[zvmaz]

> I don’t really follow. There are billions/trillions of these creatures who are eaten alive every year in the wild. Why is it so significant that humans also do this?

That tells us little on our moral obligations towards them and, for that matter, towards our fellow humans. Animals also murder other members of their own species, is murder hence ok?

[nvahalik]

> Animals also murder

I think you mean kill. Murder involves intent. Animals do not have intent. Usually murder involves malice. Animals don't have malice.

Killing can be in self-defense or self-preservation. Most animals don't simply kill other animals unless provoked or they are hungry.

Animals kill. Humans are the only beings capable of murder.

[Jtsummers]

> Animals do not have intent.

Only if you believe they're automata. Which raises the question, are humans not automata as well? If we are, then we also don't murder as we also don't have intent. But if we have intent, what's the line that separates us (other than the obvious "not the same species") from other animals that renders them mere unintentional automata and us intentional non-automata?

Also, spend a few days with any animal, you'll see they have intentions. They're just harder to discern.

> Animals don't have malice.

Likewise some do have malice. It's just harder to discern as we lack the ability to communicate with them and they lack the ability to articulate to us what their feelings are.

[TheNewsIsHere]

I agree with your analysis, but while I can’t speak for the original commenter, I think their point was probably closer to:

“If we can all have this conversation together, it’s clearly a choice for us.”

I (am not being cute when I say I) truly wish I could talk _with_ my cat. I would ask if she murdered that bug or was operating on instinct. Did she kill for sport, defense, or hunger? Was she just pissed off? I don’t know and she can’t tell me, so I can only assume she’s just doing what cats do.

Among our own species I don’t think that “benefit of the doubt” (?) is defacto transferable.

I hope this makes sense. I am enjoying this conversation in an odd kind of way. I’ve been waiting for news like this for a long time.

Though the article and UKGOV articles are from 2021?

Edit: today my main job was typos

[snapcaster]

I don't understand how you can think this if you've spent any significant time around animals

[jackmott42]

Are you sure no animals have intent?

[fredrikholm]

You sound as if you've never interacted with an animal of any kind; I don't otherwise see how you could draw such a demonstrably false conclusion.

[cgh]

Clearly you have never owned a cat.

[kwhitefoot]

No one owns cats!

Dogs have owners, cats have staff. :-)

[rascul]

The internet tells me that cats will murder small animals such as birds.

[xdennis]

No one is saying we should do everything animals do.

But when it comes to basic things like eating, the fact that non-human omnivores eat animals is a good indicator that we should be doing the same.