- One ought not to cause harm except in certain special cases, such as those in which it's necessary to do so in order to preserve one's own life.
- To kill a subject of a life--something there is something it is like to be--is to cause that subject harm.
- So one ought not to kill a subject of a life--even in the most humane ways possible--except in certain special cases.
- The fact that the subject of life in question is not a human being is not one of the special cases mentioned in (3).
- So in general, humans ought not to kill non-human subjects of lives, even in the most humane ways possible.
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| Bison at a nearby farm, where I've bought meat in the past. [1] |
* * *
Proponent of AUH: You're wondering why you should believe (4). The most obvious reason to believe (4) is just that there are not any differences between animals and humans that make it okay to kill the former but not the latter.
Omnivore: I disagree. In fact, it seems to me there are two.
First, there is the fact that it is (presumably) quite a different thing to be a human being and to be--for example--a chicken. In particular, there is the (apparent) fact that a human being can reflect on her life, can imagine her life being different than it is, and decide she'd rather it be that way, and so can set goals for herself and experience the satisfaction that comes with achieving them, whereas chickens and (I take it) all or at least most other animals can't do any of this. If my assumption here about the mental lives of animals is right, then it seems fair to say that the life of a human being is much, much richer than that of any animal. For if the capacity I've mentioned is necessary, as it seems to me to be, to experience successes and failures as successes and failures, and if these experiences at least in part constitute some of the best and worst experiences a human being might have, then neither the depths of suffering nor the heights of joy that are possible for humans are even available to animals.
And second, there's the fact that animals just can't do many if not all of the most impressive things humans can do. For instance, animals can't write plays, novels, poems, and dialogues, can't do open-heart surgery, and can't do scientific experiments.
Just for the sake of clarity, let me add a couple more points before we move on:
First, I'm fully aware that the differences between humans and animals are different depending on which type of animal in particular we're talking about, and that some animals might have the capacities I just denied them to some degree. I want to grant that to the degree an animal has any morally significant qualities, they will merit different treatment.
And second, I don't at all mean to be suggesting that because there are these differences between us and animals, we can kill them cruelly, or casually, or for no reason. My suggestion is just that in view of the differences between human beings and animals, it's okay to kill animals in circumstances and for reasons in and for which it wouldn't be permissible to kill a human being. For example, I think it's permissible for Josh to catch and eat fish in something like the way the admirable fisherman he described in "In Defense of Fishing" does, provided of course that the environmental consequences are not too severe and, more generally, that no other unsavory consequences besides the fish's death results from his doing so. But were it the case that I derived a similar level of enjoyment from hunting and eating human beings, it would--needless to say--not be okay for me to do that--even if there were no adverse environmental or other consequences.
First, I'm fully aware that the differences between humans and animals are different depending on which type of animal in particular we're talking about, and that some animals might have the capacities I just denied them to some degree. I want to grant that to the degree an animal has any morally significant qualities, they will merit different treatment.
And second, I don't at all mean to be suggesting that because there are these differences between us and animals, we can kill them cruelly, or casually, or for no reason. My suggestion is just that in view of the differences between human beings and animals, it's okay to kill animals in circumstances and for reasons in and for which it wouldn't be permissible to kill a human being. For example, I think it's permissible for Josh to catch and eat fish in something like the way the admirable fisherman he described in "In Defense of Fishing" does, provided of course that the environmental consequences are not too severe and, more generally, that no other unsavory consequences besides the fish's death results from his doing so. But were it the case that I derived a similar level of enjoyment from hunting and eating human beings, it would--needless to say--not be okay for me to do that--even if there were no adverse environmental or other consequences.
[Animals have] no consciousness that we would recognize as consciousness. No awareness, as far as we can make out, of a self with a history. What I mind is what tends to come next. They have no consciousness therefore. Therefore what? Therefore we are free to use them for our own ends? Therefore we are free to kill them? Why? What is so special about the form of consciousness we recognize that makes killing a bearer of it a crime while killing an animal goes unpunished? [2]Even though what you're saying is significantly different from the remarks of the imaginary omnivores Costello's responding to, my reaction is the same as hers. Your view just seems ludicrous to me. Even supposing you're right about this way the mental lives of human and animals differ, why should these differences between humans and animals make the difference you say it does?
