Carnivorous dogs and other animals

[Guest guest]

*Dear AAPN members,*

 

* After a long time we are having a debate on AAPN that

has very strong immediate theoretical and practical components and this is

one of the reasons I think AAPN is such a valuable platform. My heartfelt

thanks go to all of you who have responded and every one of you have made

valid points and assertions. I will try and place my thoughts by taking your

views one by one. I am taking your positions randomly so please forgive me

if there is no continuity in the manner in which I tackle the issues raised.

Feel free to tell me if I have missed any important points. So here goes:*

 

*1) Colonel Dennis Brewin : Thank you for your response. You seem to be

in agreement with the notion that dogs are carnivores. Thank you also for

your personal kind words, I am flattered and embarrassed. We do agree on

some issues and disagree on others, which is as it should be. But we respect

each other's points of view and that is the important thing.*

 

*2) John Wedderburn : You say that Jeannette Thomason's article is

typical of junk science. I disagree. Is any scientist spouting junk only

because it refutes your pet 'veganism will save the world' agenda? The

general theory is that The dog (Canis lupus familiaris)is a domesticated

subspecies of the gray wolf, a mammal of the Canidae family of the order

Carnivora. This biological classification clearly indicates that meat is an

integral part of the diet of dogs, even though it may not be exclusively so.

Nature has designed animals like dogs to hunt and kill and eat meat, and

even though you may substitute all dietary requirements with vegetarian or

vegan items, it would still be unnatural for its mode of living. It is true

that dogs and wild canids do eat vegetarian food, for example, the dogs in

Puerto Rico that Merritt Clifton mentioned as eating avocados or the Maned

Wolves that eat fruit, but that is not to say that they eat vegetarian food

at the total exclusion of meat or other non vegetarian items. Jackals and

foxes, closely related to dogs will eat anything and everything. So your

point on the vegetable component in a dog's diet is well taken, but I part

company with you when you advocate a strict vegetarian diet for animals that

are essentially carnivores.*

 

* You say, " I believe that we have a moral duty to do as little

harm and as much good as we can while on this earth. Therefore we should

consider the suffering that goes into producing our companions' food. "

Agreed, but please don't try and preach the ethics of non violence and

veganism to a dog or a cat, for they will not understand it and care even

less. Let them be as nature intended them to be, and nature intended them to

be as hunters and killers and eaters of flesh. You are a doctor, you should

know better.*

 

* You add, " There are many issues to be taken into consideration when

deciding what to feed our companions - but their evolutionary history is not

relevant in this modern world. What animals in zoos are given to eat is also

not relevant to this discussion. " Totally disagree. The evolutionary history

is the most relevant thing to consider in this modern world. Considering how

animals have evolved helps us to understand them and ourselves better. Facts

of evolution are not always compatible with moral notions, we should have

the openness of mind to accept this. What animals in zoos are given to eat

is also not relevant to this discussion? Why, may I ask? Are not the same

moral issues involved in feeding carnivorous animals in any situation

considering your own argument regarding our moral duty to do as little harm

as possible? And what about carnivorous and omnivorous animals in rescue

centres? I wonder if your veganism stance has ever led you to suggest vegan

diets for the bears in Jill Robinson's sanctuary? By avoiding the issue of

what we should feed carnivorous animals in captivity, are you suggesting

that we should not tend to an injured carnivore and just leave it to die

because we are uncomfortable feeding it meat?*

 

* *

 

*3) Dr Sandeep Jain : I do agree with you that it might be possible to

rear a dog on a vegetarian diet but it is necessary to give it the requisite

amount of meat for healthy living. However you seem to be agreeing on the

notion that cats cannot be made vegetarian. You raise a realted subsidiary

issue of great relevance, ie., it is cruel to breed dogs for the pet trade

and making them captive in the first place. I do agree and this raises the

question, should animal rights/welfare activists approve of keeping any pets

at all, including dogs and cats? And if we accept that dogs and cats are in

our care, we should also accept that lions and tigers are in our care and

the same moral principles apply to their care as they do for cats and dogs.*

 

* *

 

*4) Mr Merritt Clifton : I am in general agreement with everything you

have written on this issue. It is true that the pet food industry does not

really slaughter animals exclusively for its products, the non vegetarian

items in pet food are essentially by products of the meat industry.*

 

* *

 

*5) Ms Nandita Shah : You write, " **The question remains, is a dog¹s

life more worthy than a chicken's or a cow's? Do we have the right to kill a

chicken to save a dog? I have no

problems with carnivores that kill their own prey, but are WE right in

saving dogs by killing other animals? In nature, when a lion kills a zebra,

its actually supporting the survival of the species because it eliminates

the weakest. But humans weaken and sicken animals that are raised for food.

