you know, um if they're not aware of it, then it doesn't seem like it would be anything to do with their flourishing, right?

>> I mean, if they're not aware of the puppies, then you can't really have a moral evaluation there if it was mistaken. Like if I step on like, you know, a small mouse when I

>> Well, if you could stop them. If you could stop them.

>> Uh, it depends. If So, you're asking if I should stop them. I mean, I should probably say, "Hey, watch out, buddy. There's a bunch of puppies there."

>> Okay. Well, I mean, would it be permissible if it didn't like So, and I'm trying to just like give you a scenario in which uh it wouldn't like uh pertain to human flourishing, but it would just kill like a million puppies.

>> Um I don't know like let's just say that we can kill a million puppies, but we can increase like human flourishing slightly.

>> Um would that be permissible or like keep human flourishing neutral, right? Is that like completely fine to you? like torturing like a million puppies but not actually touching human flourishing whatsoever. Like these are two completely independent events.

>> Well, okay. So, but like based on the setup of the hypothetical um you know, however we would figure that out.

>> Um you are baking into the hypothetical that

>> for human flourishing it doesn't have any change at all. So, yeah, it would be morally neutral cuz my ethics is based on what's good for humans.

>> Okay. So I mean, so yeah, but that's kind of like the whole point of this conversation, right? Like why is it only for humans? Why is it why does it not, you know, why do uh pigs, cows, chickens, etc. not fall under the scope, I guess.

>> Um, so we can Okay, you know, this we've been going off on this for a bit. I guess we can go into the study um of like forming concepts.

>> Uh, sure. Uh I would say um I'd be wary that the study is got even got a theory of concept formation in the first place like that's this is not um an easy thing in full like what what theory of concepts are they even working on to cuz if they don't have a theory of concepts like you know obviously I can't read a you know 18page study on stream um like

>> no no that's all good um

>> I can't really trust that the study is what is it even measuring because I don't I don't know what Right. If if if it's got like a platonist theory of concept, then it's just invalid right there.

>> Right.

>> Like it can't be based on that

>> here. I annotated this one. Just give me one second.

>> Okay. So, I mean, I can just give you like the TLDDR on the study, I guess.

>> Um, sure.

>> It's basically just pertains to like newborn chicks and their cognitive abilities. Uh, so at just 5 days old, uh, chickens can perform arithmetic faster than human babies. Uh, the study demonstrated this by having chicks imprint a mark on five identical objects. They put two of the objects behind the screen and the remaining three behind another screen.

>> Uh, and in the first experiment, chicks consistently chose the screen with a larger set hiding behind it even when the disappearance was in a sequential and arbitrary order.

>> Uh because the imprints are of identical size, this controls for other variables, indicating that the chicks were relying on numbers, not the size of the imprints. Preferring three goods rather than two goods, uh you know, demonstrates that they have a spontaneous discrimination for more goods rather than few.

>> Uh which I think probably would be good evidence of, you know, purposeful action, um as well as, you know, high cognitive capabilities, uh tracking higher than some humans. For example, for like babies, they um do a lot of things reflexively and they don't actually do things purposefully in the same sense that I'm guessing you're probably prescribing it as

>> um but I guess I kind of got to hear more of your So what what do you think of the like purposeful action? I guess like what is your concept of purposeful action?

>> Um well I mean I think as it pertains to uh human action, right? Uh the relevant sense where praxiology starts kicking in. I think it's chosen action really. It's where you have volition. You are making decisions about you know whether you're focusing evading blah blah blah blah and eventually you get like a whole set of premises which you then start acting upon that that is uh purposeful action in my view.

>> Yeah. And it seems to me like the chickens are doing that and obviously you know like babies wouldn't be um doing this like sort of purposeful action. I also have like a pretty interesting video. Hold on. My god, I like dumped everywhere. This like disabled person, right? This person, this is definitely not purposeful action. Oh, hello.

>> I was just going to say whilst whilst you're looking for that um on the concept of this uh the chicks going for more objects than fewer. That doesn't actually require concepts yet cuz you're you're talking about like you know five or so objects in total here, right?

>> um that that is uh this is this relates to um something called crow epistemology in objectivist uh philosophy. So the crow is basically the limit

>> what is

>> of um how many things you can keep in your head perceptually at one time how many things you can you know focus on. So, like, you know, if there was um uh if you're if you're counting people going into a park

>> um you know, 1 2 3 and then one left, you would be able to keep in your head that there's still two in the park. And a crow could do this easily enough, right?

>> Uh cuz it could focus it could focus on

>> the bird.

>> Yeah. Exactly. And like because it can f it can keep five things, you know, five is an arbitrary number, but we'll say it could keep that five things in its head at once. But if you know a 100,000 people went in the park and 70,000 left, the crow would have absolutely no way of knowing how many are still in the park, right? But a human could cuz a human

>> and it probably I mean, I'm not sure how we've

>> No, it's just watching the gates. So it doesn't it doesn't know if there's people in the park or not because it can't and a human can't keep in 100,000 entities in their focus at once either. But humans have concept formation. So, this allows us to move beyond the state of the crow because we could keep a counter. We could mark off how many people are in the park. We could say, "Okay, 100,000 people went in and then 70,000 left." So, I know that there are still 30,000 people in that park. It cuz cuz I actually have real arithmetic, not just, you know, limited by the crow.

>> So, what is the cur doing that's different exactly? I'm not sure if I'm catching that.

>> So, so repeat that. The crow isn't able to abstract beyond the particulars.

>> Um, so the crow can't form, you know, concepts about very very large numbers. Like a crow has absolutely no way to tell how far away the moon is.

>> Do you think a human can do that?

>> Uh, a newborn maybe probably can't form concepts. It's starting to form concept.

>> Can I start killing it or eating it or?

>> Uh, no. Because because it has the potential uh to form concept because I think law deals with potentials.

>> Uh, it really does. And

>> what is what is

>> like a cow or a crow at no point down the line will I ever be able to avoid conflicts with them or get into conflicts with them. But a baby I might be able to get into conflicts with it

>> in the future. You mean like the potential to do so?

>> Yeah. And that and that's that's why rights do to children,

>> right? So that I mean, that seems a bit weird, right? So, like, if you're granting rights like under the premise that this like potentially gives them the right to live under the non-aggression principle or to be granted moral consideration, um this necessarily means that like a child who has like the potential to consent for, you know, sex would have the right to consent for sex now, right? Cuz if rights are granted based on the potential um then you would grant them the right is that against do I need no fine.

>> Um so the thing the the reason why you know I have this particular definition of a child um it's not my definition. It comes from Ian Hersome um is because what I mean by a child is someone who can't express their will on in some relevant aspect. So that that's that's the problem with you know having sex with a child or punching a child even though I might be allowed to punch an adult if we both agree to a boxing match. I have no way of knowing if the child would want uh to be punched because the child can't understand what that entails. So he can't communicate his will to be punched whereas a whereas an adult could.

>> Right. But the reason you said they're they have moral consideration that is like protection under the non-aggression principle, right? Is because of their potential to be one uh like I don't know one day have like the cognitive capabilities to be considered under the non-aggression

principle. In the same case, you know, we have like, um, we have children who have the potential to hold a right. Um, so we would give them that right now. So that, I mean, that still seems very much analogous to the situation at hand, right?

Uh, so, so to be clear, I I don't think it's that they potentially can have rights. I think they do have rights because I can potentially get into conflicts and therefore I can, uh, avoid conflicts with them, right? I I want to avoid those conflicts down the line because I can potentially get into conflicts with them. Um, so to avoid those conflicts, what do we do? We have property rights. And that's why, uh, children still do have property rights. Even like the passed out man in the snow. I also consider him a child for legal purposes. Um, so he, a man passed out in the snow. This is why the paramedics are allowed to come along, you know, resuscitate him, uh, bring him to a hospital, stuff like that, because he still has

>> best interest.

>> It's not, it's not about best interest. It's about preserving him until such a state at which he can communicate his will, and he might say, "What the heck, I didn't want to be resurrected. I, I like sleeping in the snow." Right? He, he, he might, he might get pissed off about it later, but the point is, you're allowed to do anything to protect them,

>> right? But so what is like the right to consent under your worldview then? Because if you're granting rights, or actually, let me just let you answer that first.

>> Uh, so consent requires that you are expressing your will, uh, to have something happen. And but the whole point about children is that they are in a state where you can't access their will. They are not able to express their will. So you don't know what it is. So then why are you, so what is, why are we giving them moral consideration under the non-aggression principle if they don't have the, you know, current capability that, uh, like some cognitive threshold as you've like outlined earlier, because of the potential for this right or the potential to have the cognitive capabilities to, um, get into like conflicts and resolve conflicts, right?

