CONTRACTARIANISM AND INTERSPECIES WELFARE CONFLICTS

2008 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 227-257 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew I. Cohen
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Moral Standing ◽  
Nonhuman Animals

AbstractIn this essay I describe how contractarianism might approach interspecies welfare conflicts. I start by discussing a contractarian account of the moral status of nonhuman animals. I argue that contractors can agree to norms that would acknowledge the “moral standing” of some animals. I then discuss how the norms emerging from contractarian agreement might constrain any comparison of welfare between humans and animals. Contractarian agreement is likely to express some partiality to humans in a way that discounts the welfare of some or all animals. While the norms emerging from the contract might be silent or inconsistent in some tragic or catastrophic cases, in most ordinary conflicts of welfare, contractors will agree to norms that produce some determinate resolution. What the agreement says can evolve depending upon how the contractors or the circumstances change. I close with some remarks on contractarian indeterminacy.

Contractarianism and Moral Standing Inegalitarianism

Dialogue ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 55 (4) ◽  
pp. 639-658
Author(s):  
ANDREW I. COHEN
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Moral Standing ◽  
David Gauthier ◽  
Nonhuman Animals

Contractarianism is more inclusive than critics (and, indeed, David Gauthier) sometimes suggest. Contractarianism can justify equal moral standing for human persons (in some respects) and provide sufficient moral standing for many nonhuman animals to require what we commonly call ‘decent treatment.’ Moreover, contractarianism may allow that some entities have more moral standing than do others. This does not necessarily license the oppression that liberal egalitarians rightly fear. Instead, it shows that contractarianism may support a nuanced account of moral status.

The Animal Antinomy, Part 1

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine M. Korsgaard
Keyword(s):  
New Species ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
Domestic Animals ◽  
Moral Standing ◽  
Phase Out

Does a commitment to the moral standing of animals obligate us to try to end predation? “Creation ethicists,” who answer yes, believe that if we could, we ought to create new species of animals who would not need predation. The probable result would be that all animals are domestic. “Abolitionists,” who answer no, argue that the only way we can treat animals well is by leaving them alone. We should not interfere with predation, and should phase out domestic animals. The result would be that all animals are wild. This chapter raises some worries about the creationist position, although it grants that these worries are inconclusive. Since we would be substituting different kinds of animals for the ones that exist now, we need to understand the moral status of groups, including species, and to determine what is bad about extinction, before we can decide whether creating new species is a good solution to the problem of predation.

Literalism and Moral Status

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carrie Figdor
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Moral Standing ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Moral Boundaries ◽  
Psychological Capacities

Chapter 9 presents the idea that Literalism undermines current social and moral boundaries for moral status. Possession of psychological capacities, moral standing, and respectful treatment are a standard package deal. So either many more beings enjoy moral status than we now think, or the relative superiority of human moral status over other beings is diminished. It introduces the role of psychological ascriptions in drawing social and moral boundaries by examining dehumanization and anthropomorphism. It argues that in the short term Literalism does not motivate us to do more than make minor adjustments to current moral boundaries. We can distinguish the kinds of psychological capacities that matter for moral status from the kinds that best divide nature at its joints. In the long run, however, Literalism prompts us to reconsider the anthropocentric standards that govern current moral boundaries.

scholarly journals Disability, Narrative, and Moral Status

2016 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth B. Purcell
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Cognitive Impairments ◽  
Moral Standing ◽  
Moral Action ◽  
Social Ability ◽  
Present Essay

<p>The present essay aims to respond to recent arguments which maintain that persons with severe cognitive impairments should not enjoy the full moral status or equal dignity as other "cognitively-able" humans. In the debate concerning moral standing and worth, philosophers Singer and McMahan have argued that individuals with certain impairments should not be granted full moral status and therefore, by extension, should not be awarded the same inviolability as humans without cognitive impairments. In response, I argue that an overlooked social ability – the capacity to narrate – provides grounds for the full moral status of individuals with severe cognitive impairments, and thus provides a defense and support for individuals with such "disabilities" to play a robust role in moral action and contribution to human living. </p>

Toward a Theory of Moral Status Inclusive of Nonhuman Animals

2021 ◽  
pp. 159-178
Author(s):  
Ruth R. Faden ◽  
Tom L. Beauchamp ◽  
Debra J. H. Mathews ◽  
Alan Regenberg
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Climate Policy ◽  
Science Policy ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
Policy Responses ◽  
Nonhuman Animals

This chapter argues for a need for a theory of moral status that can help to provide solutions to practical problems in public policy that take account of the interests of diverse nonhuman animals. To illustrate this need, the chapter briefly describes two contemporary problems, one in science policy and one in food and climate policy. The first section provides a sketch of a way to think about a tiered or hierarchical theory of moral status that could be fit for such work. The second section considers in some depth the problem of human–nonhuman chimeras. This example is used to illustrate how a hierarchical theory of moral status should prove helpful in framing policy responses to this problem.

