When Does the Killing End?
Articles Reflecting a Vegan Lifestyle From All-Creatures.org

Vegan lifestyle articles that discuss ways of living in peace with humans, animals, and the environment.

FROM Dr. Michael W. Fox
December 2019

Bioethics, empathy and science-based, links environmental health with our own health and well-being.... Biodiversity and climate stability are interdependent, loss of biodiversity affects the climate and climatic changes affect biodiversity.

PDF AVAILABLE HERE.

Yellow Sac Spider
The Yellow sac spider Cheiracanthium inclusum, before release. May 5th 2019

Most of us who have had a close relationship with another animal can openly reflect on Goethe’s observation that “Every creature is a word of God.” Atheists can contemplate the wonder and sanctity of life. If we all embrace democracy and understand what Dr. Albert Schweitzer concluded that “Until man extends his circle of compassion to all living things, man himself will not find peace,.” then we must embrace equalitarianism: Of giving others, human and non-human, animal, plant and microorganism, equal consideration before harming or killing.

I am glad that I was able to catch and release outdoors a Yellow sac spider who recently gave me a painful bite on one cheek. I was relieved that I was able to quell my instinctual reaction to kill, turn the other cheek and practice what I preach: The doctrine of ahimsa; not harming/non-violence. But we may all wonder what kind of God could create venomous creatures, pests, parasites, predators and pathogens.

Many species of microorganisms, plants and animals are opportunistic and invasive. But we should exercise the precautionary principle before “playing god” and seeking to eliminate such threats to our own and to domestic animal health, agriculture, aquaculture and forestry, to avoid harming beneficial species. Insecticides kill beneficial insectivores and pollinators. Like military weapons, ever more potent biological weapons such as pesticides and antibiotics are no solution and cause collateral damage....

PDF AVAILABLE HERE.


The author is a veterinarian with doctoral degrees in medicine and ethology/animal behavior from London University, England. For further details see M.W. Fox Bringing Life to Ethics: Global Bioethics for a Humane Society, Sate University of New York Press, 2001, and Healing Animals and the Vision of One Health, Create Space Books, Amazon.com 2011.


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