Philosophical Vegan Forum

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Vaush's argument

P1) If we oughtn't buy meat produced through capitalism, then we oughtn't buy any commodity produced through capitalism.
P2) It's not the case that we oughtn't buy any commodity produced through capitalism.
C) Therefore, it it's not the case that we oughtn't buy meat produced through capitalism.

P⇒Q
¬Q
∴¬P

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Ask yourself discord’s 1st rebuttal

P1) If avoiding meat produced through capitalism maximises well-being to a high degree, then we aught not buy meat through capitalism.
P2) If avoiding all commodities produced through capitalism doesn’t maximize wellbeing to a high degree, then it's not the case that we ought avoid all commodities through capitalism.
P3) Avoiding meat produced through capitalism maximizes well-being to a high degree.
P4) Avoiding all commodities through capitalism doesn't maximize well-being to a high degree.
C) Therefore, we oughtn’t buy meat produced through capitalism, and it's not the case that we oughtn’t buy any commodity produced through capitalism.

P1) P⇒Q
P2) R⇒S
P3) P
P4) R
C) ∴Q∧S

If Q∧S is true, his P1 fails.

Ask Yourself fan who conceived the rebuttal:

“So P1 and P2 are just rule util, we ought do what maximizes wellbeing. The only real pushback he could give is that avoiding meat doesn't maximize wellbeing enough that we ought avoid it, but then to be consistent he'd have to say you can just murder a person every week or so.

P3 is incredibly easy to defend with data. Obviously animal ag causes unfathomable amounts of suffering. And Vaush already accepts this proposition anyway.

P4 is pretty obviously true, his position requires him to defend that buying medicine has negative utility, etc (although I am prepared for him to back up to "buying most products has negative utility"). He'll just be completely at a loss empirically to prove this is the case. How is he going to show that me buying a shirt lowers utility? Why would we think utility would be lower after the purchase? Now when VG pushed him on this, his reply was to suggest that capitalism is suppressing foreign markets so if we don't buy from these countries they will develop better. But this is an attack on capitalism, not on the idea of buying goods from other countries under capitalism. And VG didn't really catch that equivocation. There is no reason to assume that under a capitalist paradigm, buying from other countries lowers utility. And he himself doesn't think socialism can be reached via boycott, so he can't argue that we ought boycott everything under capitalism to reach socialism. “

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Vaush’s 1st rebuttal

Rejects P1 on the basis:

“The degree to which consuming a commodity in capitalism hurts the world is not the only factor we can use to determine whether it is moral to participate in that system.”

Translation: There is activism people can do in the world which creates an even higher degree of well-being, such that they shouldn’t be morally impugned for not spending time reading the backs of labels in supermarkets.

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Ask yourself’s 2nd rebuttal

P1) If there is an action (we'll call it action a) for which there is no threshold of negative utility where it becomes immmoral, and there is no consideration other than utility, then if the negative utility of action a is -∞, action a still isn't immoral. ((P∧Q)⇒(R⇒S)))
P2) There is an action (we'll call it action a) for which there is no threshold of negative utility where it becomes immoral. (P)
P3) There is no consideration other than utility. (Q)
C) Therefore, if the negative utility of action a is -∞, action a still isn't immoral. (∴R⇒S)

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Vaush’s 2nd rebuttal

Rejects P1 on the basis:

“I don’t think people should be considered immoral agents for participating in society.”

Translation: P1 is not a position I hold or an accurate distilling of my rebuttal. It has to do with the character of the agent not fully knowing the consequences (alienated), so not individually immoral for being brainwashed, but the society collectively immoral for allowing the lack of transparency, accountability, etc.

“For me it’s not about the consequence of the action, it’s about the degree of alienation that we experience with regards to the harm done by commodity production.

If for example I could press a button and get a million bucks, but a million people would die, pressing the button is immoral.

However if I’m a humble businessman who through the utilisation of economic engines led to the deaths of millions outside of my country so I’m able to become a millionaire, I don’t think that act in and of itself makes that person immoral even though the system itself causes harm.

Because I think we’re alienated from the consequences, I think it’s about collective responsibility vs. Individual responsibility.”

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My summary

AY thinks he’s pinned Vaush to saying infinite suffering is not immoral, yet he’s said it would be morally bad, he’s just raised separate concerns about the disutility of condemning people for their own brainwashing.

Vaush’s argument is in the real world not condemning brings about more chance of saving animal lives, so even if by some wild set of circumstances you saved less lives he still wouldn’t condemn because any world where people acted remotely similar to our own would require not condemning to bring about the most utility in the long run.

To put another way; you need to accept the possibility of 1 person causing infinite harm because they were brainwashed by social conditioning in order to have the highest probability of all people arriving at the future world with greater utility. Any world where we have to condemn people for being brainwashed in order to achieve greater utility is fundamentally irrational and so 1) there’s no way to know whether that greater utility achieved in one instance could easily be cancelled out later or 2) would just be some hellscape which would not fit his definition of utility.

Vaush has raised so many misunderstandings about veganism like the idea that you need to boycott vegan products from a company for also selling non-vegan products. But every time AY just refused the opportunity to help him get a better understanding which causes the confusion that leads them both to talk past each other.

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Finally a better advocacy approach I think I’m taking with Vaush compared to Ask Yourself

For many specific issues boycotts aren’t a viable tactic, because a company can easily change it’s name or another take it’s place. But at the same time, I think there are wholistic rights campaigns where once you become aware of the problem and there is an easy platform to mobilise around, it does become incumbent on that person to participate, like for example the Jewish led boycott of German goods after the Nazi party rise to power.

The objective of any productive boycott campaign isn’t to get the whole world to participate right away to be a success. Only that enough join to create breathing room for legislation and alternative projects to get to work that does help build or transition to the more ideal society that saves lives.

So, definitely talking about social conditioning is useful, like not morally impugning a racist child who grew up in a racist environment. But an adult in a less racist environment opportunistically latching onto racism for ego aggrandisement, can be seen as pretty toxic immoral behaviour.

Also like the dark example of buying child porn, where the zeitgeist understands the problem with supporting that industry I do think it becomes an ethical obligation for anyone in the know and then easier to combat and create lasting change.

I just think even optics wise, it’s important that we emphasise the many utilities at work, like with the complex case of rent controls.

