My first thought beyond "wow, what total bull" is that there is a serious philosophical battle that needs to be waged, or vacuities like "the dignity of wheat" will persist. Basically we need to get down to things broadly termed qualia - feelings, emotions, "subject experience" like color and so on. Daniel Dennett is a good place to start."Qualia" is a product of the computation power of the brain. So wheat does not have a nervous system, ergo has no computational power, ergo has no "qualia", subjective experience, the feeling of pain and so on. Once we establish all subject experience, all qualia, as a phenomenon of computation then cockamamie like the "dignity of all living things" will go away. Which, by the way, a "living thing" is roughly when you get down to it a molecule that can copy itself, so crystals are "living" too. Shall we now have a discussion on tax payer money about how much pain a crystal feels when we cut it?
Well, that simplification is not quite acceptable to me. The general definition of "living" involves more conditions. Wikipedia has a pretty good list of the 7 usual criteria. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life
I don't think crystals qualify. Still, in the end, I think I do agree with you; calling plants and\or crystals sentient life is pretty unfounded.
I don't think you would change their mind even if you convinced them that plants have no feelings. A certain segment of society is dissatisfied with modern civilization; they are disappointed with how well a capitalist, competitive, technology-heavy society has turned out. In their worldview, the noble savage is the ideal - communal tribes living "in harmony" with nature. The modern world is evil, dirty, selfish. So, they will support whatever sentiments they can to oppose it.
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[ 2.4 ms ] story [ 13.7 ms ] threadI don't think crystals qualify. Still, in the end, I think I do agree with you; calling plants and\or crystals sentient life is pretty unfounded.