I've been vaguely thinking about including something like this pea protein in my regular diet, something that quite a few consequentialists seem to go for.

I'm a bit suspicious about the environmental cost (water, CO2 or any similar externalities) of something that that, though. I presume it's better than meat, There's not much from a quick scan of Google - a report that just assumes soy-isolates are eco-friendly here. Has anyone any better insight?

Based on Alan Darwst's research, I have recently decided to switch to whey protein.

http://www.utilitarian-essays.com/suffering-per-kg.html

My rationale is that since all vegan protein sources I could find were twice as expensive per gram of protein, and the difference could be spent in ways which override the harm caused by the milk (which is in all likelihood far less than meat or even eggs)

I am willing to be convinced otherwise though.

Perhaps more relevantly...

The main thing I will say about soy, or really any industrial agriculture product, is that you do not want to be voting with your dollar for patented biotechnology. Life must remain in the Commons. There are all sorts of open source and DIY biotechnology projects starting up, and it would be far better to contribute to those.

However, there are trade-offs, just like with the milk. You could make a case for buying Monsanto soy if you truly do intend to spend the difference in ways which contribute to the breaking of the state-sponsored monopolies on genetic code.

This stuff, like terminator seeds, is a textbook example of artificial scarcity. A perfectly good renewable resource such as plants are converted into commodities which must be continually purchased. This benefits the corporations in the short term, at great cost to society.

I'm pretty sure we will be paying for air soon if this crapola continues.

I don't see what you have against proprietary information. It can cost a small fortune to create a new kind of genetic modification, and people wouldn't do it if you couldn't make a somewhat larger fortune afterwards. There is the problem of people not getting it after it's discovered even if they can afford the marginal cost, but that could be fixed by making cost discrimination easier.

This is not artificial scarcity. If it wasn't for Monsanto, there wouldn't be that kind of genetically-modified soy.

If, Embraceunity and DanielLC, you can forgive me for somewhat putting words into your mouths, I'll attempt to reframe your debate.

You are both presenting principles that make sense. When work is placed in the commons, civilisation achieves great access to its property. When work is done privately, the creation of property is incentivised. Both the commons and proprtietary information increase happiness in certain contexts. But, as utilitarians, we must not just apply principles that make sense and that have worked before, but select behaviour that will work best in some array of contexts.
> Any suggestion that free and shared resources will never be created has been destroyed since the application of the internet. Look at Wikipedia, Flickr (especially its creative commons images), Audacity (a sound editor), Gimp (a photoshop-a-like), etc.
> Many objections to capitalist principles are unfounded. They often misunderstand economics. They are often based on trends i.e. "look at this financial crisis that you have created".

I suggest that you should both agree with the following:
1) we should do work in both of these different ways to the extent that this makes people happy.
2) a trap exists in which people become attached to their principles so emotionally that they favour this 'ideology' over evidence.
3) we should do our best to promote left-wing or right-wing or any other principles only to the extent that we can back up our claims with evidence.

I disclaim that I'm not afraid of conflict in general. Nor do I believe that in any argument both sides are substantially correct. Rather, I believe that we should avoid this conflict that resembles a left/right ideological clash. Once we achieve this broad philosophical agreement, we'll be able to create a more practical ethical discussion.

I suggest making a new thread, or possibly sub-forum, for left/right ideological clash (using evidence and reason, of course). Suggestions based on left/right ideological idea, such as EmbraceUnity's post, should be done as normal. After all, this stuff is still more grounded in fact than basic utilitarian principles. Any argument based on this left/rightness, such as my response, should be placed on the political thread.

Ryan, I accept your terms, though clearly if I am suffering from a cognitive bias I will be unable to detect it except through argumentation.

I will say that I tend to overstate the case for open source in the interest of shifting the public discourse, which seems to be almost completely devoid of discussion from both a public policy and practical ethics perspective. It is either seen as a hobby or a business model, but never as an ethical or political stance.

Sorry for sidetracking the discussion a bit.

I do think this relates to environmental concerns as well though, because genetically modified crops have a variety of environmental impacts. One of the environmental factors is actually the increased efficiency of genetically modified crops (patented or otherwise)

One thing that seems to fly over the heads of nearly everyone is the efficiency paradox. As something becomes more efficient, people tend to do more of it. Even if you can engineer crops which use less water, less pesticides, etc, if industrialized agriculture is still fundamentally unsustainable then the problem only becomes worse. As its efficiency increases it will tend displace other forms of production, and the problem of unsustainability will actually be exacerbated.