Similarly I recognise your concern for the Sentinelese islanders being kept in a Stone Age monoculture, but with so many indigenous cultures continuously being genocided, which could have been basis of longstanding resistance, we should be more nuanced in not maligning their fear of outsiders and emphasising how careful we need to be in not taking risks that put them in danger when making contact without spreading disease.

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NonZeroSum wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2020 5:41 am My summary

AY thinks he’s pinned Vaush to saying infinite suffering is not immoral, yet he’s said it would be morally bad, he’s just raised separate concerns about the disutility of condemning people for their own brainwashing.

Vaush’s argument is in the real world not condemning brings about more chance of saving animal lives, so even if by some wild set of circumstances you saved less lives he still wouldn’t condemn because any world where people acted remotely similar to our own would require not condemning to bring about the most utility in the long run.

Nice little interaction, thanks!

I think it’s possible to make reasoned arguments against default immoral practices without condemning the individual’s character. Most people grow up in a society that normalizes and rationalizes the exploitation of animals, and therefore don’t ever think much of it. No, majority rule on the moral status of animals isn’t relevant in ethics, but there is definitely a difference between eating animals in this society and eating animals in an alternate society where killing animals for food isn’t widely accepted (or even illegal).

In either scenario, the practice would be equally immoral (unless necessary for survival), but at least in the former scenario, the person’s character could be vindicated.

I agree with you in that I don't think this matter will be solved with a syllogism. This sounds like an empirical issue (and I'm not sure there's much data on whether "condemning" others' characters for eating meat is very effective. Personally, I'm capable of recognizing that most people who engage in culturally accepted but immoral practices are mostly good, but significantly flawed individuals. Doing what most other people consider to be fine doesn't necessarily make you evil, but there is still definitely a need to engage honestly with ethics and learn why even culturally accepted practices may not be ethical.

Lay Vegan wrote: ↑Sun Apr 12, 2020 7:01 pm In either scenario, the practice would be equally immoral (unless necessary for survival), but at least in the former scenario, the person’s character could be vindicated.
. . .
Doing what most other people consider to be fine doesn't necessarily make you evil, but there is still definitely a need to engage honestly with ethics and learn why even culturally accepted practices may not be ethical.

Agreed, nice summations.

And I just confirmed with Vaush in his livestream chat what he was trying to get across:

WildVirtue: “I talked to him after and he agrees his argument doesn’t apply if you were answering from the place of *the agent* not being culpable due to alienation, as opposed to *the action*”

Vaush: “Oh wait, then WildVirtue we agree, I kept saying that, I’m a consequentialist, of course the action of buying animal products is unethical. I feel like I clarified that in our discussion, but...”

And what he was referring to during the debate:

Vaush: “I would argue that threshold has already been met for other products that we already consume.”

Vaush: “I don’t think people should be considered immoral agents for participating in society.”

He’s simply talking about the disutility of condemning individuals, but that all bad utility is still a moral wrong because it reduces well-being, he would just like to lay the blame for that with regards to capitalism shared out more evenly among the collective society for not fighting for more transparency, education, living wage, etc. That allow more people to make the right decision without social conditioning.

Vaush: “Because I think we’re alienated from the consequences, I think it’s about collective responsibility vs. Individual responsibility.”

Email follow up with Vaush, I don’t think the syllogisms are that interesting, but it’s amusing working through them as if they are, and I’d like to bring evidence to Ask Yourself so he can’t claim Vaush is calling the action of causing infinite suffering not immoral. I may be completely off base predicting his answers to the other premises.

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So I think I confirmed this with you when I asked you a question in chat on your last livestream, but Ask Yourself wasn’t convinced, so I would like to explain in detail and then take a quote of your reply back to him if you have the time, if not no worries.

I think the main miscommunication in that last debate was that Ask Yourself was asking if *the action* was wrong and you were using rule utilitarian language to talk about the character of *the agent* not fully knowing the consequences (alienated).

Ask yourself thinks he’s got you to say *the action* of eating a piece of steak which causes infinite suffering is not immoral if it was produced through capitalism, like your example of pressing the button.

I think you grant the harm *the action* causes to well-being so is in a way morally bad, you’re just also raising separate concerns about the disutility of condemning people/individual *agents* for their own having been brainwashed/socially-conditioned.

So I think then your answer to his first premise of his first argument...

[If avoiding meat produced through capitalism maximises well-being to a high degree, then we aught not buy meat through capitalism.]

... Is the answer you tried to give, which is yes, but because the threshold for harm ordinarily has already been passed so *we* aught not consume anything under capitalism, which even incriminates vegans for not doing enough to help poverty stricken people eat vegan through food co-ops.

You’d just like to share out the blame away from people’s character and more evenly among the collective society for not fighting for more transparency, education, living wage, etc. That would allow people to make the right decision without social conditioning in the future market socialist society.

I think there’s potential for that conversation to go in really interesting directions, like there’s circumstances in which the highest way of maximising well-being is buying meat, like flying to Syria to fight ISIS and having to eat chicken like Anna Campbell.

Finally this would also change the initial syllogism they asked you to verify to this:

P1) If an individual agent oughtn't buy meat produced through capitalism, then we oughtn't buy any commodity produced through capitalism.

P2) It's not the case that an individual agent oughtn't buy any commodity produced through capitalism.

C) Therefore, it it's not the case that an individual agent oughtn't buy meat produced through capitalism.

The model of good character in believing C while rejecting P4...

[Avoiding all commodities through capitalism doesn't maximize well-being to a high degree.]

... Is along the lines of:

A) A moral agent aught balance time spent democratising workplaces so that no one has to buy into capitalism ever again. Which is logically the strongest strategy at producing a stable longstanding high degree of well-being. As well as...

B) Developing your knowledge of market impact to always try and take the option that maximises well-being to a high degree, which doesn’t in all cases mean not buying meat. Your: “it’s good if you don’t eat meat”. I think you acknowledge it’s a character vice when you don’t, but there is disutility in making someone feel bad about their own social conditioning.

Vaush’s reply, confirming the obvious that he does think causing infinite suffering is immoral.

