The moral of the stone soup story is that greedy people can and should be tricked into sharing. Everything old is new again.

As soon as I learned that Crank wasn’t cinéma vérité, I couldn’t take Jason Statham seriously ever again.

Mmm. I grew up in a different time too. Makes me ponder how the software circumstances of that time built in us a very different idea of what an iteration actually is, when it comes to writing. The fact that we couldn’t go back and atomically dissect the history of a piece. That a draft, and an edit, were something heavier. Maybe we’d have to think a bit more slowly and carefully before irreversibly casting a previous version into the ether.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not making a “gen z bad” post. Just reflecting on how things are different these days, and maybe it leads to a different kind of work.

I don’t understand the point you’re trying to make above.

In this case specifically, the outcome isn’t unclear. Let’s call the crab’s pain one unit of pain. Assume that unit can directly alleviate 20 units of pain across a handful of other beings. The utilitarian ought to prefer avoiding 19 units of net pain, than allowing 19 units of net pain to occur.

I read your initial post to be some sort of utilitarian moral argument, roughly, that less pain is better. Or something like that. That argument, in this case in particular, leads in the opposite direction than I think you want.

For the sake of argument, let’s take for granted your statement, that ‘suffering should be reduced as much as possible’.

If the discomfort of a single crab can prevent worse discomfort/suffering/death of many other beings, and results in reduced net pain, then the utilitarian line of reasoning seems to be that we might actually be morally obligated to take blood from crabs.

Disclosure - Before you had replied, I edited out the word ‘psychotic’ above, felt it was unfair.

Cheers, thanks for the thoughtful and reasonable reply. I agree with most of what you say. & it circles something I think about a lot but haven’t made much sense of (if there even is sense to make if it), which is, the role of bad feelings in moral decision making.

I think though, the compassion line should be drawn somewhere, sometimes, with moral reason as a guide. To dip into the quagmire of philosophical thought experiments, you know, what if certain humans produced this special clotting factor, and we had to bleed them to get it, and it came with a risk of their mortality? I think reasonable people could agree, that would be an entirely different question to grapple with. So, you know, I would say it does matter, it’s not a black & white thing, where either everything is worthy of compassion or nothing is. The circumstance can, should, dictate the moral approach. Eating meat, fighting in wars, there might be a right or wrong that’s worth determining there. And knowing that, the moral and the practical are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

And totally, I expect people to have differences when it comes to compassion. Suppose I’m just surprised at the outpouring of love for the gross horseshoe crab, in spite of its real usefulness for global human health. Or at least my understanding of it, which I admit, is not very deep.

I’ve read good moral arguments for a veganism. I think it’s the right thing to do when it comes to diet. For what it’s worth, this isn’t really a discussion about diet.

It isn’t a decision between a lentil burger and a beef burger, this is an animal resource that can assist in saving human lives. There are other clotting factors used in medicine, and that’s great, let’s use and develop those. But suppose something more lethal and dangerous than COVID comes along, and vaccines need to be produced quickly and globally. I think it would be foolish to wince if we needed to take crab blood to roll out a program that would save human lives.

What I mean when I say moral is, I don’t see why it’s wrong if a bunch of invertebrates are subjugated, in pain, or die in order to provide something that improves the lives of humans. It’s not sad, it’s a good thing. “Oh but the crabs get stressed out, and 30% might die”, yeah, who cares, they’re crabs.

Sure, I’m a human, and I have a particular perspective on these things. But, we are special. Anyone who considers a trolley problem with a crab on one track, and a human on the other and honestly says, “hey it doesn’t matter humans aren’t special”, that’s, unappealing. In a purely academic, cosmic, arrangement of particles sense, OK, nothing is special. But in that condition, the suffering of animals isn’t even a question worth considering.

The fact that so many accounts in this thread are going out of their way to give weight to the well-being of invertebrates, in a conversation about human well-being, is baffling.

Should we be using existing clotting factors in medical settings that don’t rely on the blood of an endangered species that lives in an incredibly volatile habitat? Probably, but crab discomfort is at the very bottom of the list of reasons why.

Ripple effects, sure, I’m with you there, sustainability considerations, which I haven’t seen anyone mentioning ITT.

I completely disagree with you about the status of humanity. Is it really your view that the well-being of a crab has equivalent moral status to your own well-being?

Thanks for the link and info.

Not a reply directly to you, but to contrast the dominant view in the thread - what would it matter if even 100% of the crabs died? Sustainability considerations aside - a crab died for my delicious salad, who cares if they die for a life saving vaccine? Who cares if it’s painful and disorienting for the crab, it’s a crab. As humans, why should we prioritize crab life and well-being over our own?

We’ve always been at war with Eastasia.

True. And unfortunately certain privacy measures can make it easier to digitally fingerprint you as a user. Also my mind is still blown since I learned about canvas fingerprinting. EFF.org describes it as follows:

Canvas fingerprinting is invisible to the user. A tracker can create a “canvas” in your browser, and generate a complicated collage of shapes, colors, and text using JavaScript. Then, with the resulting collage, the tracker extracts data about exactly how each pixel on the canvas is rendered. Many variables will affect the final result. These include your operating system, graphics card, firmware version, graphics driver version, and installed fonts.

These settings are different from one computer to the next. But they tend to be consistent enough on a single machine to clearly identify a user.

Sounds like you’re on the right path, and I know you didn’t ask, but just wanted to chime in. I love cooking, and have both stainless and cast iron skillets. The circlejerk for cast iron is strong, but I have to say, it’s genuinely the best available non-stick pan once it’s seasoned properly. I can make a perfect omelette, sear scallops, steaks, sautee vegetables, & use it as a pan for oven roasting chickens and roasts. I use it for bread baking as well. They’re cheap (compared to clad cookware) and I’m not sure I could damage my pan even if I wanted to. They’re extremely sturdy, and hold heat very well. I clean mine with cold water and a stiff bristle brush, dry, lightly oil (when it looks like it needs it) & it’s ready to go.

Down side to cast iron pans is that they need some care in the initial seasoning stages, and it stinks up the house when you season them (do it outside on the bbq if you have one!). It’s a bit messy to keep them oiled. They’re heavy and not ergonomic. Can’t use them to simmer acidic sauces because that actually will soften and strip the seasoning, so I use my stainless for that. Get one, season it correctly, and you’ll never look back.

better tools for moderation

Where have I heard that before?

For sure, all those reasons. I didn’t really care what my karma total was, but I would look at other users karma before deciding to get into a debate just to get a sense if they were a troll, karma whore, or regular joe. Sort of gave you a quick picture of who you were talking to. FWIW, I don’t miss it as a feature at all.