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Thread: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

  1. #1
    Libertarian Autocrat Vox Imperatoris's avatar
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    Default Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    As some of you may know, I have argued this position before as an aside in other threads, but I think it deserves its own topic. Increasingly, there have been calls for more "humane" farming and scientific research—calls to avoid causing animal suffering at all costs. On its own, this would not be a problem, since these people are still a minor fringe, at least in America. The real problem is the nature of the counter-arguments being made to defend practices like modern farming, scientific and cosmetic testing on animals, and hunting. More and more people are conceding the moral high ground to the animal rights advocates by saying that the animals live fulfilling lives before they are slaughtered, that the death is painless, that animal testing is absolutely necessary to the future of science, that hunting is necessary to prevent the larger-scale suffering of animals when they starve, etc. All, or at least most, of these counter-arguments are true; however, they concede the basic, fundamental point to the animal-rights advocates, that these animals have rights in the first place, and that causing them to suffer unnecessarily is somehow morally wrong.

    Now, my point of view is basically the same as John Locke's. There is simply no justification for ascribing rights to animals. They are the property of their owners, to do with as they will. Secularly, animals are non-sapient, and they do not participate meaningfully in society, nor have they ever, nor will they ever. With nothing to contribute to society, they are therefore excluded from the social contract; they are inherently inferior to humans. And no matter how mistreated, an animal cannot rebel against society in the same way a human slave (since animal rights advocates often compare animal ownership to slavery) can, and it will not do its work better if left to its own devices, like a human slave. It won't, in fact, do anything useful at all. It is true that animals may have developed sensory organs, but what is a sensory organ? What is the suffering that these organs allow them to feel? Nothing but an electrical impulse, a negative stimulus that tells it not to remain in the situation causing it pain. Why, besides irrelevant emotional arguments, should this be worthy of consideration? It is essentially the same thing as the error dialogue a computer might output, put on a larger scale. There simply is no rational, secular justification for animal rights.

    Now, we come to religion. Unfortunately, we cannot debate religion, in any meaningful way, over the internet. Nevertheless, I do not believe that animals have souls. This alone excludes them from being considered to have basic, natural rights.

    So, how should animals be treated? Here, we come to some better arguments: animal rights are to be respected, not for the sake of animals, but for the sake of humans, since it desensitizes them to violence. However, while I agree with this in my personal life and do not abuse animals, I do not believe that this argument justifies outlawing animal "cruelty". These campaigns, like the great moral outrage over dogfighting, are the same tired, unworkable attempts to control society by means of illegitimate government force, and they are essentially the same as arguments for banning pornography because it encourages rape and objectification of women, for banning violence in movies and video games because it desensitizes children, for banning gambling because it encourages people to make really stupid decisions, for banning alcohol because it destroys lives, and for the current War on Drugs, a "war" far more expensive and devastating to Americans than Iraq and Afghanistan combined.

    Therefore, I believe that farmer, researchers, hunters, and meat-eaters in general need to stop conceding the moral high ground to animal rights advocates because, if this continues to happen, it completely shifts the goalposts (in fact, this has already happened with capitalism, to a great degree. Politicians and the electorate are so enamored with "compassion" that they forget individual responsibility). They merely have to prove that a specific practice causes unnecessary suffering, and they win the argument. This creates a steady movement towards the ridiculous goals of animal rights advocates, something which I believe is harmful to both individual rights and a sane society.
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  2. #2
    Stegodon
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    I'm certain I'm in the minority on this, but I don't believe that human life has more value than any other living thing.

  3. #3
    Oliphaunt
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    What is the suffering that these organs allow them to feel? Nothing but an electrical impulse, a negative stimulus that tells it not to remain in the situation causing it pain.
    Which is exactly the same case as with humans.

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    Sophmoric Existentialist
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by yawndave
    I'm certain I'm in the minority on this, but I don't believe that human life has more value than any other living thing.
    A minority that includes yrs. truly.

    The only value we have is what we grant ourselves. There is nothing else in the universe that does that for us, as far as I know.
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  5. #5
    no do gets SeeOhTwo's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    The OP reads as tortured reasoning, custom designed to fit an ideology. It's both ridiculous and depressing.

  6. #6
    Content Generator AllWalker's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    My two cents...

    Are humans and animals different enough to warrant different rights?

    Well, yes. Sentience go a long way to granting us rights, as well as certain responsibilities. Ultimately humans do not answer to any coporeal higher power, we are the top, and so how we treat the world is our business. That is our right, but if we act irresponsibly towards the environment we could suffer the consequences.

    What this means to me is the following:
    A single human's suffering is morally relevant (take this to be true, as it is outside the scope of this debate)
    A population of humans' suffering is morally relevant (ditto)
    A single animal's suffering is not morally relevant (as the consequences are minor)
    An ecosystem's suffering is morally relevant (as the consequences are major)

    A lot of you will not like that breakdown, particularly the point about single animals vs single humans. Fair enough, I can definitely see where you are coming from. But that leads to a new point...

    Are animals capable of suffering?

    Some are, some aren't. For the purposes of this discussion I will be ignoring animals which we know can't suffer mentally, so I'm mostly talking about mammals and a few others.

    I've heard philosophers say it is impossible to deduce whether dogs feel "pain" - but really, if you mistreat a dog it will change it's behaviour. A robot that recoils in terror at the sight of a soldering iron and shrieks when it is applied as to be considered to be feeling "pain". Pain is, after all, nothing more than an unfavourable reaction to unpleasant stimuli.

    But, are their psyches really capable of experiencing suffering? I believe suffering requires the concept of individuality, more than just a programmed Pavlovian response to remove oneself from harms way. True suffering is more significant then that, a complex product of physical, psychological, neurological and neurochemical interactions, and I feel that most creatures below the higher mammals lack the required complexity. Particularly in the psychological department.

    Humans tend to ascribe complex personality and psychological factors to the behaviour of animals than is really justified - their mentalities are entirely Pavlovian. Human psyches are not, for the simple reason that we are capable of introspection. That is what sentience is, and therein lies our ability to suffer.

    Just to clarify...

    Animals should be treated as well as is practical. Deliberately and needlessly causing harm is a sign of psychological disturbances. But if it becomes necessary to cause them harm, or too impractical to avoid it, then harm shall be caused. Sentience gives humans both the right and the means to make this judgement.
    Something tells me we haven't seen the last of foreshadowing.