>> Because, because I can potentially, it's exactly that. I can potentially get into conflicts with them, and that's, it's the exact analogous status with you. Like, I could potentially get into conflicts with you at some point down there. So there, and I can avoid conflicts with you in at present. So that's why there, it makes sense to talk about rights between us. Uh, the same is true of children,

>> right? So I mean, if I, I still don't see how that's not the case with consent. If it's the case that, um, they have like the potential to consent, then they technically would just have the right to consent now, right? Or are we, how are we granting rights if rights are based on potential for like a certain cognitive threshold? Um, I mean, didn't Rothbard talk about this as well, like the rights of children in his, uh,

>> yeah, I believe so.

>> book? Was that, was that

>> ethics of liberty, probably. And he talks about it in there. And

>> so the very definition of a child, uh, for legal purposes is someone who can't express, uh, his will in some relevant aspect. You know, he can be a child in some respects, but not in other respects. But that's sort of outside this conversation right now. Um, so we, we can just take the case of like the literal newborn baby or the man who is asleep in a coma, right? And they are not able to express their will at all. And so what it means to consent to something is to express your will. So it's like, it's not about, you know,

>> you can express your will when as a child? No, like I express my

>> not in relevant aspects.

>> not.

>> So like a child,

>> what is irrelevant?

>> Uh, so, you know, again, this, this is why it's easier to take like the reduction case of they literally can't express the will at all. Um, but as, as the child starts maturing, they grow up in different areas at different points, right? They might be able to express their will if they want to have chicken or, this is a funny example because it's a veganism debate. They want to have like chicken or beef for dinner, right? They are able to express their will perhaps over that respect, while still they might still be a child in other respects, right? They might not be able to grasp what it means to have uranium for dinner,

>> right? They, they might not grasp that at all. May, you know.

>> Yeah. So, that's kind of my like.

>> Right. So, you know, we're, we're not talking about like these like 10-year-olds or whatever. We're talking more of like the, you know, uh, I guess the edge cases of like, uh, disabled person or, you know, I mean, for example, like the disabled person definitely does not have like the potential, uh, to, um, express their will at any point. Like, I don't know, can you pull up that video I put in chat right here?

>> Sure. Um,

>> like that person clearly, like, not to be a [ __ ], but they are clearly very [ __ ]. They cannot express any sort of.

>> Sorry, it's very loud. Very loud. I got to mute this.

>> What happened? It, it was very loud. It started playing.

>> Oh, right. So, like, um, I mean, obviously, you don't need to watch the whole video. It's like the same thing. Um, but it seems pretty clear to me that this person right here cannot ever express their will. Is it now permissible? I mean, under your worldview, it would be permissible to slaughter and just breed them and eat them. So I would say the standard with, uh, you know, the severely disabled, obviously, I'm not like a neurologist or anything, so I don't know at what state this would be, but if they, if it was proven that they truly, that they truly are

>> you know, so intellectually disabled that they could never express their will again, like this is the case for brain dead people, right? You, you know, they're, they're never coming back. So they wouldn't have rights. They would be in the category of a corpse. Um, and But expressing

>> but but the thing is with with, um, humans, [ __ ] daddy long legs, with humans, because we know, because because the standard case of a human is that they are able to grow up and express their will. Um, you have to have the assumption is that they are, uh, that they do have rights. The burden of proof becomes, the burden of proof becomes to show that for this particular person, they will never ever be able to express their will. This, this is the case with brain dead people. Yeah. The burden of proof is on you to show, hey, they're brain dead, so they're never coming back.

>> Wait, there's a few, there's a few things to address there. Um,

>> sorry. So, are you at the end there? Were you saying like some sort of species normality thing? The burden of proof is because, you know, generally speaking, humans do have some sort of purposeful action, right?

>> Yeah. It'd be like if I, if I said,

>> they generally have that potential.

>> Yeah. It would be like if I, the difference between me saying, "Hey, I saw a 5'2" uh woman the other day," versus, "I saw a 90-foot woman the other day." Like, you'd be like, "No, you [ __ ] didn't. Prove to me that you saw a 90-foot one." Like, the burden of proof would be on me to show that such a thing is possible.

>> Well, I mean, I think generally when, if you're going to aggress upon something, you have to like demonstrate that it does not have like the cognitive capabilities or whatever threshold you're drawing from. But, um, so there's like two things to address there. I guess, just species normality, which is like, generally speaking, like 50% plus one is what people usually say. Um, and the other one was just that, you know, it would be permissible to just, uh, eat corpses, right? Like, obviously, I don't think even, you know, uh, assuming vegan ethics, it's impermissible to eat like some sort of roadkill. But I think what you're doing here is you've just like moved the threshold completely down. So, like, obviously this case with Bri right here, I don't, I don't know if you showed her on stream, but, you know, this like severely disabled person, um, is like just under the threshold. They're like, obviously, you know, higher than, uh, they, they have a lower cognitive capability than pigs, yet they, um, are given moral consideration, um, and they should be given moral consideration. So you're kind of in like a bind where you either have to commit to the view that pigs shouldn't be, um, like moral aggressed upon, or, you know, um, that it's permissible to kill pigs, but it's also permissible to kill these disabled people, um, and breed them and factory farm them and just like, you know, put them in abhorrent conditions. Um, so I, I think, you know, the reductive in this case would be more that, you know, is it permissible to just like factory farm, uh, millions of these people just to eat them? Um, like maybe there are some people who really have a, you know, a disposition to like eat disabled organalism or whatever.

>> Oh yeah. For organ transplants, of course. Exactly. Oh my god. Great idea.

>> Yeah. Yeah. So if, if you could, for instance, uh, genetically engineer something which was like a human in every way except the brain is just not there at all. Like, there's, they're basically vegetables, right? Uh, vegetables, right? Because you're farming them. Um, then, yeah, that, that would be permissible, permissible to farm them for

>> Sorry.

>> I said, is that vegan? Um, sorry. But anyways. Um, see, I think you're doing the same thing again where you're like moving the threshold completely down. So what I'm trying to, the reductive I'm giving you is a case where they're just like barely under the cognitive threshold. But what you've basically just told me is a case where it's like completely, there's no sentient being there. There's no like actual, it's like, it's like factory farming rocks. There's nothing wrong with factory, brain dead, or like they don't have a mind.

>> Yeah. Abs. Absolutely. If, if you could engineer them so precisely that they just barely can't form concepts. Um, for whatever reason you wanted to do that. Um, it'd be harder to control them. That, yeah, permissible.

>> Engineering like this person right here, like this disabled person, Bri, right here, did you show on stream by the way?

>> Yeah, I did. And so for that case, because this is,

>> you know, still a human, they were born by a human, where they weren't engineered specifically in this case. So the burden of proof is to show, um, that such a person, uh, actually will never be able to express their will by the nature of their brain. It will never develop to the point where they could ever, uh, do such a thing. Then, yeah, if you showed that, or if like a scientist showed this, or whatever, then, yeah, they wouldn't have

>> if a scientist showed that this person would ne, would be cognitively stunted for the rest of their life, then it would be permissible to factory farm and eat them.

>> Yeah.

>> I mean, that seems like a very weird. I mean, obviously, we both know that this person will never actually have the cognitive capabilities to like form concepts in the way that you outlined it, right? Well, I mean, I, I don't know anything about the case, so I wouldn't ever be willing to say no. I know for a fact this, you know, it might be like, you know, funny to say that by like a communist or something, but this person is obviously like, that's a real person. So I don't want to be sitting here saying, "Yeah, I know for a fact that they will never, uh, that they're not a child because they don't have the potential, uh, to grow up." I, I don't know about the case. It would take like, you know, I, I doubt, I doubt such a thing as even being considered. I doubt a doctor has even looked into such a thing because again, this is a very theory of rights that I've got. So

>> they say IQ crystallizes.

>> Yeah, sorry, not to cut you off. Um, but, you know, they say IQ crystallizes at, um, hold on, let me [ __ ] I already forgot. Um, so, you know, IQ crystallizes around like age 16. So we'd imagine that this person, you know, at age 16, it's pretty clear that they're not going to be, you know, reaching any sort of potential. They don't have any potential left. They're not going to be actualizing some like higher cognitive capabilities. Um, so then under your worldview, right, if there was like a million of these, it'd be permissible for me to start factory farming them.

>> Yeah.

>> Really?

>> Yeah.

>> But so, you know, this person here is like over 16, I think, right? Well, actually, I might be lying. Let me, I, I haven't looked at this video in a bit.

>> Okay. Again, I, I don't know. I can't comment on the particular case. Um, I'm, I'm saying as a jurist here, right? For jurists like me. I'm talking about the general principles. That's all I can give you. Like, you, it would have to be more analogous to a judge who is able to look at the specific case. Obviously, that's not really possible on stream for me to, you know, call up like a scientist who's like deeply studied this individual. That's, that's the point.

>> You can search for that if you want. But I mean, like, I don't, I don't anything if, if this, if this investigation has been done and you can show, actually, they did do this investigation and they showed that, uh, this person will never be able to express their will ever, then, yeah, that, that is the principle. That, yeah, they wouldn't have rights then.

