I have been just a little bit excited about Artemis II, that launched just before 9am on Thursday morning, Adelaide time. It’s been a long time since the Apollo program ended (1972).
I still have an enduring memory of (5 year old me) watching the grainy Apollo 11 landing on our B&W TV after getting to school and being told to go home and watch it in 1969.
Watching the launch on NASA TV (YouTube) and ABC News yesterday morning with Karen was wonderful and scary at the same time, especially waiting for the passage through maximum dynamic pressure (MaxQ), solid rocket booster (SRB) separation, and main engine cutoff (MECO).
Despite a few minor problems leading up to and after launch (e.g. a launch abort system battery sensor issue on the pad, fixing the loo and a potable water system valve in orbit), it was about as flawless as it gets.
Then today, we saw a calm lead up to Trans-Lunar Injection (TLI) that sent Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen on their way around the Moon, further than any human has been, on a free return trajectory back to Earth on day 10, similar to the one taken by Apollo 13.
The crew will get to see a solar eclipse on day 6 when the Orion spacecraft is behind the Moon.
That humanity is going back more than half a century after Apollo is the main thing, with another test flight followed by a landing in 2028. I hope it becomes as much about exploration as anything, but I realise that there are also military and commercial interests.
Here are a few useful links for the Artemis II mission:
Every so often I share a post from another blogger such as Tamino whose views I respect, e.g. on the topic of climate change.
Today I’m sharing a post from someone else whose views I respect: Michael Dowling. You can find out more about his background in the Bio section below.
I’ve had many interesting and wide-ranging conversations with Michael over the last seven years.
In the essay linked to this post, Michael explores some interesting concepts, including the nature of scientific theories, confusions that sometimes arise in science and philosophy, as well as the significance and implications of living systems and consciousness.
Woven through the essay is the thread of awe and wonder.
I hope you enjoy what Michael has to say as much as I did.
After completing a B.Sc. (Hons) degree in chemistry, Michael worked for five years as an analytical chemist, before moving into the field of scientific instruments for twenty years, providing technical sales and support for complex scientific instrumentation (e.g. chromatographs and mass spectrometers), to scientists working in a wide range of fields.
Later in life, Michael studied for ordained ministry in the Uniting Church. He worked as a chaplain in aged care for six years and later was the minister of an Adelaide Hill congregation for five years.
Michael maintains an enduring fascination with science and our lived experience in the world.
Michael Dowling is retired, married and lives in the Blackwood area of Adelaide.
A recent (23 September 2024) ABC 7:30 Report story, Back from Extinction, gave an interesting account of the Wild Deserts program that is aiming to reverse the trend toward native animal extinction in Australia. Fair enough. We don’t have a great record.
Bilbies, bandicoots, bettongs and quolls, once thought extinct in New South Wales for over a hundred years, are reclaiming parts of an outback NSW desert. (source: ABC 7:30 Report)
This seems to be a positive thing for the species and the ecosystem in which they once thrived.
About 6 minutes into the 7 minute clip, the discussion turns to controlling the causes of extinction, including feral animals, in particular cats. The method of control discussed in the program is a device that attracts a cat into a confined area such that a dose of 1080 poison is applied to its fur, which it then licks, ingests, so is poisoned and dies.
Sometimes, 1080 finds its way near locations in which pets live.
People described the death of their “loved one” from 1080 baiting as one of the most horrific experiences of their lives. Symptoms of 1080 poisoning included … vomiting, defecating, urinating, frenzied running … “screaming”, convulsions, confusion, fear, coma and finally, death. The Conversation
So, the suffering of a non-native animal doesn’t matter? Just collateral damage?
Of course the native species has to fight for survival in the ecosystem into which they’re introduced, but at least they have a fighting chance to live as opposed to being murdered for being the wrong species, in the wrong place (Australia), at the wrong time.
But, are they being reintroduced to “rebalance” or “re-engineer” the ecosystem or from which they were removed by us, or for their own “right” to live? Or both?
There is an idea, often unspoken, that native species have more value than non-native. Cats, dogs, livestock etc are not native to Australia. Neither are humans. Livestock are not native, but they are favoured by farmers over dingoes which have been here for thousands of years.
Being cute and cuddly shouldn’t be an important factor either but you would be forgiven for thinking so sometimes.
To be honest, I’m left with the feeling that both native and non-native feral species are often seen as a means to an end. That’s obviously true in the case of livestock.
