Disjoint Points of Reference

Various contemporary arguments end by floods of raw emotions and disregard of reason; several social, environmental, animal rights, or nationalistic views seem irreconcilable. The familiar fallacies such as: false dilemma, irrelevant conclusion, false cause, red herring do offer partial view on the falsity of the premises; and does not lead to the construction of a syllogism. Here is a hilarious story presented as an instance of this fallacy, the case of well being of two animals, one of which is engaged in eating the other.

A pig's tale

I present to you, a story of inconceivable injustice and horror, and a powerless cry for justice. This is what happened. A little ago, a pig, named Bobby, whom resided in central California, was enraged by the confirmed reality, and disappointed by the false promises of the animal rights myths - his pig peers were butchered openly. He could not, any longer, ignore this heartlessness acts, and, in his mind, the events were similar the WWII holocaust tragedy. Since he has realized about the understanding, by today's countrymen, of the mindless horrors of the holocaust, he found easy to believe that his story will be received openly, and the tragedy of the pigs could come to an end.

Bobby sought to get a meeting with today's governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, as he could have some understanding of pigs struggle. Not long after, the time came when Arnold meet Bobby in his governors office. After a small opening, Bobby said: Mr. Governor, I am enraged of the crimes against pigs in California, and all over the world. I know that many of the pigs are executed in cold blood, and this is the moment when the cruelty makes a turn for the unthinkable. After the pigs are killed, they are, in fact, assaulted and chopped up. Most of their body parts are used for the purpose of money making. The natural fat deposits around their bodies are detached, sliced, and sometimes smoked, and this is called bacon. The legs are shaped as a pear fruit, smoked and spiced, and called ham. But perhaps the most devilish act is chopping meat, mixing it with spices, and then blowing it into some tubes; this seem to be human more desirable pork product - it is called sausage. This habit is so wide spread, that, in different countries, people makes their sausages in the spirit of their national taste and tradition - for example there is the american link sausage, the german bratwurst sausage, and the italian sausage.

Arnold, I know that this massacre seems unreal, but absolute proof of it exists, mostly on the shelves of the grocery stores. If you care about the pighood, and are an advocate in the justice of all animal rights, then you ought to end this brutality. Bobby could not hide his emotions and started crying, large drops of tears covered his long face. Arnold, being moved by Bobby's tears, has begun to care. He promised Bobby that the situation will be analyzed, and that he, Arnold, will use his powers, to lessen Bobby's agony. Sadly, nothing came out of Arnold promise, and this cruelty was not even brought to a vote. As I write this story, the banality is that the pig's situation has not been improved, and it will not, unless the pig community will openly revolt - as the famous revolt of the sheep reported by Russell in defense of the mutton. It seems that in the humans and pig's worlds there are contrary views of what a wrong or right is, and this difference is only of a theoretical importance.

Lets begin with an abstract view of the life on our planet, the human's place on this earth, and the requirements and obstacles for our preserving its life. The life on earth has not ended with the extinction of some forms of life, such as the dinosaurs, but has changed, and other species, as now man is, have become the dominant species. Sometimes we, the humans, assume that God has created all the world for us; this is naive as the earth was great before man has populated it, and it would still be great after the probable destruction of humans on the earth. There is no guarantee that the future does hold a place for human life on earth, and we should not imply that human are necessary species for the life on earth to continue.

In the past, a difficulty appeared from the faulty judgment, and the disregard of the well being of all Gods creatures. This lead to artificial, monstrous acts, which unfortunately have been common part of humanity. The today's world injustices, violence, even killings, are unacceptable, as all humans are, at least, creatures of the mighty God. We extend this injustice to the existence of animals, as they are also the creatures of God.

Also, it is known that people are, by their nature, obligated for self-defense and by the duty of race preservation; this in the strictest way, and not on artificial reasons based on ones false interpretation of natural order. Human understanding is limited by the power provided by its mind, by the short time human lifespan, and by prejudices or bias. It is the mind power of man that has inquired about the origin of our world, life, and the universe, and the search for the meaning is still ongoing. Men, therefore, may be called irrational, if, they allow their actions to be determined by the morality. As Schopenhauer noted, the moral law is conditional, as in the faulty argument of the "A pig's tale" story. According to Aristotle, there is a natural hierarchy of living beings. The different levels are determined by the abilities present in the beings due to their natures. Human beings are superior to most animals because human beings have the capacity for using reason to guide their conduct, while animals lack this ability and must instead rely on instinct.

As Hume once said, it is universally acknowledged the great uniformity among action of men, in all nations and age's humans' nature remains the same. We humans, are meat eaters, and, sometimes are, the savage beasts that are a few steps above of the apes in the woods, as Nietzsche said. Our powerful urge of preserving our own existence is contrary to the wish of the radical environment defenders; the irremediable antagonism and conflict between the requirements and demands of the human nature and the restrictions of, what we call, civilization - as Freud noted.

In the famous Chinese teaching: Don't do to others what you wouldn't like done to yourself, Confucius perhaps was not reflecting about the steamed piglet he had for dinner when he used the words "to others". According to Freud, that what we call our civilization is largely responsible for our misery, and that we should be much happier if we gave it up and returned to primitive conditions. But the mystery is simpler, and the problem is a logical fallacy, using as premises disjoint points of reference, when constructing the argument. The "A Pig's Tale" story is just an example of the synthetic horror and injustice inserted by this fallacy, and for rejecting that we, humans, are required by our nature, and we have been always been engaged in eating of other animals.

The conflict between our natural needs, and our acquired synthetic sensitivity and generalization of our observations to all animals, has created a contradiction, that can be resolved only if our priorities are strongly defined, and acted upon. Is eating pork, or perpetuation of the pig's life essential to our self-preservation as a species, or is the pig population that matters? The answer is that none of the possible options are complete, the pork is an important part of most human's diet, but it is not, alone, essential to our species survival. In their need to self-preservation and survival, the humans seem a selfish, and cruel species. But when our vital necessities are satisfied, then we are caring and perhaps kind, even toward the pigs. Under some circumstances, I love all mankind.

Jok - November 2nd, 2004