Mark Bryant Budolfson's papers against veganism

[bobo0100]

Prof. Budolfson is a fairly unpopular proponent against veganism, not that he is biased or clearly wrong, but rather that he has not received much attention. He has a doctorate in philosophy and publishes on a wide range off issues, notably 4 times (at least) on veganism. He also appeared along side Prof. Peter Singer in "MOFAD Roundtable // The Future of Meat" here--> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AdfZXfNXOM . His arguments relate to bio-ethics NOT animal ethics, although he seems to agree entirely with the vegan view of animal ethics. I came along this guy when researching for a report I'm writing entitled "Utilitarian Ethics on Animal Agriculture" which should be self explanatory. The papers he has written have been incredibly convincing so I wanted to see what you guys had to make of them. They are available here -->

https://b1bc346f-a-62cb3a1a-s-sites.goo ... prints.pdf

https://b1bc346f-a-62cb3a1a-s-sites.goo ... truism.pdf

animal ethics graph.png

animal ethics graph.png

As stated before he does not consider animal ethics at least in these paper's, from this perspective, do you think he would conclude differently if it was considered?

I rarely argue the environmental side of veganism, and now more than ever I consider it the worst argument for veganism. Do you think that, based on the graph below, when arguing how bad the carbon output of beef and lamb is, it is only fare to also mention potatoes, apples and tomatoes ect?

[brimstoneSalad]

As stated before he does not consider animal ethics at least in these paper's, from this perspective, do you think he would conclude differently if it was considered?

He deliberately didn't consider them because he likely doesn't care about them and sees no means of quantifying them. He would value the contribution, based on his bias, as near zero.

– for example, as one
recurring example, demand from developed nations for a particular vegan staple might
harm humans in lesser developed nations by pricing their hungry citizens out of the
market for that nutritious staple, as has allegedly happened with staples such as
quinoa

This kind of argument is valid, but it means that we should be more careful about what staples we choose and where our food comes from, not that we should say "fuck it all" and just eat the most harmful things possible and not care.

I rarely argue the environmental side of veganism, and now more than ever I consider it the worst argument for veganism. Do you think that, based on the graph below, when arguing how bad the carbon output of beef and lamb is, it is only fare to also mention potatoes, apples and tomatoes ect?

I'm looking into his methodology now. It will take me some time to read the paper. Based on skimming that graph, chances are his methodology was highly ignorant at best, and possibly even deliberately manipulative and deceptive.

See this thread about supposed human harm, though: https://theveganatheist.com/forum/viewt ... 969&p=9810

Yes, there is harm in agriculture, but he's undoubtedly massively exaggerating it. Giving people the choice to work for a low wage is not harming them.

[bobo0100]

He deliberately didn't consider them because he likely doesn't care about them and sees no means of quantifying them. He would value the contribution, based on his bias, as near zero.

Or maybe the paper's are, quite explicitly, on the topic of bio ethics, and not on the topic of animal rights.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jOJPHQ2RPg

I disagree with Singer, because I don't think your choices as an individual consumer can have a difference for the number of animals that are produced and harmed.

It is possible that what he meant by harmed here is ambiguous. He has used the term harm to mean other things in the past, such as carbon footprint.

or

The guy actually holds vegan goals, he just does not think individual veganism is anything but a symbolic stance against a massive industry. I think he stated later that not consuming animal products is ineffective compared to supporting legislation. I see two ways that this could fail;

Premature Legislation
This is when legislation secedes too early, leading to those who relied on the old rules facing horrific consequence. One example happened in oz, when the government blocked all live exports to Indonesia, and the local farmers and (often poor) Indonesian slaughter house workers felt it bad. Many losing there jobs, and as a result the ban was dropped fairly quickly. On top of all this animal rights was deionised as anti human. Although my souses on this come down to 2 local reporters, who are yet to publish there documentary on the topic.

Wide Eyed Governments
It is not uncommon for seen human needs to trump over both animal rights and environmentalism. If people where to adopt this policy approach to the topics it is likely to be ignored because of say, humans continuing to perches animal products.

This kind of argument is valid, but it means that we should be more careful about what staples we choose and where our food comes from, not that we should say "fuck it all" and just eat the most harmful things possible and not care.

although the "fuck it all" approach would seem reasonable from his perspective wherein veganism has little to no effect on the industry.

I'm looking into his methodology now. It will take me some time to read the paper. Based on skimming that graph, chances are his methodology was highly ignorant at best, and possibly even deliberately manipulative and deceptive.

I thought this initially and took my time to try and search through some of it. Most of it looks legitimately sourced, although I don't know If that is likely to be biased. The science stuff is always where I get lost.

Yes, there is harm in agriculture, but he's undoubtedly massively exaggerating it. Giving people the choice to work for a low wage is not harming them.

unless there where to be things that reduced there other options, as is likely the case with migrant workers. But I'm not going to pretend I Know anything about this topic.

