interesting responses, thank you for taking the time to reply to my post. you've agitated my mind by bringing in new concerns. thank you. i love you.
>>3
i strongly believe that pain is inherent to all living matter on the cellular level. for vegetal and microbial life, it is certainly not processed in the same way as animals process it, and it may be imperceptible to us, but i believe that it is still there and equal in amount and intensity. i see it most clearly in the twisted forms that trees take, in the omnipresence of illness and parasites in nature (on this topic, allow me to go on short tangent. my mom told me not too long ago about a specific kind of mushroom that can be found in my local area. i can't remember its name, forgive my poor memory, but this mushroom is mostly unremarkable when it is healthy. it's not toxic, but it's not particularly good for eating either. when this mushroom becomes ill, its taste begins to transform and becomes much more pleasing to a human palate. i thought this was a very interesting phenomenon.), and in the incessant ravage that beings exert on other beings, the tearing apart of living things for the sake of other living things. only a malevolent force could be responsible for such a world. the destruction of a part of or of the totality of an organism cannot go unnoticed by said organism, regardless of presence or absence of a complex nervous system like that which can be found among animals. one of the main differences i've noticed in response to pain and death among animal and vegetal is that i've never seen a vegetal twitch, stiffen or contract abnormally from pain, whereas i've seen it happen with animals ranging from insects to men, though that difference could be explained by the absence of a muscular system in vegetal lifeforms. i've also never seen a vegetal exhibit symptoms of fear in the face of expected pain or death, since vegetals do not have the means to express that fear in ways that we can decipher. i'll admit that my beliefs are not based on empirical evidence but instead firsthand observations, so they may not be very sound from another's perspective, but i hold them with confidence nonetheless.
regarding synthetic foods, i am aware of them, but they are suboptimal for the reasons that you've mentioned, especially their cost for the consumer and their generation of waste, as well as their requirement for an unsustainably high level of technology and complex supply chains (unstable). hopefully someday mankind's so-called "greatest minds" figure out a wasteless (or not so wasteful) and affordable (for everyone) synthetic food that is nutritious enough to avoid leading to serious deficiencies. meat's expensive too, but it contains some pretty awesome nutrients, and there's always at least one cut of meat that's affordable enough at the grocery store. i'm not picky. on that topic, i think that eating meat is conceptually cool from the viewpoint that i am gulping down something that is made of the same thing as i. in a way, it's like i'm eating me. i fw that idea big time. though i'm not too happy with the fact that i don't have to put in any direct effort to get that meat. i think meat eaters need to take part in the sacrifice of the animal and make peace with themselves being the blade in order to be truly able to enjoy their meal. to me, the killing and disassembly of an animal by its consumer is an important ritual for meat-eating societies that has sadly faded out of practice as modern supply chains became what they are now. this ritual does not necessarily need symbolism to be attached to it because it has intrinsic meaning, but the symbolism that some tribes (i think especially of the inuit peoples and their animism in regards to this. they are not the only tribe to hold/have held such beliefs, but they are the one with which i am most familiar.) have attached to their eating habits is highly important and i am very sad to see it gone from most societies today. even without symbolism, it grounds one in their place in the world, it reminds one that they are down in the dirt with the rest of life and not some higher being. it teaches one about the pain of others, how similar it is to one's own, and commands respect, or fear, or pity, or all of those things, for all life.