142: ”Veterinarians are merchants of doubt for animal ag” - Dr. Crystal Heath - Founder of Our Honor - Sentientism

Crystal is a veterinary practitioner, a journalist and an activist. She is the co-founder of Our Honor, a charity aiming to create an organized network of veterinary professionals who are able to challenge unethical institutionalised systems and amplify the voices of those who have been marginalised.

In Sentientist Conversations we talk about the two most important questions: “what’s real?” & “who matters?”

Sentientism is "evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings." The video of our conversation is here on YouTube.

We discuss:

00:00 Welcome

- "I'd love for these sorts of conversations to be had in #veterinary schools"

- "Should all vets maybe adopt a #Sentientism philosophy?"

03:21 Crystal's Intro

- "A veterinarian who kind of recently joined the animal rights movement"

- "This movement has kind of taken over my whole life"

- Full-time veterinary practice & founding Our Honor

- Empowering vets to "speak their conscience & confront systems of violence"

- Countering bullying & retaliation

- Compassionate Bay working on Californian legislation

- The California fur ban & global impact

- "It's quite astonishing - the resistance in the veterinary community to animal rights"

- The founding of veterinary practice in animal exploitation

- "They actively keep out anybody with an animal rights agenda from entering the profession"

06:36 What's Real?

- Growing up in an agnostic family on a farm

- Celebrating Christmas

- "What are you, Christian or Jewish?... like those were the only two options"

- Asking what happens when chicks die... "their soul goes to heaven"

- Young people's encounters with death "shocking & terrifying" "but I don't have that same sense of trauma from it... they're being released from this faulty body"

- "I have a very scientific mindset"

- Reading the Bible... being fascinated

- Arguing about organ donation

- Weddings: "the wife had to obey & submit... that didn't seem like something I could jump on board with"

- @ellendegeneres #ellendegeneres coming out & being attacked by religious homophobes

- Religion: maintaining hierarchy & power structures vs. people treating each other better

- "What if agnostics & atheists organised themselves - would they end up trying to oppress others?"

- "There are some big unanswered questions... why am I here... where does consciousness come from? Once you die, lights out... really?"

- "...consciousness is a supernatural thing? I don't know"

- Ontological & methodological / epistemological #naturalism

- "All models are wrong but some are useful"

- Sentience vs. consciousness

- Panpsychism & Luke Roelofs episode...

...and much more. Full show notes at Sentientism.info.

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