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I don't much care for AY's opinion anymore, but this is what I have to say - as a utilitarian, I believe morality of an action is determined by its outcomes. It is undeniable that participating in the consumption of animal products contributes harm to the world, which is why I consider the act of purchasing meat immoral and the decision to go vegan moral. I'm not a virtue ethicist and do not concern myself with the moral character of individuals, only the outcomes of the actions they engage in. When I speak of morals, I am speaking of outcome. If I say a person is "good" or "bad", or than an action makes a person "good" or "bad", I'm nonrigorously assigning a level of heinousness to their behavior which doesn't necessarily correspond to the morality of their actions. A thousand years ago, I might well call a man "good" if he dedicated his life to making the world safe and just, even if the ways in which he pursued women, while acceptable at that time, would today be called predatory or rapey. The predation is still bad, but as I am not a virtue ethicist my estimation of a person's characters is more of a general feeling than a rigorous philosophical position. Maybe I should never use that language from now on - either way, it's not relevant here.

What is relevant is the fact that utilitarianism doesn't really comment on the extent to which an individual must engage in moral behavior. No human lives their life maximizing utility for everyone. It's not possible. What's more, most people frequently engage in immoral acts they could easily change if they chose to - like purchasing other types of immorally produces commodities, which every single one of us does. My contention is this - why do we condemn people who engage in the consumption of animal products but not those who engage in other forms of immoral consumption? Why is one immoral action so much more heinous? Are both heinous? Are neither? Is their a superseding level of moral consideration saying we derive more utility by not morally condemning people for certain types of immorality? That would be my argument.

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NonZeroSum

Modified version of Vaush’s initial argument

P1) If an individual agent oughtn't buy meat produced through capitalism, then we oughtn't buy any commodity produced through capitalism.

P2) It's not the case that an individual agent oughtn't buy any commodity produced through capitalism.

C) Therefore, it it's not the case that an individual agent oughtn't buy meat produced

Defence of P1

P1) A moral agent ought to spend time advocating for and organising to democratise workplaces so that we can transition to socialism (where no one has the surplus value of their labour systematically stolen from them).

P2) If in the process of doing P1 (through the best strategy one is aware of for creating lasting maximum well-being) they make P1 harder for themselves through buying a commodity produced through capitalism (either because of social conditioning or not having the time to research), then the immorality is shared more evenly among the collective society as opposed to the individual’s character.

P3) The same for P1 and P2 is true where we replace the words socialism with animal rights, democratise the workplace with end animal agriculture & commodity with meat.

C) Therefore, if a moral agent oughtn't buy meat produced through capitalism, then a moral agent oughtn't buy any commodity produced through capitalism.

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PhilosophicalVegan

P1) A moral agent aught spend time advocating and/or democratising workplaces so that we reach a point in time where no one has to cause harm through buying into capitalism ever again.

There are a lot of things we could imagine to be good, but don't know to be possible.

Like we could say "P1) A moral agent aught spend time advocating and/or inventing magic so that we reach a point in time where no one has to cause harm through being limited by physics"

The trouble with advocacy of unknown or hypothetical goods like these is that there's an opportunity cost. We should advocate that which will be effective to known good ends.

P3) The same for P1 and P2 is true for animal rights.

Animal welfare and effects on the environment isn't hypothetical in the way of anti-capitalism, so I disagree with that (though having just disagreed with P1 refuting another premise probably isn't necessary)

I'll address the newer version NonZeroSum presented:

P1) A moral agent ought to spend time advocating for and organising to democratise workplaces so that we can transition to socialism (where no one has the surplus value of their labour systematically stolen from them).

In addition to the "this may very well be impossible" this version begs another question: Why is theft innately wrong if it causes no harm? I don't think people are inherently against others profiting from them; they understand the principles of risk and investment. The owner of your factory invested a lot into building the factory and making a job for you, and many people see it as innately fair that he or she should see some returns from that.

P2) If in the process of doing P1 (through the best strategy one is aware of for creating lasting maximum well-being) they make P1 harder for themselves through buying a commodity produced through capitalism (either because of social conditioning or not having the time to research), then the immorality is shared more evenly among the collective society as opposed to the individual’s character.

OK, that's not necessarily true either. There's no reason to believe that "buying a commodity produced through capitalism" would make it harder to advocate for democratic workplaces or organize them. The only way you'd be acting counter to your methods is if you claimed to be USING supply and demand capitalistic economics to... support communism? It would be a very unusual position among forms of activism to acknowledge the supremacy and superiority of the very thing you're working against.
In contrast, buying animal products causes harm in a very obvious process -- through supply and demand economics -- and the economics themselves aren't something vegans deny or have a problem with, just the product. Using supply and demand to push for veganism is pretty much baked into the definition.

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NonZeroSum

Why is theft innately wrong if it causes no harm? I don't think people are inherently against others profiting from them; they understand the principles of risk and investment. The owner of your factory invested a lot into building the factory and making a job for you, and many people see it as innately fair that he or she should see some returns from that.

I would say if the factory owner isn’t confident enough to give the full value of the workers labour and trust they will reinvest part of it back into the company on their own, then there is harm done to to the worker’s character. For many possible reasons, like:

A) If the worker is someone who should invest back into the company for their own wellbeing but wouldn’t anyway, the harm was done by the collective society’s lack of investment in education. Or...

B) The company should hire more people to be more productive, but instead you’ve got workers bored out of their minds who would just like to have more leisure time for study, so want to work less hours for slightly less pay (so less investment back to the company) without risking losing the job entirely and a healthy quality of life.

Further an owner might make all the right decisions to maximise the wellbeing of their workers, but to the extent that the workers don’t have an equal opportunity* say democratically in how jobs rotate - so they are continuing to learn and achieve happy flourishing through setting their own goals - they are harmed.

*A consensus decision making meeting would still be right rationally to defer to expertise where a suggestion factually didn’t align with a persons expressed goals, but again that goes back to lack of investment in education.

Further reading:
https://toleratedindividuality.files.wo ... nesses.pdf

There's no reason to believe that "buying a commodity produced through capitalism" would make it harder to advocate for democratic workplaces or organize them. The only way you'd be acting counter to your methods is if you claimed to be USING supply and demand capitalistic economics to... support communism? It would be a very unusual position among forms of activism to acknowledge the supremacy and superiority of the very thing you're working against.

So I’m saying on the level of action - morally out of a sense of social virtue - we ought never validate exploitative capitalist relationships e.g. going up to the till of a shop with a worker who doesn’t want to be there, etc.

