Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Review Of Gary E. Varner's Personhood, Ethics, And Animal Cognition: Situating Animals In Hare’S Two-Level Utilitarianism, Tal Scriven

Between the Species

No abstract provided.

Virtue Ethics And Animal Law, Taimie Bryant

Between the Species

This essay explores virtue ethical concepts in the context of animal law theory and practice. For reasons discussed in the essay, virtue ethics may not, on its own, serve as an adequate foundation for general anticruelty statutes, but it may have application in those contexts in which sufficient sharing of values enables participants in legal reform to work through differences in moral commitments to generate at least temporarily acceptable laws. The article considers a detailed example of that type of application, based on the actual and realistic situation of legislator-requested feral cat colony caretakers’ participation in the development of ordinances …

Introduction To Special Issue, Vol. 15, Issue 1, Jane Johnson

Between the Species

No abstract provided.

What The Wild Things Are: A Critique On Clare Palmer’S “What (If Anything) Do We Owe Wild Animals?”, Joel P. Macclellan

Between the Species

In this critique of “Clare Palmer’s “What (if anything) do we owe wild animals?”, I develop three points. First, I consider the case study which opens her essay and argue that that there are good empirical reasons to think that we should assist domesticated horses and not wild deer. Then, I critique Palmer’s claim that “wildness is not a capacity”, arguing that wildness connotes certain capacities which wild animals generally have and which domesticated animals generally lack. Lastly, I develop what I call the “supererogation problem” against Palmer’s preferred contextualist view, claiming that while the contextualist view doesn’t obligate us …

On The Respectful Use Of Animals, Jon Garthoff

Between the Species

In his essay “The Integration of the Ethic of the Respectful Use of Animals into the Law”, David Favre begins to articulate a new framework for understanding the legal status of nonhuman animals. The present essay supports the broad contours of Favre’s framework, but raises challenges for some of the framework’s elements. The first half questions Favre’s claim that possession of DNA and the capacity for life underlie the need for a more robust conception of animal legal standing. The second half questions Favre’s prior proposal that animals be deemed persons under law and questions his pragmatic suggestion that judges …

Ethics, Law, And The Science Of Fish Welfare, Colin Allen

Between the Species

Fish farming is one of the fastest growing sectors of agriculture, attracting considerable attention to the question of whether existing farming regulations and animal welfare laws are adequate to deal with the expanding role of fish in feeding humans. The role of fish as model organisms in scientific research is also expanding -- a majority of research biology departments now keep zebrafish for the purposes of genome biology, and they are used widely used for basic neuroscience research. However, due to their diversity and distance from mammalian biology, fish pose difficult questions for the application of legal and ethical principles …

Beyond Suffering - Commentary On Clare Palmer, Gordon M. Burghardt

Between the Species

None needed?

What (If Anything) Do We Owe Wild Animals?, Clare A. Palmer

Between the Species

It’s widely agreed that animal pain matters morally – that we shouldn’t, for instance, starve our animal companions, and that we should provide medical care to sick or injured agricultural animals, and not only because it benefits us to do so. But do we have the same moral responsibilities towards wild animals? Should we feed them if they are starving, and intervene to prevent them from undergoing other forms of suffering, for instance from predation? Using an example that includes both wild and domesticated animals, I outline two contrasting ways of thinking about our moral responsibilities with respect to assisting …

Review Of Paola Cavalieri's The Death Of The Animal, Angus Taylor

Between the Species

Review of The Death of the Animal, by Paola Cavalieri (with an introduction by Peter Singer and contributions from Matthew Calarco, John M. Coetzee, Harlan B. Miller, and Cary Wolfe)

Review Of Gary L. Francione's Animals As Persons, Tony Milligan

Between the Species

No abstract provided.

Korsgaard And Non-Sentient Life, Gregory L. Bock

Between the Species

Christine Korsgaard argues for the moral status of animals and our obligations to them. She grounds this obligation on the notion that we share a common identity, our animal nature, with them and that animal pain represents a public reason that binds us; nevertheless, her distinctive attempt to enlist Kantian arguments to account for our obligations to animals has a startling implication that she fails to adequately consider: that we have direct duties to plants as well.