As it turns out, I do not think that cats (for example) should be allowed to roam unsupervised in backyards or elsewhere, where that would result in harm to native animals whose species is in threat of extinction. Limiting freedom in this case seems to be a necessity, but that doesn’t mean it’s fair, and it doesn’t mean the pet should suffer.
It would seem that animals can go from being considered as a pet to a pest, depending upon location and negative impact in their environment, e.g. cat-as-pet vs cat-in-backyard-eating-birds or cat-as-feral. I’ve written elsewhere about another mammal that’s mostly considered a pest but that like most of us, is just trying to get on with its life.
Of course, all animals can be viewed as pests from the right point of view, all carry disease, all can do damage to ecosystems. Not to downplay the importance of the work being done by researchers in the Wild Deserts program, but it’s just interesting, and at times disturbing, to see the various ways in which we think we “know best”.
Many amateur astronomers, myself included, have enjoyed Quasar Publishing’s annual Astronomy publication. Astronomy 2023 includes an article titled Astrology – the First Astronomers which at least in some forums, has generated some discussion.
The one page article talks a bit about the historical context of astrology as predating astronomy, its focus on the constellations that the Sun appears to pass through – the zodiacal constellations – due to the Earth’s annual trek around the Sun, and that the Earth’s slow wobble about its axis leads to the so-called precession of the equinoxes that has changed the zodiac’s constellation-occupying date ranges.
The article also talks about some well-known figures in the history of Science have practiced astrology including Galileo, Tycho Brahe, Ptolemy. As did Kepler, who also believed that there was some relationship between the platonic solids and planetary spacing. Today, we revere him for his Three Laws of Planetary Motion, investigations into optics, measuring the volume of wine barrels, and an early Science Fiction story (Somnium). He, like many early scientists, was on the cusp of the old and new ways. Think also of Newton, who was an alchemist. It’s easy for us to see the many ways in which they were in error now, given our historical perspective and educational good fortune.
The Astronomy 2023 authors comment on the aspect of the day of a person’s birth in relation to the Sun’s position at that time as used in “newspaper horoscopes”, and follow on with this:
Astrologers have clearly defined methods on how to create such charts, but the problem is the validity of their initial assumptions to start with. From a scientific basis, it has never been demonstrated how the arrangement of these distant bodies can influence individual’s characteristics.
So far, so good.
Earlier in the article we have this:
This article is not a criticism of astrology, but more spelling out the differences between astronomy and astrology.
That’s also fine as far as it goes. They continue with:
A bit like how science cannot be used to disprove God (whichever version) or in this case, astronomy disprove astrology.
It’s true. The existence of gods is not susceptible to proof or disproof. I’m not going to lose sleep over this or the infinity of other things we can’t prove or disprove. As an aside, the word prove shouldn’t be bandied around so much. The only things that can be proven are mathematical theorems. Science doesn’t prove things: it gathers more and more evidence in favour of a particular hypothesis or against some other.
The article follows on with:
They are just different. Astrology and religions are belief systems which are effectively non-falsifiable…this means there is no test known (or perhaps even possible?) that would disprove a concept. By religions, we include all the gods, including those that used to be worshiped by the ancient Mediterranean and Middle East cultures, responsible for the mythological figures immortalized in today’s constellations.
To be honest, by the time I had tossed around the content of the article, the initial knee-jerk reaction of “why the heck is there anything about astrology in Astronomy 2023?” had given way to: “how could the article be improved?”
My main feedback to the authors is that we need to be careful not to encourage the perception that all forms of knowledge are equal. Having an opinion isn’t enough, especially for things that matter in some important way. It’s okay to criticise ideas and systems of belief. More than that, we must criticise ideas because otherwise no progress can ever be made! Sometimes ridicule is also valid, in the case of truly toxic belief systems. Kinder, constructive criticism is better. Let’s face it: we’ve all had bad ideas.
The authors do make the point that belief of the astrological and religious kind are not falsifiable. They also mention that astrological assumptions and mechanisms are suspect.
Perhaps the case could have been made even more clearly by saying that systems of belief such as astrology and religion have no predictive or explanatory powers, whereas Scientific theories do, and further that the latter are open to question and revision. That’s not to say that Science is not a human process. There’s ego and politics aplenty. But the Method wins in the end.
I would also suggest that if all someone does when reading their daily horoscope is to have a laugh, then there’s nothing to worry about. If astrology or religion leads to important life decisions, then I think it is more than reasonable to apply a bit more scrutiny.
