Posted by alexandra_k on May 21, 2005, at 22:03:15
In reply to Re: Just for the record..., posted by so on May 20, 2005, at 21:27:03
> I would ask the adminstration if it is uncivil to write things that could make animals feel put down, but I'm starting to enjoy the exchange. Of course, animals can't read, but somebody might read your post to their dog or cat.
Thats ok. It isn't just that they can't read,
animals don't understand abstract concepts either.
> How do we know they don't know any better? Other species have reasonably well developed behavioral cultures.Sure.
You can find examples of altruistic behaviour in animals. If you look for similarities you can see lots of similarities in the behaviour of humans and animals. But there are also importaint differences too. I was thinking more along the lines of 'lets look at differences'.
> What I'm implying is that presumption of our own supieriority as moral agents is just that, an assumption. Our cultures of morality finds evolutionary roots in other species, which in turn seem to have codes of behavior.Whoa. 'Superiority' as moral agents??? I don't see it as a matter of 'superiority'. What moral agency buys you more often than not is a sense of duty and obligation. Ones actions can be evaluated positively and negatively. Because animals are unable to think about different options (they just act) they aren't able to weigh pros and cons to make moral decisions. They lack an understanding of moral concepts.
There do seem to be rudimentary forms of moral behaviour in animals. But there are also important differences. Most people grant that you have a moral obligation to keep a promise (though it is also true that in some cases one is better to break a promice in some cases because there are greater moral duties).
But animals can't even MAKE promises. So it is silly to say that they are obliged to keep promises when they can't even make them to start with.
> Maybe if we are moral agents, though, and animals aren't, under your system of cosmology, it's okay to eat them.Nope. If something is a moral agent then that means that we can evaluate their actions with respect to whether they *should* or *should not* have done that. Whether what they did was morally required, or morally unacceptable etc etc. That is the notion of moral agency.
What you seem to be thinking of now is 'who are the members of a moral community'? Where the moral community consists in the things whose interests / welfare is worthy of moral consideration. Basically, a moral agent needs to consider the interests of the moral community before deciding what they *should* do.
Moral agents are worthy of moral consideration.
Most people say animals are worthy of moral consideration.
Some people say the environment (eco-system) is worthy of moral consideration.Descartes, for example did not think that animals were part of the moral community. He didn't think that they felt pain. Sure they recoiled from it but he thought that that was because they were wired up to do that. He didn't think they felt pain. Because they didn't actually feel pain he thought it was morally acceptable to kick a dog or a cat. It wasn't harming it so there wasn't a problem.
But. If something is sentient (the subject of experience) then it is part of the moral community. Animals do have an interest in surviving and reproducing and avoiding pain etc. While they themselves aren't moral agents moral agents do have a duty to take their suffering into account when the moral agent decides what the moral agent is to do.
So.
Equal interests deserve to be taken into account equally.I would say that the animal has a greater interest in remaining alive than we have in 'having fun' (shooting them). Therefore - we shouldn't do it. When we had to eat them to stay alive it did come down to a 'them or us' situation. There both creatures have comperable interests. But now the situation is different.
People argue about whether we have a moral obligation to the environment or whether we only have a moral obligation to it in the sense that it will come back to bite our future generations on the *ss if we don't look after it. The environment isn't typically thought of as sentient, so it is unclear whether sentience is required in order for something to be worthy of moral consideration.
Some people think there is an intrinsic value in nature.
Other people think the value of nature is only because we should value our future generations, so it only has instrumental value ie value to us because we need it.
poster:alexandra_k
thread:498173
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/poli/20050509/msgs/500969.html