>> That's kind of what, that's what I mean by like crystallized. Like they don't, they no longer lack the, or they no longer have the potential to like actualize some other level of IQ for, you know, um, like IQ is generally like a good heuristic measuring cognitive capabilities, I'd say. Um, so in the case that this person is over 16, right? And there are many such cases where we have like disabled people just like Bri, um, I don't, I feel like it's a very, I don't know, untenable conclusion to come to that, you know, we can start factory farming or doing whatever we want with them, right? Um, like a million Bri's, you'd really just let that like factory farming go forward.

>> Yeah. If, if they could show that for, for this, you know, sub-race that there, that there is such a thing as like these subhumans and we can breed them and they will never ever be able to express their will. Then, yeah, that, that is the principle.

>> The reason I'm not doing some like hypothetical here is because this is like a very real case. It's like you see that person in front of you. Do you don't have any like intuition?

>> You know, it's probably.

>> Again, I, I can't comment on particular cases and there, it takes a lot to, you know, prove such a thing. Um, like I'm not like a biologist. I'm not like a scientist. I don't.

>> I mean, yeah, they look [ __ ] up. I mean, there's plenty of people who look [ __ ] up and let's, uh, it's okay. I mean, it doesn't seem like their IQ's.

>> I mean, they're very clearly below the threshold, you'd say, right? Like, clearly a pig would have higher cognitive capabilities than this type of person.

>> If, if you say so.

>> Would you agree that?

>> I, I, again, I.

>> I mean, you've seen the video. I mean, I think it's very.

>> I can't comment on particular cases unless I've like actually studied that particular case.

>> All All I can do is get you the principle. The general principle is if, if it were shown that this person is in fact not a child because they, because they could never express their will ever, no matter what, then, yeah, they wouldn't have rights.

>> Yeah. So this person's 34, it looks like. Um, and obviously, you know, they're not going to be changing anything. Um, they're not going to, they don't have any more potential to like increase their cognitive capabilities. It's quite clear. Um, I mean, is there anything in that video that shows you that this person has any sort of like concepts that are exclusive to humans that a pig wouldn't have?

>> Well, again, I, I don't know.

>> I, I don't know. All I can say is.

>> They look, they look [ __ ] up. Like that's, that's as much as I can say based on like the little clip I've seen.

>> That's as much as I can conclude.

>> All right. Um, okay. I mean, I guess we can just move on to species normality then. So is the case of like species normality, like the burden of proof needs to be shown that, um, like 50% plus one have the potential to actualize such like cognitive capabilities or.

>> So, so it's, it's not, it's nothing like, um, you know, specific like percentages or anything. It's about, uh, you know, what, what is the, what is the standard case for the species. It's, I, I agree with homeostatic property clusters, uh, basically. Um, so like, there is, there is some, there is some sort of peak on the chart around a certain characteristic. Um, and you have to show that there's, that there's some exception to this, uh, basic, uh, property that we, we, as we look at all entities of the species, that they generally have this property. It's like how, you know, dogs generally have four legs. If I, if I said, like, I saw a three-legged dog, you know, that, that's a new, that becomes an outlier. That becomes, uh, something, uh, distinct at that point.

>> Oh, I mean, when you said standard and like homeostatic property clusters, so that's like, I mean, that seems just like to be generally the case. If something applies to them, right? Um, and there's like skews or outliers, then we wouldn't really regard that as like part of the standard. Is that correct?

>> Yeah. Like this is how concept formation works. You look at, you abstract from the particulars,

>> um, to, to get a, get a, you know, general image of it. But this image, it's not like the second that a dog loses its one of its legs that it's no longer a dog anymore. We, we can't even conceptualize it. It's like, what the hell is this crazy creature? You know, it looks kind of like a dog. It's only three legs. You know, it's, you still, it's a dog, but it's a three-legged dog, right? You have to add that like three-legged prefix to it,

>> right? Yeah. So we would say like, all dogs have three legs or whatever. Um, but that's why I'm saying like, is, is what is the threshold exactly? It's like 50% plus one, right? That's, I imagine what the standard would be. The majority, um, have a certain trait. That's why we say the standard for, uh, such a species is this trait, right?

>> Um, I would say if, if it was literally only 50% plus one, you would, you'd have to end up like considering, okay, well, these, these might, these are either different concepts or the, the property I'm looking at actually isn't relevant to at forming this concept, like, like how, you know,

>> you cut out a bit.

>> So, so if it was literally like basically half have property A and half don't have property A. Well, then you need to start considering, okay,

>> no.

>> It's, it's like,

>> 50% plus one have property A and 50, the remaining have property.

>> It's, it's like men and women, right? I believe there are more women than men. We wouldn't say the general case for a human is that they have boobs, right?

>> Well, we, we say generally human. I mean, I don't think that's what we consider to be like humankind. Humankind is probably like derived from.

>> Exactly. It's a broader.

>> Uh, concept. That's what you have to do. Either you have to, uh, start forming different concepts, or, or so you say, this isn't actually relevant, like having boobs isn't relevant to being a human, but it is relevant to being a woman. Okay. So, but it is relevant for when we're talking about moral consideration for like the, sorry, potential for like a certain trait, right? So, that's why I think the 50% plus one, if we're going to pertain to like a certain trait, um, or like the potential to such a trait, um, it seems like that would be relevant, um, if we're going to take like some sort of species normality or like some sort of standard, um, to give them moral consideration. And I mean, it, but what I'm saying is, if it were the case that, you know, half of the time when a homo sapien is born, and they are in fact born with, you know, such a low level of cognition that they could never ever express their will. Um, then you have to start considering, well, we have to class these as different concepts, right? We have to say humans and subhumans at that point. Um, and then, and then, yeah, the subhumans wouldn't have, uh, rights, whereas the humans would have rights.

>> Right. So we're like boiling it down to cognitive potential, right? Like that's, that's an actual trait that is boiling down to like what humankind is and why we're, why you're discriminating between like humans and other species. Correct.

>> Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's whether they have specifically those two criteria I talked about, that they, you know, have volition and that they can, we can avoid conflict with them.

>> Right. Oh, I, I guess I kind of didn't address the volition point. Um, we can talk about that after, I guess. Um, it's more that, you know, in some cases, like in some periods throughout history, right, we had like insanely high levels of, um, infant mortality, such that, you know, we, the norm, the normality, or like the species normality in that case would be, you know, not having the potential. So in that case, would it be like then permissible to just, you know, start factory farming all the people during that time period or like aggressing upon them? Um, even though, you know, a good bunch of them do, um, have like this ability or like cognitive capability to reason, right? Um, it seems like you're just drawing like an arbitrary line between the two.

>> No, because even if you have like infant mortality rates, you know, through the roof, um, they're still humans. They, so they, they still based on the nature of humans, we know that humans do have the potential,

>> to do these things.

>> Um, now they might die before they ever actualize that potential. That, that's possible. Um, but that isn't relevant to law. Law doesn't ask you know us to be omniscient.

>> Sorry. Was there a definition of law? I was a subset of ethics and.

>> Yeah, it's specifically the subset of ethics, right?

>> Yeah. It's the subset of ethics which deals with, um, conflict. What to do with respect to conflicts.

>> All right. Sure. Um,

>> Okay. So, so it's more of just like applied ethics on how we. And you said not everything that's immoral is going to be illegal.

>> Yeah.

>> Right. Um, so I mean, it seems like the, how can you really say that they have the potential to do things when the majority of them die before, you know, actually proving that they have the actualization?

>> Well, because, cuz I've, I've, I've met many humans in my life and I, and those humans that I meet, they're generally able to, you know, form concepts. Uh, you know, obviously I've met babies before. They're, I don't think they're able to form concepts.

>> Well, I mean, in like the, I mean, in like the Middle Ages, right? That doesn't seem like that would apply during the Middle Ages. If you were a person living in the Middle Ages, wouldn't it be more?

>> It seems like it would be have a different nature back then. It was the same nature and the nature of a human. [ __ ] goddamn arachnid. I'm going to kill this bug on the veganism stream.

>> No. No. I mean, you can kill my goddamn face. This thing is pissing me off.

>> Perfect.

>> So, yeah. I mean, I, I think, you know,

>> on a slight tangent, you know, if,

>> if a bug's like aggressing on your private property, you're definitely allowed to kill it. Or like, if a, you know, a Vole is starting to kill your crops and eating your crops, it's obviously permissible to spray them with Lysol or whatever.

>> Sure. Um, but I think it's, it's also permissible even if they're not doing any of those things. I, I do want, I do want to go over,

>> um, you know, one, one thing you said earlier was the, the squirrel sort of like sequestering away a bunch of nuts for the winter. Um, this shows that they have,

>> the concept of goods and like they have some sort of time preference. I think that is, um, pardon me, I think that's absolutely false. Right? Ants will collect food, but they're, they're like automata, right? It's possible to have an automaton which.

