We pretty much breed the meat we eat.
In the main.
Obviously we eat fish, too.
Sharks eat us, too.
Where is the line between morality and prey here.
Again, these super-intelligent aliens sound far more callous and actually stupider than we are.
Again, theyāre bred to be eaten.
Thatās certainly a topic, but itās a very different topic.
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Cow says - 'stop killing and eating us after befriending us to the point where we begin to trust you.
What we hear - āMooā
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Get back to me when you discover cow culture.
And so on.
Familial bonds.
Self-awareness.
Emotion.
Even communication with other cows.
Thatās the 64 thousand dollar question. Where is the line?
I understand how you can differentiate between a human that is advanced enough to put forward a case and a pig that just squeals if you try to grab it.
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Well, yes.
And an argument that a pig doesnāt want to die is much stronger.
Stronger than a cow.
And many, many measures stronger than an ant.
Do you think that by saying ālook aliens, you cant eat us because weāre highly evolved but we humans can eat cows/pigs/chickens because theyāre at a much lower level of developmentā is just us looking to factually vindicate a stance based on sentiment?
If we could get the point across that weāre intelligent enough to know that the world will continue to go on after we die Iād hope they wouldnāt eat us. Because weāre the only creatures that do understand the concept of life and death arenāt we? Maybe whales?
Interesting.
I feel like there would be plenty of examples of preparing for after the individualās death through instinct.
Spider mothers allowing themselves to be eaten by their young, for one example.
Again, Iām not in love with this metaphor.
Itās not backwards convertible.
You want us to be the aliens, but also the prey, and assume that we donāt adapt the way we treat animals due to intelligence, when we absolutely do.
Further, we donāt sayā¦well, you whales donāt give a ā ā ā ā about plankton, so ā ā ā ā You, I guess.
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Thatās a deep-seated instinctual act right? Itās not like āoh ā ā ā ā Iām gonna miss out on getting on the gear at Babylon next year if I kick the bucketā kind of thing.
You say tomatoā¦
But it doesnāt have to be self-sacrifice.
I donāt have any examples from the top of my head, but I feel like there are animals that prepare for events after their lifetime.
Instinct or a firm concept of the futureā¦
I meanā¦squirrels. Allegedly.
This is my new favourite thread!!
And after recently going on a Hannibal binge courtesy of Netflix, I can say that long pig has never looked so appetising
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Also, why donāt we tell the aliens to eat cows?
Weāve already done the heavy lifting there.
Itās not like the aliens have a thousands of years history of domesticating, breeding and eating humans.
This really is a very crap metaphor.
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Also, alsoā¦cows are not bison.
We donāt eat bison.
I meanā¦native Americans totally did, but they donāt anymore.
Because we have cows.
If you want me to bisons to start a Cow Lives Matter movement, then I can get onboard with that.
I think I have officially over-extended the alien metaphor.
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Do we really treat animals a great deal differently due to intelligence? We eat pigs, Asian and pacific nations eat dog. For the record, Iām talking specifically slaughtered to be eaten, ānot treatmentā per se.
I canāt see a problem with the metaphor. Why does it need to be backwards compatible when it canāt be? The same reasoning cannot be applied to the alien/human scenario because both are highly evolved.
No, youāre just crap at playing hypotheticals 
Iām not.
Iām being asked to accept that aliens are both smarter and stupider than humans.
Iām being asked to both accept and ignore every indicator of emotional intelligence.
Iām being asked to imagine a crueller echelon of being, and then make a plea to them.
Itās a seriously crap metaphor.
Thereās no sardine in Moby ā ā ā ā . In fact, itās hard to imagine that book being written about any other animal.