...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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...All Animals Are Equal PHI103 I chose to do my argument over “All Animals Are Equal” by P. Singer. After reading this argument I have concluded that it is trying to take serious discrimination issues with humans and comparing them to discrimination issues with nonhumans (animals). The information begins by talking about all the discrimination issues we have faced and 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...
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...between causing harm to a human being and an animal. In order to prevent the human from being wounded, you would have to cause a greater amount of pain in the animal. Most likely, you would choose to spare the human, thus injuring the animal. According to Peter Singer in his article “All Animals are Equal”, the welfare of animals must be considered equally with that of humans in part because of their ability to feel pain and joy as humans do (1972). His approach is utilitarian, as it judges actions based on the amount of suffering or joy brought about by an action. Therefore, in the aforementioned situation, one following Singer’s approach would choose to allow the human to be harmed because the total amount of suffering caused...
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...Our group agreed with that Singers’ argument that animals should be given equal consideration to humans, however not everyone agreed to the same extent. One of the views expressed was that while humans care for other animals, for humans as a society to advance, they must exploit other species along the lines of “hunt or be hunted” and “survival of the fittest.” In this way we are speciests. Other group members agreed more strongly with Singer, saying that growing up in a time where animal rights activists began their movement, it isn’t unusual for to believe that animals deserve better rights. If you agree with me, under Kolberg’s stages of moral development, many of us developed this in the first conventional level. Society was changing and becoming more conscious about animals rights and I followed thinking it was the right thing to do because so many people were involved saying it was the right thing to do. Singer verifies this thinking through his many examples like questioning what’s the difference between a mentally disabled person and a dog are concrete supportive arguments to the moral thinking that I have. In Singer’s essay, he uses the word sentience as reasoning to why animals are entitled to equal rights. By using sentience he is referring to all those who may feel suffering and enjoyment. Singer says that being able to experience pain and suffering means that one has an interest that must be taken into consideration...
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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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...environment healthy, all these element need to work together. There are no global laws protecting the environment and that is why everyone should practice good ethics when it comes to the environment. Environmental ethics is the part of environment philosophy which considers extending the traditional boundaries of ethics from only including hum and to non-humans. There are many ethical decisions that human beings make with respect to the environment. Humans are been considered of rational agents because they have clear preference, models uncertainty via expected values, and always to perform the action with the optimal expected outcome of itself. The action of the rational agent performs depends on the preference, the agents information of its environment, the actions, duties and obligation available and the estimated or actual benefits and the chances of success of the action. I will be arguing that rational agents have a moral obligation towards the environment. Using Peter Singer and John Rawls to argue for and Immanuel Kant to counter argue my arguments. Singer (2011) states rational agents should explore the values of preserving the wild nature; he believes that sentient beings who are capable of experiencing pain including non-humans affected by an action should be taken equally into consideration in assessing the action. Singer regards the animal liberation movement as comparable to the liberation movements of women and people of different colour skin (Singer, 2011). Unlike...
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...All Animals are Equal The argument I’ll be addressing today is to decide if “All Animals are Equal” by Pete Singer. Singer’s essay “All Animals are Equal,” develops an emotional debate for how we view or treat animals as humans (Singer, P. 1989). He also stirs up an argument regarding the equal treatment of animals and the equality with how we treat human beings as a whole. “Singer calls for the beginning of a “liberation movement” similar to those that were sprouting up during the period in which he wrote his essay and focused on such issues as gay, women’s and African-American rights.” There has been a lot of media coverage of an American dentist whole killed a lion in another country, while ignoring some senseless killings in our own country. Has the time come for us as human beings, beginning to respect the rights of animal’s verses our own kind? Will we continue to enjoy that nice steak dinner, hamburger, or thanksgiving turkey? Is it fair to say the sport we call hunting, is inhumane as abortion, the death penalty, or sending our defenders of this country to war for some people? Could his message be subliminal in this essay by referring those animal to human beings that endured struggle? Are we born into this world to be vegetarians due to our teeth structure and development of our body composition? We very well be but that decision should be left to the individual to decide. Pete’s utilitarian direction, due to the theory of an animal that suffers, should be...
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...Matthew Adams Business Ethics 12, Oct 2014 Final Essay The Place of Nonhumans in Environmental Issues Peter Singers essay titled “The Place of Nonhumans in Environmental Issues”, focuses on a general question. How the effects of our actions should figure in our deliberations on what we ought to do in regards to nonhuman beings, or generally speaking, animals and our environment. Speciesism is defined as “involving the assignment of different values, rights, or special consideration to individuals solely on the basis of their species membership”. Simply put, we humans consider ourselves while discounting the effects of our actions on the nonhumans. When a new roadway is to be built that may directly interfere with Elk habitat, or a dam that is to be built where salmon flood the river during spawning season, we do a cost benefit analysis. But, when we do the analysis, we rarely figure in the impact on the surrounding wildlife and only figure the benefits to human beings. A new roadway will help us travel to work faster, but interferes with the surrounding wildlife that lives in these areas. And a new dam will help power hundreds of new homes, while decimating the already low salmon numbers. We humans calculate our benefit, while discounting the effects of our actions on nonhumans and the environment. We can use the example of the past racist white slave owners of the South. These slave owners only were concerned with benefiting themselves and those of their white race, while...
