A fire killed 18,000 cows in Texas. It’s a horrifyingly normal disaster

A fire killed 18,000 cows in Texas. It’s a horrifyingly normal disaster(vox.com)

10 points by quaker5567 3 years ago | 4 comments

oatmeal1 3 years ago |

I'm guessing that if you have 18,000 cows in one building, that their housing isn't the most humane.

And as far as I can tell from videos online, cows aren't too dissimilar from dogs. Sad to see so little empathy for these animals.

rurban 3 years ago | |

So if you have 1.800,000 people in one district, their housing isn't the most humane? That's only their living room, the area is huge there.

South Fork Dairy https://maps.app.goo.gl/q7gUax7dNXRFfdhB8

RGamma 3 years ago | |

And now consider the trillions of lives and many thousands of species prevented/extinguished by clearing land to feed that machine (and other associated externalities).

Makes you think the "rogue AI ending" may not be so bad.

vba616 3 years ago | |

>Sad to see so little empathy for these animals.

I didn't know offhand how many cattle are slaughtered for meat every year.

The answer appears to be something around 150 million. (22 million in the US, divided by 15% global share)

So, that would be like eight thousand for every one of these that died by fire.

I don't have a particular point, except I'm thinking of the quote attributed to Josef Stalin:

"If only one man dies of hunger, that is a tragedy. If millions die, that’s only statistics."

For a cow, every year is like 30 Holodomors.