...animal-rights-library.com/texts-m/singer02.htm. In recent years a number of oppressed groups have campaigned vigorously for equality. The classic instance is the Black Liberation movement, which demands an end to the prejudice and discrimination that has made blacks second-class citizens. The immediate appeal of the black liberation movement and its initial, if limited, success made it a model for other oppressed groups to follow. We became familiar with liberation movements for Spanish-Americans, gay people, and a variety of other minorities. When a majority group— women—began their campaign, some thought we had come to the end of the road. Discrimination on the basis of sex, it has been said, is the last universally accepted form of discrimination, practiced without secrecy or pretense even in those liberal circles that have long prided themselves on their freedom from prejudice against racial minorities. One should always be wary of talking of "the last remaining form of discrimination." If we have learnt anything from the liberation movements, we should have learnt how difficult it is to be aware of latent prejudice in our attitudes to particular groups until this prejudice is forcefully pointed out. A liberation movement demands an expansion of our moral horizons and an extension or reinterpretation of the basic moral principle of equality. Practices that were previously regarded as natural and inevitable come to be seen as the result of an unjustifiable prejudice...
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...our refusal to extend some form of equality to animals. He states that because attitudes such as racism and sexism are fundamentally wrong, so too is the premise that one species is more deserving of ethical treatment based solely on the idea that one is more capable of thought or suffering than the other. The idea of treating animals as our equals is one that has been mocked in the past, but only because many have taken that idea to mean that animals are equal to humans in the most literal sense possible. As far as we can tell, most animals do not invent, think deeply, or create culture, and therefore are not equal solely in terms of rational behaviors. However, this is not the kind of equality Singer advocates for in his essay. First, he argues, we should not be equating moral equality with that particular kind of factual equality. If we were to base moral equality on factual equality, then we would be justified in discriminating against fellow humans based on ideas of inequality in regards to sex, race, or intelligence. The only way to fight this type of discrimination would be to prove that the feature or capacity we have chosen as a marker for factual equality is arbitrary, and can provide qualifiers from some other feature or capacity instead. The African-American and women’s liberation movements took this approach. They argued that skin color and sex were only arbitrary markers of factual equality, and that the markers of factual equality truly had more to do with intelligence...
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...Logic: Peter Singer An Evaluation of Singer Peter Singer questions our conception of equality as it relates to the human species and other animal species. He fundamentally argues that, “The principle of the equality of human beings is not a description of an alleged actual equality among humans: it is a prescription of how we should treat humans.” The statement, revealing Singer’s essential argument, also comprises two approaches we might take towards establishing equality among living things. Let’s trace Singer’s claims surrounding these two approaches and finally consider his fundamental, philosophical assumption. One approach to equality stems from philosophers, who determine a base-line set of attributes or functions that constitute human beings. Typical treatises attribute humans with rational, linguistic, or emotional capacities that differentiate them from “brutes.” However, Singer culls evidence from the medical field, not research but simple observations of medical disabilities, where a human with born defects actually functions at a lower level than certain animal species. For example, someone with severe cognitive paralysis may be less rational or “able” than a normal-functioning dolphin. Thus, Singer points out that if we wish to establish equality based upon attributes, we have a hard time excluding many species of non-humans. As a corollary, the standard of equality by a typical set of characteristics must be set lower and lower to encompass all humans when...
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...are facing as a country and how we have began to fight for equality. It states “We became familiar with liberation moverments for Spanish-Americans, gay people, and a variety of other minorities” (P. Singer, 1989). Liberation movements changed the way society viewed discrimination and how we equally treat “minorities.” A liberation movement demands an expansion of our moral horizons and an extension or reinterpretation of the basic moral principle of equality. And it’s sad to say, but if we wish to avoid being numbered amongst the oppressors, we must be prepared to re-think even our most fundamental attitudes. As P. Singer states, “I am urging that we extend to other species (animals) the basic principle of equality that most of us recognize should be extended to all members of our own species” (1989). Singer then focus’ on women’s rights and how fighting for women’s rights isn’t sound. He goes on to make the claim “if women’s rights are sound when applied to women, why should the argument not be applied to dogs, cats, and horses?” (P. Singer, 1989). One way which we might reply to this argument is by saying that the case for equality between men and women cannot validly be extended to nonhuman animals. It might be said men and women are similar beings and should have equal rights, while humans and nonhumans are different and should not have equal rights. “The basic principle of equality, I shall argue, is equality of consideration: and equal consideration for different beings...