[brimstoneSalad]

The guy actually holds vegan goals, he just does not think individual veganism is anything but a symbolic stance against a massive industry. I think he stated later that not consuming animal products is ineffective compared to supporting legislation. I see two ways that this could fail;
[...]
although the "fuck it all" approach would seem reasonable from his perspective wherein veganism has little to no effect on the industry.

I read it, and that part of his argument made me feel sick. He has made a few valid empirical points, but he's philosophically and morally bankrupt. It's as disgusting and immoral as vicarious redemption in Christianity; an excuse to do nothing and be a hypocrite but feel good about yourself anyway.

Who cares about our actual actions? Better sign a petition instead!
Disgusting.

Of course our actions matter. Small is not nothing. Even minute changes are responded to in the supply chain relatively quickly.
More importantly, to be good moral examples, we should behave in ways that others should model, not try to force the world to behave according to standards that we won't even uphold ourselves.

You also hit the nail on the head with his political approach; politics preceding social change isn't very useful. It goes deeper than that, though.

We should care about politics, but not only is it effective to abstain from harmful consumer actions (he's dead wrong there), but it's an essential prerequisite to model moral behavior personally instead of merely leveraging our wealth to buy our ways out of the responsibility. It's a matter of game theory.

Take this thought experiment:

Bob wants to eat meat, but he's morally troubled. So, instead of going vegan, he convinces Sally to go vegan.
Now Bob's impact on the world is neutralized. Yay Bob!
Sally also wants to eat meat, so she convinces Tom to go vegan instead. Now Sally's impact on the world is neutralized!
Tom, then Julie, then John, the Karen, and so on. They all convince the next person to go vegan in a giant moral Ponzi scheme where the next person's investment pays false dividends on the prior's.

It doesn't work.

He's saying "Don't actually bother being sustainable, just tell other people to be sustainable and you'll be even more moral!"

Fuck him and hypocritical hummer he rode in on.

I thought this initially and took my time to try and search through some of it. Most of it looks legitimately sourced, although I don't know If that is likely to be biased. The science stuff is always where I get lost.

Some of it looks like it's in the right ballpark.

Sweet fruit isn't particularly useful nutritionally, as I've discussed at length elsewhere. Likewise, rice is of marginal nutritional value, and is associated with some methane production due to field flooding.

Potatoes are nutritious and agriculturally efficient, but apparently storage to prevent mold or sprouting is an energy issue. This is GRID energy, though. So, who knows where that comes from.
Tomatoes can vary massively, depending on how they're grown. Some areas use hothouses to grow them in the winter.

Those may be plausible worst case numbers when comparing them with each other.

Something is very wrong with his animal agriculture vs. plant numbers/scale, though.

Feed conversion ratios for Chicken are around 2:1. A chicken is around 10% composed of "usable" protein.
That's 20kg of feed to 1 kg of protein.
Feed contains about 20% protein.
4 kg feed protein makes 1 kg chicken protein.
This is astoundingly efficient, by whatever vice of twisted breeding and hormone application and constrained living space.

Still, 4:1

Based on simple thermodynamics, chicken should not be capable of yielding the same protein for less than four times the cost of bean or corn protein (which have comparable yields in terms of protein per acre).

Yet beans are listed at 22, and chicken at 25.

Something is seriously amiss with these numbers. Beans are either listed too high, or chicken is listed too low. Maybe a bit of both.

At 167g CO2 per kg grain ( http://soilcrop.agsci.colostate.edu/sce ... roduction/ ) for current production...
The contribution (*40) from corn would only be about 6.7kg CO2 for that amount. The rest being production and transportation costs makes sense.

Where's that number come from for beans?

As I've mentioned before, I don't like how this chart compares kilograms of consumed food:
http://www.ewg.org/meateatersguide/a-me ... l-impacts/

But in terms of beans, it's listing them at 2, and chicken at 6.9. Adjusting for protein in beans and chicken gives you about 3 for beans. Chicken still has double the CO2 cost, not a narrow margin.
Maybe it was canned beans he was looking at, or he confused wet and dry beans.

I don't have time to check any of this stuff now, unfortunately.

unless there where to be things that reduced there other options, as is likely the case with migrant workers. But I'm not going to pretend I Know anything about this topic.

It's kind of irrelevant. Not having any other options, work is better than no work.

He cites dissatisfaction in surveys. Anybody can bitch about his or her job. Those kinds of 'studies' if they can even be called that for lack of any controls, are done with a political agenda.

It really sucks to be in a position with no real prospects, but having a job is better than not.

[bobo0100]

I read it, and that part of his argument made me feel sick. He has made a few valid empirical points, but he's philosophically and morally bankrupt. It's as disgusting and immoral as vicarious redemption in Christianity; an excuse to do nothing and be a hypocrite but feel good about yourself anyway.

Who cares about our actual actions? Better sign a petition instead!
Disgusting.

Of course our actions matter. Small is not nothing. Even minute changes are responded to in the supply chain relatively quickly.
More importantly, to be good moral examples, we should behave in ways that others should model, not try to force the world to behave according to standards that we won't even uphold ourselves.

