Sorry vegans; Brussels Sprouts like to live too.

[elleng]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=246x12430

[Ignis]

1. Bacteria and virii are also alive. You can't avoid killing them.

But in the great continuum of consciousness, I'll pick eating something without a CNS over something with one any day of the week.

[LeftyMom]

2. Plants lack the capacity to "like" anything or to feel pain.

They have chemical processes to initiate responses to injury, in response to a biological imperative to survive and reproduce.

Anyhow, if for some reason we came up with some dramatic new discovery that resulted in a serious biological rethink and reason to believe plants were in some way capable of feeling (and that would be one hell of a revolution in our understanding!) we'd still be reducing suffering by eating our plants directly instead of processing many more plants through inefficient animal life to produce the same number of calories.