>> Automata from Hell Divers.

>> No, plural of automaton. So.

>> Oh, like a robot?

>> Yeah, like they're effectively like an ant isn't going, "Oh, gee whiz, I bet I better get this, um, this food over to the queen, cuz then the queen will be able to lay a bunch more eggs and we'll have a bigger ant colony in case, you know, cuz we might have an ant war coming up. We, we don't know. Those, those fire ants I saw, uh, moving in around the corner, they look pretty nasty. I, I need to get this food for the colony so that like an ant doesn't think these in, in these terms. It doesn't think at all. It's just, it is going along and then it starts, it starts collecting that food and bringing it back. That's just what it does. It's like a cell in your body. Uh, like a cell in your body doesn't go, "Oh, geez, I better, I better process this oxygen, or or else the brain won't get any." Like a cell doesn't think, right? It's not, it's not like planning out. So, it's possible for a squirrel to collect nuts without thinking, "Geez, this is, it's going to be pretty cold winter. I saw on Fox News the other day, you know, Fox News. I saw on Fox News the other day, uh, that there was going to be a real cold winter, so I better collect action." Like, they don't think in their terms. It's just, it's just going along.

>> Of course, I agree. It's getting towards a certain season and, you know, it's got a biological clock and it's, and that biological clock is,

>> uh, giving it the impetus to start collecting nuts and squirreling them away.

>> Okay. So, you're basically just saying they're like mindless meat bags.

>> Yeah.

>> But, okay. So, to, okay, let me like clear things up, cuz I don't want anyone, especially in the audience, to think that, you know, I care about bacteria or like the environment or like, uh, what was the other thing? Uh, cells, right? Like, I don't think those are sentient creatures. I don't think they have moral consideration. Um, obviously, um, I'm just going to be, you know, abducting from evidence. Um, that being like the skeletal system, the muscular system, the nervous system of, you know, the similarities between humans and squirrels to kind of come to the conclusion, just by virtue of like a story, the law of parsimony, um, that they are in fact, you know, doing purposeful action when we see them doing purposeful action. Um, obviously, you know, I can, like, it seems like you're posing like some alternative conclusion that they're not purposeful. They're just like doing things habitually. Um, so, like, if, you know, if the lights in your room just went out, right, and you flipped the switch, um, the simple explanation is just that they, the lights went off because you flipped the switch. Um, and that's kind of going to be like the parsimonious one, right? So, like, the more complex explanation would just be like, I don't know, uh, maybe lightning struck, but you didn't hear it, and it was invisible. Um, wait, no, actually, I think I don't even think you can hear lightning to begin with. Um, but, you know, there's also another explanation that is logically possible, that you just had like a power outage. But, you know, we default to the more parsimonious one. We don't want to multiply things beyond necessity. Um, because those conclusions are just like very much, uh, you know, I don't know, they, it just doesn't have much merit to it. So the probability that I'd say that, you know, squirrels are purposeful actors is very much higher, much more than like the, uh, theory that they're just like mindless meat bags, I'd say.

>> Sure. But moreover,

>> I do have a little bit of notes on,

>> like that they are collecting nuts for the winter. That isn't enough to prove that like, you know, they're, oh, geez, it's going to be a cold winter. I better I better stock up for this. Like, that doesn't prove that, because ants are able to collect things for the winter as well.

>> Of course. Yeah. So that's going to be just coupled with like, you know, their skeletal system, their muscular system, nervous system, you know, uh, I don't know, their reproductive system. Like, they, they obviously have brains. Um, they, I mean, they have like pretty large squirrels specifically. Um, I think I looked at the gray squirrel. I'm not too sure about like, I don't know, like a flying squirrel. Um, they, like, they have large brains relative like to body size. Um, like they have a cerebral cortex, um, which is like something that I think, correct me if I'm wrong, you can search this up, but neurologists have like narrowed that down to be like problem solving in memory, right? So that'd be like cold cognition in this case. Um, and then also, so coupled with that information, right, and seeing them like plant, uh, acorns in the ground, I'd say that it's more likely than not that they actually do have like some sort of hot cognition that is like a low time preference in long-term planning.

>> Um, sorry, I've actually notated hot cognition the wrong way. So, was hot cognition the emotionally charged one with high time preference?

>> No, no, low time preference and long-term planning.

>> So, it's emotionally charged, low time preference, long-term planning.

>> Did I say emotionally charged? I might have misspoke. Um, just generally, I just see that as like long-term planning. Um, and I, let me search that up. I think it's like H16, usually people get that.

>> So, yeah, I mean, the, the thing is like, it, it certainly has some level of cognition, or else, you know, it wouldn't have evolved a brain, right? Um, but, you know, you're not going to catch anybody teaching language to a squirrel, or to a gorilla, or to a chimp, or to anything else. Because, you know, they don't have the faculty. Like, this is the cognitive trade-off hypothesis, right? That humans, you know, we ate up quite a large amount of, uh, brain matter, which could have been used for, you know, having a really high crow limit. Like, a chimp has a crazy ass crow limit, like it can instantly identify like 20 numbers or something, which is very important for a chimp to do in case it's in a war with another tribe of chimps, right? Um, very important.

>> Is this real, or you just.

>> No, no, this, this is a real thing. It's, it's very important for a chimp to be able to quickly identify, okay, there are, you know, 15 of them and there's only 12 of us, so we got to get the [ __ ] out of here. Like, that's very important for a chimp. But humans kind of,

>> took over a lot of these parts of the brain, um, in order to develop language, right? That's why humans have language and these other things don't. It's a very expensive process to have language. And why is it so expensive? Well, it's because language is actually intimately tied with the ability to form concepts. And that's why humans are so much so much more intelligent than anything else. Like, it's not even close.

>> Um, because humans have this concept.

>> Right. So I mean, this is kind of just goes back into like the debate of like cognition. But so you agree that they're not, squirrels are more likely than not, like, uh, the evidence I provided is like probability raising to the case that they are not just like robotic meat bags, right? But the way, the way in which I'm using robotic meat bag is to say that they aren't, uh, choosing. I don't think they have volition because I think volition is again tied to the ability to form concepts. I think that's when, uh, free will kicks in. I don't think that squirrels can form concepts.

>> You can, you give me some like example? Okay. But, but they're not, obviously we're like drawing a threshold or, uh, we're drawing like a distinction between squirrels and ants, right? Like, they would not be like analogous in terms of, uh, cognitive capabilities, right?

>> Sure. A squirrel, I would, I would be willing to say that a squirrel is vastly more intelligent than an ant.

>> And it's more likely than not that they're. Okay. So I, I guess it seems like you're doing some sort of distinction between, um, purposeful behavior with squirrels and purposeful behavior with humans on this like whole volition thing, which I'm not entirely clear about. So I guess we can go over that. So what is volition exactly? It, it, it's free, free will, the ability to choose. I mean, you don't think the squirrel has the ability to choose between one good and another good, or like, you know, maybe one of the studies I gave you, like where a, I don't know, a chicken chooses between three goods and two goods and chooses the higher amount. Or perhaps like a, I don't know, a, uh, I don't know, a rat chooses between like a [ __ ] nut or a peanut,

>> right? I, I don't think that they're choosing. It's just, you know, a fact of reality. Like, they can't split off in two and take it all at once, right? That's just a fact of reality. But like, you know, the same is true for if I have like,

>> you know, put a tiny crumb on one side of the room and like a whole buffet,

>> on the other side, the answer for the [ __ ] buffet,

>> right? That doesn't mean that they're choosing. They're not going like, "Oo, I'm going to, I'm going to really consider this and think, well, it would actually be better for the for the colony if I went over and took some of the more food that rather than the less food." Like, they, they're not choosing. And specifically, I, I'll maybe clarify this. Uh, the, the locus of free will is very particular on my view. It is specifically, uh, related to your concept formation, cuz it's the very first level of choice you have is whether to focus or drift when you're, when you're forming concepts, right? And, and then is beyond that, if, if you choose to focus,

>> then your choice is between, uh, thinking or evasion. Evasion is disintegrating the facts of reality. Uh, thinking is integrating those facts of reality. And then way up the hierarchy,

>> what is disintegrating? What does that mean? Disintegrating the facts of reality?

>> Is basically choosing to, uh, you, you acknowledge those facts and then you choose to just blank them out, like you are trying to just keep them away from your cognitive apparatus rather than integrating them into your cognitive apparatus. And, you know, perhaps concept, I'm saying ants don't do that. I'm saying only humans do that.

>> So only humans acknowledge facts and keep integrate them into our mind?

>> Yeah, only humans can integrate, uh, because integration is again, uh, related to concept formation.

>> I mean, how would that be the case if they're not integrating them into their mind and like having some sort of, uh, low time preference and, you know, coming to this squir, this like [ __ ] the nut cache, right? Or like birds finding like seed caches, right?