  7. #7
    aka ivan the not-quite-as-terrible ivan astikov's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Hopefully the rest of the world will catch up at some point. The meat industry will fight it tooth and nail, but it'll happen.
    Quote Originally posted by Wikipedia on Sentience
    In 1997 the concept of animal sentience was written into the basic law of the European Union. The legally-binding Protocol annexed to the Treaty of Amsterdam recognises that animals are ‘sentient beings’, and requires the EU and its Member States to ‘pay full regard to the welfare requirements of animals.’
    My shillings worth.

    Sharing animal status with wild beasts shouldn't entitle us to act like them. The fact we have someone package our meat portions in neat parcels and manageable portions, doesn't make us morally superior to the animal that rips it off the bone while it is still warm, and consumes it raw. (Not heard of many hunters participating in that practice.)

    If it is accepted belief that humans originated from lesser animals back in the mists of time, why would we want to eat our relatives, now we know better? Maybe someone can convince me that vegetarians are less fulfilled creatures, have their humanity diminished, or even live shorter lives, as a result of not eating meat?

    ps. "I like eating meat because it is tasty." is not an argument in favour of it being done.
    To sleep, perchance to experience amygdalocortical activation and prefrontal deactivation.

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    Oliphaunt
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    AllWalker said, in philosophical and practical terms, what I also believe. I'll just add this in MomSpeak: It just ain't nice, kiddo. They may not have rights (and I agree they don't, rights are legal constructs and animals are extra-legal; by their natures they cannot be part of the human legal process), but that doesn't mean it's nice to cause suffering when you could spend a little more time and effort (read: money) to avoid it. I agree with you, Vox, in that causing harm to animals damaging to us as humans, if not to the animal's souls or psyches. But I'd say it's more than just because it desensitizes us to violence, it's just because it isn't a nice thing to do. People are, generally speaking, happier when they're nice.

    Sometimes, all I need to know, I learned in kindergarten, indeed.
    Whatever became of the moment when one first knew about death? There must have been one. A moment. In childhood. When it first occurred to you that you don't go on forever. Must have been shattering. Stamped into one's memory. And yet, I can't remember it.

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    aka ivan the not-quite-as-terrible ivan astikov's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    To sleep, perchance to experience amygdalocortical activation and prefrontal deactivation.

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    Oliphaunt
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Which speaks to the ability of some people to thrive on a meat-free diet. Which is cool and all, but considering that we've got populations which can and cannot digest lactose, or wheat proteins or... I think we shouldn't be so quick to assume that because some people can do it, all people can do it. Humans have had ethnic/racial/environmental diets different from one another long enough to show genetic diversity in what we can and cannot eat to maintain optimal health. I've been veg, and my health declines very rapidly.

    'Sides, this isn't a vegetarian debate, but a debate about how to treat animals while they're living and during the slaughtering process. It's possible to minimize or even eliminate suffering* and still produce meat.



    *For reasonable values of "suffering", of course. I'm not addressing those who think that life is inherintly suffering and therefore immoral.
    Whatever became of the moment when one first knew about death? There must have been one. A moment. In childhood. When it first occurred to you that you don't go on forever. Must have been shattering. Stamped into one's memory. And yet, I can't remember it.

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    aka ivan the not-quite-as-terrible ivan astikov's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imp
    and they do not participate meaningfully in society, nor have they ever, nor will they ever.
    You're a smart young man, VI; do you want to have a rethink about this statement? I'll give you a clue... dogs.

    What Exit, perhaps we should be eating the lactose-intolerant members of our population, as they are obviously less worthy creatures than those of us who aren't?
    To sleep, perchance to experience amygdalocortical activation and prefrontal deactivation.

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    Oliphaunt
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by ivan astikov
    What Exit, perhaps we should be eating the lactose-intolerant members of our population, as they are obviously less worthy creatures than those of us who aren't?
    Psst...WhyNot? :wink:

    I've actually heard it suggested that lactose intolerance is the latest population wide genetic mutation of the sort that would make Darwin go giddy. That is, that lactose intolerant people are "more evolved" than the rest of us. So perhaps we should start marinating ourselves to be extra tasty when they start eating us!
    Whatever became of the moment when one first knew about death? There must have been one. A moment. In childhood. When it first occurred to you that you don't go on forever. Must have been shattering. Stamped into one's memory. And yet, I can't remember it.

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    Elephant CRSP's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Animals have whatever rights society deems to give them. Same with humans. There are no "natural rights", and if you disagree, please feel free to show that they exist (and any argument, to my mind, that attempts to show that they exist can be adequately subsumed by a utilitarian argument: we assign the "right" to life to fellow humans because things work out better for the rest of us, that way).

    So if a majority of people are convinced by animal rights activists to assign certain rights to animals, then they have those rights.
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by WhyNot
    Quote Originally posted by ivan astikov
    What Exit, perhaps we should be eating the lactose-intolerant members of our population, as they are obviously less worthy creatures than those of us who aren't?
    Psst...WhyNot? :wink:
    Yup, yer right indeed. You look so alike at a quick glance. :smile:
    Quote Originally posted by WhyNot
    I've actually heard it suggested that lactose intolerance is the latest population wide genetic mutation of the sort that would make Darwin go giddy. That is, that lactose intolerant people are "more evolved" than the rest of us. So perhaps we should start marinating ourselves to be extra tasty when they start eating us!
    That's a thought! I'll be watching those lactose-intolerant buggers from now on. Psst...do they have any significant features I need to look out for?
    Quote Originally posted by WhyNot
    'Sides, this isn't a vegetarian debate, but a debate about how to treat animals while they're living and during the slaughtering process. It's possible to minimize or even eliminate suffering* and still produce meat.
    Regarding this, it seems like this 'debate' is meant to be a justification of why it is okay to mistreat animals for our benefit, with their benefit being a minor consideration.
    To sleep, perchance to experience amygdalocortical activation and prefrontal deactivation.

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    Oliphaunt
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by ivan astikov
    That's a thought! I'll be watching those lactose-intolerant buggers from now on. Psst...do they have any significant features I need to look out for?
    Flatulence? Your nose knows!
    Whatever became of the moment when one first knew about death? There must have been one. A moment. In childhood. When it first occurred to you that you don't go on forever. Must have been shattering. Stamped into one's memory. And yet, I can't remember it.

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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by WhyNot
    Quote Originally posted by ivan astikov
    That's a thought! I'll be watching those lactose-intolerant buggers from now on. Psst...do they have any significant features I need to look out for?
    Flatulence? Your nose knows!
    Hey, I could be one myself then! Whoever would have thought I'd be able to blame my farts on being more highly evolved?
    To sleep, perchance to experience amygdalocortical activation and prefrontal deactivation.

