Octopodes don't actually have a very long lifespan, as adults die shortly after mating. Which is only to say that the decision to consume is more complicated for this creature than others, because if the goal is to minimize suffering, an ethically aquaculture-farmed octopus harvested after mating will not live much longer anyways.
And I've always found the argument that "more intelligent/sentient creatures deserve more protection and rights" to be basically a post hoc defense against cannibalism. We can't know what "suffering" feels like to less intelligent and "simpler" animals so why make our sentience a criterion for the morality of eating? Just from a safety concern we shouldn't be eating humans, but not because we "suffer uniquely more" than other species.
> And I've always found the argument that "more intelligent/sentient creatures deserve more protection and rights" to be basically a post hoc defense against cannibalism.
It's not some veiled aversion to cannibalism, it's because humans have empathy for other humans, and our empathy for non-humans scales with how human-like we perceive those animals to be. If someone sees intelligence as a defining trait of humanity, then they're likely to empathize with animals that display great intelligence. And if you empathize with the animal, you're more likely to be sensitive to its perceived suffering.
Raw intelligence isn't the only thing that drives our empathy toward animals though. I'd argue that it isn't even the main thing.
We care much more about an animal's biological/genetic similarity to ourselves, which is why people are comfortable eating octopuses but not lemurs, even though octopuses are much better problem solvers and lemurs are relatively dumb.
We also care more about sociability / the animal's ability to communicate with humans. This is why people are more comfortable eating pigs instead of dogs. Pigs might be smarter, but dogs are much better at communicating with us, eager to please, etc.
This is completely cultural and has little to do with "genetic similarity". People have been eating monkeys since forever. Monkeys that have the most human-looking gazes.
> We can't know what "suffering" feels like to less intelligent and "simpler" animals so why make our sentience a criterion for the morality of eating?
Using the power of the scientific method, we can form hypothesis. Take a bite out of a few hundred people, give them IQ tests. Give surveys. Use induction.
As our ability to communicate with more and more animals improves with technology, start giving them surveys after taking a bite out of them.
My hypothesis is that every animal along the questionnaire wave front will overwhelmingly self report that they prefer not to be eaten.
At some point, we'll all have to wring our hands about an arXiv preprint where somebody convincingly lets us know that the corn doesn't like being eaten either.
We'll find a few really depressed plants and animals that are ready to be eaten, and some people will propose we make the world a more depressing place so there's more consent in all this. That's a bad take, but the argument will last 1000 years. All the while everyone and everything will keep on eating and eating.
Have you ever sat and thought about all the eating that has gone into making this moment for you? Like, all the eating you've done, all the eating of the creatures and plants that you've eaten have done. All your ancestors. So on and so forth back to the simplest primordial chemical reactions. Life is the tip of the spear atop a long cone of death and teeth gnashing. It's quite horrific.
The universe would be a lot more chill if we could just leave the clouds of fluorine to meditate. They're quite serene when they do that.
And I've always found the argument that "more intelligent/sentient creatures deserve more protection and rights" to be basically a post hoc defense against cannibalism. We can't know what "suffering" feels like to less intelligent and "simpler" animals so why make our sentience a criterion for the morality of eating? Just from a safety concern we shouldn't be eating humans, but not because we "suffer uniquely more" than other species.