>> That not be the case that they're acknowledging facts and putting them in their minds or integrating them into their minds?

>> Well, specifically, I don't think that they're, there's any choice involved here because I don't think they're forming concepts. I think they're operating only on the level of particulars. This particular nut. They're not, uh, inventing the science of nutology to figure out what causes nuts to be existing. Where do nuts come from? How can I make more nuts? Should I open up a nut store and sell it to all the other squirrels? Like, they, they could never get there because they don't have a concept of nuts.

>> That's low time preference. They, they do have a concept of nut. It's like, oh, nut equals sustenance. Um, nut, um, I'm going to save it for,

>> I don't think that's the case.

>> whatever the value of the scarce goods are going to be, you know,

>> I think they're only basically,

>> you know, automatically driven towards seeking out these particular nuts. But that doesn't require that they form the concept of nut. They can do that operating only on particulars in the exact same way that an ant is able to identify food, uh, without forming concepts for food. And in even a cell, a bacteria is also able to seek out nutrients. A bacteria can, you know, go towards nutrients that it's not thinking, right? Just.

>> That's why I kind of gave the.

>> Yeah, this is why I gave that. Okay. But obviously, you know, squirrels are not automatic in the way that you described, it seems. Um, you know, it, it is the case that, you know, we're doing like some sort of abstract, uh, planning with like a squirrel and a nut, right? They're not just like, oh, I see a nut. I'm going to just habitually go to it and eat it. Right? So, this is like the whole point of hot cognition. Like they have a low time preference. They know when goods are going to be scarce. They have concepts of scarce. I disagree with that.

>> That being like.

>> I don't, I don't think, I don't think squirrels learned like, geez, gee whiz. It got real cold around when when the moon had done this pattern recognition.

>> No, no, no. I don't, I don't think a squirrel is going like, I've actually counted the rotations that the moon has been making around the earth and around about this time it starts getting very cold. So, I should, I should start saving up food. Like, I don't think it's doing that. I think it's just literally.

>> I don't think it's that advanced.

>> I think it's like biologically driven to do. It's like, it's like the beavers in captivity will still build dams across doors and stuff like that.

>> No, they're, they're not using like moon phases and like they're not like some obvious.

>> No, they are. They're using heuristics, like, you know, falling leaves. They're changing the colors of the leaves when the.

>> Of course, they are. Why, why else would they just like.

>> Why do they, why do beavers build dams in captivity?

>> I have no idea. I have no, no clue anything about beavers.

>> Like, beavers build dams normally in the wild because, like, you know, that's, that's, I think they like build their little burrows, um, based on like, after they've dammed up the river, then they build their burrows so they can have like their children or something. I, I don't know the exact reason why beavers build dams. Um, but like, even in captivity, if you take a beaver, raise it up without where it's never been in the wild, it's never seen any other beavers, it's never come to any conclusion like, "Oh, I really should build a dam to solve this problem I've got." Like, it's never had any of that. It will still start building dams. Like, it'll take all of its soft toys and put them across a doorway to build a dam. Like, it's just,

>> it's biologically wired to do that. It's, it's not solving.

>> Some sort of problem that it's facing.

>> You think they have some sort of.

>> Okay, I'm not, I, I don't want to comment too much on beavers because, like, I'm completely in the dark for that. Um, I, I mean, I can look into that obviously after we do this, but, um, in the case of the squirrel, do you think they really have some sort of like biological clock in which, you know, oh, my biological clock is telling me that it's winter and something is like triggering in my, I don't know, like neural synapses, right? Uh, that's telling me, oh, I need to go grab a nut now and start digging it in and come back to it in like five months. Oh, but how do I know it's in five months? I have like some other like biological trigger that's telling me or like some sort of feedback loop. That seems very much more like, uh, complex and like multiplying, you know, beyond necessity.

>> It's absolutely not multiplying beyond necessity would be, uh, saying that the, that the squirrel, you know, one winter it didn't save up because it didn't know that winter was coming and then it was like, "Gez whiz, that was real [ __ ] cold. I got to go collect more nuts this time, right?" Like, I, I really don't think there's absolutely no evidence that that is what's happening as against just, you know, it's biologically motiv. It's biologically programmed. It's the same way where if you take a sheep dog, raise up in captivity. It's never herded anything. It doesn't go like.

>> What is a sheep dog? Is that.

>> It's something, you know, shepherds used to herd their sheep. Like, it's, it's never, it's never seen a.

>> Sheep in its life. It isn't solving some problem where it's like, I've got this problem here and this problem will be solved better by herding sheep. Yes, I will, I will herd. Like, it's not doing that. Like, if you take a sheep, sheep dog, which has never seen a sheep in its life, it'll start trying to herd. It'll try and herd things still. Like, you know, there's that, there's that story of, I'm not sure how.

>> No, no, it's a specific, it's a specific type of chasing. It literally them. Like, if, like, there was, um, you know, this one story of this of this couple where they had a sheep dog. It was, it had never seen a sheep. They weren't farmers. One day it got out and they found it herding sheep. Like, it just knew how to herd sheep. It wasn't solving some problem that it was facing and going, "Hm, maybe if I get these sheep into this different field, then that would solve my problem. Let me try that out." Like, it's not thinking like it. Or even if, even if there's videos online of like sheep dogs where they see like a statue of a sheep and they'll start trying to herd that statue of a sheep. Like, they, they aren't trying to solve some problem that they're facing by doing this. They're just.

>> Well, the way that you're describing like them doing, oh, I'm going to start herding sheep and help my farmer friend or whatever, like, I don't think they're doing that. But I still, I still think these dogs are doing purposeful action, but not to the end that you're describing. I think they're doing purposeful action as like a means to their end of, uh, you know, entertainment. Obviously, like when I run around, my dog chases me, not because it's like habitual, well, maybe it's like programmed in them that it's fun, but they're still making a choice to do something that is fun. Um, and in the case of squirrels, you said there's like no evidence or whatever. Um, but obviously I outlined right with like biology and like the empirical evidence of their like cerebral cortex and now neurologists are kind of just narrowing it down to be, um, the cerebral cortex to be, uh, like logical reasoning. Um, so I mean, the question is, can you think like a squirrel can sense temperature and use heuristics like based on, uh, you know, like if it's fall, it's obviously going to be colder than summer. Well, I don't know, exact, I don't know the exact obviously I'm not a biologist, so I don't know the exact mechanism.

>> Through which, you know, certain animals know which season.

It is like, you know, like how a cicada can sleep for 13 years, you know? Why is it 13? It's because it's a prime. It's because it's a prime number.

And so, different predators will be on different cycles. So, if it's a prime number, it's less likely to be facing a cycle with predators. That's why they cicada always sleep in the ground. Yeah, that's why they always sleep in the ground for prime numbers of years.

Now, I absolutely do not think for one iota of a second that cicas got together. They had their, their cicada, you know, uh, Nobel Prize awards and and they, they figured out, "Hey, these these predators, we've studied predators, here are the scientists, we've cicada scientists, we've studied predator patterns and we noticed that they come up in like, you know, years of four or something. Uh, so and we actually discovered the science of mathematics as well. So, we know that the best way to avoid this, uh, most times is by sleeping for exactly a prime number of years." And so, that's what we're going to do, guys. Like, I don't believe for one second that that is what that, that is what happened.

Obviously. Yeah. No, I don't believe that. I I don't think there's like some secret cicada coalition like planning and all this stuff. But, you know, I also said before, like I'm like pretty agnostic about, um, bugs. But it seems to be the case that, you know, that can just be attributed to, um, natural selection. Not that they're doing anything purposefully there, but in the case of, you know, uh, like animals doing certain things, I don't think it's just natural selection. It's very much purposeful behavior in the same way that we are like predisposed to do certain things based on, you know, our own behaviors, but also somewhat due to natural selection. And like, um, I don't know, we we all have like certain predispositions, but I don't necessarily mean that, uh, sorry, I don't necessarily think that means that we're not actually doing anything purposefully.

Right? But like specifically what you're, what you're claiming here is that, you know, at least for the squirrel, like, like you're, you're willing to grant these other cases where cicas didn't figure out that they had this problem with predators, so they need to sleep for a prime number of years. You're saying that that has definitely not happened. That the, they always sleep. Yeah, they, they sleep in the ground. They, always sleep, right? So like specifically for 13 years, for for a prime number of years. Like you're saying they didn't have predators, so they decided, they figured out that sleeping for 13 years would, um, allow them to avoid predators more often so they could have more offspring. Like you're, you're saying that's the case for the cicas, but then for the squirrel, like you, you don't seem to be able to grant that, well, it's definitely possible for a squirrel to also recognize which season it is. Or or like a bird, right? A bird doesn't go, "It's going to be winter soon, and I better fly down to Africa, but better get down to the southern hemisphere for winter." Like a bird isn't figuring that out. It just, it just, you know, it, it's biologically programmed a certain time of year to move from the northern hemisphere to the southern hemisphere.

