Lecture 7 Animal rights

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Lecture 7Animal rights
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Racism, sexism

• Racism is treating people differently merely
  because of their race. Since race is regarded as
  an irrelevant characteristic, racism is condemned
  as unfair and morally wrong.
• Sexism is treating people differently merely
  because of their sex. Since sex (being male or
  female) is regarded as an irrelevant
  characteristic in many contexts, sexism is
  condemned as unfair and morally wrong.
• These condemnations are based on the principle of
  equal consideration it is all right to treat two
  individuals differently only if they differ in
  relevant respects.
• If there is no relevant difference (as between
  blacks and whites, or between men and women) ,
  the individuals should be treated in the same way.

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and speciesism?

• Defenders of animal rights say that
  discrimination against animals is arbitrary in a
  similar way as racism and sexism, and hence
  morally unjustified. They call it speciesism.
• The principle of equal consideration requires
  that, as with race and sex, members of one
  species (homo sapiens) should not be favored over
  other kinds of animals, just because they belong
  to that particular species.
• Does this mean that advocates of animal rights
  think that, for example, dogs should have a right
  to vote?
• Of course not. Dogs (and other animals) are here
  relevantly different from humans since they lack
  necessary concepts for taking part in elections,
  their exclusion is entirely justified.

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Two kinds of speciesism

• A distinction is usually made between bare
  speciesim and indirect speciesism.
• Bare speciesism is the belief that we have a
  moral right to treat other animals differently
  merely because they do not belong to our species
  Homo sapiens.
• Indirect speciesism is the belief that we have a
  moral right to treat other animals differently
  because of some specific characteristics of our
  species, which other animals do not possess (e.g.
  rationality, language, moral sense, etc.).
• If there are indeed morally relevant differences
  between us and other animals, speciesism would be
  acceptable.
• Are there such differences?

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Kant was a speciesist

• But so far as animals are concerned, we have no
  direct duties. Animals are not self-conscious and
  are there merely as a means to an end. That end
  is man. If a man shoots his dog because the
  animal is no longer capable of service, he does
  not fail in his duty to the dog, for the dog
  cannot judge, but his act is inhuman and damages
  in himself that humanity which it is his duty to
  show towards mankind. If he is not to stifle his
  human feelings, he must practice kindness toward
  animals, for he who is cruel to animals becomes
  hard also in his dealing with men. (Lectures on
  Ethics)
• An obvious question If, indeed, we have no
  duties towards animals, why then does Kant think
  that bad treatment of animals would lead to bad
  treatment of people?

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Bentham on animals

• The day may come, when the rest of the animal
  creation may acquire those rights which never
  could have been withholden from them but by the
  hand of tyranny. The French have already
  discovered that the blackness of the skin is no
  reason why a human being should be abandoned
  without redress to the caprice of a tormentor. It
  may come one day to be recognized, that the
  number of the legs, the villosity of the skin, or
  the termination of the os sacrum, are reasons
  equally insufficient for abandoning a sensitive
  being to the same fate. What else is it that
  should trace the insuperable line? Is it the
  faculty of reason, or, perhaps, the faculty of
  discourse? The question is not, Can they reason?
  nor, Can they talk? but, Can they suffer? (An
  Introduction to the Principles of Morals and
  Legislation, 1789)

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Equal consideration

• Bentham also said Everyone is to count for one,
  and no one for more than one.
• Does this rule apply to situations where we have
  to decide whether to sacrifice animals or
  peoples interests? For example, what to do if we
  have to choose whether to save one human life or
  lives of 5 monkeys? Is human life worth more? If
  we say yes, are we guilty of speciesism?
• How about choosing between saving a human or a
  monkey?
• Many animal rights advocates admit that death is
  worse for humans than for animals (because of
  self-consciousness, sense of future) and that
  consequently saving humans rather than animals is
  justified.
• But in case of pain and suffering there may be no
  difference.

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Dog pain and human pain

• Descartes thought than animals have no mental
  states, but very few people believe this today.
• Equal consideration demands that we regard same
  amounts of pain as equally evil, independently of
  the species to which the suffering organism
  belongs.
• If a dog attacks a child and we can protect the
  child only by inflicting a greater pain on the
  dog than the pain the child would suffer if
  bitten by the dog, are we allowed to protect the
  child?
• Wouldnt that be speciesism (irrationally and
  unjustifiably protecting our own kind)? Or would
  it?
• What should carry more weight here (a) the
  philosophical argument about equal consideration,
  or (b) an intuitive gut reaction that protecting
  the child is the only right action?

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Two letters

• Sir,you appeal for money to save the gorillas.
  Very laudable, no doubt. But it doesn't seem to
  have occurred to you that there are thousands of
  human children suffering on the very same
  continent of Africa. There'll be time enough to
  worry about gorillas when we've taken care of
  every last one of the kiddies. Let's get our
  priorities right, please!
• Sir,you appeal for money to save the gorillas.
  Very laudable, no doubt. But it doesn't seem to
  have occurred to you that there are thousands of
  aardvarks suffering on the very same continent of
  Africa. There'll be time enough to worry about
  gorillas when we've saved every last one of the
  aardvarks. Let's get our priorities right,
  please!

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Do humans have a special moral status?

