H2002, thanks; I understand your wish to keep the discussion to the clinical point (which, though, it did not concern to begin with).
I think it's relevant to point out that to compare the common knowledge of the process of obtaining whale blubber, which is that it involves slow death and horrific suffering of highly aware animals, to the ignorance which would demand that rabies saliva could only be obtained by first infecting a healthy pup is something that you could only suggest if you truly had no idea of how whale blubber is obtained, just as you explicitly disclaim all knowledge of and interest in the origins of the chicken you wish to eat.
Wilful ignorance is anybody's prerogative; but it is no basis for discerning the relevance of the suffering inherent in a whim for whale blubber as a medicine.
Kind regards,
John
looking for some whale blubber - instead getting all this blubbering
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John Harvey
- Posts: 1331
- Joined: Wed Oct 18, 2006 10:00 pm
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John Harvey
- Posts: 1331
- Joined: Wed Oct 18, 2006 10:00 pm
Re: looking for some whale blubber - instead getting all this blubbering
Shannon, Liz's comment was in direct response to the moral relativism of this:
That comment to which Liz was replying essentially made the claim that it's possible to kill a snake in order to milk it of its venom (whether doing so would even be successful, I don't know, but the point is its author's belief) and therefore cannot be impermissible to kill anything for the purpose of utilising its body parts as "medicine".
If your belief is that Soula's intent was to specify uncontaminated blubber from a certain, or at least known, species of whale of known sex and age taken in a known location and season from a whale that died of natural causes and that humans were unable to save, they you have a strange way of expressing it. It seems rather that you're relying on the novelly expressed belief in the possibility of obtaining whale blubber from a beached whale (details still unspecified to the recipient of the blubber) as a justification for seeking to obtain some whale blubber by any means, from any whale, without restriction (and incidentally in complete ignorance of the circumstances, even as broadly as what species of whale). Of course, that possibility was not used to limit the request, leaving your question itself irrelevant as well as disingenuous.
The request as put is indefensible.
John
That comment to which Liz was replying essentially made the claim that it's possible to kill a snake in order to milk it of its venom (whether doing so would even be successful, I don't know, but the point is its author's belief) and therefore cannot be impermissible to kill anything for the purpose of utilising its body parts as "medicine".
If your belief is that Soula's intent was to specify uncontaminated blubber from a certain, or at least known, species of whale of known sex and age taken in a known location and season from a whale that died of natural causes and that humans were unable to save, they you have a strange way of expressing it. It seems rather that you're relying on the novelly expressed belief in the possibility of obtaining whale blubber from a beached whale (details still unspecified to the recipient of the blubber) as a justification for seeking to obtain some whale blubber by any means, from any whale, without restriction (and incidentally in complete ignorance of the circumstances, even as broadly as what species of whale). Of course, that possibility was not used to limit the request, leaving your question itself irrelevant as well as disingenuous.
The request as put is indefensible.
John
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John Harvey
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- Joined: Wed Oct 18, 2006 10:00 pm
Re: looking for some whale blubber - instead getting all this blubbering
Sorry, H2002; I guess I thought it was straightforward. (But then, I think that the Organon is straightforward too.)
You argued that we shouldn't fuss particularly over the possibility of increasing the suffering of whales, because we effectively kill snakes when we prescribe a snake remedy.
Liz replied that homoeopathy does not need to kill anything in order to prescribe the remedies we have already, something I fully agree with, and asked that we not buy into whale slaughter for any reason.
Shannon responded by repeating a prior observation that no whale necessarily need be killed in order to obtain some whale blubber, and on that basis questioned the relevance of Liz's comment.
My response was to point out the nature of your comment, by which you effectively argue that the method you imagined was used to obtain snake venoms (they are actually milked alive, not killed!) grants us wholesale licence to kill for medicine -- meaning that Liz's comment was entirely relevant to your argument.
I then argued that the later-stated hypothetical possibility of obtaining whale blubber without causing or encouraging whale slaughter -- by obtaining it without harm from dead beached whales whom nobody was able to save -- is irrelevant to the morality of the original request, which I said was, by leaving wide open the possibility of obtaining the blubber through slaughter, morally indefensible.
I expect next further suggestions that ethics are irrelevant to medicine and to commercial enterprises such as the harvesting of rare and endangered species for profit and that taking suffering and biodiversity into account can only interfere with the production of new medicines -- just as though the planet's problems did not largely result from exactly such schizoid ignorance.
I hope that that makes the thread of the discussion somewhat clearer, anyway!
Cheers --
John
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"The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd."
-- Bertrand Russell
You argued that we shouldn't fuss particularly over the possibility of increasing the suffering of whales, because we effectively kill snakes when we prescribe a snake remedy.
Liz replied that homoeopathy does not need to kill anything in order to prescribe the remedies we have already, something I fully agree with, and asked that we not buy into whale slaughter for any reason.
Shannon responded by repeating a prior observation that no whale necessarily need be killed in order to obtain some whale blubber, and on that basis questioned the relevance of Liz's comment.
My response was to point out the nature of your comment, by which you effectively argue that the method you imagined was used to obtain snake venoms (they are actually milked alive, not killed!) grants us wholesale licence to kill for medicine -- meaning that Liz's comment was entirely relevant to your argument.
I then argued that the later-stated hypothetical possibility of obtaining whale blubber without causing or encouraging whale slaughter -- by obtaining it without harm from dead beached whales whom nobody was able to save -- is irrelevant to the morality of the original request, which I said was, by leaving wide open the possibility of obtaining the blubber through slaughter, morally indefensible.
I expect next further suggestions that ethics are irrelevant to medicine and to commercial enterprises such as the harvesting of rare and endangered species for profit and that taking suffering and biodiversity into account can only interfere with the production of new medicines -- just as though the planet's problems did not largely result from exactly such schizoid ignorance.
I hope that that makes the thread of the discussion somewhat clearer, anyway!
Cheers --
John
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"The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd."
-- Bertrand Russell