Why the first difference should matter is indeed less obvious. I suppose I take the fundamental reason this difference matters to be that, because there is this difference between us and them, animals lose much, much less than human beings do when they die. When a young person dies, she loses any prospects she might have had of getting married, having children, building a home, reaching the peak of Mt. Everest, publishing a great book, creating a great art work, being at the forefront of a social or political movement that winds up effecting meaningful change, starting a successful business, or of accomplishing whatever other goals she might have had. Of course there's a sense in which animals lose similar prospects--finding a mate, or lots of them, and having children, migrating, hunting--whatever. But in an important sense they don't, since no matter what they might have gone on to do in their lives, they never could have experienced any of it as the achievement of a goal. Nor could they experience failing to do any of these things as failure. Rather, I take it, when they achieve what (in a sense) they want, they feel a kind of satisfaction and a cessation of want, and that when they don't get what they (in a sense) want, they feel discomfort. But neither the highs nor the lows that can come with living a human life ever enter in for them, since animals don't--indeed can't--have goals, at least not in the sense we do (or so I'm assuming).
It occurs to me now that my thinking here is something like my thinking about the difference between a thief who, knowing full well what he's doing, steals the car of a single mother struggling to make ends meet and one who does the same to a millionaire. Both of the thieves have done something blameworthy, certainly. But the first thief has committed a much worse crime than the second just because he takes so much from someone who can afford to lose so little, whereas what the second takes from the millionaire the latter can replace with a wave of his hand. Killing a human being seems to me something like robbing the single mother, killing an animal like robbing the millionaire. The salient difference is just that whereas it's wrong to rob even a millionaire, it's not wrong to kill animals in certain ways.
Proponent of AUH: This all still strikes me as perverse. Just consider what the things you're saying sound like transposed to interactions between humans. Regarding the first difference, you're saying that because since, if you take something from someone else, they wouldn't really lose that much, it's okay for you to do it. And regarding the second, you're saying that because there's no reason to expect someone to anything very important with their life if left to their own devices, you can do whatever you need to do with them in order to achieve your own, more momentous or meaningful or higher ends (within limits, of course, as you've made clear).
Of course, we do think in something like these ways in some other cases. As for the first line thought, think, for example, about why it's okay for a job applicant to take a job if he's offered it, even though by doing so he does a kind of harm to any other applicants for the same job by foreclosing for them certain possibilities (namely, having the job in question) previously open to them. Part of the reason is surely that the extent to which the other job applicants will be harmed if one of them takes the job is minimal: they are merely deprived of a possible experience of which they never had any reasonable assurance in the first place. But that can't be the whole reason this is okay: otherwise it would in general be all right for us to cause small amounts of harm to others, and it's not. To round out the story, we need to notice that when someone applies for a job, he gives his tacit consent to the possibility that some other candidate might harm him by depriving him of any hope he might have had of getting that job.
It occurs to me now that my thinking here is something like my thinking about the difference between a thief who, knowing full well what he's doing, steals the car of a single mother struggling to make ends meet and one who does the same to a millionaire. Both of the thieves have done something blameworthy, certainly. But the first thief has committed a much worse crime than the second just because he takes so much from someone who can afford to lose so little, whereas what the second takes from the millionaire the latter can replace with a wave of his hand. Killing a human being seems to me something like robbing the single mother, killing an animal like robbing the millionaire. The salient difference is just that whereas it's wrong to rob even a millionaire, it's not wrong to kill animals in certain ways.
Proponent of AUH: This all still strikes me as perverse. Just consider what the things you're saying sound like transposed to interactions between humans. Regarding the first difference, you're saying that because since, if you take something from someone else, they wouldn't really lose that much, it's okay for you to do it. And regarding the second, you're saying that because there's no reason to expect someone to anything very important with their life if left to their own devices, you can do whatever you need to do with them in order to achieve your own, more momentous or meaningful or higher ends (within limits, of course, as you've made clear).
