I really value health that I wouldn't mind spending a lot of money on it especially when it comes to food. I'm a health buff but I am not trying to be a Vegan but reading Consider the Lobster by David Foster Wallace makes me curious in some way. Suppose that animal does feel the pain and suffers like human being? Boiling lobster to be specific, when you're about to cook them, do they somehow suffer, feel the pain, or have this emotions? because they struggle a lot in a pot when cooking it and make unnecessary noises. Based on this research, it is proven that animals have emotions.
The major thing about Mr. Wallace’s article is his concern about suffering of Lobster which he briefly explain the facts, he’s article feature the Maine Lobster Festival in Maine which the festival will cook 25,000 pound of lobsters, the World Largest Lobster Cooker as they call it, lobster will be cook in a gruesome way which he is concerned. Mr. Wallace characterized the lobster that boiling them is really hard for him to watch. Example is in his article he said that “Lobster looks like they are suffering as they hang their claws in the pot”. But this explains why the violent reaction of lobsters to boiling water is a reflex to noxious stimuli. And to add, Based on review by the Scottish animal welfare group Advocate for Animals released reported, a scientific evidence that strongly suggests that there is a potential for lobsters to experience pain and suffering. This is primarily because lobsters and other decapod crustaceans have opioid receptors and respond to opioids analgesics such as morphine in a similar way to vertebrates, indicating that lobsters' reaction to injury changes when painkillers are applied. The similariti...
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...this research I love animals more than ever that I don’t care if science nor people believed it or not that they have emotions.
Works Cited
Schaefer, Edell Marie. "Book Reviews: Science & Technology." Library Journal 120.9
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Ferrie, Suzie. "The Ethics Of What We Eat." Nutrition & Dietetics 64.1 (2007): 67. Academic
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(n.d.). Retrieved December 16, 2013, from http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/animal-odd-couples/excerpt-the-emotional-lives-of-animals/8005/
(n.d.). Retrieved December 13, 2013, from http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0304/feature4/
As “Consider the Lobster” investigates the ethics of how one cooks lobster, it employs pathos while explaining the actions and reciprocations of cooking a lobster. As Wallace addresses the steps in which one cooks
The lobsters are complex creatures, as David Foster Wallace explains in the essay, and the people that are going to the festival are making this complex creature so easy to kill. Wallace is able to validate this argument by using their complexity of life and the simplicity of their death to show the paradox that the festival has created explaining, “Taxonomically speaking, a lobster is a marine crustacean of the family Homaridae, characterized by five pairs of jointed legs, the first pair terminating in large pincerish claws used for subduing prey” (Wallace 55). Then later explaining, “Be apprised, though, that the Main Eating Tent’s suppers come in Styrofoam trays, and the soft drinks are iceless and flat” (Wallace 55). This paradox that Wallace brings to the attention to his audience show that these articulate and graceful creatures are being disgraced by the festival goers by being served on Styrofoam trays and served with unappealing beverages. It is no coincidence that two things that are really explained is the anatomy of the lobster and how complex the makeup of the lifeform is and the simplicity of the death of the lobster. By explaining these two things in depth, he is able to show how ridiculous and unfair he feels that killing and eating the lobster is. Wallace also humanizes the lobster to bring the situation into a perspective that
When settlers first came to America, lobster was considered a poor man’s food. The lobsters were so abundant at that time that many people felt that they were competing with them for space on the shore. The settlers felt that the lobster had no nutritional value. At that time both Native Americans and settlers used the lobster as fertilizer for their fields and as bait to catch other fish. Lobster was so disdained that it was given to prisoners, indentured servants, and children. This was such a common practice that in Massachusetts many servants and prisoners had it put into their contract that they could not be fed lobster more than two times a week.
Nestle, Marion. Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002.
In “Hooked on a Myth”, Victoria Braiyhwaite states that fish feel pain. Even though many think otherwise. I totally agree. In spite of the fact that fish might be seen as dumb , that does not imply that they can't feel pain. I've never been fishing but i can only imagine how much pain they go through and we don't realize because they show empty expressions. In any case, if no one shows their emotions you won't realize what they're going through.
...ience understands more, they will begin to realize what goes on behind the scenes of the lobster festival, which may make them change their minds about lobster forever and start saving the lives of lobster and and start saving the lives of lobster by reducing or stopping completely the amount of lobster they may eat.
