In spite of the considerable literature nowadays existing on the issue of the moral exclusion of nonhuman animals, there is still work to be done concerning the characterization of the conceptual framework with which this question can be appraised. This paper intends to tackle this task. It starts by defining speciesism as the unjustified disadvantageous consideration or treatment of those who are not classified as belonging to a certain species. It then clarifies some common misunderstandings concerning what this means. Next, (...) it rejects the idea that there are different kinds of speciesism. Such an idea may result from confusion because there are (1) different ways in which speciesism can be defended; and (2) different speciesist positions, that is, different positions that assume speciesism among their premises. Depending on whether or not these views assume other criteria for moral consideration apart from speciesism, they can be combined or simple speciesist positions. But speciesism remains in all cases the same idea. Finally, the paper examines the concept of anthropocentrism, the disadvantageous treatment or consideration of those who are not members of the human species. This notion must be conceptually distinguished from speciesism and from misothery (aversion to nonhuman animals). Anthropocentrism is shown to be refuted because it either commits a petitio principia fallacy or it falls prey to two arguments: the argument from species overlap (widely but misleadingly known as “argument from marginal cases”) and the argument from relevance. This rebuttal identifies anthropocentrism as a speciesist view. (shrink)

The argument from relevance expresses an intuition that, although shared by many applied ethicists, has not been analyzed and systematized in the form of a clear argument thus far. This paper does this by introducing the concept of value relevance, which has been used before in economy but not in the philosophical literature. The paper explains how value relevance is different from moral relevance, and distinguishes between direct and indirect ways in which the latter can depend on the former. These (...) clarifications allow the argument to explain in detail how we can make two claims. The first one is that being a recipient of value should be the only criterion for full moral considerability. This follows if we accept that value relevance should determine, directly or indirectly, moral relevance. The second claim is that, given what the main theories of wellbeing imply regarding what entities can be recipients of value, sentience is both a sufficient and a necessary criterion for full moral considerability. The paper argues that this conclusion stands even if we hold views that consider other values different from sentience. (shrink)

Many think doing animal ethics demands we see moral humanism as a speciesist prejudice of the kind found with sexism and racism. The only serious case for this rests on the Argument from Marginal Cases. We find that argument to the point, but show that properly understood it supports humanism. Understanding why it does this lets us see how we ought to go on in animal ethics.

There has been increasing attention in sociology and internet studies to the topic of ‘digital remains’: the artefacts users of social network services (SNS) and other online services leave behind when they die. But these artefacts also pose philosophical questions regarding what impact, if any, these artefacts have on the ontological and ethical status of the dead. One increasingly pertinent question concerns whether these artefacts should be preserved, and whether deletion counts as a harm to the deceased user and therefore (...) provides pro tanto reasons against deletion. In this paper, I build on previous work invoking a distinction between persons and selves to argue that SNS offer a particularly significant material instantiation of persons. The experiential transparency of the SNS medium allows for genuine co-presence of SNS users, and also assists in allowing persons (but not selves) to persist as ethical patients in our lifeworld after biological death. Using Blustein’s “rescue from insignificance” argument for duties of remembrance, I argue that this persistence function supplies a nontrivial (if defeasible) obligation not to delete these artefacts. Drawing on Luciano Floridi’s account of “constitutive” information, I further argue that the “digital remains” metaphor is surprisingly apt: these artefacts in fact enjoy a claim to moral regard akin to that of corpses. (shrink)

Teresa believes in God. Maggie’s wife believes that the Earth is flat, and also that Maggie should be home from work by now. Anouk—a cat—believes it is dinner time. This dissertation is about what believing is: it concerns what, exactly, ordinary people are attributing to Teresa, Maggie’s wife, and Anouk when affirming that they are believers. Part I distinguishes the attitudes of belief that people attribute to each other (and other animals) in ordinary life from the cognitive states of belief (...) theoretically posited by (some) cognitive scientists. Part II defends the view that to have an attitude of belief is to live—to be disposed to act, react, think, and feel—in a pattern that an actual belief attributor identifies with taking the world to be some way. Drawing on scientific, scholarly, and literary sources of evidence, How Beliefs are like Colors provides a framework for research on belief across the humanities and sciences of the mind. (shrink)

This paper investigates forms of metaphysical vertigo that can appear when contrasts between humans and animals are challenged. Distinguishing three forms of vertigo and four ways of differentiating humans and animals, the paper attempts to achieve a perspicuous representation of what could be termed “the difficulty of being humans when we are animals”; or alternatively, “the difficulty of being animals when we are humans”.