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...MODR 1730, Debate 1: June 5th 2014 Topic: Discuss that apes and other higher primates ought to be afforded limited rights; to do otherwise is speciesism. Arguments For Apes Getting Limited Rights If apes can be defined and categorized as persons, then they are to be given equal consideration and limited basic rights such as the right not to suffer from cruel treatment (i.e. in medical experiments). To argue otherwise would be speciesism, which can be defined as a prejudice towards the interests of one's own species and against those of members of other species. Main points as to why apes can be defined as persons: 1. Some scientists have linked the 5 great apes into 1 biologically similar group (chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, bonobos, and humans). Humans are just another type of ape. Humans and chimpanzees are 99% identical genetically (in respects to blood type, brain structure) and they demonstrate identical behavior for the first three years. 2. According to Kant, humans are self-conscious and rational, whreas animals are not and that is why we have no direct duties to animals themselves, but rather only to humans. However scientists have found that all 5 apes (this includes humans) are self aware and morally aware, as displayed in behavior. For example, if you place a dot on a chimpanzee, they are able to recognize that and realize it does not belong. This shows that they are self aware. Moreover, by observing Kanzi, the bonobo, we can see human...
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...Responsibility to Animals Animals only exist through the eyes of the beholder. They are cute kitties, sweet puppies, and then we have animals like rats, chickens, cows, and pigs. Some animals we have emotional commitment with and those we do not. We are arguing for animals to have the rights as humans do. There are animals being used in labs, in poor conditions on farms for mast productions, and animals being mistreated. Should any animal have the right to life? Should they have the right to be pain free? Have right to food? Animals cannot not speak for themselves, so people are having to speak up for them. Animals do have rights that are the same as humans. Whether or not proving if animals should have the right could change how they are treated and the usage of animals. "What we conclude about animal rights will have consequences for the food we eat and the clothes we wear, and it will have direct bearing on the kinds of science we think morally justifiable"(Cohen, 1986). The argument here other than animal rights is that humans think they are in control of their own rights or wrong ideas as long as society or culture goes along with them. When asking the question, “what are our moral obligations to animals,” the argument is that we do not have any obligations toward animals, due to them being species, not taking part of political contract or of determining what right or wrong is. Humans have laws in place that we have created, therefore, non-humans are expose to the rules...
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...In his essay “All Animals are Equal,” Peter Singer argues that there is no moral justification behind 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...
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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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... Question Type: | # Of Questions: | # Correct: | Multiple Choice | 20 | 17 | | | Grade Details - All Questions | Question 1. | Question : | What is Peter Singer’s point about performing vivisection on mentally disabled human infants? | | | Student Answer: | x | That if we say that it would be wrong to perform experiments on such humans but not on non-humans then we are showing bias based upon species alone | | | | That a good speciesist would not perform experiments on any being | | | | That we should test upon mentally disabled human infants because the results would be more reliable than tests on animals | | | | That anyone who would consider testing on a human infant is a monster | | Instructor Explanation: | The answer can be found on p. 6 of Peter Singer’s “All Animals are Equal.” | | | | Points Received: | 1 of 1 | | Comments: | | | | Question 2. | Question : | Peter Singer’s “basic principles of equality” applied to animals means: | | | Student Answer: | | Animals should be given all the same rights as human beings. | | | x | Animals are not entitled to not all the same rights but to an equal consideration of interests. | | | | Animals should not be given the same moral consideration because they are do not have the same power to reason as humans. | | | | Animals do not have rights unless they can demonstrate the same abilities as humans. | | Instructor Explanation:...
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...difficult to establish, especially when it comes to whether or not humans and animals should be allowed different rights, or whether they are completely equal. This also includes whether or not all humans should be equal. Moreover another huge concern with ethics is when an unethical action might be considered the best choice; for example it is considered unethical to use animals to do research, but in some cases this might looked past. Depending upon the benefits of the research some might be slightly ok with using the animals. Often there is controversy over whether or not humans and animals should be held to an equal level, and even more whether or not animals can feel pain just as humans. Some just like Peter Singer who Francis Fukuyama discussed in his essay, seem to believe that animals should be held to a higher power and be considered more valuable than that of humans. Fukuyama quotes from Peter Singer in his article “Human Dignity”, “the need for animal rights, since animals can experience pain and suffering as well as humans, and the downgrading of the rights of infants and elderly people who lack certain key traits, like self-awareness, that would allow them to anticipate pain. The rights of certain animals in his view, deserve greater respect than those of certain human beings” (Fukuyama 190). Overall, Singer is saying that depending upon the mental ability of the human and depending upon the animal it may be in demand of much more reverence than the human. Of course, there...
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...they are the only animals able to articulate an argument. I believe this theory to be sound because as humans we are the only animals that can make decisions based on given information or circumstances.The main weakness in his theory is that not all humans are able to speak intelligibly such as infants or the infirm. Also, some animals such as primates are able to articulate needs from much younger ages if not from birth. Peter Singer believes that animals and humans are equal, that we should consider how our decisions will impact all sentient beings and make the choice that benefits the community the best. The biggest weakness to this theory is that humans have a higher ability to process thinking than other animals. Regan states that all animals have an “inherent worth” meaning that they are subjects-of-a-life meaning that they have the right to life as it comes and not be the means to an end. The strength with this theory is that he makes the point that we are not just use non-human animals just for the means to an end, but that if we are to use them we should look at the impact that it will make on the greater picture. His theory however fails to define where the line of inherent worth ends, or even what it means to have inherent worth. In regards to zoos I believe that both Kant and Regan have justifiable arguments in favor of zoos. Zoos can be a touchy subject due to it brings out the aspects of all the different theories and points of view all with justifiable...
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