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...Animal Equality: Effects of Giving Animals Rights PHI 103 Informal Logic June 2, 2014 Argument When it comes to animal equality it can be hard to imagine a dog, cat, or even a hamster of having equivalence. When I think of animals, I picture our pets, wild animals, and even those in which are consumed. The question of what is and what is not ethically appropriate in the treatment of animals has is debatable. Peter Singer’s provides a utilitarian arguments for why animals with a certain level of perceptive justify equal moral attention with humans. Introduction Singer calls for the establishment of a “liberation movement” comparable to those that remained emerging up throughout the dated in which he wrote his essay and attentive on such problems as gay, women’s and African-American rights. Noting how previously “legitimate” forms of judgment and prejudice, over time, correctly came to be observed as unfairly and immorally damaging towards definite classes of people, Singer argues that the time has come for a similar pledge to the rights of species that walk on four legs instead of two. The animal liberation movement, which was essentially begun by Singer’s book, Slate.com (2001) argues “It is ethically wrong to use animals in such a way that we cause them suffering, either by deprivation of essential components of a happy existence, or by causing them pain.” (Slate.com, 2001) The animal liberationists would like to disallow most medical experimentation using animal...
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...War is a state of armed and often prolonged conflict carried on between states, nations, or parties[1][2] typified by extreme aggression, societal disruption, and high mortality.[1] As a behavior pattern, warlike tendencies are found in many primate species,[3] including humans, and also found in many ant species.[4][5][6] The set of techniques used by a group to carry out war is known as warfare. An absence of war is ususally called peace. War generally involves two or more organized groups or parties (often, nations). Such a conflict is always an attempt at altering either the psychological or material hierarchy of domination or equality between such groups. In all cases, at least one participant (group) in the conflict perceives the need to either psychologically or materially dominate the other participant. In all wars, the group(s) experiencing the need to dominate other group(s) are unable and unwilling to accept or permit the possibility of a relationship of fundamental equality to exist between the groups who have opted for group violence (war). The aspect of domination that is a precipitating factor in all wars, i.e. one group wishing to dominate another, is also often a precipitating factor in individual one-on-one violence outside of the context of war, i.e. one individual wishing to dominate another.[7] In 2003, Nobel Laureate Richard E. Smalley identified war as the sixth (of ten) biggest problems facing the society of mankind for the next fifty years.[8]...
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...The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals Scrutinizing the ethical factors concerning the “eating of animals,” Michael Pollan asserts that “most domesticated animals cannot survive the wild” (Pollan 310) and “without us eating them, they simply wouldn’t exist at all.” (Pollan 310) Furthermore, he makes an attempt to refute Peter Singer’s cultural and philosophical affirmations about the “exploitation of non-humans,” (Pollan 309) especially when Singer endeavors to show the “speciest” mentality (as Pollan calls it) that our society has towards non-humans, thus raising the question on whether the “principle of equality” (Pollan 308) can be fairly utilized between humans and nonhumans. A vegetarian lifestyle is, by all means, no...
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...Nowadays, animals are in danger of dying out, at least one million animal species have already disappeared since 1980. Worse still, as the using of hunting, laboratories, and commercial getting common, the number of animal species decreases faster and faster, and this phenomenon will continue if no one come out and speak up for the animals. Today, animal right is a highly contentious issue. Do animals have rights? Philosophers have different standpoints. In “The Case for Animals Rights” which is written by Tom Regan, Regan states that animals should have fundamental rights as humans, and also be protected from the unnecessary harm. In addition, in Peter Singer’s article “All Animals Are Equal”, he has the same standpoint as Regan that animals should have the same principles that human received. In contrast, in the article “The Case of the Use of Animals in Biomedical Research” by Carl Cohen, he supports Regan in his moral theory, however, he argues that animals should not have rights, and he also points out that the using of animals in medical research is important. “The Case for Animal Rights”, “All Animals are Equal” and “The Case of the use of Animals in Biomedical Research” let us know that although hurting animals is not unlawful, it’s morally wrong; for the purpose of protecting animals, people must change their beliefs. In Regan’s article, he supports that animals are equal to humans, and should have the same rights as humans. Although animals and us born in different...
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...Pollution is harmful to the animals living within Puget Sound. 7) Reducing pollution is beneficial to animals. 8) Reducing pollution is beneficial to the animals within Puget Sound. 9) Polluting Puget Sound is beneficial to those who do the polluting. 10) Principle of Equality of Consideration of Interests. 11) Reducing pollution is more beneficial to animals than it is harmful to humans. 12) Pollution in the Puget Sound ought to be reduced. Singer, a utilitarian, states that sentient beings ought to be given moral consideration,...