  17. #17
    Oliphaunt
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by WhyNot
    I've actually heard it suggested that lactose intolerance is the latest population wide genetic mutation of the sort that would make Darwin go giddy.
    As far as I know, this is entirely wrong. Lactose tolerance is the mutation; the adult ability to digest lactose is new and far from universal.

  18. #18
    Oliphaunt
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    Now, my point of view is basically the same as John Locke's. There is simply no justification for ascribing rights to animals. They are the property of their owners, to do with as they will.
    Why are slaves different?

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    Secularly, animals are non-sapient, and they do not participate meaningfully in society, nor have they ever, nor will they ever.
    One paragraph in and already your argument collapses.
    Horses (riding, ploughing, racing) and dogs (guide dogs, sheep dogs, hospital dogs, drug dogs) for example.

    Why should we look after terminally ill children? According to you they contribute nothing to society and never will.
    My motto is "Never apologise, never explain."

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  19. #19
    Elephant
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    You know, I wouldn't usually pull this card, but the OP is sufficiently muddled that I think it's relevant.

    VI, perhaps you could come back and try explaining how individual responsibility conflicts with the obligation to mitigate suffering, once you've had some tiny taste of either of those things.

    Self-determination and compassion are not mutally exclusive, kid. I have a responsibility to take care of myself, AND I have a responsibility to not inflict unnecessary suffering on, well... anything. This is the foundation of a sane society.

    There is no such thing as "natural" rights, or "morally irrelevant suffering".

    Oh, and by the way:
    Now, we come to religion. Unfortunately, we cannot debate religion, in any meaningful way, over the internet. Nevertheless, I do not believe that animals have souls. This alone excludes them from being considered to have basic, natural rights.
    Are you saying that religious beliefs (yours, in particular, natch) should determine public policy?

  20. #20
    Stegodon Dragon's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    I have seen animals mourn the loss of a human / animal friend. I do not believe that is just a Pavlov response.

    Some animals mate for life and refuse to get another if one dies.

    Without artificial help, we are no where near the top of the food chain.

    Until humans treat all other humans better than we treat our pets, we are hypocrites in the matter of animal rights / suffering.

    We can only look at this subject from our position here and now. If we were living in a starving Africa nation and knowing only what we were taught there to be true and right, we would think about it a totally different way.

    Truth and right and wrong are relative to time and place, facts are the only thing to transcend time in the constricts of this discussion.

    YMMV
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  21. #21
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by SeeOhTwo
    The OP reads as tortured reasoning, custom designed to fit an ideology. It's both ridiculous and depressing.
    Yes. It's disappointing.

    When the belief system you've constructed leads to obviously, stupidly wrong statements like "the suffering of animals is morally irrelevant", you're better off trying to identify the error that led to this bad conclusion than trying to justify the bad conclusion as correct.

  22. #22
    Libertarian Autocrat Vox Imperatoris's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    [quote=glee]
    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    Now, my point of view is basically the same as John Locke's. There is simply no justification for ascribing rights to animals. They are the property of their owners, to do with as they will.
    Why are slaves different?

    Quote Originally posted by "Vox Imperatoris":pz8ghkl2
    Secularly, animals are non-sapient, and they do not participate meaningfully in society, nor have they ever, nor will they ever.
    One paragraph in and already your argument collapses.
    Horses (riding, ploughing, racing) and dogs (guide dogs, sheep dogs, hospital dogs, drug dogs) for example.[/quotez8ghkl2]

    They do not participate meaningfully in society as equals. They provide benefits by serving their owners or by acting as pets, not by doing things for their own sake.

    Why should we look after terminally ill children? According to you they contribute nothing to society and never will.
    Because they are humans, and I believe that there is a moral obligation to them because of that. There is no similar moral obligation with animals.

    Quote Originally posted by Diana
    Are you saying that religious beliefs (yours, in particular, natch) should determine public policy?
    Not at all. In fact, I'm saying the opposite: that your religious/moral beliefs cannot hold sway over me.

    Quote Originally posted by Harlequin
    Which is exactly the same case as with humans.
    True. And this is exactly why, as I have posted in the thread back at the Dope about how atheists have morality, I believe that there can be no absolute morality without God. There can be arguments in the general about whether humans should harm each other, but no arguments against killing John Smith, assuming I would benefit from his death, besides the fact that the police might catch me.

    And even the religious justification ultimately boils down that there will be punishment for wrongdoing.

    Quote Originally posted by Excalibur
    Yes. It's disappointing.

    When the belief system you've constructed leads to obviously, stupidly wrong statements like "the suffering of animals is morally irrelevant", you're better off trying to identify the error that led to this bad conclusion than trying to justify the bad conclusion as correct.
    It is not, "obviously, stupidly wrong." It is a perfectly rational argument that you refuse to accept for irrelevant emotional reasons.
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  23. #23
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by WhyNot
    I've actually heard it suggested that lactose intolerance is the latest population wide genetic mutation of the sort that would make Darwin go giddy. That is, that lactose intolerant people are "more evolved" than the rest of us. So perhaps we should start marinating ourselves to be extra tasty when they start eating us!
    What? No. Why would lactose intolerance be adaptive? What would make it "more evolved"?

    Lactose intolerance is a primitive trait; lactose tolerance is the derived trait and it's the anomaly in need of explanation. Adult mammals don't retain the capacity to digest lactose because adult mammals don't ordinarily consume it. A minority of adult humans, however, continue to produce lactase into adulthood, almost certainly as a result of adaptation to the availability of dairy products in certain parts of the world.

  24. #24
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    Quote Originally posted by Excalibur
    Yes. It's disappointing.

    When the belief system you've constructed leads to obviously, stupidly wrong statements like "the suffering of animals is morally irrelevant", you're better off trying to identify the error that led to this bad conclusion than trying to justify the bad conclusion as correct.
    It is not, "obviously, stupidly wrong." It is a perfectly rational argument that you refuse to accept for irrelevant emotional reasons.
    No, it's not a rational argument. You can tell, for one thing, because it is predicated on the (obviously unexamined) assumption that it would be necessary to assign animals human-like "rights" in order for it to be morally wrong to abuse them.

