Re: Philosophy's lack of proofs

[chokhmah@xxxxxxxxxx]

Zinov, will you still check the mailing list? I find the conversations
interesting. Even if you step away for a bit, I would be pleased to
continue the discussions after you return.

To continue my argument, there exists no consensus even amongst
vegetarian philosophers. There exists no consensus about applied ethics,
nor about the princinples or axioms used to prove vegetarianism. For
example, suppose you believe that there should not be differential
treatment among species. This is equivalent to saying that all species
have equal value. I could point out that vegetarians contradict this by
eating plants.

If only non-plants have equal value, then vegetarians are inconsistent
when they routinely kill primitive animals like beetles, worms, ants,
aphids, and other pests as a routine part of agriculture.

Often, the killing of species is even deliberate. If rodents spread
disease among humans, would it not be ethical to kill rats in order to
save human lives? Similar arguments can be made for killing cockroaches,
ticks, and mosquitoes. Many of these vectors clearly experience
sentience and feel pain.

Among vegetarians, there is not even any consensus about the extent to
which animals can be exploited. Even if all philosophers agreed to not
kill animals, there would be no agreement about the extent to which
their labor and products can be used.

Is it ethical to eat chicken eggs? Is it ethical to raise bees for
honey? Is it ethical to raise cattle for dairy? No consensus.

If we had lived in an era before engineering, we would likewise find no
consensus about the use of draft animals. Is it ethical to use horses
and donkeys for transportation? Is it ethical to use oxen for plowing?
Is it ethical to use worms for vermicomposting? Is their consent
necessary?

Today, new unresolvable problems arise. Is it ethical to genetically
engineer other species to produce valuable human products, such as
insulin? Beyond E. coli, sentient mammals, birds, and fish are routinely
used to produce therapeutic human proteins. Again, no consensus or hard
proof can be offered about ethics without some religious tradition.

To compound the problem, there are zero methods offered for ethics
enforcement. When a man chooses or disregards ethics, outside of
religion, there are zero consequences.

Suppose you could undeniably *prove* that it is unethical to kill
animals for meat. 90% of the world, however, accepts the practice of
raising livestock for food (as it currently does). What consequences
would these people face for their unethical practices? Since the
majority controls the government, the law offers no punishment for these
offenders. Without divine or cosmic justice, ethics becomes entirely
devoid of meaning.

The problem therefore is threefold:

1) No consensus (not even among philosophers)
2) No verifiable proofs
3) No consequences

The issue is not specific to vegetarianism. The problem is that many
philosophy problems suffer from the exact same 3 flaws. These flaws
render discussion of the problems of philosophy completely meaningless.

chokhmah

On Wed, Jul 08, 2026 at 05:44:06PM -0700, chokhmah wrote:
> The problem with philosophy in general is the inability to verify or
> prove its conclusions. This was discussed in the past with idealism vs
> realism; there is no way to prove, without resorting to some authority
> or tradition, which is true. The Ship of Theseus paradox regarding
> identity is another.
> 
> In this thread, let us discuss ethics. How do you *prove*, in a way
> convincing manner, that behavior XYZ is ethical? Take the hypothetical
> statement: "Killing X is wrong".
> 
> X could represent a human, an animal, a plant, a cell, a robot, etc.
> Most people agree killing a human is wrong. Some believe killing an
> animal is wrong. A tiny minority believe killing a plant is wrong.
> Without religious tradition, how do you prove that Killing X is wrong,
> or that Killing X is ethically acceptable?
> 
> As another example, take the ethical statement, "Y requires permission
> from Z". For example, Y could be taking a photo, which would require
> permission from Z the person in the photo. Or Y could be dumping
> pollution in a river, which would require permission from Z the
> municipality that owns the river. How do you *prove* that these actions
> are ethical or unethical?
> 
> Plato thought that censorship of the arts and literature was ethical to
> achieve his goal of a harmonius, beautiful city. He believed deceiving
> the public was ethical to enforce an efficient caste system. He thought
> forced marriages and infanticide was ethical to achieve superior human
> breeds. Without resorting to tradition, how do you prove that what he
> believed was unethical?
> 
> For these questions, there has been almost zero consensus amongst
> philosophers for over two thousand years. This is why ethics (and
> philosophy in general) appears to many to be a fruitless field. It is
> not because I do not desire to learn the truth. The problem is no hard
> proofs can ever be offered, so no consensus can ever be reached. The
> result is no truth is to be found.
> 
> It is not like this in other fields like mathematics where proofs can be
> demonstrated, consistency and logic is systematic and methodical be
> demonstrated, and sometimes empirical experiments can even be used to
> confirm the truth of claims.
> 
> chokhmah
> 
>