We all ought instead - where possible - support worker co-ops like Zapatista coffee where you’re approving of the democratic work they’re doing with a fully mutual exchange of resources.

On the level of character, the moral agent oughtn’t think they are immoral for not always doing this, for many reasons like this not being the no.1 most effective strategy at arriving at socialism, so one might be directing their efforts elsewhere so by necessity or not having time to research a product, they fail to act morally in one instance, but do more good long term.

Similarly on the level of action, morally we all ought not support capitalism & animal agriculture, and I recognise a worse degree of harm there that it’s good people pay special attention to researching and avoiding animal products for their own character goals and the happy flourishing of others in creating breathing room for legislation and worker co-op projects which help towards total liberation.

As well as using a ton of other ways of reducing your harm through consumption like buying dried foods in bulk, boycotting palm oil & Israeli goods, freegan salvaging, repair & reuse, etc.

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PhilosophicalVegan

I would say if the factory owner isn’t confident enough to give the full value of the workers labour and trust they will reinvest part of it back into the company on their own, then there is harm done to to the worker’s character. For many possible reasons, like:

It's not about investing it back into the company, it's about capital gains. When you take a risk, there has to be a reward to make that risk a viable investment.
I think a lot of people understand that. They get that the boss could have gone broke, and getting rich is his reward for taking that risk.

A) If the worker is someone who should invest back into the company for their own wellbeing but wouldn’t anyway, the harm was done by the collective society’s lack of investment in education. Or...

Education doesn't always lend itself to rational decision making. People can be impulsive even knowing they're behaving impulsively.
I don't see what your point is about harm to the worker's character from not trusting the worker.

B) The company should hire more people to be more productive, but instead you’ve got workers bored out of their minds who would just like to have more leisure time for study, so want to work less hours for slightly less pay (so less investment back to the company) without risking losing the job entirely and a healthy quality of life.

You seem to be describing a boring or unfulfilling job; this is not innate to all companies. Again, not sure what your point is.

Further an owner might make all the right decisions to maximise the wellbeing of their workers, but to the extent that the workers don’t have an equal opportunity* say democratically in how jobs rotate - so they are continuing to learn and achieve happy flourishing through setting their own goals - they are harmed.

You're begging the question. If the boss is making all of the right decisions, then he or she is probably also giving the workers enough control over their work to be able to enjoy it, learn, and set goals for themselves and achieve their ambitions, then rewarding those to create a feedback of positive mental health and productivity. There's no reason to believe that would be harmful or that there's a viable alternative that would be more beneficial. Not everybody needs to feel 100% independent and self actualized at all times, there are diminishing returns and sometimes even negative returns from too much freedom (look at how it can harm the enjoyment of some "games").

*A consensus decision making meeting would still be right rationally to defer to expertise where a suggestion factually didn’t align with a persons expressed goals, but again that goes back to lack of investment in education.

Does it though? I don't think there's any evidence of that. And IF people can be educated into having the right goals despite those goals being set for them by others, why can the same not be true of the goals the factory owner sets for the person if the factory owner is making all of the right decisions?
You seem to be contradicting yourself here.

So I’m saying on the level of action - morally out of a sense of social virtue - we ought never validate exploitative capitalist relationships e.g. going up to the till of a shop with a worker who doesn’t want to be there, etc.

As a consequentialist, I'm not very impressed with vague claims of wrong from violations of social virtues. I'm interested in what harmful consequences actually come from these things, and you're not really providing any. Perhaps it's consistent with some kind of made to purpose virtue ethic, but such an ad hoc system can be created to support anything, even ancap.

On the level of character, the moral agent oughtn’t think they are immoral for not always doing this, for many reasons like this not being the no.1 most effective strategy at arriving at socialism, so one might be directing their efforts elsewhere so by necessity or not having time to research a product, they fail to act morally in one instance, but do more good long term.

If we grant that's even a useful thing to do, I appreciate that. And I've said the same with regard to veganism, like if eating tiny amounts of animal products in something portrays you as more chill and gets more people on board with 99% veganism.
The thing is that when you compare a movement like that to one which is inherently about supply and demand economics you can't draw that kind of analogy.
We can do more for sure, but the analogous logic you're applying from anti-capitalism just doesn't really work to vindicate purchasing meat.

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NonZeroSum

The conclusion doesn’t vindicate eating meat, the way I’ve written the defence of P1 of Vaush’s initial argument (2.0) concludes it is an obvious immoral action and bad character vice to not be vegan as soon as one is made aware of the harm and I think Vaush has said that too.

He’s just also made mention the disutility of judging him for eating meat when he agree it’s unethical, he just thinks all consumption under capitalism is unethical so is unclear how to draw clean lines in the sand.

I know you think it’s as simple as saying supply and demand doesn’t relate in the same way to all products, but for a socialist who advocates for a radically compassionate workplace, there simply is negative social capital /social virtue to fighting for that world whilst surrounding yourself with the excesses of consumer capitalism with the amount of greed, dehumanisation and excessive waste/environmental damage that goes on.

The only exception for me would be eating meat where it is absolutely necessary in order to achieve more wellbeing fighting other liberation causes in extreme situations. For example flying to Syria to protect the Yazidis from ISIS and having to eat spam from a tin because it’s the only rations the militia could afford to budget. Which many vegans agree would be ethically vegan or ethically on par with veganism.

The purpose of playing devils advocate is to think about what arguments vegans can use on socialists and visa versa to relate to each other’s philosophy.

Obviously you’d have to completely reject capitalism as worse than socialism to agree with P1. And I acknowledge it’s not as easy as saying just start a worker co-op under capitalism because lack of regulation does then require gambling with peoples hard earned money to stay afloat.

I think Vaush is in search of language which obligates someone to work for broad legislative change because of the problems social conditioning presents in perpetuating immoral industries. Similar to the way that effective altruists try to measure the worth of different charities and lifestyles.

I would need to voice chat if you want to carry on the socialism vs. capitalism debate as I only see our answers to each other’s statements spiralling our longer and longer in text.

I’ll just say lastly I think one of the benefits of virtue ethics is that it is far removed from the idea that it’s useful to sort life into simple categories of suffering and pleasure. There is more of an emphasis on embracing the hard work that you chose through an understanding of your own interests and passions.