  25. #25
    Elephant
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    Quote Originally posted by Diana
    Are you saying that religious beliefs (yours, in particular, natch) should determine public policy?
    Not at all. In fact, I'm saying the opposite: that your religious/moral beliefs cannot hold sway over me.
    Um... you're suggesting that your opinion that animals have no soul means that it should be okay for anyone to treat them however they like. I'm suggesting that it's not okay to inflict unnecessary suffering, ever. One of these is a religious belief, and one of these is a basic tenet of humane behavior. You do see the difference, right?

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    I believe that there can be no absolute morality without God.
    Well, that could be part of the problem. And it's at least as obviously and stupidly wrong as the concept of "morally irrelevant suffering".

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    It is not, "obviously, stupidly wrong." It is a perfectly rational argument that you refuse to accept for irrelevant emotional reasons.
    Your argument isn't rational. It's certainly dry and cold, but that's not the same thing.

  26. #26
    Sophmoric Existentialist
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Excalibur
    No, it's not a rational argument. You can tell, for one thing, because it is predicated on the (obviously unexamined) assumption that it would be necessary to assign animals human-like "rights" in order for it to be morally wrong to abuse them.
    I agree with this. It is an issue that is part of my daily life as a farmer. Most farmers treat their livestock well, although the definition of "well" is hard to pin down. It's a poor farmer that abuses the source of his income.

    But my own view is more inclusive than the mere economic reasons. My views are somewhat nebulous, perhaps misty-eyed and tending to the Pink Fluffy Bunny universe, but I think that since humans are the only species (at present, on Earth) that have "power" over the natural world, we must assume some responsibility along with that power. Certainly we "can" do as we like and by and large we have. This will not, in the end, benefit us; even now we suffer from our lack of self-control. I think it is wrong to add to our "sins" by ignoring the truth that many animals can suffer - or, more exactly - we should assume they can unless we can prove otherwise. Does a moral being cause needless suffering? Is there "needful suffering"? Does it matter? It matters to me.

    A man I know poured gasoline on a cat and set it on fire. Was that an immoral act?
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  27. #27
    Stegodon
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by SeeOhTwo
    The OP reads as tortured reasoning, custom designed to fit an ideology. It's both ridiculous and depressing.
    I unfortunately agree with this assessment. The issue of animal rights is both relevant and important, and a critical component under the aegis of environmental ethics. To begin to tackle the question of animal rights, I suggest identifying what quality of humanity grants us moral consideration, then reformulating that quality as a test which may be applied to other potential candidates. (I suggest this tract expressly citing the moral considerability of humanity as an inductive truism, a first principle. I trust it is sufficiently noncontroversial.)

  28. #28
    Elephant
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    They do not participate meaningfully in society as equals. They provide benefits by serving their owners or by acting as pets, not by doing things for their own sake.
    An equally valid argument could be made that you, yourself, as a minor child are also incapable of participating meaningfully in society as an equal, and that you exist purely to provide a benefit to your owners/parents by validating their existence and providing them with amusement. After all, you can't vote in elections, probably don't pay any taxes, do no meaningful work, cannot enter into a legally binding contract and don't have extended relationships with society as a whole, fully functioning member thereof. With this as a justification, it would be reasonable to ignore your request for aid if, say, your parents were in the habit of burning you with cigarettes if you pissed them off, since your suffering is morally irrelevant. This viewpoint okay with you? Because you don't need or deserve any rights until you're actually playing in the bigs, right?
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Diana
    Um... you're suggesting that your opinion that animals have no soul means that it should be okay for anyone to treat them however they like. I'm suggesting that it's not okay to inflict unnecessary suffering, ever. One of these is a religious belief, and one of these is a basic tenet of humane behavior. You do see the difference, right?
    Why? You haven't offered any logical justification for this. You just said it, and I don't agree with you. I don't think you are The Decider of "humane" behavior, and neither is the majority, for that matter (unless you agree that something like slavery is acceptable if 50% or 66% of the people agree). Your "basic tenet" is no different from a religious justification. I certainly don't care what you think.
    Quote Originally posted by Excalibur
    No, it's not a rational argument. You can tell, for one thing, because it is predicated on the (obviously unexamined) assumption that it would be necessary to assign animals human-like "rights" in order for it to be morally wrong to abuse them.
    And you're doing the same thing. Without rights for animals, there is no logical reason why they should not be abused if their owner so wishes. Why is it wrong, in your opinion? And with what justification?
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    Quote Originally posted by Excalibur
    No, it's not a rational argument. You can tell, for one thing, because it is predicated on the (obviously unexamined) assumption that it would be necessary to assign animals human-like "rights" in order for it to be morally wrong to abuse them.
    And you're doing the same thing. Without rights for animals, there is no logical reason why they should not be abused if their owner so wishes. Why is it wrong, in your opinion? And with what justification?
    Actually, I was pointing out an unexamined assumption, while you were making that unexamined assumption. We were in fact doing the exact opposite thing.

    Anyway, since you haven't really elaborated your premises beyond "humans have rights and animals don't" it's not much different from you just declaring that it's okay to abuse animals but not humans just because.

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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Vox, remind me again why human animals which are unable to express themselves, should have any more rights than a 'lesser' animal? Merely being human shouldn't be enough of a qualification, as there are humans who can express themselves who are of far less value to society than the majority of animals.
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Excalibur
    Anyway, since you haven't really elaborated your premises beyond "humans have rights and animals don't" it's not much different from you just declaring that it's okay to abuse animals but not humans just because.
    So, tell me why people shouldn't abuse animals. I've explained below why people should have rights.

    Quote Originally posted by SmartAleq
    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    They do not participate meaningfully in society as equals. They provide benefits by serving their owners or by acting as pets, not by doing things for their own sake.
    An equally valid argument could be made that you, yourself, as a minor child are also incapable of participating meaningfully in society as an equal, and that you exist purely to provide a benefit to your owners/parents by validating their existence and providing them with amusement. After all, you can't vote in elections, probably don't pay any taxes, do no meaningful work, cannot enter into a legally binding contract and don't have extended relationships with society as a whole, fully functioning member thereof. With this as a justification, it would be reasonable to ignore your request for aid if, say, your parents were in the habit of burning you with cigarettes if you pissed them off, since your suffering is morally irrelevant. This viewpoint okay with you? Because you don't need or deserve any rights until you're actually playing in the bigs, right?
    Why should children not be considered the absolute property of their parents? That is a good question, and it certainly was true in ancient times. First, you must differentiate exactly what constitutes a "minor". Is it merely state-made law? Or is based on mental capacity, or something else? And what right does a minor have to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"? (An animal certainly has none.) Is that merely based on the laws of the state? There are (at least) three alternate explanations: one is that minors have souls, and therefore inalienable rights, "endowed by their Creator". The second argument, based on practicality and used by many liberals, is that ensuring the good treatment of minors creates a society that fits with the mandated or agreed-upon goal. The third is based on the idea that every man, in looking out for himself, wants to be free of restrictions upon himself ; therefore, he agrees with others not to violate their rights in order to protect his own. Children may not yet be fully-grown adults, but they will become so. Senile people likewise are no longer fully-functioning adults, but they used to be. As they have, or had, the potential for full humanity at some point, they are entitled to status as humans under this agreement. (Or, if you do not accept this, then only the first argument works.)