To prefer the hard facts over our dearest illusions, that is the core of Science.
The documentary 2040 (or visual diary as it has been referred to) does a good job of putting a positive outlook on the future by emphasising solutions, things that can be done to mitigate climate change, including but not limited to local solar electricity networks, kelp farms as a future protein source, and a move away from private car ownership toward more efficient transport systems.
I’m a father too, so I understand the film maker’s desire to put his young child (daughter in this case) at the centre of the story, imagining a better world for her early adult years and beyond.
2040 – official trailer
But, as uplifting and inspiring as 2040 is, it doesn’t go nearly far enough in my view.
What bothers me about the film is how anthropocentric it is. In what follows, I give examples of how its vision falls short. I may be accused by some of being overly critical of what is an otherwise heart-felt, genuine labour of love, but so be it.
There is a section in which a farmer is interviewed and there is talk of farming practices to improve the health of the soil, which is great. But the true costs of animal agriculture in terms of emissions (comparable to the whole transport sector) and animal welfare are not really addressed.
Near the end of the film, there is a self-congratulatory comment about how much less meat people will eat by 2040. We are already seeing a trend towards eatingless meat and towards other protein alternatives.
Primary-school aged children were interviewed throughout. Their insights sometimes bordered on the profound and were often more wise than the adult utterances. The kid who talked about planting a seed and getting meat was on the money, if the rise of the lab grown meat industry is anything to go by, as was the girl who liked bacon but wasn’t sure she should eat it because of its source. These are the sorts of comments that get an uncomfortable “isn’t that cute” laugh from the audience, the members of whom may more-or-less dismiss the seriousness of the points being made.
There is a rushed and insipid comment by the film maker about the existence of some nice meat alternatives as supplements (not potential replacements), but no meaningful concession to the need for a totally plant based diet, just that we should be heading toward eating more plants: a no brainer since that’s what the latest Australian Dietary Guidelines have been telling us for almost a decade anyway!
At one point the future daughter asks her off-screen father “what were you thinking” regarding our generation’s shipping of fish long distance, as opposed to “what were you thinking” by engaging in the act of industrial scale fishing at all, with its attendant destruction of the ocean environment, species population decimation and untold suffering.
The film ends with a jubilant young generation having a party, but it’s a little too soon for much celebration it would seem to me, when there is no sign that any serious attempt to tackle speciesism (arguably, a barometer of our maturity as a species) has been made, and we are in 2040 likely still too narcissistic to think much beyond the end of our collective noses.
In short, 2040 is evolutionary, not revolutionary, and to be fair, that’s consistent with the film maker’s focus on what we can do in future derived from what approaches exist today.
But I think we should want to do even better than what is proposed by 2040, if we are not only going to mitigate the worst of effects of climate change for Australia and the world in general, but also to be able to look our future selves in the mirror and consider homo sapiens worthy of a place as anything like competent stewards of this planet.
Karen was looking through family history documents recently and came across this photo of my Mum at 2 years, 2 months old in 1930 with her parents Alma and Jim Melville.
My mother, Lorna Jean Benn (nee Melville) at 2 years, 2 months of age.
Other than being a beautiful photograph, what struck me was what a very different time it must have been.
The back of the postcard on which Mum’s picture appears.
I was initially planning to stop there. Being on holidays and in a contemplative mood, I began wondering what was going on in 1930, 2 years after the discovery of penicillin, 11 years after the end of the Spanish Flu, between two world wars, at the start of the decade which saw the rise of nationalism.
Thinking about the history of computing, this was the year of Christopher Morcom’s death, the young man who was so important to Alan Turing, and six years before Turing’s historic paper On Computable Numbers. In 1930, an analog computer capable of solving differential equations was created in the US by Vannevar Bush and a simple binary counter was built in the UK by C.E. Wynn-Williams. John Vincent Atanasoff completed his PhD before inventing the world’s first electronic digital computer in the late 30s. The influential Dutch computer scientist Edsger W. Dijkstra was also born in 1930.
Moving from computing to space and science history, American astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Pete Conrad were all born in 1930, as was Frank Drake, American radio astronomer and SETI pioneer. The process by which ozone is replenished in the upper atmosphere was explained by Sydney Chapman in that year, Pluto was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh, Neoprene was invented by DuPont corporation, the diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis vaccine was first used and the particle later identified as the electron neutrino was postulated by Wolfgang Pauli.