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PhilosophicalVegan

He’s just also made mention the disutility of judging him for eating meat when he agree it’s unethical, he just thinks all consumption under capitalism is unethical so is unclear how to draw clean lines in the sand.

Seems an appeal to futility fallacy. You don't need "clean lines" to recognize that the harms can add or "intersect" if you want. Claiming that buying beef or an impossible burger is wrong in either case so it doesn't matter which you choose and doesn't reflect on your character poorly to choose beef is a deeply irrational and fallacious claim.

I know you think it’s as simple as saying supply and demand doesn’t relate in the same way to all products, but for a socialist who advocates for a radically compassionate workplace, there simply is negative social capital /social virtue to fighting for that world whilst surrounding yourself with the excesses of consumer capitalism with the amount of greed, dehumanisation and excessive waste/environmental damage that goes on.

I understand the belief, but do you realize the contradiction?

If you claim to be fighting capitalism by using capitalism (choosing products that are *less* capitalistic because they come from companies using shared ownership etc.) then you are admitting that some products of capitalism are better than others and they're not all simply "wrong" thus negating the significance of choosing one over another -- whether buying from a cooperative company or buying an impossible burger instead of beef.
And if you are claiming that, it lends support to the notion that the whole socialist thing may indeed be impossible after all, at least through personal action.
But if you are not claiming to use capitalism, and you reject capitalistic engagement entirely, then the analogy to veganism is pointless because again the personal action stuff breaks down with advocating socialism/communism but that doesn't apply to veganism.

It's a choose your poison situation. Either P1 is in serious jeopardy for socialism/communism, or the premise that claims them to be analogous is false. And if P1 is in jeopardy for communism, even if they ARE analogous, in terms of any sensible epistemology of virtue you should favor the more probable rather than the less, which means P2 is no longer proportional between anti-capitalism and veganism.

You can't equate the moral responsibility for not taking a crapshoot with wildly unpredictable odds at doing something good vs. the moral responsibility for not taking overall very deterministic and reliable steps to something good. You can't even compare them quantitatively because the odds (or even possibility) of communism etc. are totally unknown.

Obviously you’d have to completely reject capitalism as worse than socialism to agree with P1. And I acknowledge it’s not as easy as saying just start a worker co-op under capitalism because lack of regulation does then require gambling with peoples hard earned money to stay afloat.

It's not just that... there are a bunch of internal contradictions going on in the argument. You can find all of the premises plausible on their own while seeing that they don't fit together and thus in sum one of them must be wrong (without knowing which).

See the preface paradox: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preface_paradox

I think Vaush is in search of language which obligates someone to work for broad legislative change because of the problems social conditioning presents in perpetuating immoral industries. Similar to the way that effective altruists try to measure the worth of different charities and lifestyles.

But it's not similar. What it's missing is a means of quantification, that's the most important part. We need to understand both the odds and be able to somehow quantify how beneficial the outcome would be compared to other things.
That is the challenge when, for instance, we compare human vs. non-human animal charities. It's much easier to compare human charities to each other or non-human charities to each other in terms of substantially similar lives saved or substantially similar socioeconomic improvements or other metrics that can be looked at in terms of wellbeing and translated on to another.
The anti-capitalist arguments are light years from that kind of rigor. You can't make assertions or comparisons like that about that which you can't quantify in any way.

I’ll just say lastly I think one of the benefits of virtue ethics is that it is far removed from the idea that it’s useful to sort life into simple categories of suffering and pleasure. There is more of an emphasis on embracing the hard work that you chose through an understanding of your own interests and passions.

There's preference consequentialism for that kind of thing already. Not sure what virtue ethics adds to the conversation.

There's probably no need to discuss this at any more length, just hoping you can see the logically problematic interrelationship between those claims. If you accept all of the premises then the conclusion may follow, but perhaps vacuously so due to the principle of explosion from entailed contradictions between them. An argument can be a bad one even when it's technically formally valid, and even when each premise taken alone may seem plausible or convincing.

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NonZeroSum

Sure I can see how it would look like a bad comparison if you aren’t convinced worker co-ops are a 100% necessary and productive direction to move in as a society ethically.

The reason to buy Zapatista coffee from their worker co-op is a personal choice in agreement with their democratic pursuits like a charity regardless of what supply and demand says is the correct price for coffee.

Preference consequentialism thinks interest is what needs to be at the core of organising complex social behaviour whilst balancing concepts like pain-pleasure all the way to social capital (hedonic util to virtue ethics), I just think it’s more useful to acknowledge charachter as the core and balance concepts from pain-pleasure all the way to intuitional duties. Especially considering we problem solve most efficiently drawing upon both interest and duty in everyday life.

I also wouldn’t grant any credence to some hedonic util arguments as some preference consequentialists do, like being against all wild animal suffering. Because for me it’s clear it would interfere with animals being able to express all their capabilities to their most self actualised state, and I can easily intuit why that would be bad by noticing how my dog accepts being cold in the snow to get to chase squirrels.

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PhilosophicalVegan

Sure I can see how it would look like a bad comparison if you aren’t convinced worker co-ops are a 100% necessary and productive direction to move in as a society ethically.

Nobody should be 100% convinced of that. Suggesting an order of certainty about this even remotely as high as reducing unnecessary animal suffering by ending animal agriculture would indicate some form of delusion.
I understand thinking "this might be better", but the systemic effects of that are pretty unknowable.

More importantly, you've missed all of the innate contradictions in your claims:

1. How is it OK for somebody to be forced to do something they don't want by majority rule (even if the majority is right/rational) vs. a benevolent dictator? You gave the excuse of them not agreeing with the majority as being a failure of education (or a failure of brainwashing), but how is that any different in a single owner situation when the owner is doing the best things for the company and the workers?
The distinction you draw is inconsistent.

2. The IDEA of activism through purchase is fundamentally different.

The reason to buy Zapatista coffee from their worker co-op is a personal choice in agreement with their democratic pursuits like a charity regardless of what supply and demand says is the correct price for coffee.