    Quote Originally posted by ivan astikov
    Vox, remind me again why human animals which are unable to express themselves, should have any more rights than a 'lesser' animal? Merely being human shouldn't be enough of a qualification, as there are humans who can express themselves who are of far less value to society than the majority of animals.
    The argument above works as a general reason for why people shouldn't harm each other. However, I do not believe that there is any secular argument for why I shouldn't kill an invalid or someone I don't like. (Except that I will get caught.)
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by The Logos
    Quote Originally posted by SeeOhTwo
    The OP reads as tortured reasoning, custom designed to fit an ideology. It's both ridiculous and depressing.
    I unfortunately agree with this assessment. The issue of animal rights is both relevant and important, and a critical component under the aegis of environmental ethics. To begin to tackle the question of animal rights, I suggest identifying what quality of humanity grants us moral consideration, then reformulating that quality as a test which may be applied to other potential candidates. (I suggest this tract expressly citing the moral considerability of humanity as an inductive truism, a first principle. I trust it is sufficiently noncontroversial.)
    This is not something that you can just put out as a "truism". There is no absolute secular basis for the moral considerability of humanity. The practical secular basis comes from the fact that individual human beings resist tyranny and domination.
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    I also didn't expect such a backlash. I mean, I wasn't expecting unanimous agreement, or even a majority, but neither was I expecting to be the sole defender of a position shared by most of the foundational figures of Western philosophy.
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    SmartAleq, you have made me think more on the issue of children. I think this article by Murray Rothbard explains it better than I have:
    Applying our theory to parents and children, this means that a parent does not have the right to aggress against his children, but also that the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights. The parent therefore may not murder or mutilate his child, and the law properly outlaws a parent from doing so. But the parent should have the legal right not to feed the child, i.e., to allow it to die.[2] The law, therefore, may not properly compel the parent to feed a child or to keep it alive.[3] (Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question.) This rule allows us to solve such vexing questions as: should a parent have the right to allow a deformed baby to die (e.g., by not feeding it)?[4] The answer is of course yes, following a fortiori from the larger right to allow any baby, whether deformed or not, to die. (Though, as we shall see below, in a libertarian society the existence of a free baby market will bring such "neglect" down to a minimum.)
    So parents are not allowed to burn children with cigarettes, for that is included within their rights (as I explained that they have earlier, in a situation that Rothbard calls "trustee-ownership"). But neither can they be forced to care for the child, because that would violate the parents' rights (by forcing them to perform work that they do not wish to do). Of course, other people are free to step in and adopt the child for their own if it has been given up in this manner. (And do you really want children raised by parents forced to do so?)

    As for how they can discipline children:
    The mother, then, becomes at the birth of her child its "trustee-owner," legally obliged only not to aggress against the child's person, since the child possesses the potential for self-ownership. Apart from that, so long as the child lives at home, it must necessarily come under the jurisdiction of its parents, since it is living on property owned by those parents. Certainly the parents have the right to set down rules for the use of their home and property for all persons (whether children or not) living in that home.
    The parents have a sort of "trustee-ownership" over the child until it reaches full age, and they can set down rules for it because it resides on their property, just as they can set down rules for anyone else entering the house. But this "trustee-ownership" does not confer any positive obligation; they merely obtained it by giving birth to the child, and they can discard it at any time.

    And for the issue of the "free market in babies" that I quoted earlier, this is what he's talking about:
    Now if a parent may own his child (within the framework of non-aggression and runaway freedom), then he may also transfer that ownership to someone else. He may give the child out for adoption, or he may sell the rights to the child in a voluntary contract. In short, we must face the fact that the purely free society will have a flourishing free market in children. Superficially, this sounds monstrous and inhuman. But closer thought will reveal the superior humanism of such a market. For we must realize that there is a market for children now, but that since the government prohibits sale of children at a price, the parents may now only give their children away to a licensed adoption agency free of charge.[10] This means that we now indeed have a child-market, but that the government enforces a maximum price control of zero, and restricts the market to a few privileged and therefore monopolistic agencies. The result has been a typical market where the price of the commodity is held by government far below the free-market price: an enormous "shortage" of the good. The demand for babies and children is usually far greater than the supply, and hence we see daily tragedies of adults denied the joys of adopting children by prying and tyrannical adoption agencies. In fact, we find a large unsatisfied demand by adults and couples for children, along with a large number of surplus and unwanted babies neglected or maltreated by their parents. Allowing a free market in children would eliminate this imbalance, and would allow for an allocation of babies and children away from parents who dislike or do not care for their children, and toward foster parents who deeply desire such children. Everyone involved: the natural parents, the children, and the foster parents purchasing the children, would be better off in this sort of society.[11]
    It really makes no sense not to allow parents to sell their "trustee-ownership" children, since this gives them a positive motivation not to let children they do not want languish in their home. They can sell them to wealthy people who want to adopt, benefiting everyone. Of course, "trustee-ownership" is not the same as absolute ownership, like an animal or a slave, because the child is not bound to its owner. It can leave at any time and go off on its own. And this solves the issue of the age of majority, too, which was troubling me: the child reaches "majority" when it decides to leave home and the jurisdiction of its parents. That's it.

    ETA: And please read the whole article. I don't agree with everything Rothbard says, but he does have some very interesting ideas.
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    The argument above works as a general reason for why people shouldn't harm each other. However, I do not believe that there is any secular argument for why I shouldn't kill an invalid or someone I don't like. (Except that I will get caught.)
    You would be perceived as a psychopath. Traits like yours will slowly die out, because society as a whole won't accept them. Everyone in a society of selfish individuals will benefit from the elimination of your randomly destructive behavior.

    Your personal reasons or beliefs are completely irrelevant to this process! During the generations, individuals like you will become less and less likely to occur. Advanced ethics in a society will form through self-organization, just like beneficial adaptations in a population form through evolution.

