A friend in college had a pet chicken. I was surprised by how intelligent this seemingly stupid bird could be. It would follow commands, recognize me, and even play with me.

That's for a chicken. You only have to spend 5 minutes with a dog or a cow to see how smart they can be.

Dogs are amazing. I have two Border Collie x somethings. I believe they are siblings, same date of birth, same size, same colourings and markings. They have vastly different personalities. They're both very affectionate, one of them ridiculously so: he sleeps most nights curled up against my chest with the back of his head pressed firmly against my chin. If I move, he follows. The two dogs and I have worked together enough that they know all our little drills, and all the discipline-in-small-things we do that enables them to be relatively calm and well behaved for 16 month old dogs. They won't run through open doors or gates, and I walk them off lead and they won't touch the road nor cross the road uninvited, after first sitting and waiting for 10+ seconds.

There was once a Vietnamese couchsurfer who stayed a few nights. Another couchsurfer asked her: have you ever eaten dog. Her response: yes, we eat dog. Not "yeah I've tried it" just unemotionally "yes we eat it."

I've read that pigs outperform 3-year-old human children on cognition tests and are smarter than any domestic animal, and animal experts consider them more trainable than cats or dogs.

The absurdity of all this just astounds me. And yet I continue to eat meat, including pigs.

So it seems to me our problem, as a the Human Society, is that we just don't care. We don't care that we are reducing our own long term survivability, both personally with regard to our own health, and globally with regard to the resources we all share.

Because if we, as all-the-humans-on-the-planet did care, we certainly wouldn't be in this mess.

The problem, then, isn't money, nor politics, nor pollution, nor climate change, etc etc etc.

The problem is: we don't care.

You're right: we just don't care enough. We've desensitized ourselves to the killing of most animals. Eating dogs is gross because dogs are pets, but pigs and cows are just as adorable and yet we eat them.

The funny thing is that my wife is vegetarian and I know for a fact that vegetarian food can be just as nourishing and delicious as a meat-filled diet.

I don't even know what the solution. Perhaps if lab-grown meat becomes a viable option, I'd switch in a heartbeat.

> delicious as a meat-filled diet

Isn't that highly subjective? I love meat, but I really doubt any sort of vegetable combination can give me the same taste.

To be fair, poster didn't say "the same taste", they said "just as delicious". I think Indian food proves them correct.

There are definitely some Indian dishes where I would pick the vegetarian option over the meat one happily.