This is not the point.
Either capitalism beats socialism on a level playing field or not, and if it does it doesn't make sense to push socialism through economic choices -- you need legislation there to fix the game in favor of shared structures. That makes it meaningless or nearly meaningless to buy from a cooperative company instead of any other. The same is not true of veganism where vegans believe there IS an effect through capitalism and meat alternatives can beat meat through the free market.
We can talk about animal ag. subsidies slanting the free market in favor of meat, but that doesn't compare to the socialism issue because free market forces put pressure those unstable subsidies, and even DESPITE those subsidies we know that the fundamental methods of production (if scaled) favor vegan alternatives and we know the alternative market is gaining ground. We're talking about the difference between a perpetually uphill battle there's no evidence of it even being possible to win with market tactics vs. one with a lot of evidence for it that will become self-sustaining once it reaches a critical point (which isn't that far off, it's arguably there for milk alternatives).

Preference consequentialism thinks interest is what needs to be at the core of organising complex social behaviour whilst balancing concepts like pain-pleasure all the way to social capital (hedonic util to virtue ethics),

There isn't any ad hoc incorporation of these things, they can just be relevant to preferences, including this:

Because for me it’s clear it would interfere with animals being able to express all their capabilities to their most self actualised state, and I can easily intuit why that would be bad by noticing how my dog accepts being cold in the snow to get to chase squirrels.

That isn't a debunk of preference consequentialism or a problem for it, it's an argument within it.

I just think it’s more useful to acknowledge charachter as the core and balance concepts from pain-pleasure all the way to intuitional duties. Especially considering we problem solve most efficiently drawing upon both interest and duty in everyday life.

Something being easier doesn't mean it's right. People "problem solve" pretty efficiently by drawing on snap judgments from racial biases too, that doesn't mean those solutions are valid -- in most cases these invalid heuristics are just creating more problems.

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NonZeroSum

1. The idea that it’s right that an owner has all the power because it was their brainchild so they’re most likely to make all the right decisions might be true at the beginning under capitalism, but has diminishing returns.

It’s definitely not ethical for example that the owner employs someone to do all the directorial overseeing that they had planned to do, while they go swig martinis on a beach for the rest of their life acquiring the surplus value of their workers.

It’s right that someone gets payed more for the effort and time that went into gaining expertise, but it’s vacuously true that a director could intuit all the goals of their workers and fulfill them whilst still extracting their surplus value. Because the most ethical situation long term is still that the workers are able to use the full value of their labour and full education to better decide what role they want to play in the company, how much money they want to invest, how they are enabled to spend their leisure time that feeds back into their work life, which would all happen in a way that no one person could perfectly anticipate and thus know all their workers desires.

2. “That makes it meaningless or nearly meaningless to buy from a co-operative company instead of any other.”

I disagree, by only buying from worker co-ops, you are forming a pressure group that encourages more companies over to a co-operative model, it’s about maximising the amount of money and thus creative potential is in the hands of those who advocate for socialism, then through numerous tactics are able to bring about that goal.

3. My wild animal suffering example wasn’t meant to be a formal debunk of pref consequentialism, it was an observation that a majority I’ve encountered side with hedonic utils because, in my view, they have the wrong first order priorities.

The fact that some side with social capital is great, but with respect to thinking their answers satisfy psychological needs & harness human motivations, I simply notice them getting those answers more wrong than right. Not that I’m saying absolutist deontologists do any better mind.

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@NonZeroSum What exactly is the debate proposition? Does Vaush think there can be no ethical consumption under capitalism?

NonZeroSum wrote:as a utilitarian, I believe morality of an action is determined by its outcomes. It is undeniable that participating in the consumption of animal products contributes harm to the world, which is why I consider the act of purchasing meat immoral and the decision to go vegan moral.

Vausch is a utilitarian, no? If so, then he appears to be contradicting himself.

This is what it sounds like he’s saying:

1. There exists a threshold in some greater “hedonistic calculus" where negative utility outweighs positive utility for society, thus an action is deemed “immoral.” There is a threshold where positive utility outweighs negative utility for society, thus an action is deemed “moral.”

2. Eating meat cannot be deemed immoral (even if the negative utility outweighs the positive utility) because the agent may not be aware of the consequences eating meat has on the greater society.

All the rambling about social conditioning and society not properly educating the masses is irrelevant. Either that threshold exists or it does not exist. Regardless of the character or intent of the agent, utilitarians should be capable of distinguishing good and bad decisions based on the outcomes of those actions.

Again, I agree with his position is that people shouldn't necessarily be condemned for eating meat if they are otherwise *mostly* good people who haven't thought much about their actions. I don't agree with the all-or-nothing vegan or scum rhetoric. But vindicating immoral behavior that causes real harm because the larger society accepts it isn't really "doing" ethics.

Lay Vegan wrote: ↑Fri Apr 17, 2020 10:38 pmEating meat cannot be deemed immoral (even if the negative utility outweighs the positive utility) because the agent may not be aware of the consequences eating meat has on the greater society.

No he wouldn’t make this statement, it’s still immoral... “I believe morality of an action is determined by its outcomes. It is undeniable that participating in the consumption of animal products contributes harm to the world, which is why I consider the act of purchasing meat immoral”

When he talked about threshold before he was just making a separate point about character:

Vaush wrote:My estimation of a person's characters is more of a general feeling than a rigorous philosophical position. Maybe I should never use that language from now on - either way, it's not relevant here.

My contention is this - why do we condemn people who engage in the consumption of animal products but not those who engage in other forms of immoral consumption? Why is one immoral action so much more heinous? Are both heinous? Are neither? Is their a superseding level of moral consideration saying we derive more utility by not morally condemning people for certain types of immorality? That would be my argument.

He’s purely talking about the disutility of going up to someone and making them feel bad about their actions when they are in a state of confusion about how to consume ethically without spending their whole life researching the business practices of every company.

If one was a liberal utilitarian who saw no harm in buying from sweatshops to spread the productivity of industry then maybe he would accept there are clean lines one can draw in the sand. But he’s of the position that it would be more moral to try to reduce your spending as much as possible and help by donating money saved in other ways. Also not feeling bad about the small luxuries you participate in with friends even though all consumption under capitalism is seen as immoral.

So immoral action, bad charachter vice, especially bad industry one ought avoid and yet confusion about an easy line in the sand so disutility in going up to someone and making them feel awful about themselves.

Lay Vegan wrote: ↑Fri Apr 17, 2020 10:38 pmWhat exactly is the debate proposition?