I disagree. I I definitely think they're like sensing some sort of temperature. And the reason why I'm not granting this to like cicas, right, is because, uh, through natural selection, I'm sure there was at some point a cicada that lived for or slept for like 15 years, and then they died. At the same time, there's like a plethora of evidence to demonstrate that, you know, bugs don't actually act purposefully. They don't actually do anything to attain their ends. They don't do anything, um, outside of like habitual, uh, movement. So like Peter Singer in his book, Animal Liberation, has like a million studies on bugs, like how they're getting eaten alive and they're not even noticing. They're like going about their day. They're just like doing everything mindlessly. Like there's not much evidence I can see of like a bug acting purposefully, um, especially given the sense the case that, you know, they're not actually, um, they don't have like a cerebral cortex in the same way that like a squirrel does, or actually, I'm not fully aware. I'm pretty sure they don't, but, you know, Peter Singer's book kind of outlines this, not to get into a utilitarian discussion, but.

So, I mean, like, do you think that there was some point at which birds, you know, European birds, they like hawks or whatever, that they would just stay in Europe all year round, and then they started to slowly figure out, "Hey, actually, if I travel really, really, really far south, like just an insane amount south, it's actually summer down there whilst it's winter up here." Like, did they figure that out and then start solving their problem of it being cold in the winter and there being less prey and stuff? Or or was it just an evolutionary, they've been biologically programmed a certain time of year to fly south?

What do you mean they're bi- Obviously, you know, someone at some point, the first bird would have had to do it purposefully. So, I don't see why if that was the case, then behavior would be passed down.

If it, if the first bird to do that did do it purposefully, like it was solving some problem, why the hell would that behavior be passed down to their offspring?

If it wasn't a biological imperative?

Well, it's just a predisposition to, you know, be smart about things. When you feel a cold temperature, you go away from it, right? So, you know that things are going to be so like, it's this like level of intelligence, I guess, is getting passed down in the same way.

I I don't know. I don't know how I don't know how much you've been around winter, um, when it gets cold. Like, if I just start walking south, I live in New York. Like, if I, you know, when it get, when it gets to winter time, it's starting to get to winter time here now. If I start walking south, it's going to take me a hell of a lot time before I can get so far south that it's like, it's actually starting to warm up down here. Like the variations from north to south are way less than the variation from day to day.

Well, I mean, I see what you're saying as in like, if you go south, you won't feel the temperature hit right away because Earth is ginormous, right? But obviously birds are not limited to our like 5 mph like American obese like walking speed, right? So, obviously they can just fly at like whatever. I mean, let me search that up. How fast does that bird fly?

Even like, even like a bird, it's going to take it a whole lot of time. 240.

Like the variations are very minimal. Like it can be colder. You know, I I live I live in.

200 miles an hour. That's a that's a lot of progress in one day.

No, that's when they're diving.

Diving.

Yeah. They like dive into like.

I mean, let me let me search up what the average bird speed. I mean, I did search up bird. I didn't like cherry pick. Okay, it's giving me individual birds. Let me just, uh, chat you a bit here.

So like the point is that like the v the variations from day to day, like, you know, I live up in Scotland, but there are some days where it's colder in London than it is up here. Like, I don't think a bird would ever be able to figure out.

I don't think a bird would ever be ever be able to figure out that, hey, as I go further south, it tends to be warmer, even with the variations from day to day. Like, I don't think a bird would ever figure that out. I think that it evolved to do that. Like, I don't think it, it had this problem of winters and then solve that problem. Whereas a human could figure out, cuz a human could go, "Hey, I actually, you know, I look at satellite data, I know that when it's, you know, when it, when it's summer in the northern hemisphere, it's winter in the south and so on and so forth, right?" Like a human can figure that out and a human could decide that they wanted to go south for the south for the winter if they wanted, you know, to do that. Um, but like, it's absolutely ludicrous to suggest that birds face this problem and then, you know, cuz do you think there was some time in the past where birds, you know, literally were just, you know, staying for the winter, they just like buckled down and dealt with it, and then like one one of their bird friends came up and, "Hey, you know, tweet tweet, as it turns out, it's actually summer if you go way way south, if you go like, you know, well like a thousand miles or so south, it's summer." And he he told this to all his bird friends and they all started getting together and like.

Here's what I think that happened. Okay, so it seems like it would take about four to six days for a bird to like fly from Scotland to the equator. I think what happened is, you know, as like the cold, you know, sets in, right, birds will start flying in different directions to try to avoid this. The birds who like make the correct decision pass on their genes of, you know, actually making good decisions, right, of figuring out where the cold, uh, or where the warmer weather is, um, such that, you know, evolutionary biases would render like the smartest, most purposeful birds, uh, the ones who are like alive in this current, uh, generation, right? So like that kind of begs the.

But then you're saying that they made a better decision.

Right, but what data would the bird have to make that decision on? Cuz you're saying it's just the smarter birds which survived, and the smarter birds figured out that you should go south. But like, I don't think that's the. I think because they, you know, they have they can detect magnetic field.

Days.

But they, they can detect magnetic fields, right? And so it was actually, I don't, I don't think it's the smarter birds. I think it's the birds which tended to fly south, uh, for, you know, whatever reason, random mutation, and this random mutation started getting more and more, uh, severe to the point where, you know, they have a very acute sense of magnetic fields. And so they all start just, they don't, they didn't just, they didn't figure it out. They didn't go, "Oh, it's going to be winter soon, so I better go south, and I know where south is." They, they just have this biological imperative that forces them to go south when when the time of year is right.

No, but listen, okay, so it only takes about five days for them to like fly from north to south, right? So that, that's a very, very low margin, um, that they have to make. And, you know, it takes months to set in for winter. to the time where like they can't actually live during the winter. Um, I I don't think it's evolutionary because that, that would just mean that they're just flying arbitrarily, and I don't see how you could like pass down some sort of like south, uh, southbound gene, right? Like, that doesn't make too much sense. It's the same because that, that's why they can detect magnetic field.

How does that work?

They, they can detect magnetic fields, birds.

Oh, is that how they, is that, is that why they fly down?

Yeah, they detect the magnetic fields and they start going down south when the time of year is right, and they go back up north when the time of year is right.

Right. So that.

Why do they fly down south? If they detect magnetic fields, they know.

Because, because after, you know, after a while, they start having these random mutations which would give them the ability to slightly tell magnetic fields. Uh, and then, you know, in conjunction, I don't know, which, you know, chicken or egg problems, right? I don't know. I'm not a bird expert. Right. After after a while, uh, these random mutations which would, uh, force them to go down south, those birds ended up being more successful than the birds which didn't do that. This is just evolution, right?

Right. So even if it's the case that they can follow like some sort, or if they can detect magnetic fields, that still seems like a more complicated theory. I mean, I think, you know, just like off the cuff, uh, the better.

Crazy [ __ ]

Right? But I mean, all else equal, that with the information we're like kind of armed with, right? Uh, it's probably something along the lines of like their original bird found like a correct route, and then they take their like offspring with them on that route. The kids then learn based off of that past experience. Um, because obviously, you know, I think we can both grant that animals can learn from experiences, right? But this.

And then the kids follow the parent, and then it goes on and on.

But again, this, this, this model of how that works, it's refuted by animals raised in captivity where they still do their instinctual behaviors, even though there's absolutely nothing being solved with that. They didn't learn it from their, the beavers in in captivity, they didn't learn that from their parents to build dams. They just instinctually have to build dams. That that's just a biological imperative for them to build dams. Is that, I mean, I, I'm not too sure about beavers, but I mean, if that's true, then I, I imagine there's like other conclusions you can come to, um, that like they're doing it out of their own self-interest and it's like, kind of sort of a trial and error thing. Um.

Trial and error. Frogs, right? They they have.

I mean, what, what is the problem with the dams? Like, why are they building dams?

You. I don't know specifically. I think it's something to do with their reproductive cycle, or it helps them like get food. I don't, I don't know the specific reason, but there is some, you know, specific reason why beavers evolved, right, to build dams. Uh, those beavers ended up being more successful than the, than their counterparts who didn't build dams. Um, but that like, then if, if it was just a learned, "Hey, little Johnny beaver, um, we we're facing this problem. Um, and it helps us solve that problem if we build dams. Um, uh, so you got to build dams as well." Like, that isn't what happened. Uh, what happened is they've evolved to build dams. Like, he doesn't have to, you know, Daddy Beaver doesn't have to tell little Johnny Beaver to build dams. Little Johnny Beaver is just going to build dams cuz he's a beaver.

So you don't think there's like anything in the mind going on when they're just like building, uh, dams for no reason other than just to build dams?

Well, it, there, there is something which, um, you know, some problem that solves which makes purpose.