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...Name: Email: Telephone Number: Class: Date: NUSSBAUM’S CAPABILITY THEORIES FOR TREATING NONHUMAN ANIMALS ETHICALLY APPLIED TO CARL SAFINA’S DISCUSSION ON VARIOUS NONHUMAN ANIMALS In this paper, I intend to explain Martha Nussbaum’s capabilities theory for treating nonhuman animals ethically, then apply this theory to Carl Safina’s discussion of various nonhuman animals in his book Beyond Words, How Animals Think and Feel. Martha Nussbaum is an American Philosopher, who focused on philosophy in the field of moral theories. She is a distinguished Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago. Her interests include the ancient Greek, ethics, political philosophy, Roman philosophy, feminism and animal rights. Her works include various books either as an author or an editor. Carl Safina is a philosopher who explored the inner feelings of the animals in his book Beyond Words. This paper will apply Nussbaum's philosophy to the Carl Safina's discussion that demonstrates that animals have feelings, and describes their cognitive nature. Thus, they are aware of the mistreatment, only that they are powerless to resist the abuses. He elaborates the communication abilities of the elephants, whales, and other animals. We, human beings consider ourselves superior to the others, but by various measures, we are the most “frequently irrational, distortional, delusional, worried.” Many people who oppose the harsh treatment of animals cite Martha Nussbaum’s capabilities theory. His...
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...1 JUSTICE, EQUALITY, AND RIGHTS by John Tasioulas For R. Crisp (ed), The Oxford Handbook of the History of Ethics 1. The Nature of Justice Philosophers have advocated many divergent views as to the content of the correct principles of justice. In contemporary philosophy, for example, the live options range from the austere libertarian thesis that the claims of justice are limited to a small class of rights that protect us from coercive interference by others to more radically egalitarian doctrines that mandate the large-scale redistribution of wealth and other goods. But there is a prior, conceptual question: is there an illuminating sense in which these disagreements are aptly described as concerned with justice? Alternatively put, is there a concept of justice of which these rival accounts can be interpreted as offering different conceptions? (Rawls 1971/1999: 5-6). If not, the dispiriting conclusion looms that these disputes are „verbal‟ rather than genuine, like a debate about the nature of „banks‟ in which one party has in mind financial institutions and the other party the sloping bits of land at the sides of rivers. One answer is that the concept of justice marks out the entire domain of moral evaluation, or at least the whole of inter-personal morality, excluding only moral concerns relating purely to oneself or to non-persons, such as animals. This expansive reading of justice – as (inter-personal) moral rightness or virtue – has a venerable pedigree. The Greek...
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...Intro According to The Vegetarian Resource Group’s 2008 telephone survey, approximately 5% of U.S citizens say that they never eat meat, fish, seafood, or poultry. [1] Also, Huffington Post has announced that Americans consumed 12.2 percent less meat in 2012 than in 2007. [2] These facts tell us that the number of people who do not eat meat increases and we can connect this to an animal rights issue. Back in 1984, Tom Regan, a philosophy professor at North Carolina State University, already published his writing “The Case for Animal Rights” to defend animal rights. However, I do not agree with his argument that we should completely stop using animals as resources. Tom Regan’s view Regan has three big goals: 1. The total abolition of the...
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...made a rebellion comprised of slaves in Haiti inconceivable because it was entrenched in western perceptions of humanity, stateness and racism that never include blacks. The ontological conception of humanity excluded black slaves from the discourse of humanity, “The captain of a slave boat bluntly emphasized this implicit opposition between white ‘Men’ and the rest of humankind.” The captain clearly distinguish the other by emphasizing who has humanity- the white men. Thus, black slaves were not even perceived to be in the same sphere of humanity, and were even perceived as a species separate from the white men. Trouillet also uses Enlightenment text to reflect the ontological perception of humanity, “In this version of the famous passage, modified in successive editions of the Historie, the most radical stance is the unmistakable reference to a single human species. The conception of ‘a single human species’ implied that black slaves were also humans thus also capable of similar, if not same, liberties and rights of white men. An ideal, inherently, counter-intuitive to their ontological consciousness of slavery and racism. It was evident that if black were considered to lack humanity then colonialism and slavery would result as forms of ontological order to manage black populations. Thus, the...
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...The problem with this is that in this situation wages were only enough to get the lower class back to work the next day. They didn’t have money for extra expenses. The workers are being alienated from their species being. Being alienated from yourself means that you will be alienated from others as well. “In estranging from man (1) nature, and (2) himself, his own active functions, his life-activity, estranged labor estranges the species from man” (Marx, 75). When all you can do is work and not do anything else that makes you human is when you are being alienated. Since they are already being exploited for their surplus labor then you would think that the business owners would be responsible for paying for the damages. This was not the case. The bourgeoisie created a ruling idea of the decision to not include warnings about weather. Natural disasters are equivalent to the crisis of overproduction because everything has to be rebuilt which leads to economic...
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...wives earned more than their spouses in almost a third of married households where the wife worked.” Of course, he doesn’t tell us where he has this information from, so we should still be critical, but since we, after looking at his career, can see that he has written for many big newspapers and magazines, we can assume that he has his facts straight. The way that he appeals to ethos is when he refers to multiple psychologists, divorce attorneys, who agree with his statement. It’s makes it legit and not just an unsupported claim. To support his claim, you can also say that the women he speaks of are “experts” in the field, since they have up close and personal experience. You may say it’s a stretch to call it a use of ethos, but in this case, I would...
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