Animal law

1. Animal Law

ANIMAL LAW
Animals and Ethics

2. Three philosophical approaches:

Question: Assuming that we have moral duties
towards animals, what is the nature of those
duties?
1. Indirect theories
2. Direct, but unequal theories
3. Moral equality theories.

3. Indirect Theories: main standpoints

• Animals cannot be subjects of moral
consideration
• Animals are not morally valuable by themselves
• Animals, however, are to be treated well,
because otherwise the humans would suffer
• It is an anthropocentric approach (based on
human interests)

4. Indirect Theories:

• Worldview/Religious Theories
• Cartesian Theory
• Kantian Theory
• Contractualist Theories.

5. Worldview/Religious Theories

• Aristotle (384-322 BCE): there is a natural hierarchy
of living beings, where the inferior serves the needs
of the superior
• Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274): if a being cannot
direct own actions (animals), others (humans) must
do it
• Food chain theory: if one eats another, it is natural
that the weaker one is an instrument for the
stronger one

6. Aristotle

"Plants exist for the sake of animals, and
brute beasts for the sake of man"
Aristotle, Politics

7. Thomas Aquinas

"It matters not how man behaves to
animals, because God has subjected all
things to man's power"
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica

8. Cartesian Theories

• René Descartes (1596-1650):
• Animals are mechanisms, which can act as if they
were conscious, while they are not
• This is because for Descartes there is an absolute
separation between mind and body (dualism), and
since animals don't have language, they cannot have a
mind (or a soul)
• So they are only bodies without mind, and when they
are destroyed they don't really suffer. Their screams
of pain and terror are just like the noise produced by a
machine that breaks

9. Kantian Theory

• Immanuel Kant (1724-1804):
• Only humans, driven by moral impulses, can stand
back of own desires, so only humans have will.
• Animals do not have will, neither bad or good, so
they do not have any intrinsic value.
• Animals are to be treated well only because
otherwise the human being is harmed.
• Our duties towards animals are merely indirect duties
towards humanity.

10. Kantian Theory (2)

"So far as animals are concerned, we have
no direct duties. Animals are not selfconscious, and are there merely as a
means to an end. That end is man"
Kant, Lectures on ethics

11. Contractualist Theories

• John Rawls (1921-2002):
• the best conception of a just society is one in
which the rules governing that society are rules
that would be chosen by individuals from behind a
veil of ignorance. The veil of ignorance is a
hypothetical situation in which individuals do not
know any particular details about themselves,
such as their sex, age, race, intelligence, abilities,
etc.

12. Contractualist Theories (2)

• Rawls has his imagined contractors be largely self-interested:
• Each person's goal is to select the rules that will benefit them the
most.
• Since they do not know who exactly they are, they will not choose
rules that benefit any one individual, or segment of society, over
another (since they may find themselves to be in the harmed
group).
• Instead, they will choose rules that protect, first and foremost,
rational, autonomous individuals.
• Can this theory be applied to our relations with animals?

13. Contractualist Theories (3)

• Peter Carruthers has observed that the application of Rawls’
contractualist theory to animals has an important limitation:
• The contractors are self-interested, but do not know who
they are: so they will accept rules that protect rational
individuals.
• However, the contractors know enough about themselves to
know that they are not animals.
• They will not adopt rules that give special protection to
animals, therefore, since this would not further their selfinterest.
• The result is that rational human beings will be directly
protected, while animals will not.

14. Direct but Unequal Theories

• Why animals have direct moral status
• Why animals are not equal to human beings:
• Only human beings have rights
• Only human beings are rational, autonomous and selfconscious
• Only human beings can act morally
• Only human beings are part of moral community

15. Why animals have direct moral status

1. If a being is sentient then it has moral status
2. (Most) animals are sentient
3. Therefore (most) animals have direct moral
status

16. Why animals are not equal to human beings

• Only human beings have rights
• Only human beings are rational, autonomous and
self-conscious
• Only human beings can act morally
• Only human beings are part of moral community

17. Moral Equality Theories

•Singer (Peter Singer, b. 1946)
influenced by Jeremy Bentham
•Regan (Tom Regan, b. 1938)
influenced by Kant

18. Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)

“The question is not, Can they reason? nor,
Can they talk? but, Can they suffer?”
Jeremy Bentham, Introduction to the Principles of Morals and
Legislation

19. Singer’s ladder

1.
If only human beings are given certain rights it means that
human beings possess some particular quality (-es) P
(Consciousness? Memory? Self-judgment? Creativity? Abstract
thinking?)
2. Some human beings lack P
3. Many animals have P
Therefore:
Not every human being should be a subject of moral consideration
(impossible) or
Animals deserve moral consideration.

20. Regan: Case for animal rights

• Tom Regan is influenced by Kant but doesn’t focus his
theory on rationality as the condition for respect
• The proof is that we respect human beings who are not
rational (like infants or the mentally impaired)
• Every living being has intrinsic value because it has a life
and the right to live it
• Every being who has an intrinsic value deserves respect
and cannot be used as an instrument for others
• Marginal cases

21. Argument from Marginal Cases

The Argument from Marginal Cases attempts to demonstrate
that:
• if animals do not have direct moral status, then neither do
such human beings as infants, the senile, the severely
cognitively disabled, and other such "marginal cases" of
humanity.
• Since we believe that these sorts of human beings do have
direct moral status, there must be something wrong with any
theory that claims they do not.