Of course, we do think in something like these ways in some other cases. As for the first line thought, think, for example, about why it's okay for a job applicant to take a job if he's offered it, even though by doing so he does a kind of harm to any other applicants for the same job by foreclosing for them certain possibilities (namely, having the job in question) previously open to them. Part of the reason is surely that the extent to which the other job applicants will be harmed if one of them takes the job is minimal: they are merely deprived of a possible experience of which they never had any reasonable assurance in the first place. But that can't be the whole reason this is okay: otherwise it would in general be all right for us to cause small amounts of harm to others, and it's not. To round out the story, we need to notice that when someone applies for a job, he gives his tacit consent to the possibility that some other candidate might harm him by depriving him of any hope he might have had of getting that job.
There are also a handful of cases in which we think in something like the second way I mentioned as well, surprising as this may be. Think, for example, about imprisonment. Ideally, the way this works is that when people do things harmful to others, we deprive them of their autonomy and force them to do something that will make them into better people, ones who will no longer make others worse off. (I've been given to understand that American prisons generally fall depressingly far short of this ideal, but that's not relevant for my purposes. It's the ideal case that matters.) But here too, the only reason it's okay to imprison someone is that they have, in a way described to Socrates by the laws in Plato's Crito, given their tacit consent to our doing so, even if they in fact protest: by choosing to live in a country where one is imprisoned for breaking the laws, one gives one's tacit consent to being imprisoned if it can be shown, in accordance with whatever conventions for doing show prevail in that country, that one has broken those laws.
What disturbs me about your suggestion is that you seem to think the ways of thinking I described are okay in our relations with animals even though animals do not ever consent to being killed or otherwise having their lives interfered with in any way or for any reason.
Omnivore: I agree with what you've said about the job applicant case and about imprisonment, but I don't think your remarks show that there's anything amiss in the way I'm thinking about our relations with animals. Everything hinges here on how we think about the fact that, as you put it, "animals do not ever consent to being killed or otherwise having their lives interfered with in any way or for any reason."
You can begin to see what I mean if you consider the following line of thought. It seems reasonable to say that John cannot consent that Mary do something to him if John cannot consider how his life would be were Mary to do whatever she's proposing and judge that way for his life to be acceptable. But, I take it, at least most if not all animals lack this capacity (and as before, if they can, then these considerations don't apply to them). And if that's right, it seems it's the case not only that animals don't in fact consent, but in addition that they couldn't possibly do so. And if animals can't consent, they can't refuse consent either, at least not in the same sense people can.
Now, with this picture of how things stand firmly in view, consider with me these the following facts:
(2) is more like (3) than (1): regarding both (2) and (3), things couldn't have been otherwise, since neither the chicken nor the bricks could possibly have consented. This consideration suggests it might be the case with chickens as with bricks that we may do with them as we will, and that the fact that a chicken doesn't consent to being treated in a certain way gives us no reason to do or refrain from doing anything to or with regard to it.
But of course, chickens are not bricks: while chickens can't experience successes and failures as such, they do experience pleasure and pain. In view of this difference, many people have thought, quite reasonably, that with chickens it is just not the case, as it is with bricks, that we may do with them whatever we will. So, in terms of its practical significance, (3) differs significantly from (2).
You can begin to see what I mean if you consider the following line of thought. It seems reasonable to say that John cannot consent that Mary do something to him if John cannot consider how his life would be were Mary to do whatever she's proposing and judge that way for his life to be acceptable. But, I take it, at least most if not all animals lack this capacity (and as before, if they can, then these considerations don't apply to them). And if that's right, it seems it's the case not only that animals don't in fact consent, but in addition that they couldn't possibly do so. And if animals can't consent, they can't refuse consent either, at least not in the same sense people can.
Now, with this picture of how things stand firmly in view, consider with me these the following facts:
- The millionaire in my example doesn't consent to having his car stolen.