The Integration Of The Ethic Of The Respectful Use Of Animals Into The Law, David Favre

Between the Species

This article develops an ethical construct of “respectful use” to govern the conduct of humans toward animals. The scope of the terms “use” and “respectful” are developed. Some guidelines for the discernment of respectful use of animals are suggested. Then the status of animals within the legal system is briefly considered. Within the law, the socially defined key term is “unnecessary” rather than respectful. Finally, the newer legal standard of duty of care is shown to be approaching the ethical concept of respectful use.

Comparing Suffering Across Species, John Nolt

Between the Species

Moral life often presents us with trade-offs between the sufferings of some individuals and the sufferings of others. Researchers may need to consider, for example, whether the suffering imposed on animals by a certain line of medical experimentation justifies the relief that the resulting discoveries may bring to (human or non-human) others. Often in such cases, the suffering of some individuals is incomparable with—that is neither greater than nor less than nor equal to—the suffering of others. While this complicates moral decision-making across species, it does not undermine it.

Towards A Coherent Theory Of Animal Equality, Stijn Bruers

Between the Species

In this article I want to construct in a simple and systematic way an ethical theory of animal equality. The goal is a consistent theory, containing a set of clear and coherent universalized ethical principles that best fits our strongest moral intuitions in all possible morally relevant situations that we can think of, without too many arbitrary elements. I demonstrate that impartiality with a level of risk aversion and empathy with a need for efficiency are two different approaches that both result in the same consequentialist principle of prioritarianism. Next, I discuss that this principle can be trumped by an …

Mousetraps And How To Avoid Them: The Convergence Of Utilitarian And Scientific Cases For Limiting The Mouse Model In Biomedical Research, Cynthia Townley, Brett Lidbury

Between the Species

The primary aim of biomedical research is to discover and develop new knowledge to advance human medicine. Frequently a ‘mouse model’ is taken to be a necessary step towards understanding a disease, biological mechanism or intervention. We argue for caution with respect to the mouse model: theoretical reasons, meta-analyses of empirical data, and viable alternatives all support a more restricted use of animals in laboratories than is current practice. On its own terms, a utilitarian scientific justification for using animals in biomedical research converges more closely with welfarist claims than is usually recognised.

The Chicken Challenge – What Contemporary Studies Of Fowl Mean For Science And Ethics, Carolynn L. Smith, Jane Johnson

Between the Species

Studies with captive fowl have revealed that they possess greater cognitive capacities than previously thought. We now know that fowl have sophisticated cognitive and communicative skills, which had hitherto been associated only with certain primates. Several theories have been advanced to explain the evolution of such complex behavior. Central to these theories is the enlargement of the brain in species with greater mental capacities. Fowl present us with a conundrum, however, because they show the behaviors anticipated by the theories but do not have the expected changes in the brain. Consequently fowl present two challenges of interest to us here. …

Animal Models For Human Disease – Reflections From An Animal Researcher’S Perspective, Imke Tammen

Between the Species

Neuronal ceroid lipofuscinoses (NCL) are a group of lethal inherited neurodegenerative disorders in humans and many animal species. Critical reflections on a range of ethical issues concerning NCL have been instigated by my research on sheep and cattle affected with NCL, the claim that these sheep and cattle are useful models for the disease in humans, and engagement with families and support groups. My reflections on moral status of animals and validity of animal models are outlined in this paper.

Does Lack Of Enrichment Invalidate Scientific Data Obtained From Rodents By Compromising Their Welfare?, Ann L. Baldwin Phd

Between the Species

In countries where major animal research is conducted, comprehensive laws exist to ensure that the animals’ physical needs are satisfactorily met. However, animals also require an environment that allows them to fulfill their behavioral needs; this will be the focus of the article. Two studies are described in detail, one on rats and the other on genetically modified mice, which were performed by the author to compare the effects of enriched and un-enriched cage environments on rodent physiology. Evidence is presented showing that if research rodents are housed in cages lacking structures that allow them to perform their normal behaviors, …