If you scroll back all the way to the beginning, Ask Yourself formalised the argument “there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism” into a syllogism related to action, then attacked the first premise in a debate with Vaush.

I was willing to defend a modified version of this argument which is what I think Vaush’s argument more accurately related to about not being so quick to condemn someone’s character:

NonZeroSum wrote:Conclusion) Therefore, it it's not the case that an individual agent oughtn't buy meat produced through capitalism.

The one exception I could think of that affirmed this conclusion was:

NonZeroSum wrote:Eating meat where it is absolutely necessary in order to achieve more wellbeing fighting other liberation causes in extreme situations. For example flying to Syria to protect the Yazidis from ISIS and having to eat spam from a tin because it’s the only rations the militia could afford to budget. Which many vegans agree would be ethically vegan or ethically on par with veganism.

The purpose of playing devils advocate is to think about what arguments vegans can use on socialists and visa versa to relate to each other’s philosophy.

The only thing anyone can hold Vaush to is that he has a character vice in knowing the horrors of animal agriculture and not going vegan. This is similar to a hypothetical future in which galaxies of humans are being killed to manufacture 1 burger, then still eating the burger due to social conditioning (not fully knowing). He acknowledges this is valid and stated that people who are shocked by that should go vegan. It is still his position that the action would be immoral (like all consumption under capitalism), something Ask Yourself has tried to claim Vaush rejects.

I watched the debate and found it both interesting and frustrating. A few observations in no particular order:

1. Abstract syllogistics don't necessarily map onto the messy material world very well. I think this is AY's primary weakness. Inferential structures work within defined contexts such as symbolic logic, mathematics, and some branches of science such as physics. But they don't necessarily work well in everyday life. For example, people are complicated and have mixed motives and because of this ethical evaluations are difficult to see clearly in any given case.

In addition, these kinds of abstractions tend to be ahistorical, an aspect that can be brought against V as well when he talks about results vs. motivation.

2. There is a widely held view among many religious and philosophical systems that suffering is an inherent part of the cosmos for living and conscious beings. One religion, Buddhism, states this as its primary axiom (the First Noble Truth), but even those that do not place suffering at the center acknowledge its pervasiveness. A good example is Stoicism that treats suffering, and other negative aspects of human existence, as simply givens and then develops means for responding to this. I believe this impacts both V's and AY's views because it seems to be the case that they want to 'minimize' or eliminate suffering; but what if that is not possible? I think it is possible to argue for a vegan way of life without using the quality of suffering as the foundation; for example, as a means of purification.

3. V argues for the view that the ethical content of an action is dependent upon the outcome. I think it is more complicated than that. Motivation needs to also be considered. This is an ancient discussion. For example, early Jain Discourses mock early Buddhist Discourses for arguing that motivation is crucial to karma and ethics. Instead Jains argue that outcome determines karma and ethics and that motivation does not need to be considered. I tend more to a Buddhist view. But it is not obvious that outcome determines ethical value, and this is enshrined in our legal system were intention is routinely considered.

4. The discussion about consumption under capitalism (vs. what isn't clear to me) is intriguing but to my mind not well thought out. Bringing up historical cases where consumption was, or is, not under a capitalist system does not seem to indicate that consumption driven suffering is either eliminated or lessened. Totalitarian systems from the 20th century did not seem to produce any better results in this regard, and I think it could be coherently argued that their systems of consumption generated greater suffering. In addition, pre-capitalist societies, speaking historically, do not seem to have been better at reducing consumption driven suffering. I was disappointed that AY did not challenge V on this point; but perhaps that has been done in other contexts and they didn't want to bring it up again.

There are societies that have lessened consumption driven suffering, but they are the kind of societies that neither V nor AY would tend to look at. I am thinking of religious societies that have dietary restrictions, as well as other restrictions on consumption such as restrictions on extravagant clothing. Chinese Buddhist and Taoist monasticism are two historical examples. The Jain community is another. The 7th Day Adventists are another. I believe introducing these historical examples into such a discussion might take the discussion in directions that might prove fruitful.

In closing I found the discussion intriguing and worth listening to, as well as the above comments.

Yo @brimstoneSalad, I was never unbanned from AY’s discord, I joined under a false name, so I could deliver the final conclusive piece of evidence to AY that Vaush does think causing infinite suffering is immoral, then told him it was me for laughs, falling on my sword so to speak.

So we’ll have to continue the discussion here anyways.

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PhilosophicalVegan

1. The idea that it’s right that an owner has all the power because it was their brainchild so they’re most likely to make all the right decisions might be true at the beginning under capitalism, but has diminishing returns.

I don't see how that's relevant, since I never claimed anything like that. If there were empirical evidence as to which system produced better products at higher efficiency and more profit for the company too then that might be an argument to favoring one over another in itself, but it's tangential to the discussion.

It’s definitely not ethical for example that the owner employs someone to do all the directorial overseeing that they had planned to do, while they go swig martinis on a beach for the rest of their life acquiring the surplus value of their workers.

Can you explain why that is not ethical?
If the owner hires somebody competent to retire, then the owner donates 99% of income to charity and spends the remaining 1% paying the mortgage on a beach house he or she has retired to and financing a martini habit that's different from hoarding the money or worse contributing to conservative political campaigns. I don't think the fact of the owner being otherwise in retirement is relevant, nor where he or she is living or what he or she is drinking (unless if course it's animal products, of alcohol consumed by an active driver).
It's better to DO something with your time and knowledge than not to, but I don't think that's any different for this hypothetical owner than anybody who is, say, playing video games instead of working on something that helps others.

It’s right that someone gets payed more for the effort and time that went into gaining expertise, but it’s vacuously true that a director could intuit all the goals of their workers and fulfill them whilst still extracting their surplus value.

You haven't explained clearly what would be wrong with that. I would only ask how this director is spending his or her income -- again, coming back to consumerism. I don't care much how somebody EARNED income as long as it's not actually harming anybody, and can't really see a reason to.

If the employees are aware of and upset by this director "stealing" all of their good ideas that's another issue, but they could just as easily be happy to have a director who listens to them and does what they want without really caring that he or she is getting paid for doing almost nothing. And if they ARE upset about that, maybe it's an educational failing rather than the fault of the director: perhaps they could stand to be a little more Tao about things.