I think he is regarding climate change again in this. His argument is that the good you will do is not going to be enough to hinder climate change, and more drastic, less fair measures have to be taken. here--->http://www.budolfson.com/papers/BudolfsonFutility.pdf

Something is very wrong with his animal agriculture vs. plant numbers/scale, though.

Feed conversion ratios for Chicken are around 2:1. A chicken is around 10% composed of "usable" protein.
That's 20kg of feed to 1 kg of protein.
Feed contains about 20% protein.
4 kg feed protein makes 1 kg chicken protein.
This is astoundingly efficient, by whatever vice of twisted breeding and hormone application and constrained living space.

Still, 4:1

Based on simple thermodynamics, chicken should not be capable of yielding the same protein for less than four times the cost of bean or corn protein (which have comparable yields in terms of protein per acre).

Yet beans are listed at 22, and chicken at 25.

Something is seriously amiss with these numbers. Beans are either listed too high, or chicken is listed too low. Maybe a bit of both.

I am now to ask of you what you have asked of many, can you please provide me with your sources on this, it would be greatly beneficial to my report.

Where's that number come from for beans?

He does provide his sources. I think they come from a website hosted by Princeton university, with somewhat ambiguous output. It would take far more digging to find this.

I don't have time to check any of this stuff now, unfortunately.

The numbers came from the report those states are meant to be based on, but something does seem a-miss. Having read the report I think its down to the sources the report uses, they uses proper evidence, along side interviews with members of the industry.

Thanks brimstone, your amazingly helpful as always.

[brimstoneSalad]

I think he is regarding climate change again in this. His argument is that the good you will do is not going to be enough to hinder climate change, and more drastic, less fair measures have to be taken. here--->http://www.budolfson.com/papers/BudolfsonFutility.pdf

We can't be complacent with mere reduction, that is true. But we have to start our efforts on the personal scale; we can't expect government to do everything for it.

For example, grid power? Aside from putting solar panels on your house if you live in a good location for it (which you should do, IF you live in a good location), or installing a vertical wind turbine if you live in a good place for that, the rest is unfortunately largely down to government. We need to act quickly to deregulate nuclear power. That just isn't something the individual can really do much about.

So, in that sense, the argument would be even MORE anti-meat, because it would increase the urgency to reduce Methane and Fossil fuels more so than grid power.
Grid power is more responsible for the waste associated with hot house tomatoes and refrigerated/humidity controlled potato storage. So, if those arguments held, you could scratch those off the list as damaging.

Government isn't going to fix animal agriculture, though, only consumers can do that by abstaining.

I am now to ask of you what you have asked of many, can you please provide me with your sources on this, it would be greatly beneficial to my report.

Sorry, I closed the windows. I don't have anything on hand aside from what I linked to.

I used Google for nutrition information. Dry beans are comparable to chicken, not at about 1/3 protein.

Feed conversion ratio for chicken can be found on the Wikipedia page for Feed conversion ratio.

For the amount of the bird that's meat, I had to estimate a little. Carcass yield, after viscera, feathers, blood, and head, and maybe feet are removed is about 70%. I got that from an industry site. Don't have the link anymore. This is called dressed weight, and Wikipedia says it's usually 75% for chickens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dressed_weight

That doesn't exclude bones and other waste like fatty skin and cartilage.

A drumstick (according to Google) is 18% protein. (search chicken nutrition, use the drop-down to select drumstick on the nutrition widget to the right, and set it to 100g).

If we assume 70% carcass yield is drumsticks on average (there's all kinds of ribs and pelvis etc.), that would give us 12.6% protein for the whole chicken weight.

Pretty close to what I found.
What I used is a site where somebody bought some whole chickens (minus the heads, feathers, viscera, etc.), and cut them up to remove the bones and such to get "standard" meat portions, and weighed those vs. the entire chicken. She had 60% yield of meat from the chicken, BUT was including largely drumsticks and bones in the wings with skin.

Try:
75% * 60% * 18% = 8%
Or:
75% * 60% * 30% = 14%

Somewhere between 8% and 14% probably. But you can probably also find sites that break down actual 'edible' meat yield more clearly.

Anyway, that's why I said "around"; it was hard to estimate.

I didn't include something called "live weight loss", mostly because I found it almost impossible to search (you'll see why if you try). This is the weight the chickens lose after being fattened up and before slaughter, when they are apparently starved in between.

For chicken feed, I just searched that. Maybe with % protein in terms. I skimmed a few sites selling or advising on feed for fattening up chickens for meat. It's different than for egg production, IIRC.

He does provide his sources. I think they come from a website hosted by Princeton university, with somewhat ambiguous output. It would take far more digging to find this.

Yes, I'm afraid I don't have time. But if you figure it out (or anybody else does) please let me know.

For now, I simply don't believe these numbers. They are abnormally high and thermodynamically dubious.

Oh, and in terms of corn vs. beans, I just searched corn yield, or bean yield, and compared the amounts, and multiplied by % protein, to give the protein per hectare. I assumed the intensity of modern agriculture to be roughly proportionate.