  37. #37
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    Secularly, animals are non-sapient, and they do not participate meaningfully in society, nor have they ever, nor will they ever.

    They do not participate meaningfully in society as equals. They provide benefits by serving their owners or by acting as pets, not by doing things for their own sake.
    ORLY? I feed all of my cats daily. Just the same, they keep my home free of mice, not because they love me, but because they're hard wired to catch and kill the little critters.

    There's a bathouse in my garden. Bats don't hang out in a bathouse because they have some measure of affection for the guy who stuck it on a pole. They hang out there because there are lots of bugs to eat. They reduce the mosquito population, which is of benefit to me, but they'd eat bugs anyway, whether I gave them a bat condo or not.

    Without various predatory species, some types of disease would be more prevalent. By culling the slow and weak from other species, predators help to ensure that the best survive for breeding future generations.

    How many thousands of trees have been planted by bird droppings? For the sake of argument, I'll add insects to the discussion. Without them, you have no flowers, fruits, vegetables, or other plants which depend on bees and butterflies to effect pollination.
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    I think this whole benefit-to-others discussion is beside the point. For me, it comes down to one thing: animals feel pain. I have every reason to believe they do. I don't think causing pain is a good thing. That's it.

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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    So, tell me why people shouldn't abuse animals. I've explained below why people should have rights.
    You really haven't, though.


    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    There are (at least) three alternate explanations: one is that minors have souls, and therefore inalienable rights, "endowed by their Creator".
    That's certainly not something we can build a rational system of laws on, though. Some people think animals have souls. Some people don't think anyone has a soul. "Soul" doesn't really mean anything outside of some religious traditions. Decreeing that humans have rights and animals don't really just boils down, again, to saying "humans have rights and animals don't and that's that", since "souls" aren't something provable or universally agreed upon.


    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    The second argument, based on practicality and used by many liberals, is that ensuring the good treatment of minors creates a society that fits with the mandated or agreed-upon goal.
    But you don't believe that; you don't believe that people have individual rights because granting such rights is to the maximum collective benefit.


    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    The third is based on the idea that every man, in looking out for himself, wants to be free of restrictions upon himself ; therefore, he agrees with others not to violate their rights in order to protect his own. Children may not yet be fully-grown adults, but they will become so. Senile people likewise are no longer fully-functioning adults, but they used to be. As they have, or had, the potential for full humanity at some point, they are entitled to status as humans under this agreement. (Or, if you do not accept this, then only the first argument works.)
    Everyone wants rights. Among them, the right to raise their children as they wish. In some cases, without the State interposing itself and deciding, for instance, that toughening up the kid by burning him with cigarettes is somehow "child abuse".

    Anyway, children don't have rights only because they will one day grow up and possess the agency of a normal adult. That clearly doesn't work; there are people who live their lives severely mentally handicapped, enough that they will never be able to care for themselves, vote, or express this sort of agency you describe. Nevertheless people like that may be clearly aware of their environment, "sentient" (I use dickfingers here because the term is poorly defined.) Unless you wish to take the position that severely mentally handicapped but aware people don't have at least some rights. Besides that, it's a non-starter anyway because you haven't developed any principle to justify your stance that holds that, since a person may one day be able to exercise agency, that they now deserve to be treated as if they do. (Since, again, it is in your view that there is no moral relevance to the treatment of something that doesn't have agency.)


    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    I also didn't expect such a backlash. I mean, I wasn't expecting unanimous agreement, or even a majority, but neither was I expecting to be the sole defender of a position shared by most of the foundational figures of Western philosophy.
    Ehh. You haven't argued this nearly as well as you think you have. Whatever irrational emotional issues you want to attribute to me or anyone else, you have yet to come up with an entirely coherent line of reasoning to support your position here.

  40. #40
    Libertarian Autocrat Vox Imperatoris's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Excalibur
    Anyway, children don't have rights only because they will one day grow up and possess the agency of a normal adult. That clearly doesn't work; there are people who live their lives severely mentally handicapped, enough that they will never be able to care for themselves, vote, or express this sort of agency you describe. Nevertheless people like that may be clearly aware of their environment, "sentient" (I use dickfingers here because the term is poorly defined.) Unless you wish to take the position that severely mentally handicapped but aware people don't have at least some rights. Besides that, it's a non-starter anyway because you haven't developed any principle to justify your stance that holds that, since a person may one day be able to exercise agency, that they now deserve to be treated as if they do. (Since, again, it is in your view that there is no moral relevance to the treatment of something that doesn't have agency.)
    As I already said, from an individual moral standpoint, there is no absolute secular reason why anyone should respect the rights of an invalid or anyone else. However, you do make the valid point that a religious argument cannot be the basis of society's laws (and neither can a just-as-fabricated atheistic moral commandment).

    But there is an argument that works: it is the natural condition of man, as a species, to exercise agency and to make rational observations about the world. It is this state that allows him to enter into the agreement not to harm others on the condition that he not be harmed, himself. States like childhood, senility, and invalidity only exist as deviations from this standard condition of man. However, we cannot get inside the minds of these people to see how they really think, and we know that we have been or may someday be in these states ourselves. Therefore, under the agreement, or "natural law", we agree not to aggress against anyone who exhibits the basic state of humanity, as part of protecting our own rights. Similarly, we agree not to persecute a certain class, say, gypsies, in particular because, although we know that we will never be gypsies, no matter what, of both the practical reason that the gypsies will rebel and cause us harm and because, in removing the rights of a certain class of humans, we have lost the basis on which we set our own rights—humanity—and so we have made our own rights vulnerable. This is the "human potential" that animals do not have, and so their suffering is simply an irrelevant fact to morality, the same as the error message displayed by a computer when you tear up the hard drive is irrelevant to morality. It is not merely particular animals that do not have agency and rational thought, it is all the animal species, as opposed to the species of mankind.

    Now, explain why you think mere consciousness makes animal suffering relevant, or why you think the suffering of the disabled is morally relevant, for that matter, before you continue to pick apart my argument. You haven't offered any alternative.
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    I think moral relevance doesn't have anything to do with whether something may or may not screw me over personally. I don't oppose persecution of gypsies because people might come after me next.

