I don't believe that animal suffering matters, not in and of itself. Unless you have an objective reason why it should, it is just a matter of personality and personal philosophy.

"Where capacity_for_pain might be 1 for humans and .01 for cows and .000001 for shrimp."

Okay, then cows get .o1 of the rights that humans enjoy. Please explain what that would entail. Or is there no correlation between sentience and rights? As long as it falls above o on a sentience scale a creature gets equal rights to humans?

Sounds like the exact opposite of a utilitarian system. It's too inclusive to be useful, and it is to convoluted to work as a guide to moral behavior.

http://encarta.msn.com/dictionary_/sentient.html

1. conscious: capable of feeling and perception

a sentient being

2. responding with feeling: capable of responding emotionally rather than intellectually

http://www.aolsvc.merriam-webster.aol.com/dictionary/sentient

1 : responsive to or conscious of sense impressions

2 : aware

3 : finely sensitive in perception or feeling

http://www.aolsvc.merriam-webster.aol.com/dictionary/aware

1 archaic : watchful, wary

2 : having or showing realization, perception, or knowledge

Let me put it this way, you are equating an extremely basic, rough, and extremely applicable definition of "sentience" with human "sentience".

I don't hold that you are using sentience in its correct context, just abusing its various meanings. Words have specific, contextual definitions.

Human sentience, which is our current context, is inapplicable in almost all animals without debate. Some come close to human sentience, but no case has shown "awareness" (the defining characteristic of sentience in human beings) definitively in any animal.

If you are going to afford animals the same rights as humans, based on sentience, they need to have the same sentience as humans. If they have less sentience, they have less rights. And, in this context, we are talking about human sentience.

Since no animal has human sentience, or awareness, they are afforded no rights and may be eaten at will.

It is entirely irrelevant that you've found a definition of the word "sentience" that you can apply to animals you wish to protect. It is a "sentience" that is far removed from the context.

Let me be more clear: we can keep quibbling from occurring by resting our definition of sentience on what humans have. If you accept that there are many definitions of sentience (which there are), in the context of this debate we are talking about human sentience and granting human rights to animals based on the level of human sentience they have.

They have none, for they are not human or on the level of humans. They may have what you could call "animal sentience", but that is inferior to human sentience and therefor human morals are inapplicable.

You'd have to develop a moral system based entirely on animal sentience, and decide whether that moral system is equal to humans. To do THAT, you need objective criteria.

Technically speaking, animal sentience needs to create its own morals (just as human sentience did). Because animals cannot do that, and humans can, animals have no morals and actions from or towards them cannot be judged on a moral scale. Humans, who generate moral-making sentience, can be judged according to morality and may be forced to play by moral rules.

However, moral rules only cover beings that have morals. Anything that does not fall under moral rules can have anything done to it. Like: Hammers, Squid, Planets, Atoms..etc.

The only time morals can play a role is if a human-sentient being is affecting another human-sentient being.

"Subjective sensations of good and bad are the foundation of any system of ethics."

And my subjective sensations are different than yours. Which is what I was saying.

Sentience is the conscious perception of one's own being and of the world around. It is the ability to conceptualize the world, to come up with abstract and subjective thoughts. That's been the traditional meaning, which you obviously were not aware of.

No animal known has the ability to conceptualize abstractions or understand itself, most animals cannot even recognize a mirrored reflection of themselves. Certain Monkeys and Apes come somewhat close, but, again, we don't generally eat them.

There is no semantic quibbling here, you simply are misusing a term. You are equating emotions, impulses, and feelings with the ability to engage in intellectual capacities of conception and understanding.

I have been trying to get you to define sentience, hoping you'd notice that you don't actually have a definition whatsoever. You just heard the word and decided to apply it emotionally, not logically.

Anyways, capacity for pain is not sentience. There are alot of animals you probably wouldn't eat that don't feel pain at all. There are generally no invertebrates that feel pain: lobsters, shrimp, mussels, crabs,..etc. It just so happens that the vast majority (over 90%) of all animals on earth are invertebrates. Even many types of vertebrates, such as fish, do not feel pain.

So, the best you've got there is a ban on cows and most other mammals. Otherwise, you are allowing people to eat the vast majority of animals on Earth.

That, of course, is if I even accepted the "pain threshold", so to speak. Which I do not. I see no reason why the experience of pain protects an animal from being eaten. You can try out some moral mumbo-jumbo, but those are random value judgments which aren't based on anything objective. If I don't value what you value, any moral argument is going to be useless.

It's hard to have a gradient when there are only two distinct options: eat or do not eat.

If we determine an animal to be "half-sentient" we cannot "half-eat" it and expect it to live. I doubt you advocate having a policy of eating an entire insect, a half of a frog, or a leg of a goat (and no more).

At any rate, you're going to have to back up your point of view by telling me which animals are okay to eat and which are not. Unless you have other criteria that makes all animals off limits, whether they have central nervous systems or not.

Secondly, sentience is not simple intelligence and simple emotions. It's abit more than that. Most animals have rudimentary intelligence, they can solve simple tasks and engage in simple behaviors, even without brains.

Also, humans have the tendency to lay emotions on animals that do not necessarily have them. Many studies have shown that we project our personalities onto other animals, especially our pets.

That said, some simple emotions may still be found in some animals. But, again, emotions do not make a sentient being.

Sentience is not defined as having a central nervous system. The vast majority of what we label as "animals" do not even have that.

The only animals that come close are the most developed mammals and some fish. Even then, there are not many mammals that we consume that could be considered to have any advanced thoughts.

Our major animal food sources: pig, chicken, cow, fish are not known to have any conception of who they are, what they are, or anything resembling the sentience that we have. They may be more intelligent than plants or insects, but sentience as it is generally understood is limited to humans strictly.

The best you could do is include some species of monkey or ape....which we don't generally eat.