Abraham Maslow famously illustrated this basic concept with his image of a pyramid representing our hierarchy of needs. This is speciesism, which, despite much criticism, is a perfectly coherent moral position to take. Most people would regard this as a totally immoral idea, and would want to reject the theory that leads to this conclusion. There is a serious difficulty with using self-awareness and the preference to stay alive as criteria for full moral status.
Defenders of speciesism argue that humans have a special rational nature that sets them apart from animals, but the problem is where that leaves infants and the profoundly intellectually disabled. Instead of defending the idea that all humans have rights but no animals do, we should recognise that many things we do to animals cause so much pain and yet are so inessential to us that we ought to refrain. We can be against speciesism and still favour beings with higher cognitive capacities, which most humans have – but that is drawing a line for a different reason.
- Most people would regard this as a totally immoral idea, and would want to reject the theory that leads to this conclusion.
- What is missing from Peter Singer’s New York Times op-ed, and from too much of our activism lately, is the willingness to boldly and lovingly assert that the lives of animals matter.
- In a candid camera type of situation, Dateline watched the reactions of people walking by.
- But Singer quickly became so defensive and enraged that he used the c word in order to humiliate me, as he misrepresented an embarrassing event from our past.
- So in trying to figure out how advocates can boost their chances of successfully expanding the circle, it makes sense to investigate what contributed to the success or failure of past movements.
- While one can reasonably argue that people should accept the consequences of their choices, everybody knows that a fast-food diet leads to heart disease and diabetes.
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- During our recent health crisis Peter Singer wrote that hospital beds should be denied to those who chose not to get a certain shot.
- The first route isn’t particularly promising as evidenced by the fact that if we found out that some small percentage of the “human” population were actually rational space aliens disguised as humans, we wouldn’t infer from this that they didn’t matter morally.
- Here at Vox, we’re unwavering in our commitment to covering the issues that matter most to you — threats to democracy, immigration, reproductive rights, the environment, and the rising polarization across this country.
- Let’s hang the “Animal Liberation Now” banner over the activists fighting for it.
- But will their professed concern about climate change really cause them to change their diets?
Are you vegan and how did you first become concerned about animal suffering? I don’t do it much, but I have no objection to eating oysters – I don’t think they can suffer – and oyster farming is quite an environmentally sustainable industry. Also, if I am out somewhere where it’s a real problem, I will go for something vegetarian.
Are Humans More Equal Than Other Animals? An Evolutionary Argument Against Exclusively Human Dignity
During our recent health crisis Peter Singer wrote that hospital beds should be denied to those who chose not to get a certain shot. While one can reasonably argue that people should accept the consequences of their choices, everybody knows that a fast-food diet leads to heart disease and diabetes. Yet Singer never suggested that those whose diets had led to those comorbidities should be denied hospital beds, even though such a policy might have encouraged millions to go vegan.
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It is not unreasonable to value one’s own species above others; almost everybody does it. What is unreasonable is to hold that value while holding yourself up as the foremost representative for those who you judge less worthy of life. Meanwhile, psychologists are conducting empirical research to understand what motivates people to expand the moral circle.
A critical perspective on the idea of the moral circle
What progress have we made in our treatment of animals since the original book? There have been some improvements in factory farming practices in some regions of the world, but in others we have hit new lows. China larabet casino now has enormous factory farms and lacks any national standards for raising animals for food.
Sentient organisms
Everyone reading this sentence likely (hopefully!) agrees that women deserve the same rights as men. But just a couple of centuries ago, that idea would’ve been dismissed as absurd. Organisms that don’t have subjective experiences don’t experience events as good or bad, and so, in moral terms, it doesn’t matter what happens to them.
My annual turkey rescue has been covered on ABC Now, Fox Business News, and on every local Los Angeles Network. Los Angeles ABC 7 covered it on Thanksgiving Day for 12 years in a row, from 2008 through 2019 (including the period of silence between myself and Singer). The exit and the letter are the retaliation elements of my claim. Whether the professional harms he inflicted while we were discussing the hurt caused by his sexual abuse of power, were, in fact, retaliatory, is a triable matter for a jury, not a matter for dismissal of the claim at this stage. I treasure a text from Gloria Steinem regarding my suit against Singer that ended with, “I send encouragement and gratitude for standing up to a patriarch.” Though Gloria’s first concern is women’s rights, I pray my stand will ultimately help animals.
In Thanking the Monkey, I acknowledge that reasonable people can disagree on whether it’s ever okay to experiment on animals to save human life. I suggest we focus instead on the vast majority of animal experiments, which bring us better oven cleaner, or drugs that work for an extra hour or two. Let’s tackle the issues on which every decent person would agree. In our tribal society, people may not appreciate the nuance involved in accepting that something might be a reasonable view, while not personally supporting that view.
And this means that these ‘marginal’ human beings deserve less moral consideration than other human beings, and even than some non-human animals. Some writers argue that “only organisms that have subjective experiences deserve moral consideration.” This article discusses which animals deserve moral consideration, and whether some species are more deserving than others. A colleague and I published our first paper on this last year. ChatGPT refuses to give recipes for cooking dogs on the grounds that it is unethical but readily provides recipes for cooking chickens.
What is missing from Peter Singer’s New York Times op-ed, and from too much of our activism lately, is the willingness to boldly and lovingly assert that the lives of animals matter. It is time to stop cloaking our cause in other causes we believe to be more popular. As Marianne explains it, once one person acts from an awakened heart, others will follow. Right now it seems many of us are trying to hide our hearts and hide our love for animals. And that pushes other activists to shout it in a tone that doesn’t sound like love at all.