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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    The "agreement" I was referring to above assumes that each man is the owner of himself and himself alone. There are two alternatives to this: that some people have the right to own others, partially or fully; i.e. that the owned class are not fully men with the right to do as they please, while the owning class is; and that everyone owns everyone else, i.e. Communism. However, the third option, although it sounds like a viable alternative, is really impossible to do in practice because you cannot obtain the consent of everybody on Earth before you do anything (not even a majority of them, because they each do fully own the other). Therefore, power has to be bestowed unto a ruling class to act as a "dictatorship of the proletariat" (or, I suppose, a "democracy of the proletariat", still with the rulers having the power to do what they like), which falls under the second option.

    However, liberal (as in Thomas Jefferson) thought is based on the first option.
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    But there is an argument that works: it is the natural condition of man, as a species, to exercise agency and to make rational observations about the world.
    It's certainly not the natural condition of man to make rational observations about the world. The ability to make rational observations -- insofar as we possess it at all -- is quite a recent invention.


    It is this state that allows him to enter into the agreement not to harm others on the condition that he not be harmed, himself. States like childhood, senility, and invalidity only exist as deviations from this standard condition of man. However, we cannot get inside the minds of these people to see how they really think, and we know that we have been or may someday be in these states ourselves. Therefore, under the agreement, or "natural law", we agree not to aggress against anyone who exhibits the basic state of humanity, as part of protecting our own rights.
    This one is a little better. I agree not to beat the shit out of grandpa because I don't want my grandkids doing that to me when I'm old and senile.

    This is a different line of reasoning than the one that holds that we have rights because we are smart, however. That one doesn't seem to work.


    Similarly, we agree not to persecute a certain class, say, gypsies, in particular because, although we know that we will never be gypsies, no matter what, of both the practical reason that the gypsies will rebel and cause us harm and because, in removing the rights of a certain class of humans, we have lost the basis on which we set our own rights—humanity—and so we have made our own rights vulnerable.
    If we were engaging in such sophistry in the first place, we could easily decide that, say, our unique status as white humans was the basis of our own rights. Or we could decide that gypsies aren't really humans, so refusing to grant them human rights has no impact on our own rights.


    This is the "human potential" that animals do not have, and so their suffering is simply an irrelevant fact to morality
    No, again, that doesn't work. That's just the same disguised appeal to the notion that humans have rights just because. We can easily find classes of humans that entirely lack "human potential", and whether or not they are "deviations from the norm", none of the philosophers you have appealed to above believe that humans that lack "human potential" do not have the right to not be abused.

    It is not merely particular animals that do not have agency and rational thought, it is all the animal species, as opposed to the species of mankind.
    Now you're making reference to an abstract biological concept. But you haven't come up with any reason why we should be looking at the human "species" as opposed to at individual humans. In fact, the rights that we grant different humans do vary, tremendously, in a free society. Felons, in some states, have no right to vote ever again. Children don't have the same free speech rights as adults. Parents can subject children to painful and intrusive medical procedures that they themselves could decide not to get. So what rights are given on the basis of species, and what ones are not? What is the principled basis by which we separate these two classes of rights?


    Now, explain why you think mere consciousness makes animal suffering relevant, or why you think the suffering of the disabled is morally relevant, for that matter, before you continue to pick apart my argument. You haven't offered any alternative.
    I don't really have an opinion on the subject.

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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    As opposed to simply reiterating enlightenment ideas about the origin of rights, why don't you try to explain where these supposed natural rights come from? As I said, utilitarian arguments cover all the bases that references to so called inalienable rights cover, and do so without invoking the spectre of a God (and let's be clear: those who claim that natural rights exist are overwhelmingly religious, and do so from a religious perspective.)

    I also didn't expect such a backlash. I mean, I wasn't expecting unanimous agreement, or even a majority, but neither was I expecting to be the sole defender of a position shared by most of the foundational figures of Western philosophy.
    The problem with philosophy is that it suffers from fads. You'd have been subjected to a backlash if you'd tried defending the Allegory of the Cave, too, despite it being thought up by the father of philosophy.
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Harlequin
    I think moral relevance doesn't have anything to do with whether something may or may not screw me over personally. I don't oppose persecution of gypsies because people might come after me next.
    Okay, suppose I want to go after the gypsies. Why shouldn't I, in your opinion?

    What if I'm doing it just because it would be fun? What right have you to stop me?
    What if I'm doing it because gypsies (or insert whatever group) are lazy and unproductive, wasting society's resources, and I can prove this scientifically?
    What if I'm doing it because allowing gypsies to interbreed with other people will cause the human species to eventually degrade to a state of what we would currently consider mental retardation, and I can scientifically prove this?
    What if I'm doing it because gypsies, or most of them at least, are criminals and harmful to society and cannot be educated out of it, and I can scientifically prove this?
    What if I'm doing it because it is the will of the people?

    Obviously, none of these things are true, but how would you answer them if they were?
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  46. #46
    Oliphaunt
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    Okay, suppose I want to go after the gypsies. Why shouldn't I, in your opinion?
    Because it would cause them to suffer, and I think that's a bad thing. If you don't, fine, but to be consistent you'd also have to be OK with people torturing you.
    What if I'm doing it just because it would be fun? What right have you to stop me?
    Depends on what you mean by "right". If you're talking about legal rights, I think you're well aware of what right I have to stop you. If not, my answer is "it doesn't matter". I'm not big on putting things in abstract and entirely arbitrary terms like "rights".
    What if I'm doing it because gypsies (or insert whatever group) are lazy and unproductive, wasting society's resources, and I can prove this scientifically?
    Then I agree that something should be done. Try and find root causes to begin with, and then try and find something to do about them.
    What if I'm doing it because allowing gypsies to interbreed with other people will cause the human species to eventually degrade to a state of what we would currently consider mental retardation, and I can scientifically prove this?
    Then maybe, depending on the details, we might want to write laws against gypsies interbreeding with non-gypsies.
    What if I'm doing it because gypsies, or most of them at least, are criminals and harmful to society and cannot be educated out of it, and I can scientifically prove this?
    See above.
    What if I'm doing it because it is the will of the people?
    I'd still try and stop you (I hope), but it would be difficult.