These are all issues that need to be considered. " You also say that animal

rights activists do not approve of keeping lions in zoos.*

 

* *

 

*Firstly, the issue of the moral worth of one animal over another. Albert

Schweitzer considered this question in his autobiography, 'My Life and

Thought.' He recognized that one life survives at the expense of another and

called this 'the contradiction of the will to live.' I am attaching the

relevant portion from his book that you may find of interest. Here : " When

we were making our way through a herd of hippopotamuses, there flashed upon

my mind, unforeseen and unsought, the phrase, " Reverence For Life'. The iron

door had yielded: the path in the thicket had become visible. Now I had

found my way to the idea in which world –and –life –affirmation and ethics

are contained side by side. *

 

* To the man who is truly ethical all life is sacred, including that which

from the human point of view seems lower in scale. He makes distinctions

only as each case comes before him, and under the pressure of necessity; as,

for example, when it falls to him to decide which of two lives he must

sacrifice in order to preserve the other. *

 

* I rejoice over the new remedies for sleeping sickness, which enable me to

preserve life, whereas I had previously to watch a painful disease. But

every time I have under the microscope the germs which cause disease, I

cannot but reflect that I have to sacrifice this life in order to save other

life. *

 

* I buy from natives a young fish-eagle, which they have caught on a sand

bank, in order to rescue it from their cruel hands. But now I have to decide

whether I will let it starve, or kill every day a number of small fishes, in

order to keep it alive. I decide on the latter course, but every day I feel

it hard that this life must be sacrificed for the other on my

responsibility. *

 

* One existence survives at the expense of another of which it yet knows

nothing. But evolution has enabled man to know of the existence of other

wills-to-live. So the conflict can have a sort of resolution, reaching down

to the smallest life. If I rescue an insect from a pool of water, then life

has given itself for life, and the self-contradiction of the will-to-live

has been removed. *

 

* *

 

* FROM 'MY LIFE AND THOUGHT' by Albert Schweitzer quoted by William Paton in

MAN AND MOUSE: Animals In Medical Research(New Edition),1993, Oxford

University Press *

 

*Regarding feeding of animals in zoos. I have researched zoos and animals in

captivity. I do not like the idea of incarcerating animals in zoos just like

you but much as I abhor the concept, I cannot wish zoos away and till the

time we have carnivorous animals in captivity, I feel they should be fed

meat in the correct proportion to keep them healthy. I also feel that

rescued carnivorous animals should be fed meat and in those cases we do make

an arbitrary choice regarding which animal to save and which to kill. There

are no cut and dried answers on which individual to save at the cost of whom

and this is a wide open debate. Do share your thoughts on this.*

 

* *

 

*6) Jigme: I think you agree with me on what I have written.*

 

* *

 

* *

 

*7) Sean McCormack : You talk about predators and prey and nature being

cruel. I concur. However, here I quote my great guru Richard Dawkins who

says that, " The universe would manifest no intentions of any kind. In a

universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are

going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find

any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe we observe has

precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design,

no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

As that unhappy poet A E Housman put it:*

 

*For Nature, heartless, witless Nature*

 

*Will neither know nor care.*

 

*DNA neither knows nor cares. DNA just is. And we dance to its music. " *

 

*(Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden, Phoenix Press, page 155.*

 

* *

 

* *

 