- The chicken whence came the fajitas I ate over the holidays did not consent to being killed and eaten.
- The bricks my house is made of didn't consent to being made into a house.
- Babies don't consent to being taught a language.
(2) is more like (3) than (1): regarding both (2) and (3), things couldn't have been otherwise, since neither the chicken nor the bricks could possibly have consented. This consideration suggests it might be the case with chickens as with bricks that we may do with them as we will, and that the fact that a chicken doesn't consent to being treated in a certain way gives us no reason to do or refrain from doing anything to or with regard to it.
But of course, chickens are not bricks: while chickens can't experience successes and failures as such, they do experience pleasure and pain. In view of this difference, many people have thought, quite reasonably, that with chickens it is just not the case, as it is with bricks, that we may do with them whatever we will. So, in terms of its practical significance, (3) differs significantly from (2).
Might then certain types of people who can't consent, like babies, provide a better model? Like bricks and chickens, babies human beings not only don't but in fact cannot consent, since both groups lack the relevant capacity. Nevertheless, (4) doesn't license us to do as we will with babies. Rather, since babies will one day be able to consent or refuse to consent to have certain things done to or with them, we are obligated to respect the decisions we can expect them to make. In order to do that, we have to figure out what those decisions might be, and so (4) gives us reason to do our best to put ourselves in their shoes and figure out what we would want were we in similar circumstances. Since it's hard to see why anyone would prefer never to have learned any language, the conclusion it seems this exercise ought to lead us to draw is that we have a very strong reason to teach children languages.
So is (2) like (4)? Not quite. Unlike with babies, it's not the case that chickens will one day be able to consent or refuse to consent to have certain things done to or with them. Since that means there simply are no decisions we can expect them to make one day, it simply cannot be true that we are obligated to respect those decisions. Still, though, something like the same imaginative procedure seems in order. Perhaps, then, (2) gives us reason to ask what a chicken would consent to were it to have, just for a moment, the opportunity to step back and, with human-like cognitive abilities and full knowledge of what it's like to be a human being, reflect on its life.
So what would a chicken like that want? Consider, for example, the case of the chicken whence came my holiday fajitas. If we had been able to ask it beforehand whether or not it was okay with it if I made it into fajita meat, what might it have said, assuming for the sake of argument that it had somehow acquired human-like cognitive abilities and some general knowledge about human life?
So is (2) like (4)? Not quite. Unlike with babies, it's not the case that chickens will one day be able to consent or refuse to consent to have certain things done to or with them. Since that means there simply are no decisions we can expect them to make one day, it simply cannot be true that we are obligated to respect those decisions. Still, though, something like the same imaginative procedure seems in order. Perhaps, then, (2) gives us reason to ask what a chicken would consent to were it to have, just for a moment, the opportunity to step back and, with human-like cognitive abilities and full knowledge of what it's like to be a human being, reflect on its life.
So what would a chicken like that want? Consider, for example, the case of the chicken whence came my holiday fajitas. If we had been able to ask it beforehand whether or not it was okay with it if I made it into fajita meat, what might it have said, assuming for the sake of argument that it had somehow acquired human-like cognitive abilities and some general knowledge about human life?
Proponent of AUH*: Obviously that it's not all right with being fajitas, right? If they could, I take it animals would make the same choice any human being would.
Omnivore: Well, the chicken certainly might think like that. But mightn't the chicken instead think like this? "I suppose that under certain conditions, I could make myself amenable to being made into fajitas. Certainly I want to be allowed to live a full life, where that means growing into adulthood, laying a bunch of eggs, spending a good deal of time pecking for grubs and such in fields, roosting in a comfortable environment, raising a few chicks, hanging around other chickens, and generally living well. But I realize that once I've done all of those things, there's really not that much more to a chicken life. More life would just mean more of the same. And while I'm sure I would enjoy it, I realize that it's possible that if I allow my life to be cut short, my life might be made to serve purposes toward the achievement of which it wouldn't otherwise have contributed. In particular, I could help to make it possible that some people (those who eat me) live lives more enjoyable than mine could ever be, that they live good, admirable lives, or that they accomplish something great. And besides, fajitas are delicious, so at the very least they'll enjoy eating me. So I suppose that, after I've gotten my fill of chicken life, and so long as the people who eat me make it a point to make their lives live up to the sacrifice I've made and are sufficiently appreciative of that sacrifice, and I am killed in the least painful way possible, I could become fajitas."