• Dawkins says that, of course, much better reasons
  can be given in support of the first letter, but
  he criticizes our tendency to take for granted
  that humans are special (so much so that the
  question Why? often does not arise).
• The interesting issue is what happens if we are
  unable to find cogent reasons for giving priority
  to human interests.
• Should we then (1) treat humans and animals
  equally, because no ground for preferring humans
  is discovered, or (2) should we nevertheless
  continue treating humans as special, relying on
  the deep, strong and persistent moral intuition
  that behaving otherwise would be wrong.
• In other words, in this conflict should we trust
  more an abstract argument or a basic feeling
  about what is right?

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Reflective equilibrium

• General moral ideas are often tested by their
  implications in particular cases. If the conflict
  arises between what a general idea advises and
  our intuitive reaction about what is right, we
  have a choice.
• Either we can reject the general idea or abandon
  our intuitive reaction. Sometimes its hard to
  say what is right.
• Reflective equilibrium is the name for
  balancing the two considerations and for
  indicating that there is no clear and unambiguous
  answer which side to trust more.
• Another example of such a conflict is
  consequentialism and its implication that it can
  be OK to punish the innocent.
• In the context of animal rights the question is
  does the rule of equal consideration trump the
  intuition that a monkeys or dogs pain is not as
  important to avoid as a childs pain.

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Animal experimentation

• Medical experiments are often conducted on
  animals, with the purpose of understanding better
  the human physiology and developing cures for
  various diseases.
• Is such practice morally acceptable?
• Most people agree that unnecessarily cruel
  experiments should be avoided, as well as those
  with inadequate justification.
• But if the suffering is minimized and the goal is
  worthy, does this make the experimentation moral?
• The principle of equal consideration seems to
  forbid them even under these circumstances.
• Two issues are frequently run together here (a)
  do these experiments really promise to give us
  knowledge? and (b) what is their moral status,
  even if they yield knowledge?

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Generalizing from animals to humans

• Some philosophers claim that (1) if animal
  experimentation is useful, this shows that it is
  morally unacceptable, and that (2) if it is
  morally acceptable, this shows that it will not
  be useful.
• If the cognitive abilities of humans and animals
  are so drastically different as to morally
  justify experimentation, then those differences
  will both reflect and promote other biological
  differences which undercut inductions from
  animals to humans. On the other hand, if
  underlying biological mechanisms are sufficiently
  similar to justify scientific inferences from
  animals to humans, then the higher-order traits
  of the test subjects are sufficiently similar to
  human traits to make research morally
  problematic.
• H. LaFollette N. Shanks, The Origins of
  Speciesism, Philosophy (1996)

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Generalizing from animals to humans (2)

• This is a fallacious argument.
• True, in order to generalize from animals to
  humans, there has to be a similarity between the
  two kind of organisms.
• True, if animals and humans have a different
  moral status, there has to be a difference
  between the two kinds of organisms.
• But the argument that the similarity in the first
  sense necessarily undermines the difference in
  the second sense is not convincing.
• There is no a priori reason why organs of some
  animals should not be very similar to human
  organs, but with their moral status being
  nevertheless very different.
• The same applies to the reasoning in the opposite
  direction (from moral difference to functional
  difference).

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Dogs and people

• Researchers have developed a process to stop and
  restart a dog's heartbeat. This was the first
  step in heart surgery.
• Research on dogs led to development of the
  heart-lung machine, which allows surgeons to
  sustain life while performing heart surgery.
• Heart surgery techniques, such as coronary bypass
  surgery, artificial heart valve insertion, and
  pacemaker implantation were tested and studied in
  dogs before being used in humans.
• Through the use of dogs, researchers found that
  diabetics lack the hormone insulin.
• The 1990 Nobel Prize for medicine was awarded to
  researchers who studied the immunologic basis of
  organ rejection by working with dogs. These
  studies resulted in the ability to transplant
  kidneys, hearts, lungs, livers and pancreases in
  human patients.
• Through research on dogs, scientists have gained
  extensive information on repairing fractured
  bones and saving the limbs of humans. The
  artificial hip was first developed in dogs.

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Are people special?

• We think that it is more wrong to harm a mouse
  than a cockroach. Also, that it is more wrong to
  harm a monkey than a mouse.
• Are we right about this? If yes, isnt it
  possible that it is more wrong to harm a human
  being than a monkey?
• There is an argument that we should stop killing,
  say, antelopes. But we dont think that we should
  stop lions from killing antelopes. Why not, if
  killing antelopes is wrong?
• One answer is that it is in lions nature to kill
  antelopes.
• But why should we change our natural behavior
  (which harms other animals), but let other
  animals continue doing these horrible things that
  we can stop.
• If we are the only living beings that can change
  their natural behavior, does not this make us
  special?

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Cruelty no, but

• There is a consensus today that cruelty to
  animals and causing them unnecessary suffering
  are both wrong.
• But not all want to go so far as to say that we
  should never hurt animals or use them as a means
  toward our ends.
• Some say that the equality between animals and
  people is established as much by increased
  respect for animals as by decreased respect for
  people. Contrast the care expressed for animals
  with some of Peter Singers views about people
• Killing unborn babies is OK.
• Killing handicapped babies after birth is OK.
• Killing healthy but unwanted children is OK.
• Killing old and sick people is sometimes OK
  (occasionally even against their will).
• It is sometimes a waste of resources to care for
  old and sick.