  47. #47
    Stegodon
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    [quote=Vox Imperatoris]
    Quote Originally posted by "The Logos":1aretu4z
    Quote Originally posted by SeeOhTwo
    The OP reads as tortured reasoning, custom designed to fit an ideology. It's both ridiculous and depressing.
    I unfortunately agree with this assessment. The issue of animal rights is both relevant and important, and a critical component under the aegis of environmental ethics. To begin to tackle the question of animal rights, I suggest identifying what quality of humanity grants us moral consideration, then reformulating that quality as a test which may be applied to other potential candidates. (I suggest this tract expressly citing the moral considerability of humanity as an inductive truism, a first principle. I trust it is sufficiently noncontroversial.)
    This is not something that you can just put out as a "truism". There is no absolute secular basis for the moral considerability of humanity. The practical secular basis comes from the fact that individual human beings resist tyranny and domination.[/quote:1aretu4z]

    Nor did I suggest an "absolute secular basis" for moral considerability. Perhaps the most defensible position concerning what might be understood as the ontology of ethics is one of eliminativism.

    Nevertheless, the construction of ethical tests necessitates the induction of first principles. In order that an act or belief be judged moral or immoral, that act or belief must be conjoined with a second order evaluative statement.

  48. #48
    Libertarian Autocrat Vox Imperatoris's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Harlequin
    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    Okay, suppose I want to go after the gypsies. Why shouldn't I, in your opinion?
    Because it would cause them to suffer, and I think that's a bad thing. If you don't, fine, but to be consistent you'd also have to be OK with people torturing you.
    There are two problems with the Golden Rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. The first is that it is entirely arbitrary; you just offered your opinion, with no justification. The second is this: suppose I'm a masochist. I would like to torture you, but I'm perfectly fine with you torturing me back. In fact, I would greatly enjoy it. Why shouldn't I be allowed to torture you, then?

    What if I'm doing it just because it would be fun? What right have you to stop me?
    Depends on what you mean by "right". If you're talking about legal rights, I think you're well aware of what right I have to stop you. If not, my answer is "it doesn't matter". I'm not big on putting things in abstract and entirely arbitrary terms like "rights".
    So the only answer is that you have the right to stop me because you have the might to stop me. Rights are important because adherence to them protects people even when protecting them isn't expedient.

    What if I'm doing it because gypsies (or insert whatever group) are lazy and unproductive, wasting society's resources, and I can prove this scientifically?
    Then I agree that something should be done. Try and find root causes to begin with, and then try and find something to do about them.
    What if it's an incurable genetic affliction of the entire gypsy "race"? Should they be excluded from welfare and charity, since they are not willing to work hard, even when given a job?

    What if I'm doing it because allowing gypsies to interbreed with other people will cause the human species to eventually degrade to a state of what we would currently consider mental retardation, and I can scientifically prove this?
    Then maybe, depending on the details, we might want to write laws against gypsies interbreeding with non-gypsies.
    So gypsies do not have the right to reproductive freedom, if this could be dangerous to society? I believe that right is respected by the UN and the EU.

    What if I'm doing it because gypsies, or most of them at least, are criminals and harmful to society and cannot be educated out of it, and I can scientifically prove this?
    See above.
    Would it be alright to compel gypsies not to have children (in a similar way to China's one child policy) in an effort to peaceably bring about their demise as an ethnic group, if this were the case?

    What if I'm doing it because it is the will of the people?
    I'd still try and stop you (I hope), but it would be difficult.
    Why isn't the will of the people sovereign? They, after all, constitute "society".

    For example, in U.S. history, Sen. Stephen Douglas was a fierce advocate of Popular Sovereignty to decide whether slaves should be allowed in U.S. territories, but the man who beat him in the election of 1860, Abraham Lincoln, with only 40% of the vote behind him (and almost zero votes in the South), killed over a million people to force the Confederate states to rejoin the Union and give up slavery. Why was Douglas wrong? Or Lincoln, for that matter? (In fact, as an aside, I think he was wrong on secession, though not on slavery.)

    Nor did I suggest an "absolute secular basis" for moral considerability. Perhaps the most defensible position concerning what might be understood as the ontology of ethics is one of eliminativism.

    Nevertheless, the construction of ethical tests necessitates the induction of first principles. In order that an act or belief be judged moral or immoral, that act or belief must be conjoined with a second order evaluative statement.
    So, you're saying that, in order to judge whether one act is moral or immoral, it has to be compared with a foundational moral principle? Where do those come from?
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  49. #49
    Oliphaunt
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by Vox Imperatoris
    There are two problems with the Golden Rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
    Why are you now introducing the Golden Rule into the discussion only to attack it? I haven't mentioned it.
    So the only answer is that you have the right to stop me because you have the might to stop me.
    No, I didn't say that.
    What if it's an incurable genetic affliction of the entire gypsy "race"? Should they be excluded from welfare and charity, since they are not willing to work hard, even when given a job?
    Difficult to answer without the kind of details that would be available were this a reality. I have said that it is quite possible that something should be done. Is that enough?
    So gypsies do not have the right to reproductive freedom, if this could be dangerous to society? I believe that right is respected by the UN and the EU.
    I believe so too. What of it?
    Would it be alright to compel gypsies not to have children (in a similar way to China's one child policy) in an effort to peaceably bring about their demise as an ethnic group, if this were the case?
    Depends on the severity of the problem, but yes, it might.
    Why isn't the will of the people sovereign?
    Why would it be?

  50. #50
    Libertarian Autocrat Vox Imperatoris's avatar
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    Default Re: Animals have no rights, and their suffering is morally irrelevant.

    Quote Originally posted by CRSP
    As opposed to simply reiterating enlightenment ideas about the origin of rights, why don't you try to explain where these supposed natural rights come from? As I said, utilitarian arguments cover all the bases that references to so called inalienable rights cover, and do so without invoking the spectre of a God (and let's be clear: those who claim that natural rights exist are overwhelmingly religious, and do so from a religious perspective.)
    Um, the Enlightenment philosophers were mostly right. So, that is where they come from. I think utilitarianism is foolish because the "best for the most" is irrelevant to me; I don't care what's best for the most. I care about what's best for me, but since other people do, too, I have to agree not to violate their rights to keep them from violating mine. I don't have a responsibility to them, though; they have no claim on my life.

    And not all believers in natural rights are Believers in any sort of god. Rothbard is an almost militant atheist, but he is also a vehement proponent of natural rights. So are Objectivists. You can read his opinion on natural law here. (Published by libertarians free, in full, on the internet, even though they also sell it! )

    Quote Originally posted by Excalibur
    I don't really have an opinion on the subject.
    Well, can we not assume that the default state is that an action is not prohibited? Since you have offered no justification for preventing animal cruelty, there's not much point in arguing with you until you do. After all, if you stop me on the street and take my money or tell me that I can't go to my favorite restaurant, it's you who has to give a legitimate explanation; e.g. "Taxes," or "Disease control."
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