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| Chicken fajitas. [3] |
Proponent of AUH: Okay, fine: I admit that a chicken might think like that. But surely you would admit that it might also think in the way I suggested. If you do, it seems to me your view faces a tough question: how ought we to choose on which of the two possible ways the chicken might think to base our behavior?
Omnivore: You're right--that is a tough question, and there's no obvious answer to it. But--crucially--your view faces the same tough question, since if you can't rule out the possible answer I've suggested for the chicken, I don't see any grounds for your claim that killing it (with all the caveats I've mentioned) is impermissible. In any case, here's a proposal for deciding this question that suggests mine is the better approach. If you can think of a better alternative, I would be very interested to hear it.
Perhaps it helps here to think again about babies. We can perhaps imagine someone growing up and feeling resentful that they were ever taught a language. But does that--should that--stop any parent from teaching their children language? Of course not. But why should this be? Perhaps the answer is that what's important is not so much what the child might end up wanting later in its life as what it should want at that time. And it should want to have learned a language, since not knowing one would be incapacitating.
Now, I want to suggest, perhaps we can think of the animal case in a similar way. Perhaps we ought not to be concerned with what our imaginary super-smart chicken might in fact think as in what it should think. And, I submit, it should think in the way I've suggested rather than in the way you've suggested, since my way is more selfless and, for that reason, nobler.
Vegans and vegetarians have often invited omnivores to ask themselves whether or not the pleasure they derive from using or consuming products made from dead animals was so great that it justified the killing involved. Similarly, my position invites omnivores to ask themselves a question when they choose to use or consume animal products: will you live your life so nobly, or accomplish anything so great, or experience anything so wonderful, that you can claim to have a right to do what you're doing? The difference between this question and the vegan's or vegetarian's is that whereas the latter is meant to show the omnivore that his actions are unjustifiable, mine sets him a task.
Perhaps it helps here to think again about babies. We can perhaps imagine someone growing up and feeling resentful that they were ever taught a language. But does that--should that--stop any parent from teaching their children language? Of course not. But why should this be? Perhaps the answer is that what's important is not so much what the child might end up wanting later in its life as what it should want at that time. And it should want to have learned a language, since not knowing one would be incapacitating.
Now, I want to suggest, perhaps we can think of the animal case in a similar way. Perhaps we ought not to be concerned with what our imaginary super-smart chicken might in fact think as in what it should think. And, I submit, it should think in the way I've suggested rather than in the way you've suggested, since my way is more selfless and, for that reason, nobler.
Vegans and vegetarians have often invited omnivores to ask themselves whether or not the pleasure they derive from using or consuming products made from dead animals was so great that it justified the killing involved. Similarly, my position invites omnivores to ask themselves a question when they choose to use or consume animal products: will you live your life so nobly, or accomplish anything so great, or experience anything so wonderful, that you can claim to have a right to do what you're doing? The difference between this question and the vegan's or vegetarian's is that whereas the latter is meant to show the omnivore that his actions are unjustifiable, mine sets him a task.
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Proponents of AUH, how should the conversation go after this? Or what should the proponent have said that I left out? Or is there a more compelling defense open to the omnivore? I'd love it if someone were to write a continuation of the dialogue in the comments. I'm especially interested to hear about any considerations that suggest the mental lives of animals are richer in some significant way than the omnivore in the dialogue assumes.
Notes
[1] Image from the farm's Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/gunpowderbison?fref=ts.
[2] J.M. Coetzee, The Lives of Animals, (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001), p. 44.
[3] Image from http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/chicken-fajitas-4.
