Animal Rights

1. Animal Rights Helena Pereira de Melo Helena.melo@fd.unl.pt May 2013

2. What do you see?

3. A laboratory rabbit • A pet rabbit • A meat rabbit • A wild rabbit

4. Or…an Easter - bunny

5. Why? XX Centuries Regeneration – remarkable fertility indispensable for a prey animal Their paws are removed as part of fertility charms

6. Animal roles in human society: Food Companion Entertainment (circus, sports) Medical experiments Clothing Symbolic

7. ANIMAL EXPLOITATION PAIN DISTRESS SUFFERING CONFINEMENT LONELINESS TRADE LOST OF HABITATS

8. ANIMAL LIBERATION Right to life Right to liberty Respect of animal dignity

9. Philosophy: Human beings are superior to nonhuman animals and occupy a privileged place in the moral order All species deserve equal moral consideration

10. Anthropocentrism Only human beings deserve moral consideration All human beings deserve equal moral consideration All nonhuman animals lack moral standing There is nothing we can do to them that will wrong them

11. Criterion of moral consideration: - rationality- linguistic ability- autonomy- capacity for reciprocity…

12. Ex.: St. Thomas Aquinas (1225 – 1274) Immanuel Kant (1724 – 1804) René Descartes (1596 – 1650)

13. St. Thomas Aquinas “Divine providence makes provision for the intellectual creature for its own sake, but for other creatures for the sake of the intellectual creature” (Differences between Rational and Other Creatures)

14. Immanuel Kant Only rational moral agents are “members of the kingdom of ends” and so animals have no moral standing Animals are not “ends in themselves” but “means to an end, and that end is man” We have no duties regarding them

15. Indirect duty to animals We should be kind to animals and abstain from cruelty to them because “he who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealing with men” while “tender feelings towards dumb animals develop human feelings towards mankind” (Duties in Regard to Animals)

16. Descartes All non-human animals are incapable of using language – they are mindless machines, mere automata devoid of thought and reason (Animals are Machines)

17. Carl Cohen In order to have rights a being has to be an autonomous moral agent with the capacity to fulfill reciprocal obligations. Animals do not have rights. (The Animal Rights Debate, 2001)

18. DO THEY HAVE RIGHTS?

19. Do animals really lack rationality? Do animals lack autonomy, the capacity for reciprocity?

20. Voltaire (1694 – 1778) “Answer me, machinist, has nature arranged all the means of feeling in this animal, so that it may not feel? Has it nerves in order to be impassible? Do not suppose this impertinent contradiction in nature” (“A Reply to Descartes”)

21. Charles Darwin (1809 – 1882) “there is no fundamental difference between man and the higher animals in their mental faculties” There is a continuum of mental capacities among animal species (“Comparison of the Mental Powers of Man and the Lower Animals”)

22. Eric Eckholm “The impressive linguistic accomplishments of various gorillas, chimpanzees, and parrots…” (Language Acquisition in Nonhuman Primates)

23. Science Daily, 2006 The chimpanzee and human genomes are more than 98% identical, but there are a few short DNA sequences that have changed significantly in humans since the 2 species diverged about 5 million years ago

24. The same moral and legal status?

25. Human – Animal Studies

26. PYTHAGORAS (570 – 490 BCE) the soul is immortal and after death it transmigrates into other animated bodies all animated beings are kindred, and belong to one great family men shall not eat animals

27. Plutarch (65-120 CE) The eating of flesh “makes us spiritually coarse and gross by reason of satiety and surfeit” Animals deserve moral consideration because they are sentient, intelligent creatures

28. “justice lies in restraint and harmlessness towards everything that does not harm” “since justice consists in not injuring any thing, it must be extended as far as to every animated nature” (On Abstinence from Killing Animals) Porphyry (232-304 CE)

29. Jeremy Bentham (1788 – 1832) “The relevant question is not, Can they reason? Nor Can they talk? But, Can they suffer”? (A Utilitarian View)

30. Arthur Schopenhauer (1788 – 1860) There is no morally relevant difference between humans and animals “Universal compassion for every living thing” is the only genuine moral motive (On the Basis of Morality)

31. J. Howard More (1862- 1916) SPECISM = RACISM

32. “The complete denial by human animals of ethical relations to the rest of the animal world is a phenomenon not differing either in character or cause from the denial of ethical relations by a tribe, people or race of human beings to the rest of the human world… The human being who extends his moral sentiments to all the members of his own species, but denies to all other species the justice he accords to his own, is making the same ethical mess of it as the savage” (Universal Kinship)

33. ANIMAL LIBERATION PETER SINGER TOM REGAN

34. PETER SINGER (1946) All animals are equal = all animals deserve to have their interests considered equally with the interests of other animals, regardless of their race, gender or species (“Animal Liberation”, 2002)

35. Which animals are “equal”?

36. Only sentient beings are worthy of moral consideration Sentience = the capacity to feel pain or experience pleasure

37. Utilitarianism requires that: • We give equal consideration to the interests of all beings • We act in ways that maximize the satisfaction of interests of all affected by our conduct

38. Interest in avoiding pain? Rabbits do not have tear ducts and cannot flush out substances that are put in their eyes

39. Whose interests should prevail?

40. “Giving animals equal consideration requires that we give their pleasures and pain equal weight with humans pleasures and pains when carrying out utilitarian considerations”

41. “Since eating plant-based foods can satisfy our interest in nutritious meals without requiring animals to suffer in factory farms, utilitarianism requires us to eat plants instead of animals”

42. TOM REGAN (1938) Non-human animals “who have an individual experimental welfare” may have moral rights (Animal Rights and Human Obligations, 1989)

43. NEGATIVE MORAL RIGHTS • Source: fundamental moral values • Rights to non-interference • Right not to be killed, not to be tortured, to bodily integrity

44. Rejects the utility-maximization principle because it sanctions sacrificing individuals for the greater good Do Aunt Bee or the turtle have intrinsic value?

45. The best action is the action that results in the best consequences for all affected

46. “Aunt Bea has inherent value, i.e., value in herself, which is independent of her usefulness to us. Even if killing Aunt Bea and using her wealth to build a children’s hospital would maximize utility, it would be wrong to kill her, because it would fail to respect her inherent right as an individual.”

47. Many animals are also experiencing subjects of a life, have inherent value and moral rights in the same sense and with the same strength that humans do. All who have inherent value have it equally, regardless of their sex, race, religion, species, intellectual capacity, sexual preference… (Defending Animal Rights, 2001)

48. Peter Singer and Tom Regan A new liberation movement is needed to combat speciesism – this arbitrary prejudice in favor of our kind and the forms of animal exploitation that flow from it.

49. Do animals have legal rights? Which animals deserve legal consideration? How much legal consideration do they deserve?

50. Universal Declaration of Animal Rights (1989- 1990) “All animals have equal rights to exist within the context of biological equilibrium. This equality of rights does not overshadow the diversity of species and of individuals.” (art. 1)