While 1930 was a very different time from 2021 in many ways, there were historical events unfolding when my mother was just a small child that have shaped our world in important ways, bringing her time and mine a little closer in a strangely comforting way.
Recently, Karen and I were waiting for a tram in Bourke Street to take us to a vegan pizzeria in Melbourne I’d heard good things about.
Before the tram was able to come, hundreds of climate change protesters emerged. It was an unseasonably cold, wet day, as the picture suggests.
Now, as someone who in late 2019 attended a climate rally and a protest against oil and gas exploration in the Great Australian Bight, I’m broadly supportive of such public protests and marches.
However, there were a few problems with this one…
It seemed to Karen and I that the protesters were mostly preaching to the converted.
It took place in a street in which trams run. Trams. Not cars. Public transport.
Sure, not very efficient public transport given Victoria’s current reliance on coal for power (perhaps that was at least part of their point).
Why not march up a street where cars ran instead? They, at least, could have taken a different route. There was a police presence since this was a planned event, unlike another recent protest in Melbourne.
Yes, I know that disruption was probably part of the aim.
But the truth is that you don’t have to be completely disruptive to get attention like a two year old having a hissy fit.
Another problem was they appeared to circle around multiple times…
After the boredom set in, Karen and I got to wondering what a poll would show about just how seriously participants in the protest were about finding solutions to climate change.
Which of these people, we wondered, use vehicles (theirs or others) in a responsible way in order to minimise emissions?
Which of these people were vegan or at least made some significant attempt to reduce the consumption of animal products, given that the animal agriculture industry is responsible for a similar quantity of emissions as the whole of the transport sector.
Which of these people regularly waste food?
Which of them recycle? And so on…
Yet another problem was that at one point, the chants changed from being climate related to:
Always was, always will be, aboriginal Land
I encountered the same thing during the 2019 oil and gas exploration protest in Adelaide.
Now, no matter how sympathetic you are to the plight of aboriginal people in Australia (and there is good reason to be), how much you support the notion of land rights, or how positively you view the aboriginal people as good stewards of the Land, this is a problematic statement.
For one thing, it is astonishingly anthropocentric, the very thing that has gotten us into so much trouble with climate change.
For another, it’s a claim that can only have any validity for the last 60,000 years or thereabouts. Before that brief geological time span, the land “belonged” to other species.
Such a view may not be politically popular these days, especially with Australia/Invasion Day on January 26, but it has the distinct advantage of being true.
Of course, none of this excuses the terrible things done to the aboriginal people by our white settler ancestors and it is important to separate the massacres of two centuries ago from the broader historical place of homo sapiens, and the future of our species.
I’ve written more on this theme elsewhere. As I said there:
I’ve always found the Cosmic Calendar quite compelling. Popularised by Carl Sagan on Cosmos, the whole timescale of the universe is compressed into 12 months. Nothing remotely human begins until late morning on December 31. The original settlement of Australia by seafarers didn’t happen until 11:58pm and the last few thousand years of human history occupies the last 30 seconds of the day!
Getting back to the chant… It was out of place in the context of this protest.
If you’re going to have a protest about climate change, stick to the point!
Don’t dilute the message!
Also, ensure that you are really making an attempt to walk the walk, not just talk the talk.
We eventually got to that vegan pizzeria, but it was far enough that we caught a cab.
Anyone who knows me, knows how much I hate catching a cab if I don’t have to!
An extremely modest number really, compared with other observers over a similar timeframe.
But still, somehow a nice milestone.
I’ve also submitted more than 100 DSLR photometry observations to AID. Again, not many in comparative terms.
The light curve shows the last ten years of visual and B band data along with the 169 (in purple) visual and DSLR eta Carinae observations I’ve made during that time. The red trend line shows the steady rise in eta Carinae’s brightness that has been going on for decades now.
Between VStar, work, and life in general, I don’t get a lot of time to observe these days, but I try to make each observation count.
For anyone following Strange Quarks, you will have noticed my preoccupation with other things in recent months.
The criteria we apply to food choices are: our desires, our health, what’s good for the food producer (e.g. Fair Trade), environmental impact (climate change, resource usage/degradation), and what’s good for non-human animals (animal welfare).
Other than our health, without which nothing much matters to us, I consider this list to be essentially in order of increasing importance.
