Ethics and Political Philosophy Commons^™

Cautions About Precautions, Jay R. Stauffer Jr.

Animal Sentience

Assuming an animal to be sentient in the absence of conclusive evidence to the contrary is an extreme position, hence it should not and could not be the default assumption. Birch explains how the precautionary principle may be used to substantiate decisions to give the animal the benefit of doubt. Although I am reluctant to accept all of his points, Birch has provided an excellent argument for the use of the precautionary principle for the detection of animal sentience. I agree that more research is needed to refine and understand this relationship.

A Risk Assessment And Phylogenetic Approach, Culum Brown

Animal Sentience

The precautionary principal is often invoked when talking about the evidence of sentience in animals, largely because we can never be certain what any animal is thinking or feeling. Birch (2017) offers a preliminary framework for the use of the precautionary principal for animal sentience combining an epistemic rule with a decision rule. I extend this framework by adding an evolutionary phylogentic approach which spreads the burden of proof across broad taxonomic groups and a risk assessment component which magnifies the likely impact by the number of animals involved.

The “Precautionary Principle” – A Work In Progress, Shelley Adamo

Animal Sentience

The target article by Birch illustrates the practical difficulties with the “Animal Sentience Precautionary Principle” (ASPP) while presenting potential solutions. However, the ASPP will be difficult to use without guidelines detailing how evidence of sentience should be assessed. Moreover, extrapolating conclusions found for a single species to all species within an Order is problematic. Finally, I recommend that Birch demonstrate his ASPP framework using a controversial test case to help show how it could be used in real-world situations.

What If All Animals Are Sentient?, Arthur S. Reber

Animal Sentience

Birch develops a useful framework for determining when the Animal Sentience Precautionary Principle (ASPP) should be invoked. He rightly notes that there is a lack of agreement among social scientists, ethicists, and legislators even about whether the precautionary principle is useful, let alone when and how it should be implemented. His proposal is to establish a kind of cognitive threshold, and only when an animal shows a sufficient level of sentience would the ASPP be appropriate. From the point of view of the Cellular Basis of Consciousness model (Reber, 2016), all animals are sentient. If correct, the problems Birch identifies …

Shoring Up The Precautionary Bar, Jon Mallatt

Animal Sentience

I offer four ways to reinforce Birch’s precautionary principle so it can be used effectively and practically in deciding which animals to cover by legislation for humane treatment: (1) add one more credible indicator of sentience to the BAR rule; (2) use phylogenetic classification, not the outdated Linnaean classification, to test which animal clades have sentience; (3) disentangle the pain of suffering from sentience; and (4) reconsider the sentient status of decapods and insects to remove potential inconsistencies in the proposed framework.

Anecdotes Can Be Evidence Too, Heather Browning

Animal Sentience

Birch’s criterion for the precautionary principle imposes a high evidential standard that many cases will fail to meet. Reliable, relevant anecdotal evidence suggestive of animal sentience should also to fall within the scope of the precautionary principle. This would minimize potential suffering (as happened in the case cephalopods) while further evidence is gathered.

Not Statistically Significant, But Still Scientific, Rachael L. Brown

Animal Sentience

Birch’s formulation is persuasive but not nuanced enough to capture at least one situation where it is reasonable to invoke the precautionary principle (PP): when we have multiple, weak, but convergent, lines of evidence that a species is sentient, but no statistically significant evidence of a single credible indicator of sentience within the order as required by BAR. I respond to the worry that if we include such cases in our framework for applying the PP, we open ourselves to the charge of being “unscientific.”

The Precautionary Principle: A Cautionary Note, Robert C. Jones

Animal Sentience

The precautionary principle regarding animal sentience is often used in decision-making about human actions that may cause harm to nonhuman animals. Birch (2017) develops an account of the precautionary principle requiring two pragmatic rules for its implementation. I support Birch's proposal but offer a cautionary note about relying on precautionary principles if one's ultimate goal is to emancipate animals from human domination.

Will The Precautionary Principle Broaden Acceptance Of Animal Sentience?, Simon Leadbeater

Animal Sentience

Birch uses existing practice to develop a formal Animal Sentience Precautionary Principle (ASPP), which he hopes will become more widely adopted and improve animal welfare outcomes. Birch considers the assumption that all animals are sentient to be extreme. Despite its merits, Birch’s ASPP remains human-centred.

Animal Pain And The Social Role Of Science, Leslie Irvine

Animal Sentience

Assuming that all animals are sentient would mean ending their use in most scientific research. This does not necessarily imply an unscientific or anti-scientific stance. Examining the social role of science reveals its considerable investment in preserving the status quo, including the continued use of animal subjects. From this perspective, the use of animal subjects is a custom that science could move beyond, rather than a methodological requirement that it must defend.