Mulkeen, Declan and Carter, Simon. “When Should Animals Suffer?” Times Higher Education Supplement 1437 (5/26/2000): p34
Wallace uses Pathos as an persuasive device in his article as he describes the catching and cooking process of the lobster. Using his words, he gives the audience the idea that the lobster is not just an item for consumption, but also a live creature. “They come up alive in the traps, are placed in containers of seawater, and can, so long as the water’s aerated and the animals’ claws are pegged or banded to keep them from tearing one another up under the stresses of captivity, survive right up until they’re boiled (Wallace, 60). He mentions that the lobster is in fact boiled alive to maintain it’s freshness and describes the boiling process. “[The lobster] comes alarmingly to life when placed in boiling water. The lobster will sometimes try to cling to the container’s sides or even hook its claws over the kettle’s rim like a person trying to keep from going over the edge of a roof” (Wallace 62). He compares the lobster during the cooking process to a human in terror of falling to their death. This gives the audience something to relate to on an emotional level based on the simile he presents to us. Based on this evidence and the words the author chooses to present to the reader, it is suggested that
Consider the lobster is a philosophical commentary on the ethics of preparing and eating lobster using surprising juxtapositions of ideas that lead to fresh insight.
In response to your second question, I believe that animals still experience pain. Although lobsters do not produce endorphins to help them handle intense pain, it does not mean that their pain receptors are absent all together. For example, some point out how pain is subjective. They claim that lobsters do not experience the same pain we humans do, and they go on to say that the creatures might not even mind the pain. However, this begs the question: why do they try to climb out of the pot of boiling water? If they truly did not mind the pain, wouldn’t they just relax in the boiling water as they are burned alive? Therefore, I think pain is the correct term in this case. So much so that we even realize, deep down, that we are hurting them.
Eating is an instinctual habit; however, what we decide to put in our body is a choice that will affect our way of living. In “The American Paradox,” Michael Pollan, a professor of journalism at University of California, Berkeley, disapproves of the way Americans have been eating. The term “American paradox” describes the inverse correlation where we spend more of our time on nutrition, but it would only lead to our overall health deteriorating. According to Pollan, our way of eating that had been governed with culture, or our mother, was changed by the entities of food marketers and scientists, who set up nutritional guidelines that changed the way we think about food. Nutritional advice is inaccurate as it is never proven, and it is not beneficial
"Consider the Lobster" an issue of Gourmet magazine, this reviews the 2003 Maine Lobster Festival. The essay is concerned with the ethics of boiling a creature alive in order to enhance the consumer's pleasure. The author David Foster Wallace of "Consider the Lobster” was an award-winning American novelist. Wallace wrote "Consider the Lobster” but not for the intended audience of gourmet readers .The purpose of the article to informal reader of the good thing Maine Lobster Festival had to offer. However, he turn it into question moral aspects of boiling lobsters.
The experiments and other data show that animals are not just driven by instincts alone. There is more to them than that. It is hard to watch dogs play and believe that they derive no fun or pleasure from it at all. Animals have shown that they are sensitive to their social surroundings. They punish one another and alleviate other’s pain. Some monkeys in established communities attack those that find food and don’t share. These studies are important. A better understanding of how animals are feeling could create a whole new guideline of rules on the way animals should be treated. Humans should not be so arrogant to believe they are the only animals capable of emotion. How are we capable of seeing from their viewpoint and assume they feel no emotion.
Fast food can be just as addictive as drugs and alcohol. Fast food is mass-produced; and provides a convenient food source, but what about nutrients? Many more would agree that the health benefits of a vegetarian diet might substantially reduce health risks. When considering other food related health options, “The Slow Food Movement” encompasses several different aspects regarding the fast food industry and sustainability of food production that applies a cohort mentality. This group of food advocates agrees that, “the Slow Food Movement rejects the notion of compromising nourishment for economic and health related outcomes.” (McCarthy 206) The groups form cohorts of growers, farmers, consumers, and educators to discuss viable options for food production, for sale and for consumption on an international level. McWilliams suggests another way to influence ethical eating: “Unitarian Universalists developed a system of ethically sound practices for production and consumption,” (405) Ethical eating involves the greenhouse effect and leaves behind an ecological footprint. An insightful look at marketing, production, and economy are all related to the ethical standards of eating, which impacts human beings from a global