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greenhouse gas 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide. Furthermore, management of
livestock and their excretions often cause sewage runoff. In a joint study between John Hopkins
University and University of North Carolina, the researchers found freshwater samples from near
pig factory farms have levels of fecal coliforms, E. coli, and Enterococcus [exceeding] state and
federal recreational water quality guidelines (Heaney, 682). Livestock also require enormous
amounts of land not only for the animals themselves but also for their fodder. As described by
Raymond Lindemans Ten-percent Law, a fundamental principle of Ecology, consumers of
biomass only acquire about ten percent of energy produced by photosynthetic autotrophs
(plants), which means livestock only acquire 10% of their fodders energy and humans
consequently acquire only 1% of it. Therefore, meat consumption wastes potential calories 9
times greater than it can provide, adding to a huge waste of natural resources through agricultural
processes (10% from direct consumption - 1% through meat consumption = additional 9% lost).
A more comprehensive summary of the environmental consequences can be found in this
diagram by nationally-famous dietitian Julieanna Hever:
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demonstrate the pigs ability to anticipate different events and to express this anticipation through
various emotions. The pigs also demonstrated individualism amongst themselves when they
apparently exhibited various personalities. In one 1995 experiment by Swedish Agricultural
University, 110 piglets were each turned on their backs and arrested for one minute while the
researchers counted the number of escape attempts. The piglets were then also tested for
aggression by sending an intruder into its residence, the results of which would confirm a
correlation between the two procedures results and categorize pigs within a passive coper /
active coper dichotomy (Forkman, 33 - 35). The results, however, yielded no such correlation,
and the researchers instead concluded their inability to generalize the piglets behavior and
identified three possible personality traits, or individual behavioral tendencies throughout the
test: aggressiveness, sociability, and exploration (Forkman, 40 - 41). Together, results of these
two tests indicate that pigs can not only comprehend and predict past and future events, but also
have individual thoughts and information indicative of self-consciousness and identity. Copious
research have since yielded similar results, and pigs sophisticated cognitive abilities are wellacknowledged by the scientific community.
Similarly to the pigs, researchers have witnessed sophisticated cognitive abilities from
other major livestock animals such as cows and chickens. In a 2008 study by the University of
Paris Laboratory of Experimental Comparative Ethology, cognitive scientists conditioned 8
PrimHolstein heifer cattle to distinguish between 2-D images of cattle between two species,
associating food reward with one specie. The cows were then tested to distinguish between the
two species by being shown images of these cows from different angles, providing different
various distinct images of same individuals (2). To the researchers surprise, every cow
succeeded in distinguishing between two species, showing cows have complex discriminative
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abilities indicative of personalized identities (2 - 3). On the other hand, domesticated chicks
demonstrated lateralization of social cognition in University of Padovas 2009 research. In this
study, the cerebral hemispheric dominance was measured during various social cognition
procedures, such as perceiving human gaze and learning not to taste bitter food from other
chicks reactions (transitive inference) (967 974). Although the researchers interests lay with
the chicks hemispheric dominance, the experimental procedure implies the chicks abilities to
demonstrate social cognition, which the subjects did during each trial (967 974). Social
interactions among chicks such as transitive inference indicate that chickens comprehend
consciousness and individuality, as they recognize the different access to information amongst
different individuals. Observations from these researches consolidate the animals cognitive
status well-within the scope of Singers proclamation and consequently demand prohibition of
unnecessary animal cruelty and slaughter.
However, current livestock management practices do not reflect these considerations. As
noted by the nationally successful American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals,
over 99% of farm animals in the U.S. are raised in factory farms, which frequently produce
unclean air, unnatural lighting, unnatural growth, non-therapeutic medicating, unnatural
reproduction, [no] veterinary care, surgical mutilations, and shortened lives for the farm animals
within. Combined with its environmental costs, the inefficiency and immorality of factory
farming presents the practice as a serious problem of contemporary society and warrants its
complete eradication or replacement.
One proposed solution to this problem is the adoption of vegetarianism or veganism.
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Work Cited
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