South London Beers: Reboot - Last Thursday of the Month at The Prince Regent, Herne Hill, SE24

Sorry Oliver but your ethical position would seem to lead (no matter that it would be a slow progression as you say) to a veritable holocaust for all animal life currently farmed by humans.

How do you reconcile your stated desire for us to stop farming animals with the loss of said animals from our environment?

You've asked that before, Neil, and my position is still the same--I simply don't think any of this would conceivably occur so suddenly. It depends on supply and demand based on people's moral views. Again, I have no evangelical desire to (a) convince everybody, or (b) even if I were Prime Minister, to impose such a law as you imagine.

You're probably right that those people who have industrially-farmed livestock which they only see as a commodity, and whose continued existence they could only finance by continuing to exploit them, would initiate such a mass cull. Just look at what happened with foot-and-mouth disease--horrible. But beyond the extreme breeds (there are some horrific breeds that I choose to know as little as possible about, e.g. genetically manipulated), I really don't think that such animals as are now used as livestock will die out. There will need to be better-managed 'deep ecology' environments, proper wildernesses. Also, people who like animals for more than just economic commodity will still want them around. None of this would be very difficult to arrange.

The case of bees is particularly unlikely to lead to extinction--these are animals that are fundamental to nature, extremely well-adapted, and as I say, perfectly capable of existing independently in the wild.