I don't think there's a purpose. No, I don't think they had had an issue which building dams solved, and they were like, "Hey, building dams solved this issue. So, I'm going to keep building dams and I'm going to teach my children to build dams and blah blah blah." That is absolutely not, uh, what happened. They evolved to build dams. Like, they don't have a choice in the matter. And same with the squirrel. I don't think the squirrel has a choice in the matter. I think if you took a squirrel into captivity, in captivity, where it has, it will never deal with a winter in its life, I would bet any amount of money you want that it would still start collecting up objects for the winter, even though it doesn't have a winter to deal with.

Okay. Well, I mean, I don't think that would be the case. It seems like, you know, the squirrels obviously like staving off hunger. It doesn't seem like they're just like robotically moving around. Um, in the same way, like, you know, the studies I showed you, um, the chickens seem very purposeful on what their behavior is, like choosing more goods than less. Um, so it seems to me that like the squirrel, um, is kind of, it's like facing some sort of biological reality, right? And it, in order to like satiate its hunger, it's just going to be eating more nuts. And in the case of, I don't know, uh, like, I guess off the cuff, a turtle, right? You know how like the mama turtle, like lays a bunch of them in the sand, and they all just quote unquote habitually just, uh, go towards the water, right? I think they, they are forming concepts in the sense that, you know, this sand is very dry, and they're like, it's like sucking up all their, uh, what is it called? Um, moisture, right? So it seems to me like it would be the case that they, they are forming like some sort of concepts between, uh, sand and like water to like satiate their, you know, uh, desire to try to like moisturize and swim and not get killed by a bunch of birds.

Um, no. I again, I don't, I don't think this is how evolution works at all because, or else it wouldn't be passed down like the the beavers need to, you know, build dams, or the birds need to fly south. It wouldn't be passed down if it was truly a decision, cuz you can't pass decisions down. Evolution, like evolution can't encode a decision.

There are some, there are some things that are habitual, like if you, if you like punch your knee right now, right? That's obviously reflexive and habitual, but there are some things that are like decision-m, uh, you, there are some like purposeful things, uh, that are that do happen in like non-human animals. Um, so even if it is the case that, you know, this beaver or whatever is doing things habitually, I don't think it changes from like the fact that, um, a lot of the empirical evidence does show like purposeful behavior. Um, I mean, maybe I can.

Look through my, I might have something else. I think the disagreement here is that, sorry, you can keep going.

You're you're identifying these things behavior.

Which like, like, do you, do you deny that it's possible for evolution to, you know, encode some very complex behaviors? Like it is possible for evolution to get very complex, right?

Right. So I think some things are habitual and some things are purposeful. But in the case of like a squirrel or like a pig, you know, actually, there's a lot of videos of pigs like trying to unscrew the, you know, gestational cages, right, to try to escape, right? Do you think that that is purposeful behavior there, or do you think that's like fully habitual? It's like very hard for me to wrap my mind around that being habitual rather than them trying to like, you know, escape captivity.

Well, again, this is kind of, it gets into, you know, what specifically are we meaning by purposeful? When I'm using that term, I'm meaning like specifically chosen behavior. I don't think the pig can choose, cuz I don't think the pig can form concepts.

Okay. Sorry, what was your? I'll write this down this time. You said concepts are. Can you give me some example? U, tell me what concepts are and then give me some examples of what concepts are, I guess.

Sure. Uh, I'll have to your worldview.

Open up.

Uh, I don't have the definition just in my head.

Okay.

I'll have to open up.

Uh, concepts. Daisies need pass tab. Uh, this is from Introduction to Objectives of Epistemology. A concept is a mental integration of two or more units possessing the same distinguishing characteristics with their particular measurements omitted.

Wait, sorry. You said a mental, uh, integration of.

Let me just.

Of two or more units.

Yeah. A concept is a mental integration of two or more units possessing the same distinguishing characteristics with their particular measurements omitted, and it's a wiki, so there you can follow up.

Sure. Um, and then can you give me some examples of that, I guess, like what, in what cases would it be actual, like actually purposeful, like if I could demonstrate that?

Sure. If, if you could demonstrate that, um, a, a pig was able to do this integration, it was able to figure out, you know, the concept of freedom and it decided and it evaluated the concept of freedom was good. Uh, you know, based on like, you know, it looked at a bunch of particular instances of freedom and abstracted out what, what freedom in general is. Um, or or even like, you know, this is also an example from Leonard Peacov, like, uh, with respect to dogs.

Wait, this is like unfalsifiable then.

I mean, I can't, I can't like tell you exactly what.

True things are also unfalsifiable. So I, I agree. I could, I don't think you can falsify this.

So, I mean, we're developing, we're developing theories here. So I think, you know, if things are going to be unfalsifiable, I think my theory just, you know, is more parsimonious in that case. Um, and it's probably like based on the information or empirical evidence, it seems more like, uh, it seems more likely to be the correct theory, you know.

But I mean, again, with with your theory, you're identifying way too many things as purposeful, right? So again, with the beavers and the dams, or the squirrels collecting nuts, like, you know, there people have a tendency perhaps to personify and think, "Hmm, why would I collect nuts? It's a thing, you know, what is it? What is it like to be a bat?" Right? You can imagine what it's like to be a human pretending to be a bat, but you don't actually know what it's like to be a bat. And so, like, you know, people tend to personify animals quite a lot. Like, you, you are putting yourself in the squirrel's shoes. Why would I collect nuts for the winter? Well, it's because I would want there to be food, cuz I wouldn't want to be going out during winter. There's going to be less food around. Uh, it's going to be way colder. I might die out there, right? That's why a human would collect nuts for winter. A squirrel doesn't think in those terms, right? It's just biologically programmed that this time of year it's going to go collect nuts, right? Cuz the squirrels which did that, they survived. All right. So, listen, I mean, that might be the case with squirrels. I don't think that is the case, but there's obviously, you know, it seems like the threshold for you is just one instance of purposeful action. Is that correct?

So, the, the threshold would be that, yeah. If you could show, uh, not just maybe maybe we should move away from [ __ ] goddamn arachnid [ __ ].

Who, who the [ __ ] decided to put wings on arachn?

Animals are fighting for me and.

What?

They have wings?

Yeah, daddy long legs.

Yeah, daddy long legs.

They don't have wings.

Yeah, my goddamn face does have wings. You don't know what daddy longlegs is? Yeah, I know what that is. They don't have wings.

They absolutely do. It's flying around me right now.

Oh, I see. I mean, the ones in New York don't have that, but I. All right. Um, I mean, I guess that's how it is in Europe.

Yeah. So, so anyway, yeah. So, if you could show that, you know, pigs and whatnot are able to form concepts, then yes, they would hit the first criterion that they do indeed have volition. If you could show that. Um, but then the second criterion is still there that we can avoid conflicts. I don't know how to avoid conflicts with a pig, right? Can a pig, you know, sign a contract? Can it say, you know, build a build a fence around his property.

And and go like, "Hey, this is my property, Bob, step off." You know, it's got like a shotgun there.

So, it's like a conjunction of traits I'm hearing. So, it's like sort of, um, the ability to integrate, what is it? Two or more like units, um, with distinguishing characteristics. Um, I mean, so you don't think a pig is capable of distinguishing, uh, you know, being caged in and not being caged in, which is just going to be, you know, we can just cash it out to be freedom, right?

So, I don't think.

Otherwise, what, what, what would they be like? Why would they be unscrewing the, like, in, so they live in 2x6 gestational cages, why would they be unscrewing, uh, like a bolt to try to, you know, get out of that situation if they didn't have some concept of some like counterfactual in which they're like.

I don't know, uh, frolicking about in like a field or like not in that cage, right? So they have the concept of not being caged.

That doesn't require any concepts yet, because the pig could just go, "Oh, that looks nice out there. There there's some food over there. It's more space. I'm going to try and get out there." That the particular out there.

How is that a non-concept?

Okay, you don't need concepts for that. It could be the particular location. it wants to be at that particular location, whereas a concept, it's a universal, it's not a particular.

Right. So they don't, they don't have like just food lying around in the factory farms, right? Otherwise, you know, the, so how, what, how it works is like the mother is like in a 2x6 cage, and like the little piglets, you know, suck the mom's titties, um, on the sidelines. Um, so if it was a case that food was like around, then obviously the children would just be crowding the food a lot of times, so they wouldn't just like leave it out in the open. Um, so I, I think we can probably rule out that. But it seems to me they still have some concept of not, uh, being caged, such that like they are forming like two distinct concepts of, you know, that's kind of why they're like trying to escape.

Again, you, you don't require that, like a, a rat can solve a maze without having a concept of what a maze is. In fact, even water can solve mazes, by the way. Well, I mean, obviously, I mean, it's like malleable. Can water can go through a vent.

Like specifically, obviously doesn't have like, we don't.

Specifically, water is able to find the shortest path through a maze.