Large scale animal farming is environmentally unsustainable in terms of land and water use and the resulting waste and emissions (carbon dioxide and methane). This will only get worse as the human population continues its exponential growth. A plant-based diet could significantly reduce emissions and waste.
“Appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthy and nutritionally adequate.”
“Well-planned vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the lifecycle. Those following a vegan diet should choose foods to ensure adequate intake of iron and zinc and to optimise the absorption and bioavailability of iron, zinc and calcium.”
“Supplementation of vitamin B12 may be required for people with strict vegan dietary patterns.”
It took a long time for me to accept the idea that we’re not at the centre of the universe, that there is no compelling evidence for gods of any sort, of a higher plan, of an afterlife.
The idea that we have a higher moral status, a greater right to be happy — to be free — than other animals is widespread, even though most of us would not be inclined to say so.
This idea is called speciesism. It is as if racism had been applied beyond the borders of homo sapiens.
Raising livestock for food involves billions of sentient animals worldwide per year being born into servitude and living lives that are nasty, brutish, and short, to borrow from Leviathan (Hobbes).
We need to widen our ethical circle to include other species. We do so when thinking about species loss through habitat degradation and climate change, but not necessarily when thinking about the animals we exploit.
Do the desires (e.g. cultural, religious) of one or more humans outweigh the welfare — the life — of even a single non-human animal?
For example, it’s hard to see how the live export of cattle or sheep can be defended on cultural, religious or other grounds when we know the harm caused to individual animals.
And what of the shorter yet no less harrowing trip from farm to abattoir, to say nothing of what happens upon arrival?
Caged hens as a source of eggs can’t be ethically justified unless you think that having an area no larger than a sheet of printer paper to live in, standing on wire, beak cutting to stop pecking of other hens, not being able to engage in natural behaviours are okay.
“In the egg industry, the sex of day-old chicks is determined at the hatchery. Sexing chicks…is done at this very early stage to determine their fate.”
“If strong and healthy, the female chicks remain in the hatchery, they are grown to a suitable size and then transferred to a laying facility — which could be a caged, free-range or barn set up.”
“Male chicks are considered an unwanted byproduct of egg production and are killed and disposed of shortly after birth.”
“A hen is declared ‘spent’ when her egg production drops at around 72 weeks of age. At this point she is considered less profitable and removed from the production system… Spent hens are either killed on farm and composted, or transported to an abattoir for slaughter.”
The treatment and fate of so-called broiler chickens and other birds such as turkeys is not something I have written about so far.
“For cows to produce milk, they have to give birth to a calf. Most calves are separated from their mother within 24 hours of birth to reduce the risk of disease transmission to the calf, and most do not stay on the farm for long.”
“Separation within 24 hours of birth interferes with the development of the cow-calf bond and thus reduces separation distress. Cows will show a strong response (calling) if their calf is separated at an older age.”
“The term ‘bobby calves’ refers to newborn calves that are less than 30 days old and not with their mothers. Essentially, they are surplus to dairy industry requirements as they are not required for the milking herd.”
“Products from processed bobby calves include young veal for human consumption, valuable hides for leather, calf rennet for cheese making, and byproducts for the pharmaceutical industry.”
I would say now that I’m asymptotically approaching veganism: moving towards a plant-based diet on ethical and sustainability grounds.
There’s “low-hanging fruit” like meat. Then dairy and eggs. Once I got over a few psychological hurdles, leaving these behind turned out to be easier than I expected.
Yet there are shades of grey…
I have shoes with leather uppers that I purchased before my thinking changed. Should I discard them? Will that help the animal now? No. Will I buy shoes with leather uppers in future. No.
Last Christmas we had a turkey in the freezer with a long expiry date that had not yet been eaten. Would the “right action” have been to not consume it? If so, wouldn’t that have been a waste and wouldn’t that mean the turkey’s demise was pointless?
Do you care about herd immunity? You should. Will you get the yearly flu vaccine to protect the vulnerable in our society as well as yourself? Eggs are used in the process of making the flu vaccine. Having the flu vaccine involves a compromise, perhaps one we will not have to make forever if research bears fruit.
Do you use sweetener in your coffee? Does it contain lactose? Some do, some don’t.
Do you drink almond milk or otherwise consume almonds? I have not dealt with the question of bees and honey in the first seven posts, but irrespective of your thoughts on that, how are the flowers of almond (and other) trees pollinated? By bees. Do the bees just fly in and out of the orchard, or under some circumstances are they brought there, in man-made hives?
