Beyond prejudice Book

A "second generation" philospher writing about animals and ethics. Pretty tight.

A summary:

1. HUMAN "SUPERIORITY" AND THE ARGUMENT FROM MARGINAL CASES
A. Candidates for Inclusion into the Moral Community
- full-fledged persons, persons lower on the autonomy scale, self-conscious beings who have little or no autonomy, merely conscious beings, living unconscious, natural objects
- Rollin's argument:
(1) in order to learn from experience, must recognize experience is happening to one,
(2) in order to recognize experience is happening to one, one must be self-conscious,
(3) nonhumans learn from experience, therefore
(4) Nonhumans are self-conscious
B. Frequently Held Views on Who Counts Morally: Homocentrism
- defended by theology [circular, many religions], and sentience…
- philosophical views matter to scientists (Descartes and logical positivists)
- chimps have over 98% of our genes, yet are not 98% shakespeares [our brains 340% bigger, though bodies similar size]
- Caruthers against sentience; animals have pains but don't "feel" pains; blindsight
- intelligence: rats in narrow area, lick food off tail or exchange licks with others, honeyguides (birds) too weak to open hives lead others there and feed on remains
- moral agency: most (unrelated) rhesus monkeys went hungry instead of shocking others (compare to Milgram), rats kept others from drinking salt water; virtious, not principled
C. (FHVoWCM): The Full-Personhood View
- incompatible with homocentrism (can be nonhuman persons [God, aliens, some animals], a lot of humans not persons [marginals]).
D. The AMC: Two Versions
- "marginal" means "nonparadigmatic"
- 1) catorical version (Dombrowski calls it "strong version"):
a) Equally same means equal significance,
b) some animals and humans same,
c) marginal humans are "maximally morally significant",
d) therefore those animals are maximally morally significant (have rights). [Pc justified by Gerwith]
- 2) biconditional ("weak") version: if marginals have rights than so do similar humans

2. RESPONSES TO THE ARGUMENT FROM MARGINAL CASES (amc)
A. Unsuccessful Attacks on the AMC
-underestimating marginals [opposite may be true: chimp Kanzi's favorite video is of his own mother; asked "Matata hide?" while checking old hiding spots, than hooted when shown video and requests often]
- Coady says Washoe fails to be an "even moderately boring dinner guest" [chimp Lucy drank expensive wine, refused cheap stuff, than drank others instead]
- endangerment argument: [societies with no concern for marginals tend to respect rights of normals more]; no,just self-preservation (triage) [affluent Japanese village had a lot of infanticide for convenience, well-off Greeks did similar]
- Frey accepts biconditional (weak) form and allows vivisection on some marginals

3. SPECIESISM AND FULL PERSONHOOD
-Most plausible form: membership in a species characterized by full personhood is enough for rights [what if chimp can go to college like Rachels said?]
-Singer: when rights run exactly parallel to species line, this is speciesism
-appeal to genetic kinship: [have as many obligations to adopted as biological kids, and maybe more to unrelated life mates as siblings; racism ok?]; relationships [Rawls' unaquired vs. acquired duties; can't take neighbor's car for friend; human family can't intentionally kill those outside the family any more than a traditional family can]
-emotion: [goes both ways: a man in small lifeboat wouldn't throw own dog overboard for 2 other men; bigotry]
-its rational. Brandt says irrational preferences are those that disappear when repeatedly exposed to vivid reflection on relevant info/logic; whatever survives is rational; [Brandt's rationality impossible to distinguish from extreme bigotry, hence sexism is ok for some]; ok, rational if some persons stop wanting/believing after reflection on info/logic [people have stopped being speciesists after reflection]
-conclusion: most plausible form of speciesism is unsupported

4. UTILITARIANISM AND THE PROTECTION OF INNOCENT LIFE
-killing innocents is sometimes ok and creatures are replaceable
-total-view (count all, contraception is prima facie as wrong as killing child; we already seem to believe the repugnant conclusion, too many people for food!)
- prior-existence-view (count those that already exist; the wretched child)
- both views suck, give up utilitarianism

5. JUSTIFICATION AND JUDGEMENT: Claiming and Respecting Basic Moral Rights
- Sapontzits says animal liberation furthers three common moral goals: a) improving character, b) reducing suffering/increasing happiness and , b) being fair; burden of anti-liberationists is on them. [assumes animals have significance {no, just that suffering, etc. has significance}]
- Sumner on Rawls: circularity, presupposes morality
- Regan needs initial agreement on intuitions, Gerwith attempts this initial justification.
A. Justifying the Rights View
- moral codes are action guides for agents, agents logically must accept and respect rights of others.
(1) "I do X for end or purpose E"
(2) "E is good"; agent has desires and values goals
(3) "My freedom and well-being are necessary goods"; valued in/extrinsically
(4) "I must have F and W-B"; needs F and W-B because wants E
(5) "I have rights to F and W-B"; agent accepts she has these claims against others; to deny 5 is to deny 6
(6) "All other persons ought at least to refrain from removing or interfering with my F and W-B"; to deny 6 is also to entail 6'
(6') "Other persons may (i.e., it is permissible) remove or interfere with my F and W-B";
this contradicts 2
(7) "I have rights to F and W-B because I am a prospective purposive agent"
(8) "If the having of some quality Q is a sufficient condition of some predicate P's belonging to some individual S, then P must also belong to all other subjects that have Q"; accepts principle of universalizability
(9) "All prospective purposive agents have rights to F and W-B"
(10) "Act in accord with the generic rights of your recipient as well as of yourself"; principle of generic consistency
- allows us past relativist impasse {?}
- critics: prudential, not moral [start with agents acceptance of own rights, universalized to agents acceptance of other's rights; this is moral claim]; missiles have goals but do not regard as good
-still, many are unmoved by logic; those that are fully committed to logic will accept rights for all {?}; psychologists: caring for others comes shortly after caring for selves; why not just appeal to emotion? Cuz bad stuff happens; Kant: reason without emotion is impotent, and emotion without reason is blind
B. Respecting Basic Moral Rights: Obligations and Conflicts
- as Rollin suggested, biological parameters must be respected if any individual is to receive respectful treatment
- domestic animals: unacquired duty of noninterference unless threatened, and acquired duty to those who are alive or whose conditions are because of our choices; special obligations like those to our child, even though other kids are no more significant; possible to have respectful and mutually beneficial relationship with egg/milk producers; ok to eat naturally dead animals
- wild animals: respectful nonintervention unless threat to us or we have acquired duties; Lucy the signing chimp released into the wild later to be found dead with hands and feet missing; we would violate more rights by meddling than by staying out; ½ of deer get away injured; we are after all, the original offenders (they were here first); hunters are not friends to animals, don't see them as distinct individuals, and kill a lot that don't overpopulate (birds)
>killing ok sometimes: euthanasia, self-defense, scarcity of resources ( we don't have to draw straws anymore than flip a coin if a deranged person wants to kill us, even though equally morally significant; morals are action guides, not "chance guides"; may have psychological and prudential reasons for killing a nonhuman, but this doesn't mean they have less moral status)
- lifeboat analogies and real dilemmas: Regan's version not too common (throw one out or all die, eat one or all starve), more common lifeboat is not enough for all
> Regan's harm of death premise is egalitarian but incorrect; two prisoners varying in sophistication of desires both lose equally by imprisonment, death is same; age can be a factor in harm of death, intelligence works both ways
> Lifeboat requires inhabitants innocently caught together; liberty principle doesn't allow you to take another's vital organ cuz you will be worse-off without, they have prior "property" right to the organ.