There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all.

We should be leery of more efficient industrialized agriculture. It is by this same logic that we should be leery of higher fuel efficiency standards for internal combustion engines. The same is true for healthcare, and anything else.

It isn't how efficient we are, but what we are accomplishing, and who it is benefiting. Open production processes, since they are not based on profit, can take externalities into account, and can pursue goals other than profit. Open source projects solve real human needs, just as civil society projects of all sorts voluntarily cooperate to accomplish goals which are determined by the volunteers themselves.

Now, this isn't always possible in every case, and there are sometimes immediate utilitarian concerns which can override the concerns over process, but this doesnt seem to be the case for agriculture.

With medicine, I can definitely see a need for capital intensive industry for producing MRI machines, and such, even though preliminary open source MRI projects have been attempted. Yet, there is still enormous amounts of potential for open source with regard to drug synthesis, genetic engineering, pacemakers, cochlear implants, you name it.

Based on this idea, I think buying organic produce has two benefits. Increased sustainability and no proprietary GMOs. It likely isn't worth paying huge premiums if the money saved by not buying it can be diverted to good causes, but it is certainly worth a modest premium.

On the other hand, you could go one step further, toward Open Source Ecology. Perhaps this is not currently viable for most people, but I have a feeling it will reach a tipping point in the not too distant future. They have shown the potential to drastically reduce costs by utilizing open source tractors, open source brick machines, self-produced biofuel, solar energy, and numerous other decentralized technologies. Perhaps this is the mode of production by which farming will occur in the years ahead.

DanielLC, I think a thread for left/right clash and basic economic principles is a fair idea for a thread.

EmbraceUnity, regarding your paradox of efficiency, I can offer a solution. I'll interpret the paradox as:
1) individuals will try to be as efficient as possible in order to achieve their goals, for example to manufacture consumer goods. Efficient work can have negative side-effects.
2) Since the market promotes efficient manufacture, these side-effects will be promoted
3) Then, efficiency, which is supposed to make best use of our resources is actually damaging resources, especially environmental ones.

Now, this practical paradox can be dissolved if we clarify what efficiency means to different people. A wholly egoistic businessperson wants to use everyone's resources to create a profitable enterprise (increase his resources). Utilitarianism wants everyone's resources to be increased. Making a little money by destroying the environment a lot, for example, is efficient by the egoists standards but unethical by utilitarian standards. Profitable enterprise and utilitarian goals (i.e. corporate social responsibility, business ethics) are fairly mutually supportive. However, they are not completely so. For example, fraud, price-fixing, other anti-competitive behaviours, theft (in principle) are highly egoistic and highly un-utilitarian at the same time.

As EmbraceUnity points out, open-source development has aims almost identical to the aim of wellbeing. However, it lacks the incentive of private enterprise. Although I have little experience in open-source, I have plenty of criticism for government organisations. They are even more lazy than they are gentle to the environment. I can accept that achieving one's personal goals ethically might be more expensive, but it surely should not be that expensive. I await evidence that open-source developers are less lazy than the government.

By the way, it's just emerged that organic produce is no healthier than modified produce. I don't see any reason why it would be as sustainable as GM produce either. Although I won't yet accuse you of committing the naturalistic fallacy, I do believe you should read this impressive piece by Sam Harris about the link between ethics and nature.

I'm putting together a political thread OP at the moment. Short version: we should all stop opining on politics altogether, and address more important questions that have more tangible answers.

I'm not that sold on Sam Harris, tbh. He sometimes sounds more reasonable than he is by strawmanning his opponents, or by being very vague about the position he's attacking. I think that piece is a pretty good example.

Can you link to the research about organic vs GM food? I'm a bit suspicious, since a) long term effects are hard to demonstrate (but on questions like this I do think we should expect nature to treat us better than artificial alternatives), and b) the more persuasive opponents of GM have never been nearly as interested in the health risks as those of environmental contamination.

Arepo, the naturalistic fallacy - the suggestion that what is natural is automatically good - is far from a strawman.
For one example, take individuals who say we should eat meat because humans have evolved to do so.

For another example, people eat sea salt because of its gimmick of naturalness. In fact, in a country which has low levels of iodine, like Australia (although not in Japan or the US), iodised salt is much healthier.

For another example, consider those who say that homosexuality is wrong because it is unnatural. Although this is doubly incorrect since homosexual sex does occur in nature.