Is it right to kill animals for the sake of improving human lives that are not in jeopardy?

Yes.

Wait, no.

Damn, this is harder when the computer doesn't tell you the correct answer when you're wrong...

If I have £2 do I donate it to UNICEF or the WWF? Are babies or panda's more important?

If you only have 2 lbs, do not donate. Administrative costs will be higher than your donation and you'll actually be taking money from them.

What is worse, killing innocent plants that mostly get their energy from the sun, or killing vicious animals that are constantly killing other animals and/or plants to get their energy?

@Alderian

I am an animal, so I believe that falls under "conflict of interest", so I'm afraid I can't answer your question.

They're always asking us to donate just £2 a month here, so that's not true abge!

@Hell

Have you considered that a rogue agency may be sending you those disguised as a charitable organization? I believe the ethical term for that is "personal misrepresentation"

And with that, I'm off to work.

Before I go, I'd like to appoint Bo, Hell, and Alderian as my Ethical Deputies. Be sure to monitor the Forum in my absence.

Will do, broski.

I love corporate "ethics." Anyone who has taken an intro to philosophy course at a community college can point at that crap and tell the difference between misusing sick days and a legitimate discussion about morality. I find it particularly interesting when I hear about companies illegally dumping pollutants or running sweatshops because I guarantee that their HR departments ran ethics classes as well.

"Went a lot quicker when I realized you can skip the videos."
One would think you had to be ethical to get a certificate in ethics.

Bo, can you define "improving"? Food, television, Walker Percy's The Moviegoer, vaccines, socks, and soap all improve people's lives, but to different degrees.

Turns out I have another hour before class, so I guess I'm here for a bit longer.

@Fasces

I've taken many of these "classes" and they're all a joke. 10 questions about "ethics" where it's incredibly clear what the correct answer is. Honestly, I would be very concerned if there was someone who couldn't pass on the first try.

Rogue Agencies? I don't believe anyone would ever want to take my money under false pretenses!

@ck .. that's up to you. If you want to take it to mean basic antibiotics that get tested on animals, do so. If you want to take it to mean makeup or glue sticks, fine. That's the part where you make that decision yourself because those are two separate issues. The only thing I excluded was life-saving medications (I would include things like HIV drugs that have life-saving potential to be excluded as well).

"@Fasces

I've taken many of these "classes" and they're all a joke. 10 questions about "ethics" where it's incredibly clear what the correct answer is. Honestly, I would be very concerned if there was someone who couldn't pass on the first try."

I know, I was just making a joke about the irony of committing an unethical practice to get an ethics certificate.

The fact that it allows you to skip the videos indicates that it is not unethical to do so. For the corporation I work for, they let you take the test first and only require you watch the video if you miss any questions. Sounds like the same for abgemacht.

speaking of ethics what about this masterful production https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nvaz9NIycB4

or maybe i should have posted it in the gay marriage thread

http://threewordphrase.com/exam.htm

The problem with most people's view of ethics is that they want a simple answer, and the simple answers are not true.
Look at killing animals, most of us are fine with snuffing a chicken to get Mcnuggets, most are against torturing the neighbours cat to death because you have self enrolled in serial killers school. Even animal loving vegetarians are unlikely to argue that whales should starve themselves to death because of the millions of krill kills it takes to maintain their lives. And even the harshest 'rights of man as top of the food chain' has a hard time defending little Billy's penchant for poking small animals with sharp things until they stop moving because he likes to see them squirm and watching the light in their eyes go out.
You might think it gets simpler if you narrow it to killing man, definitely wrong, right? But what about self defence or defending another. Surely it's ok to shoot the guy lunging at you with a machete. Plugging a Columbine type spree killer before he gets to the next kid is A OK by most people's moral code. How about lesser crimes, can a potential rape victim use lethal force, his/her friend, can they strategically drive a brick into the rapist's brainpan ? Defence of property, can you shoot the rioter about to lob a molotov cocktail through your families deli window.

My point is that there are few, if any, black and white absolutes in ethics and morality. It's a sea of gray.

Currently "watching" an online ethics course for my job. Anyone have good ethics stories?