A Preliminary Investigation Into The Welfare Of Lobsters In The Uk, Gemma Carder

Animal Sentience

The welfare of invertebrates is overlooked and their needs are not understood. It is assumed that they do not experience pain and suffering. Studies on decapod crustaceans challenge this assumption. Research has focused on distinguishing between nociception (the ability to detect a harmful stimulus and to react to it reflexively) and pain (an aversive feeling or emotional experience). Findings indicate that decapod crustaceans can experience pain, which supports a case for protecting their welfare. I have investigated the current husbandry conditions of a globally consumed decapod crustacean, the lobster, as housed in tanks inside food outlets in the UK. Housing …

Moral Reasoning: An Intentional Approach To Distinguishing Right From Wrong, Michael Jones

Faculty Publications and Presentations

This book represents a unique contribution to the study of ethics: an introductory textbook that is designed to be very readable while at the same time being deeply philosophical. It leads the reader on an exploration of the major approaches to ethics that have developed in the Western philosophical tradition: Ethical Relativism, Virtue Ethics, Natural Law Ethics, Ethical Egoism, Utilitarianism, Duty Ethics, Social Contract Theory, and Divine Command Theory. It discusses the chief strengths and weaknesses of each and opts for a modified Divine Command Theory while retaining the useful elements of each of the other theories. Written in a …

The Potential For Sentience In Fishes, Jay R. Stauffer Jr.

Animal Sentience

Balcombe’s book is filled with information on the biology, behavior, and life history of fishes. I do not agree with all his premises. I am still somewhat perplexed about the discussion of whether fish feel pain; I am not sure whether the distinction between nociception and pain makes any difference. Overall, however, his treatment of the principles of both natural and sexual selection is comprehensive and accurate, and has greatly increased my knowledge and awareness of the biology, ethology, and potential for sentience in fishes. In summary, this work has exposed me to new ideas about how to examine fishes …

Servant Leadership: What Makes It An Effective Leadership Model., Janice Poland Tanno

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Servant leadership (SL), a universal, ethical leadership style, consistently produces high performance and employee engagement. For the last two decades, lack of business ethics in decision making by senior leaders has resulted in many negative outcomes, such as the WorldCom scandal. The purpose of this descriptive phenomenological study was to identify and report the lived experiences of senior leaders in relation to decision making in SL organizations in the southwestern United States. The study's theoretical/conceptual foundations encompassed Maslow's motivation theories, decision theory, spirituality, spiritual intelligence, Cicero's virtue theory of ethics, and Greenleaf's SL. Data collection involved the use of semistructured …

The Veil Of Ignorance In Rawlsian Theory, Jeppe Von Platz

Philosophy Faculty Publications

As part of his effort to answer the question "What is the best conception of justice for a democratic society?" philosopher John Rawls constructed a thought experience called the original position. In the original position, representativs of members of society choose principles of justice for society in light of limited interests and with limited information. Situated behind the veil of ignorance, the parties in the original position have no knowledge about particular facts that could lead them to prefer principles of justice partial to those they represent. The veil of ignorance is thus an important part of Rawls's argument …

Sources In Legal Positivist Theories, David Lefkowitz

Philosophy Faculty Publications

The debate about positivism in general legal theory or in the international legal scholarship manifests so many different, if not conflicting, meanings of positivism—even among legal positivists themselves—that the debate about legal positivism has proved almost unfathomable and unintelligible.

No other approach to theorizing international law is more closely associated with and dependent upon the development of an account of its sources than is positivism. The explanation for this is a simple and familiar one: if there is any thesis regarding (p. 324) law that we can uncontroversially associate with the label ‘legal positivism’, it is the view that a …

What Makes A Social Order Primitive? In Defense Of Hart’S Take On International Law, David Lefkowitz

Philosophy Faculty Publications

The widespread antipathy to Hart's description of international law as a simple or primitive social order, one that lacks a rule of recognition and therefore does not qualify as a legal system, rests on two misunderstandings. First, the absence of a division of labor in identifying, altering, applying, and enforcing law is as much, if not more, central to Hart's understanding of what makes a society primitive as is the absence of any secondary rules at all. Second, it is primarily in terms of the presence of such a division of labor and the implications it has for the ontology …

Experiment Versus Analogy In The Search For Animal Sentience, Geoffrey Hall

Animal Sentience

Deciding between rival accounts of an instance of an animal’s behavior can frequently be achieved by experimental tests of different predictions made by the alternatives. When, however, one (or both) of the alternatives is expressed in terms of the mental state of the animal, an experimental test to distinguish them can be hard to find. Although it is unsatisfactory in many ways, it may be necessary to fall back on argument from analogy with human behavior and experience.

Establishing That Contrast Is Cognitive Dissonance, Travis R. Smith

Animal Sentience

Zentall suggests that the same mechanism underlies cognitive dissonance in humans and the within-trial contrast effect in pigeons (and humans). The contrast effect has face validity in explaining cognitive dissonance, but more research is needed to establish construct validity. To determine whether both phenomena share the same mechanism, future research should test (1) whether both share physiological processes, (2) whether individuals who show sensitivity to one are also sensitive to the other, and (3) whether both phenomena are affected by the same changes in an independent variable.

Assigning Liability In An Autonomous World, Agni Sharma

CMC Senior Theses

Liability laws currently in use rely on a fault-based system that focuses on a causal connection between driver actions and the resulting road accident. The role of the driver is set to reduce with the emergence of autonomous vehicles, so how will liability adapt to meet the needs of an autonomous world? The paper discusses possible frameworks of liability that could be implemented in the future, and accentuates the importance of the causal aspects of the current framework in the new system.