I characterize the main approaches to the moral consideration of children developed in the light of the argument from 'marginal' cases, and develop a more adequate strategy that provides guidance about the moral responsibilities adults have towards children. The first approach discounts the significance of children's potential and makes obligations to all children indirect, dependent upon interests others may have in children being treated well. The next approaches agree that the potential of children is morally considerable, but disagree as to (...) whether and why children with intellectual disabilities are morally considerable. These approaches explore the moral significance of intellectual capacities, species membership, the capacity for welfare, and the interests of others. I argue that relationships characterized by reciprocity of care are morally valuable, that both the potential to be in such relationships and the actuality of being in them are morally valuable, and that many children with significant intellectual disabilities have this potential. (shrink)

Despite the strength of arguments for veganism in the animal rights literature, alongside environmental and other anthropocentric concerns posed by industrialised animal agriculture, veganism remains only a minority standpoint. In this paper, I explore the moral motivational problem of veganism from the perspectives of moral psychology and political false consciousness. I argue that a novel interpretation of the post-Marxist notion of political false consciousness may help to make sense of the widespread refusal to shift towards veganism. Specifically, the notion of (...) false consciousness fills some explanatory gaps left by the moral psychological notion of akrasia, often understood to refer to a weakness of will. Central to my approach is the idea that animal exploitation is largely systemic and the assumption that moral motivation is inseparable from moral thinking. In this light, the primary obstacle to the adoption of veganism arises not so much from a failure to put genuine beliefs into action, but rather in a shared, distorted way of thinking about animals. Thus, common unreflective objections to veganism may be said to be manifestations of false consciousness. (shrink)

The suffering of nonhuman animals has become a noted factor in deciding public policy and legislative change. Yet, despite this growing concern, skepticism toward such suffering is still surprisingly common. This paper analyzes the merits of the skeptical approach, both in its moderate and extreme forms. In the first part it is claimed that the type of criterion for verification concerning the mental states of other animals posed by skepticism is overly (and, in the case of extreme skepticism, illogically) demanding. (...) Resting on Wittgenstein and Husserl, it is argued that skepticism relies on a misguided epistemology and, thus, that key questions posed by it face the risk of absurdity. In the second part of the paper it is suggested that, instead of skepticism, empathy together with intersubjectivity be adopted. Edith Stein’s take on empathy, along with contemporary findings, are explored, and the claim is made that it is only via these two methods of understanding that the suffering of nonhuman animals can be perceived. (shrink)

In several posthumously published writings about the differences between humans and animals, Rush Rhees criticises the view that human lives are more important than (or superior to) animal lives. Rhees' views may seem to be in sympathy with more recent critiques of “speciesism.” However, the most commonly discussed anti-speciesist moral frameworks – which take the capacity of sentience as the criterion of moral considerability – are inadequate. Rhees' remark that both humans and animals can be loved points towards a different (...) way of accounting for the moral considerability of humans and animals that avoid the problems of the capacity-based approaches. (shrink)

Morally unequal treatment of different nonhuman species, like pigs and dogs, can seem troublingly inconsistent. A position Todd May calls moral individualism and relationalism appears to justify the moral discomfit attending such species-differentiated treatment. Yet some of its basic assumptions are challenged by a philosophical style Roger Scruton called narrative philosophy. Expanding upon Christopher Cordner’s discussion of narrative philosophy, this paper develops a narrative-style philosophical critique of Todd May’s moral individualism and relationalism, especially its reductionist understanding of moral reasons, consistency, (...) and relevance. Such criticism opens up the possibility that the unequal treatment of nonhuman species like pigs and dogs is perfectly consistent and even justified. However, the paper then presents a narrative-style argument that such species-differentiated treatment may be morally inconsistent and unjustified after all. (shrink)

When we say that good parenting is an ethical and not a technical matter, what is the nature of the warrant we can give for identifying one way of parenting as good and another as bad? There is, of course, a general issue here about the giving of reasons in ethics. The issue may seem to arise with peculiar force in parenting since parenting casts our whole being into uncertainty: here, above all, it seems, we do not scrutinise our commitments (...) from a moral standpoint that is itself secure, and such moral judgements as we make must be tentative. I attempt to illustrate this from the point of view not of parenting but of owning a dog, where the uncertainty and the tentativeness are more marked still and can be deeply disconcerting. A strong case, however, can be made for saying that these are inevitable and proper features of the essentially dialogic and self-reflexive nature of ethical discourse. When we appreciate this, parenting appears less an especially problematic or marginal field of ethical inquiry than a paradigm case of it. (shrink)