Which is often being used as a way to prove that, for instance. Yeah. Yeah. Like for, you know, there's there's this classic study which says like, well, slime mold, it has some sort of primitive form of intelligence, um, because it's able to find the shortest path through a maze. But this guy, um, uh, did did this experiment where actually, well, water is able to solve the exact same maze and find the exact same shortest path.

Okay. Well, I mean, I'm not super super, uh, informed about that, but there's like a bunch of like, there's there's good evidence with like rats, for example. I mean, maybe this will, maybe this counts as a concept for you. I'm like a bit unclear on what that concept is, I guess. So, like this study here. Oh, let me look at this first. This a picture? No.

It's it's a video. He he like basically the water is able to find the shortest path through that maze, which kind of.

Oh, I see. Well, I mean, it goes through [ __ ] everything. That's not the shortest path if I just test every single route.

Well, I mean.

How's it the shortest? Testing every single route? That's like a just filling in the entire maze saying I found the shortest route.

No, no. After a while, like it, it, it specifically erodes away the the shortest path, meaning that.

Oh, water can find the shortest path.

Sorry, become unresponsive.

Um, I may have to leave this call for a second.

Uh, and join back in.

I mean, we can wrap up soon. We've been at this for like two hours, but I, I just have one more thing to, or more study, I guess, that we can talk about.

Sure.

You can leave and rejoin. Uh, yeah.

Yeah, it's about 2 hours.

Yeah, let me, let me leave and rejoin real quick. Actually, I'll just go to the toilet as well. So, I'll see you in a in a couple minutes.

Okay. Yeah.

There we go. Um, BRB. Someone's asking what concept formation has to do with ethics. It's basically, can't form concepts, then you don't have volition. Uh, so there is no sense in which you can have rights. Rejoin this discord call. Hello.

All right. Um, I mean, we've been at this for a bit, so I guess I can just like, um, maybe this will count as a concept. I'm not, I probably got to read more into whatever like you mean by concepts, but in any case, um, this rat study here, right? Um, hold on.

Right. So, um, it seems like these rats here, I, I annotated the PDF and I put in a Google Drive. Let me know if it's accessible or not.

Yeah. All right. So, I mean, this study, they basically just, hold on. Sorry, my thing is like lowkey lagging out, right? Though, um, like the gist of the study is just that, you know, they aimed to measure and demonstrate like altruistic behaviors in rats, even without like direct rewards. So it was like indicating empathy and ethical reasoning. So I'm not sure if that would like under your worldview count as like a concept of choosing between like some sort of, uh, like sustenance versus, um, some like altruistic, uh, you know, helping of like their fellow rat brethren. Um, so basically, they all they did was, they, in most test trials, the rats chose to help the cage mate before obtaining food. Um, so that's kind of what suggests that the value of helping others is greater than the value of, uh, rewarding food. So I think that they have a concept of like altruistic behaviors, right? And also the concept of food sustenance. So that's like two concepts I'd say. Um, and then in the case, um, or sorry, uh, basically the results indicate that, you know, door opening behavior was motivated to liberate the cagemate from distressing situation, and thus rats can behave pro-socially. If rats were motivated to like have some social, uh, some type of like social contact with the cagemate, they would open the door even when the cagemate was not in the water. Um, and this kind of just suggests that door opening behavior could not be explained only by, like, the motivation of some sort, some sort of like social contract. Um, but yeah, I mean, does that not count as like a, like a, a concept that very much seems like they have two distinct concepts in hand here? And rats, I'd say, are probably like the bottom of the barrel in terms of cognitive capabilities, right?

I mean, that, that doesn't necessarily imply concepts. I mean, like, you know, an ant, uh, might, you know, run into, you know, kill an invading, like, termite or whatever before it goes get food, but that doesn't mean, you know, that's that's in some way pro-social because of course ants are, uh, social animals. Um, but that, that, that it's doing something pro-social, that doesn't mean that it has the concept of, you know, any concepts at all necessarily. It's, it's very, it's entirely possible necessarily that they're just like, you know, the rats have evolved, uh, to help out other rats. That's entirely possible.

Right. So, it's entirely possible like no one else other than me has like purposeful behavior, and they're all just like automatons, or is that the word? Automata. I think, um, it's like entirely possible, but like I'm just trying to demonstrate when I say like I know something or I, I, I just mean like a justified, like belief, right? So I think the evidence is like overwhelmingly in favor that, you know, like if rats have like these two concepts here, um, then we can definitely like apply them to like pigs and chickens and cows.

Well, I don't see, I don't see the concepts, though. Like, it's entirely possible for that to happen.

Without concepts, whereas, you know, having this conversation.

Well, it is possible.

I couldn't, I couldn't have this conversation with you.

Without being able to form concepts, for instance.

Of course. Yeah.

But like you.

And I mean, I think I think it's from this here, it seems like they do have.

But like they could do that, those things, concepts.

So, it's like there's an extra, you haven't, you haven't met the burden of showing like, well, they're doing something which they could not do without concepts.

Well, it seems like it's more likely. No, no, but here's the thing. There, there's always going to be like some logical, you know, obscurity that it's like possible that this other theory is true, right? With like the light switching, uh, analogy I gave, like, it's possible that they don't haven't formed any concepts, but it seems very much more likely that without like the formation of concepts, right, that they wouldn't actually, you know, make any decision that is non, uh, arbitrary. But obviously, they are making like non-arbitrary decisions, or sorry, I meant to say arbitrary the first time. Um, so it seems like they are making like very purposeful decisions, uh, with, you know, this sort of like concept in mind.

Um, it doesn't seem that way to me. Like just freeing a a captive rat doesn't imply.

Any concept at all.

Well, it's a concept of freedom and, you know, saving a life, right? I mean, you were talking about like human flourishing, flourishing is a concept they have in mind, and also say. Why is I mean, what other reason would it, doesn't seem like there's like any like evolutionary bias to like help or like sort of do these, uh, altruistic things.

If there are more rats about.

I mean, it's certainly possible. It's certainly possible, but I, I would say it's very unlikely. Okay. But anyways, I mean, we've been going at this for like two hours. I'm a bit fatigued, honestly. Um, I mean, maybe you want to like wrap up. Is that fine?

Yeah, sure. We we can wrap up there. Yeah. All right.

All right. Um.

Thank you. Thank you for coming. If.

I mean, do you have any like last, uh, last remarks or.

Sure. So, I think the basic point I would have for like the whole thing, um, would again just be like those two criteria need to be met for rights to apply. That is that both individuals must have volition, that is that they can form concepts, and both have to be able to avoid conflicts with each other. I don't think.

Right.

It has ever been shown that any animal can form, can form concepts, which is again, very intimately linked with the ability to have language, right? This is objectivist epistemology. The, the role of language for, uh, the rational being is not just to communicate, that is not the primary purpose of language. The primary purpose is actually to objectify concepts. This is why language is even important for Robinson Crusoe on the island, because you need to have some concrete form, some word that can refer to the concepts. You don't have to reabstract it over and over and over again. Um, so, uh, and every single time anybody's tried to teach language to any non-human animal, it's been an utter failure, and the people running the studies just lie about their data and they they misrepresent what they what what was happening. Like, you know, Nim Chimpsky's longest sentence was like, you know, "Give me eat orange, me eat orange, give me orange." Like, there's no grammar there. That's not language. They're just "Give me the [ __ ] orange," you know? That's that's that's what they're doing. They they aren't, they aren't, there's no language involved. And so, and the reason why it's always been a complete and utter failure is because these other beings, they don't have the ability to form concepts. There's absolutely no evolutionary reason for them to have even the ability to have language in the first place. So, they don't have that ability. Uh, it's, it's not in their brains. Um, so, so I don't think that any other animal meets criterion one. And even then, you'd have to meet criterion two, which is that you can somehow avoid conflicts. I don't know how the hell to avoid a conflict with a chimp. It's just going to rip my face off if it wants to. Like, how it doesn't, it doesn't have property rights. You know, how, how could it, how could I communicate property rights with a chimp? I, I can't.

Right. Okay. I mean, I guess all I really have to say is, you know, even if this was the case, um, you're still kind of, I mean, earlier you bit the bullet with, uh, you know, Bri, and you said we could probably just like breed in all the coster, I guess. Um, which seems like a very, you know, weird reductive to swallow, I guess. But I don't know. We worked through all of that, I guess. So, all right. Anyways, that was a, that was a nice talk.

Yep. Yeah. Again, thank you for coming on. All right. See you.

Yeah. See you.

Yeah. Thank you. See you.

All righty. I'm probably gonna stream again, uh, next week at some point. Um, G sent in a video. Um, can't remember exactly what it was. It was, um, let's see. Oh, yes. There's a Professor Dave. Professor Dave has gone off on economics again. It's been a long time since I've done any economics. So, should be fun to go over that. And yeah, I'll, uh, see you then. Bye-bye. Where the hell does.