"Currently" watching an online ethics course for my job. Anyone have good ethics stories?

Currently watching an "online" ethics course for my job. Anyone have good ethics stories?

Currently watching an online "ethics" course for my job. Anyone have good ethics stories?

Currently watching an online ethics "course" for my job. Anyone have good ethics stories?

Currently watching an online ethics course for "my" job. Anyone have good ethics stories?

Currently watching an online ethics course for my "job". Anyone have good ethics stories?

Currently watching an online ethics course for my job. Anyone "have" good ethics stories?

Currently watching an online ethics course for my job. Anyone have "good" ethics stories?

Currently watching an online ethics course for my job. Anyone have good "ethics" stories?

Currently watching an online ethics course for my job. Anyone have good ethics "stories"?

Currently watching an "online ethics course" for my job. Anyone have good ethics stories?

Currently watching an online ethics course for my job. Anyone have good "ethics stories"?

Currently watching an online ethics course for my job. Anyone have "good ethics stories"?

Step right up, step right up, take your pick. Your task is to identify which of these phrases is the most sexual in possible interpretation. Go!

There goes Thucy for you. The mod that never was (or did you just give up being a mod, I forget) trollolololing along.

"watching the light in their eyes go out. "

That reminds me ofthe time I had to put a beloved pet to sleep. He fought the drugs hard and it tore me up more than anyone could ever understand who hasn't had to do it. There really is a "light in their eyes" that goes out and you cans ee it go dim. I pray to God that I never have to go through that again. I'd rather my pets just die in their sleep and I wake up one morning to find them gone. I'll be sad but at least I won't have had to do this. Even now I sit here at my desk thoinking about that night and seeing it ove in my head, I'm shaking and on the verge of bursting out in tears.

Draug don't blame Thucy, he's mentally deficient, leading to our next ethics question: Is it OK to mock the retarded (i.e. Thucy)...because really sometimes it's just so damned fun, and, you know, they don't quit get that your mocking them, so what the hell, why not?

Hey Thucy....look boy! Afghan kids...point and shoot, boy...point and shoot!!! Fuckwad.

What the fuck did you just fucking say about me, you little bitch? I’ll have you know I graduated top of my class in the Navy Seals, and I’ve been involved in numerous secret raids on Al-Quaeda, and I have over 300 confirmed kills. I am trained in gorilla warfare and I’m the top sniper in the entire US armed forces. You are nothing to me but just another target. I will wipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on this Earth, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with saying that shit to me over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across the USA and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your life. You’re fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can kill you in over seven hundred ways, and that’s just with my bare hands. Not only am I extensively trained in unarmed combat, but I have access to the entire arsenal of the United States Marine Corps and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of the continent, you little shit. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little “clever” comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your fucking tongue. But you couldn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit fury all over you and you will drown in it. You’re fucking dead, kiddo.

I always skim this for gorilla warfare. If there is gorilla warfare, the copypasta is legit and worthy of our worship.

Thucy....<yawn...> You're so droll. Go burn down a village or something.

Wow...and I once called krellin an angry guy.

I'm not quite sure what happened here, but I will answer bo_sox's question, which was "Is it right to kill animals for the sake of improving human lives that are not in jeopardy?" I would say that it's not inherently wrong to humanely kill animals in order to improve human lives in certain ways, but many aspects of modern industry and agriculture make it so ethically problematic as to be objectionable and immoral.

@murraysheroes

What the fuck did you just fucking say about me, you little bitch? I’ll have you know I graduated top of my class in the Navy Seals, and I’ve been involved in numerous secret raids on Al-Quaeda, and I have over 300 confirmed kills. I am trained in gorilla warfare and I’m the top sniper in the entire US armed forces. You are nothing to me but just another target. I will wipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on this Earth, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with saying that shit to me over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across the USA and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your life. You’re fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can kill you in over seven hundred ways, and that’s just with my bare hands. Not only am I extensively trained in unarmed combat, but I have access to the entire arsenal of the United States Marine Corps and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of the continent, you little shit. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little “clever” comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your fucking tongue. But you couldn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit fury all over you and you will drown in it. You’re fucking dead, kiddo.

