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THE WORLD QUESTION CENTER 2006 — Page 2 on 2007-10-30
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The Nietzsche Channel: The Gay Science: Index on 2007-10-30
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Nietzsche, Friedrich : Human All, too Human on 2007-10-30
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Technorati: Home on 2007-10-18
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Birth of Tragedy on 2007-10-16
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The Moral Status of Animals (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) on 2007-10-14
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To say that a being deserves moral consideration is to say that there
is a moral claim that this being has on those who can recognize such
claims.
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But species membership does not
explain why there is a moral claim made by those that belong to this
species and not other species.
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Of course, one might respond
that it is not membership in a biological category that matters
morally, it is our humanity that grounds the moral claims we
make. Humans are morally considerable because of the distinctively
human capacities we possess, capacities that only we humans have.
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As it turns out,
none of these activities is uncontroversially unique to human.
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One of the ways that non-human animals negotiate their
social environments is by being particularly attentive to the
emotional states of others around them.
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It
appears then that most of the capacities that are thought to
distinguish humans as morally considerable beings, have been observed,
often in less elaborate form, in the non-human world.
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Nonetheless, there is something important that is thought to
distinguish humans from non-humans that is not reducible to the
observation of behavior best explained by possessing a certain
capacity, namely our "personhood." The notion of personhood identifies
a category of morally considerable beings that is thought to be
coextensive with humanity. Historically, Kant is the most noted
defender of personhood as the quality that makes a being valuable and
thus morally considerable. In the Groundwork, Kant
writes:
...every rational being, exists as an end in himself and not merely as
a means to be arbitrarily used by this or that will...Beings whose
existence depends not on our will but on nature have, nevertheless, if
they are not rational beings, only a relative value as means and are
therefore called things. On the other hand, rational beings are called
persons inasmuch as their nature already marks them out as ends in
themselves. (Kant, 1785, 428)
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And in the Lectures on Anthropology:
The fact that the human being can have the representation "I" raises
him infinitely above all the other beings on earth. By this he is a
person....that is, a being altogether different in rank and dignity
from things, such as irrational animals, with which one may deal and
dispose at one's discretion." (Kant, LA, 7, 127)
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This endorseable description of ourselves, this
practical identity, is a necessary moral identity because without it
we cannot view our lives as worth living or our actions as worth
doing. Korsgaard suggests that humans face the problem of normativity
in a way that non-humans apparently do not:
A lower animal's attention is fixed on the world. Its perceptions
are its beliefs and its desires are its will. It is engaged in
conscious activities, but it is not conscious of them. That
is, they are not the objects of its attention. But we human animals
turn our attention on to our perceptions and desires themselves, on to
our own mental activities, and we are conscious ofthem. That
is why we can think about them…
And this sets us a problem that no other animal has. It is the
problem of the normative.... The reflective mind cannot settle for
perception and desire, not just as such. It needs a
reason.
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This failure to have reasons to act
provides a basis upon which moral consideration can be denied.
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In
the Lectures on Ethics he makes it clear that we have
indirect duties to animals, duties that are not toward them, but in
regard to them insofar as our treatment of them can affect our duties
to persons.
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 towards animals, for he
who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with
men. (Kant, LE, 240)
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. What is really important, utilitarians maintain, is the
promotion of happiness, or pleasure, or the satisfaction of interests,
and the avoidance of pain, or suffering, or frustration of interests.
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When you pity a suffering animal, it is because you are perceiving a
reason. An animal's cries express pain, and they mean that there is a
reason, a reason to change its conditions. And you can no more hear
the cries of an animal as mere noise than you can the words of a
person. Another animal can obligate you in exactly the same way
another person can. …So of course we have obligations to
animals. (Korsgaard, 1996, 153)
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According to the view that an animal's moral claim is equivalent to a
moral right, any action that fails to treat the animal as a being with
inherent worth would violate that animal's right and is thus morally
objectionable. According to the animal rights position, to treat an
animal as a means to some human end, as many humans do when they eat
animals or experiment on them, is to violate that animal's right.
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The utilitarian position on animals, most commonly associated with
Peter Singer and popularly, though erroneously, referred to as an
animal rights position, is actually quite distinct. Here the moral
significance of the claims of animals depends on what other morally
significant competing claims might be in play in any given situation.
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While the equal interests of all morally considerable beings are
considered equally, the practices in question may end up violating or
frustrating some interests but would not be considered morally wrong
if, when all equal interests are considered, more of these interests
are satisfied than frustrated.
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For utilitarians like Singer, what
matters are the strength and nature of interests, not whose interests
these are .
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So, if the only options available in order to save the
life of one morally considerable being is to cause harm, but not
death, to another morally considerable being, then according to a
utilitarian position, causing this harm may be morally
justifiable. Similarly, if there are two courses of action, one which
causes extreme amounts of suffering and ultimate death, and one which
causes much less suffering and painless death, then the latter would
be morally preferable to the former.
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Importantly, the utilitarian argument for the moral significance of
animal suffering in meat production is not an argument for
vegetarianism. If an animal lived a happy life and was painlessly
killed and then eaten by people who would otherwise suffer hunger or
malnutrition by not eating the animal, then painlessly killing and
eating the animal would be the morally justified thing to do. In many
parts of the world where economic, cultural, or climate conditions
make it virtually impossible for people to sustain themselves on plant
based diets, killing and eating animals that previously led relatively
unconstrained lives and are painlessly killed, would not be morally
objectionable. The utilitarian position can thus avoid certain charges
of cultural chauvinism and moralism, charges that the animal rights
position apparently cannot avoid.
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It might be objected that to suggest that it is morally acceptable to
hunt and eat animals for those people living in arctic regions, or for
nomadic cultures, or for poor rural peoples, for example, is to
potentially condone painlessly killing other morally considerable
beings, like humans, for food consumption in similar situations. If
violating the rights of an animal can be morally tolerated, especially
a right to life, then similar rights violations can be morally
tolerated. In failing to recognize the inviolability of the moral
claims of all morally considerable beings, utilitarianism cannot
accommodate one of our most basic prima facie principles, namely that
killing a morally considerable being is wrong.
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While it is probably true that the seal had an immediate
interest in avoiding suffering, it is less clear that the seal has a
future directed interest in continued existence. If the seal lacks
this future directed interest, then painlessly killing him does not
violate this interest.
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The
significance of an animal's morally considerable interests according
to a utilitarian is variable. Whether an action is morally justified
or permissible will depend on a number of factors.
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Given the long- standing view that non-humans are mere things, there
are still many who reject the arguments presented here for the moral
considerability of non-humans and the significance of their interests.
Nonetheless, most now realize that the task of arguing that humans
have a unique and exclusive moral status is rather difficult. However,
even amongst those who do view animals as within the sphere of moral
concern, there is disagreement about the nature and usefulness of the
arguments presented on behalf of the moral status of animals.
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THE ATHENAEUM LIBRARY OF PHILOSOPHY - A HUGE COMPENDIUM OF PHILOSOPHICAL SOURCE-MATERIAL FOR STUDY AND ENJOYMENT - Athenaeum Library of Philosophy on 2007-10-11
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Blackwell Synergy - Home on 2007-10-11
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The Pulitzer Prizes -- Search the Pulitzer Archives on 2007-10-11
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Immortality Institute ~ Advocacy & Research For Unlimited Lifespans on 2007-10-11
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