*8) Dr Chinny Krishna : You say you have kept several hundred dogs and

have fed them a vegetarian diet and they have thrived. Point well taken and

appreciated. But have you ever given your dogs the CHOICE between vegetarian

and non vegetarian food? Have you ever seen if they would choose the

vegetarian diet over the non vegetarian diet? Or have you fed them a

vegetarian diet because you did not want to kill other animals and have a

clean conscience? I should be interested to know.*

* You write, " For all those who have dogs as companions, I can

honestly say that you can safely keep them vegetarian. A chicken is a cow is

a goat is a child, isn't it? " *

* I am not convinced. A dog can live on a vegetarian diet but that is a

deprived diet and an abnormal diet. In contradiction to what you are saying,

I would suggest to everyone to keep their dogs and cats non vegetarian to

have them healthy and happy. And how is a chicken equivalent to a goat and a

cow and a child? A chicken is a bird that is omnivorous, a cow is a

herbivore and a mammal(although cows in factory farms eat non vegetarian

food too), a goat is a herbivore and a mammal but quite different in

physical appearance and size compared to a cow and a child is a primate

whose digestive system is geared for an omnivorous diet. Or did you mean

that a chicken's suffering is equal to the suffering of a goat and a cow and

a child? *

 

* Regarding the healthy stature of your dogs, you emphasise, " What

Jeanette Thomason or Desmond Morris says is not relevant to this and no

matter how many " authorities " Mr. can quote, the facts

above will not change. " Why are Jeanette Thomason and Desmond Morris

irrelevant in this debate, may I ask? You quote many studies and material in

support of vegetarianism, don't you? The most recent one being the General

Thimayya lecture. So why should people consider vegetarian proponents like

religious leaders and philanthropists and members of PCRM to be relevant as

'authorities' on the issue of diet and ignore those who speak in favour of

non vegetarianism?*

 

* I want to write about my dog. He is a three year old Pug. He has been

eating non vegetarian food since the day I obtained him. He eats a wide

variety of food, including rice, milk, vegetables, fish(of several different

species), chicken, goat meat(chevon), prawns, crabs and beef. He is happy,

healthy and active. He has had no major medical problems, touchwood. He

enjoys meat. Why should I change his diet and experiment on him?*

 

* A lot of the campaigns regarding vegan diets for dogs and cats by animal

welfare/rights organizations have more to do with public relations, business

policy and marketing than genuine animal welfare. The truth is that many

animal welfare/rights organizations are speaking out for vegan food for cats

and dogs because many wealthy donors of some communities in India do not

like the idea of non vegetarian food being served with their financial

support for any purpose. So rather than come clean regarding the drying up

of the trail of the begging bowl, these animal welfare/rights organizations

present themselves as champions of veganism for dogs and cats. Sad, but

quite true. I would love to be proved wrong but I guess not.*

 

* Regarding predator and prey, many members, including you have raised

the issue.There is a good book I can recommend on this topic, 'The Raptor

and the Lamb'. This book addresses most of the issues regarding predators

killing prey and is well worth reading. I don't have it here in NOIDA right

now, but if any one of you is interested in reading it, please remind me the

next time I am in Kolkata, and I will photocopy it and send it to you.*

 

* Last point, the cardinal issue of suffering and our efforts to minimize

it. John Wedderburn says we should minimize suffering. Dr Chinny Krishna

says, " May all that has life be free from suffering. " Laudable thoughts both

and I share them. But this issue of vegan cats and dogs has made me think if

it is a realistic and achievable goal. Can nature be free of suffering?

Richard Dawkins has addressed the issue and it is well worth sharing his

writing in the context of what we are discussing. " Nature is neither kind

nor cruel. She is neither against suffering nor for it. Nature is not

interested one way or the other in suffering, unless it affects the survival

of DNA. It is easy to imagine a gene that, say, tranquillizes gazelles when

they are about to suffer a killing bite. Would such a gene be favoured by

natural selection? Not unless the act of tranquillizing the gazelle improved

the gene's chances of being propagated into future generations. It is hard

to see why this should be so, and we may therefore guess that gazelles

suffer horrible pain and fear when they are pursued to the death – as most

of them eventually are. The total amount of suffering per year in the

natural world is beyond all decent contemplation. During the minute it takes

me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive;

others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear; others are being

slowly devoured from within by rasping parasites; thousands of all kinds are

dying of starvation, thirst and disease. It must be so. If there is ever a

time of plenty, this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in

population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored. " *

 

* (Richard Dawkins,

River Out of Eden, Chapter, 'God's Utility Function', pages 153 to 154.*

 

* Lessening of suffering? I most certainly agree. Achievable? For the sake

of our own species and that of other animals, I hope so, but I'm not holding

my breath.*

 

* Many thanks to all of you again for sharing your thoughts, I have been

enriched and enlightened by this cross pollination of ideas.*

 

* Best wishes and kind regards,*

 

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