Because the most ethical situation long term is still that the workers are able to use the full value of their labour and full education to better decide what role they want to play in the company, how much money they want to invest, how they are enabled to spend their leisure time that feeds back into their work life, which would all happen in a way that no one person could perfectly anticipate and thus know all their workers desires.

Why? And why do you think they care? And why do you think they should be taught to care?
Plenty of people just want to do a job, get paid, and leave it at that. Perhaps that psychology would even be healthier than taking home work AND the anxiety over that. Self-actualization doesn't have to come from your job, it can some from social and community involvement. PERHAPS people even focus more effort into those more important things to realize self-actualization when they don't get a pseudo-satisfier from work. Arguably is it the manager who has the short end of the stick here, saddled with inordinate stress and receiving a shallow compensation who can never truly make him or her happy (money).

The psychology is happiness is very far from a confident statement on any of that, so I feel like you're letting political beliefs lead speculation on other things and just inventing evidence for yourself.

I disagree, by only buying from worker co-ops, you are forming a pressure group that encourages more companies over to a co-operative model, it’s about maximising the amount of money and thus creative potential is in the hands of those who advocate for socialism, then through numerous tactics are able to bring about that goal.

That's an admission that capitalistic forces are supreme here. The trouble is if all signs indicate those systems can not otherwise compete in terms of price or the product (unlike meat vs. meat alternatives, where the latter can be significantly cheaper) you're in an ongoing and unending battle of economy vs. ethics -- and unlike opposing animal agriculture, it's a very hard ethical argument to make as I think I've shown. Where's the end-game, or are you just setting up companies to fail once the anti-capitalism consumer group loses focus?

3. My wild animal suffering example wasn’t meant to be a formal debunk of pref consequentialism, it was an observation that a majority I’ve encountered side with hedonic utils because, in my view, they have the wrong first order priorities.

It not being a "formal" debunk does not mean it wasn't meant to be a debunk, which is what this comment seems to indicate again. It's just one that's also making a bad inductive fallacy too.

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NonZeroSum

1. The idea that it’s right that an owner has all the power because it was their brainchild so they’re most likely to make all the right decisions might be true at the beginning under capitalism, but has diminishing returns.

It’s definitely not ethical for example that the owner employs someone to do all the directorial overseeing that they had planned to do, while they go swig martinis on a beach for the rest of their life acquiring the surplus value of their workers.

Can you explain why that is not ethical?
If the owner hires somebody competent to retire, then the owner donates 99% of income to charity and spends the remaining 1% paying the mortgage on a beach house he or she has retired to and financing a martini habit.

Sure so the point about diminishing returns under capitalism was related to your example way back of an owner maybe having to front the cost of property, where as in a socialised economy the property could be voted on depending on who put forward the best plan for use. So then it might be right under capitalism the full value of a workers labour would be less than expected ordinarily where a shortfall debt like that needs to be recuperated in order that people still have jobs long-term.

The directors full value is slightly more then in that case, until it exponentially flattens out to the value of the effort that went into acquiring the expertise at coordinating staff. So having derived a small sum of money for having the expertise to opportunistically ‘game’ the capitalist market.

If he’s no longer putting in any mental or physical labour, he’s not putting in any value. Everyone should get to retire at whatever age they like, but with a universal tax income based on their own past labour, not the labour of one co-op.

If the employees are aware of and upset by this director "stealing" all of their good ideas that's another issue, but they could just as easily be happy to have a director who listens to them and does what they want without really caring that he or she is getting paid for doing almost nothing. And if they ARE upset about that, maybe it's an educational failing rather than the fault of the director: perhaps they could stand to be a little more Tao about things.
. . .
Why? And why do you think they care? And why do you think they should be taught to care?
Plenty of people just want to do a job, get paid, and leave it at that. Perhaps that psychology would even be healthier than taking home work AND the anxiety over that. Self-actualization doesn't have to come from your job, it can some from social and community involvement. PERHAPS people even focus more effort into those more important things to realize self-actualization when they don't get a pseudo-satisfier from work. Arguably is it the manager who has the short end of the stick here, saddled with inordinate stress and receiving a shallow compensation who can never truly make him or her happy (money).

That was my point all the way back at the beginning when I said maybe the workers might want to work less hours for slightly less pay (so less investment back to the company) to work on their own pursuits.

You also gave a misunderstanding of Taoism as valuing inaction in the face of non-productivity, nothing could be further from the truth. We Wei for example is about valuing the most efficient of actions. And the Te translated to ‘inner charachter’ is about acting with a conscious awareness about the way the universe works:

Tao Te Ching wrote:The way of heaven is like the bending of a bow.
The high is lowered, and the low is raised.
If the string is too long, it is shortened;
If there is not enough, it is made longer.

The way of heaven is to take from those who have too much
and give to those who do not have enough.
Man's way is different.
He takes from those who do not have enough
to give to those who already have too much.

So the highest good is helping the director see that to the degree the workers do want to be there, they should be allowed to use the full value of their labour to persue their own ideas for the best outcomes of the co-op. Where the director is resistant to this, he/she is committing an ethical wrong to the worker in stifling their potential.

The psychology of happiness is very far from a confident statement on any of that, so I feel like you're letting political beliefs lead speculation on other things and just inventing evidence for yourself.

It’s not so much the psychology of happiness that we should be concerned with, rather goal setting & overall life satisfaction with achieving abstract meaning, which can include experiencing a lot more suffering than pleasure overall.

That's an admission that capitalistic forces are supreme here. The trouble is if all signs indicate those systems can not otherwise compete in terms of price or the product (unlike meat vs. meat alternatives, where the latter can be significantly cheaper) you're in an ongoing and unending battle of economy vs. ethics -- and unlike opposing animal agriculture, it's a very hard ethical argument to make as I think I've shown. Where's the end-game, or are you just setting up companies to fail once the anti-capitalism consumer group loses focus?

No, here I think you’re just confusing markets & mutual exchange of goods with systematically capitalistic surplus value extracting economies, any gains made in turning some hierarchical businesses into co-ops just reduces the gap in arriving at the fully market socialist society.

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@Porphyry Thanks for your input, I agree that the discussion was enjoyable for the categories of topics it touched on that are worth ruminating about, even if neither side provided solid answers.