Gene Doping—in Animals? Ethical Issues at the Intersection of Animal Use, Gene Editing, and Sports Ethics

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 26-39 ◽  
Author(s):  
CAROLYN P. NEUHAUS ◽  
BRENDAN PARENT
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Gene Editing ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The State ◽  
Sports Ethics ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Animal Use ◽  
Moral Status Of Animals ◽  
Do So

Abstract:Gene editors such as CRISPR could be used to create stronger, faster, or more resilient nonhuman animals. This is of keen interest to people who breed, train, race, and profit off the millions of animals used in sport that contribute billions of dollars to legal and illegal economies across the globe. People have tried for millennia to perfect sport animals; CRISPR proposes to do in one generation what might have taken decades previously. Moreover, gene editing may facilitate enhancing animals’ capacities beyond their typical limits. This paper describes the state of animal use and engineering for sport, examines the moral status of animals, and analyzes current and future ethical issues at the intersection of animal use, gene editing, and sports. We argue that animal sport enthusiasts and animal welfarists alike should be concerned about the inevitable use of CRISPR in sport animals. Though in principle CRISPR could be used to improve sport animals’ well-being, we think it is unlikely in practice to do so.

All Animals are Equal, but Some More than Others?

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 342-357
Author(s):  
Huub Brouwer ◽  
Willem van der Deijl
Keyword(s):  
Review Essay ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
Moral Standing ◽  
Common View ◽  
Status Hierarchy ◽  
Compelling Argument

Does the moral badness of pain depend on who feels it? A common, but generally only implicitly stated view, is that it does not. This view, ‘unitarianism’, maintains that the same interests of different beings should count equally in our moral calculus. Shelly Kagan’s project in How to Count Animals, more or less (2019) is to reject this common view, and develop an alternative to it: a hierarchical view of moral status, on which the badness of pain does depend on who feels it. In this review essay, we critically examine Kagan’s argument for status hierarchy. In particular, we reject two of the central premises in his argument: that (1) moral standing is ultimately grounded in agency and (2) that unitarianism is overdemanding. We conclude that moral status may, despite Kagan’s compelling argument to the contrary, not be hierarchical.

Animal Minds and Neuroimaging

2014 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-181 ◽  
Author(s):  
TOM BULLER
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Minimally Conscious State ◽  
Conscious State ◽  
Animal Minds ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Minimally Conscious

Abstract:As Colin Allen has argued, discussions between science and ethics about the mentality and moral status of nonhuman animals often stall on account of the fact that the properties that ethics presents as evidence of animal mentality and moral status, namely consciousness and sentience, are not observable “scientifically respectable” properties. In order to further discussion between science and ethics, it seems, therefore, that we need to identify properties that would satisfy both domains.In this article I examine the mentality and moral status of nonhuman animals from the perspective of neuroethics. By adopting this perspective, we can see how advances in neuroimaging regarding (1) research into the neurobiology of pain, (2) “brain reading,” and (3) the minimally conscious state may enable us to identify properties that help bridge the gap between science and ethics, and hence help further the debate about the mentality and moral status of nonhuman animals.

Constructing the Biotech Nonhuman Animal: Instrumentalism and Ambivalence

2014 ◽  
Vol 22 (5) ◽  
pp. 439-458
Author(s):  
Sari Ung-Lanki
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
Scientific Journal ◽  
Science And Society ◽  
Nature Biotechnology ◽  
Animal Mind ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
Insight Into

This article was designed to give insight into the role of biotechnology in redefining the complex human-animal relations of our times. In particular, it is used to examine accounts of nonhuman animals and animal usage in the context of biotechnology, as covered in the leading scientific journalNature Biotechnology. Data consist of editorials, commentaries, and research news for four years (N= 104), and has been analyzed using discourse analysis. The journal constructs a consistent, yet one-sided, view on animals as they are represented through physico-material, technical and biomedical discourses, as well as discourses on human benefits and manageable risks. The biotechnological epistemology of the animal is positioned at the far end of the subjectification-instrumentalization continuum in our treatment of other animals. It also clashes with simultaneous discussions on animal mind, subjectivity, and moral status. These developments are likely to further intensify the discrepancies in human-animal relations in science and society.

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