Do you drink wine? The fining process often uses animal products (such as milk or eggs), but there are alternatives.
We need to cease deliberately enslaving and killing animals, treating them as means to our ends, instead of acknowledging them as sentient creatures who like us, do not wish to suffer and moreover, who wish to be free.
The point is to think. To ask questions. To cast doubt on long held beliefs. To intend change, to do better. To find alternatives, to say no more often.
It should never be about dogma. I sometimes hear vegan activists using the phrase “convert to veganism”. That way lies religion and unjustified ideology.
Peter Singer and Jim Mason, in The Ethics of What We Eat (pages 255, 256), say that objecting to the idea of killing young healthy farm animals for food:
…leads many people to become vegetarian, while continuing to eat eggs and dairy products. But it is not possible to produce laying hens without also producing male chickens, and since these male chicks have no commercial value, they are invariably killed as soon as they have been sexed. The laying hens themselves will be killed once their rate of laying declines. In the dairy industry much of the same thing happens—the male calves are killed immediately or raised for veal, and the cows are turned into hamburger long before normal old age. So rejecting the killing of animals points to a vegan, rather than a vegetarian diet.
I’m not fond of labels but I would say now that I’m asymptotically approaching veganism, that I am moving towards a plant-based diet. I’m largely there but 100%, all the time?
There’s the “low-hanging fruit” like meat. Then dairy and eggs.
Yet there are shades of grey.
I have shoes with leather uppers that I purchased before my thinking changed. Should I discard them? Will that help the animal now? No. Will I buy shoes with leather uppers in future. No.
Do you care about herd immunity? You should. Will you get the yearly flu vaccine to protect the vulnerable in our society as well as yourself? Eggs are used in the process of making the flu vaccine. Having the flu vaccine involves a compromise. In part 5, I referred to Australian research that aims to reduce the ethical dilemma by determining sex before hatching.
On the subject of vaccines, fetal bovine serum may be used instead of non-animal derived alternatives in vaccine production. The RSPCA says that where a synthetic serum or a non-animal derived alternative exists, they must be used instead of the animal-derived product.
The extent to which alternatives are used is something I want to discover more about, but: vaccination matters people! Imagine smallpox making a comeback.
Of course, as the recent outbreak of African Swine Fever in Chinese factory farmed pig populations shows, when a large outbreak of disease in animals occurs, they are “destroyed”. I don’t think that would fly with human disease outbreaks.
Do you use a sweetener in your coffee? Does it contain lactose? Some do and some don’t.
Do you drink almond milk or otherwise consume almonds? How are the flowers of almond (and other) trees pollinated? By bees. Is this a natural process? Do the bees just fly in and out of the orchard, or are they brought there, in man-made hives? If the latter, although less harmful than taking their honey, it’s arguably still a form of exploitation. Is that enough to make you stop drinking almond milk? If not, you made a compromise.
We recently had a turkey in the freezer with a long expiry date that had not yet been eaten. Would the “right action” have been to not consume it? If so, wouldn’t that have been a waste and wouldn’t that mean the turkey’s demise was pointless? I think so, therefore we had it last Christmas and were grateful.
Do you drink wine? The fining process often uses animal products (such as milk or eggs), but there are alternatives. Sites like Barnivore will help and obviously you can Google. Wine labels may sometimes say whether they are vegan friendly. More reds than whites seem to be vegan friendly from what I’ve seen so far, but by no means all. Beer is often okay. The main thing is: check if you don’t know.
Jelly contains, well, gelatine which is created from animal skin, bones and connective tissue. There are alternatives.
There are even lighter shades of grey.
If food has been cooked and will be discarded if I don’t eat it, should I eat it?
Perhaps.
More subtle, if food is cooked and leftovers would be kept refrigerated, should I eat it since it will be eaten later by someone else anyway. That’s less compelling since any animal based food I choose not to eat will reduce the need/demand for that food.
There are bacteria everywhere, including in what we eat. Fragments of insects may inadvertently end up in our food. I may step on a bunch of ants…
But we have to make a distinction between the foregoing and deliberately enslaving and killing animals, treating them as means to our ends, instead of sentient creatures who, as Moby said in a TED talk, just want to be free of pain and suffering, essentially just want to be happy.
The point is to think. To ask questions. To intend change, to do better. To find alternatives, to say no more often.
It should never be about dogma. That way lies religion and unjustified ideology.
