[stouset]

The point is that continuing to enjoy your existence is inflicting a massive toll of suffering around the world, to both others humans as well as non-humans.

I’m not saying I’d be one to push the button, but I think it’s worth trying to understand the mindset of someone who would. It’s very arguable that pushing it would be the ethical thing to do.

[trylfthsk]

Not entirely convinced that outside the torment nexuses used in industrial meat farming, natural suffering is any lesser sans humanity.

[aziaziazi]

Estimated scale of the torment nexuses: https://considerveganism.com/counter/

[stouset]

The fish counter is horrifying, I had no idea.

[aziaziazi]

The fish counter comes from here https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/animal-welfare/artic...

One could argue there's a double count: about one-fifth of fish are caught to feed other animals (mainly fish, but also terrestrial animals). But I don't think one kill offsets another.

> around half of wild-caught finfish numbers are destined for reduction to fishmeal and oil, of which, respectively, 70 and 73% are used for aquaculture feeds

[mock-possum]

That’s an interesting point, but the degree to which enjoying my existence inflicts “a massive toll of suffering around the world” seems negligible, how much harm could I as an individual really be doing?

I’m a very small drop in a very big bucket, and in the already tragically short time I am allotted on this earth, I would like to enjoy myself, thank you very much. I would not dream of asking others to kill themselves so that my existence might be marginally improved.

[SoftTalker]

What if the suffering is the point?

[hypeatei]

It is, because you can't have pleasure without suffering but I think these conversations should focus on the amount (maybe as a percentage) of suffering that someone/something experiences.

If you were locked in a room and being tortured, would you think it'd be appropriate for me to go: "they feed you at the end of each torture session, isn't it worth it to keep going for that?"

[diacritical]

> you can't have pleasure without suffering

That's not true, though. There's no physical law that states that an X amount of suffering is required for an Y amount of pleasure. Nothing prevents you from taking a brain that's feeling pleasure and keeping it in that state. We don't have the technology, but it's not impossible theoretically. It's a configuration of neurons that somehow gives rise to qualia. Maybe in the evolutionary or day-to-day psychological sense we "need" suffering to overcome adversity and get stronger or not to become too content with what we have and lose it, but that's very far from a law of nature or a necessity in the real sense. And obviously some animals live their whole lives in bliss, others in agony. So it's not like there aren't any real life counterexamples.