Sunday, February 1, 2004

Dale Jamieson on Beef Addiction

The addiction to beef that is characteristic of people in the industrialised countries is not only a moral atrocity for animals but also causes health problems for consumers, reduces grain supplies for the poor, precipitates social divisions in developing countries, contributes to climate change, leads to the conversion of forests to pasture lands, is a causal factor in overgrazing, and is implicated in the destruction of native plants and animals. If there is one issue on which animal liberationists and environmentalists should speak with a single voice it is on this issue.

(Dale Jamieson, "Animal Liberation Is an Environmental Ethic," Environmental Values 7 [February 1998]: 41-57, at 46)




Ambrose Bierce

Cynic, n. A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be. Hence the custom among the Scythians of plucking out a cynic's eyes to improve his vision.

(Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, c. 1911)




Finding Your Presidential Soulmate

Andrew Sullivan had a link to this website the other day. If you answer a few questions, you'll see which of the eight presidential candidates (President Bush and the seven dwarfs, er, Democrats) shares your values. It's fun. Try it. In the interest of full disclosure, here's how my values match up with the candidates':

George W. Bush: 100%
Joe Lieberman: 92%
John Kerry: 76%
John Edwards: 74%
Wesley Clark: 73%
Howard Dean: 61%
Al Sharpton: 53%
Dennis Kucinich: 47%

These results ring true to me, so I think the instrument is sound. By the way, it's "dwarfs," not "dwarves," so don't give me hell about that.

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