Hypothetically, you are a vegan with an iPhone.
Your choice to become a vegan was because you determined it to be morally correct.
Your moral evaluation is based primarily on two considerations
- That factory farming is harming the environment
- That treating animals inhumanely is, well, inhumane
You bought your iPhone because it is shiny and rad.
Of iPhones, the following things can be said pretty convincingly
- The factories these iPhones are heavily polluting and are harming the environment 1
- The workers in these factories are being treated, well, fairly inhumanely 2
QUESTION 1 As this hypothetical vegan, are you acting morally correctly?
QUESTION 2 Why, or why not?
I can't answer this question. Here is what I would consider in trying to answer it.
- Magnitude of effect
An iPhone is a once off purchase, whereas veganism is a continued three (at least) purchases a day. How much pain/suffering is caused by an iphone compared to a steak?
- Availability of alternatives
Where do nokia phones come from? Is it even possible to purchase an "ethical" appliance these days? I don't know, but I suspect they come from similar locations (though with a lot less public scrutiny than Apple gets).
- Requirement of purchase to allow you to create value
With food this is obvious - you need it or you die, therefore cannot create value. Do you need a phone? Can you create enough value with a phone to offset the social cost of it? With a lack of accessible information, and no way of comparing metrics, there is a large grey area here.
Just because there is a large grey area though, doesn't mean the extremities can't be identified. Food is an easy one because of its necessity, and the availability of ethical alternatives that are far less destructive*. Of course, if I was below the poverty line in a third world country, Veganism would likely be morally unreasonable.
- Vegans generally accept that no harm is unnattainable, and apply the princle of least harm.
Let's make a couple more assumptions, and then ask some more questions
QUESTION 3 Hypothetically, you answer that food supply problems is most important moral issue to you, and it is morally correct to be acting on at least some, but not all moral issues. Is the meat eating person who does not own an iPhone your moral peer?
I would rephrase "it is morally correct to be acting on at least some, but not all moral issues." to "you should be acting on the moral issues that are easily within your means." because I don't accept the first (and am no good at hypotheticals). This takes out "morally correct" which suggests that morality is black and white, but also admits that trying to compare certain moral issues is like apples and oranges. We just don't have a justifiable way of doing so.
QUESTION 4 If, hypothetically, you accept this person as your moral peer, what makes your proselytising acceptable?
Hypothetical proselytising? ;) To quote Martin Luther King, "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." I can't forsake people for being vocal about important issues. Veganism and iphones aren't either/or propositions, in the same way that human rights, racism, sexism, gay rights, and all other moral issues aren't mutually exclusive. In fact, the correlation is the otherway around - sympathy for one usually arouses sympathy for the others. As a hypothetical vegan I would be ecstatic if meat eaters were being vocally concerned about where their iphones came from.
QUESTION 5 If, hypothetically, you accept that proselytising is acceptable between individuals who both believe they are acting morally acceptably, can I give your phone number to an evangelical christian congregation?
In my experience, evangelical christianity does not normally support a morally defensible position (either by professional philosophers or more mainstream christians).
Fork this gist to answer, or hit my up on twitter @johnbarton