If you're going to copy and paste a screed you just used, it's a sign you're starting to get old and lazy. Just a friendly warning.

You try being outdoors in -50 and that rabbit who died for your furhat was so worth it :)

How about drugtests conducted on poor students?

Yes, it's ok to shoot someone that is a treath to you, as long as you apologize to them afterwards

I honestly can't tell if you meant to say threat or treat.

Wait, hold on, is someone arguing against animal testing. Animal testing is necessary and without it we would be halting scientific growth for a generation.

http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/about-us/the-science-action-network/forty-reasons-why-we-need-animals-in-research/

Oh, had to check with google translate. It's difficult with this foreign language. Threat, it should be threat. I think it will be ethically questionable to shoot someone who is a treat to you.

@Fasces: a lot of people are against animaltesting. I even read of a girl who is against "killing" healthy plants for food. I expect her to die from malnutrition quite soon...

Assuming shes not dead yet.

I know a lot of people (probably a majority of people) are against animal testing, I was just prepared to start arguing about it and tell them why they are wrong.

This comic readily applies to me at times:
http://xkcd.com/386/
(its 5:30 am here)

@datapolitical

lol

@thuc thanks

luvya

oh and btw


What the fuck did you just fucking say about me, you little bitch? I’ll have you know I graduated top of my class in the Navy Seals, and I’ve been involved in numerous secret raids on Al-Quaeda, and I have over 300 confirmed kills. I am trained in gorilla warfare and I’m the top sniper in the entire US armed forces. You are nothing to me but just another target. I will wipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on this Earth, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with saying that shit to me over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across the USA and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your life. You’re fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can kill you in over seven hundred ways, and that’s just with my bare hands. Not only am I extensively trained in unarmed combat, but I have access to the entire arsenal of the United States Marine Corps and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of the continent, you little shit. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little “clever” comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your fucking tongue. But you couldn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit fury all over you and you will drown in it. You’re fucking dead, kiddo.

Let's be serious now. What do you think about Milgram's experiment, the one relating to the Nazis in WWII?

My favourites
Currently watching an online "ethics" course for my job.
Currently watching an online ethics "course" for my job.
Anyone have "good" ethics stories?
Currently watching an "online ethics course" for my job.

"Wait, hold on, is someone arguing against animal testing. Animal testing is necessary and without it we would be halting scientific growth for a generation."

Not *all* animal testing is necessary. Many cosmetics and perfume companies have moved away from animal testing because it doesn't actually tell them how their product will work on human skin. The closest to human skin they have is pigs but even they have different tolerances.

I used to work for Hill Top Research (http://www.hill-top.com/index.html) developing data collection and analysis software for them so I learned quite a bit about which animals match which aspect of the human body and there were many things where they actually had human volunteers (reimbursed for their time yadda yadda) because no animal could properly replicate the environment of the human condition.

So no, animal testing is not required to advance scientific/clinical research knowledge, it is just a faster way to advance it in some cases and we should be more worried about the animals and how they are treated than "speediness to market". Test it on humans who volunteer like the Olean/Olestra study I managed all the IT side for.

By the way, as an aside, that Olean/Olestra shit they used in making some of the lowfat Pringles and stuff was not good for you. It had a very statistically significant instance of intestinal distress (gas, bloating, diarrhea, etc.)

Fasces, I was going to explain why I am against some animal testing, but then Draugnar explained it pretty well. In short: testing for legitimate medical purposes done as humanely as possible, generally acceptable (although this is one of the rare (perhaps only, thinking about it) places that need considerably more government regulation and oversight); for cosmetics or something like that, or done in an unnecessarily or particularly painful way, not acceptable.

Do you know they intentionally submit pigs to extreme sunlamps to give them severe sunburn so they can test healing creams and lotions? They even cut them then stitch them up or burn them with hot pokers so they can see hwo burn creams and vitamin D creams will work. Why pigs? Well, there skin is the closest match to ours. But they don't even anesthetize them first. They just do the trauma and don't worry about being humane to them.

I actually like this one cause its a sly insult to abge:

"Currently watching an online ethics course for my "job". Anyone have good ethics stories?"