To show favouritism toward humans has been considered a prejudice, otherwise known as 'human chauvinism', 'anthropocentrism' or 'speciesism'. Peter Singer is one philosopher in particular who holds this view. In this paper I argue that there is a lack of coherence between his ethical ideology and his actual ethical theory. Singer's ethics in crucial respects exhibits favouritism toward humans, which is something he fails to justify non-partially and plausibly. It would thus be an instance of speciesism, in a sense of (...) this term that he probably would accept. This, however, does not mean that his ethics should be rejected or is impossible to defend. (shrink)

The fact that our attitudes change poses well-known challenges for attitude-sensitive wellbeing theories. Suppose that in the past you favoured your adventurous youthful life more than the quiet and unassuming life you expected to live as an old person; now when you look back you favour your current life more than your youthful past life. Which period of your life is better for you? More generally, how can we find a stable attitude-sensitive standard of wellbeing, if the standard is in (...) part defined in terms of unstable attitudes? In this paper, I introduce an ‘attitudinal matrix’ framework that will help us clear up the problems posed by changing attitudes across time. In particular, it will help us see what is at stake, which principles that can or cannot be combined, and what might be the best solution. I defend a very plausible candidate constraint on a solution to the challenge of changing attitudes, which I call ‘diagonalism’. It is argued that among the three main forms of substantive attitude-sensitive wellbeing theories – the attitude-version, the object-version, and the satisfaction-version – it is the satisfaction-version that can both satisfy diagonalism and provide the best account of temporal and lifetime wellbeing. (shrink)

Este artículo examina los presupuestos metodológicos, axiológicos y normativos en los que descansa la que posiblemente sea la obra más conocida de Peter Singer, Liberación animal. Se exploran las tensiones entre la posición normativa, de compromisos mínimos, que se intenta adoptar en esa obra, y las posiciones de Singer acerca del utilitarismo de las preferencias y el argumento de la reemplazabilidad. Se buscará elucidar en particular el modo en el que surgen tales tensiones al abordarse la consideración del agregacionismo y (...) el interés en vivir en relación con el uso de animales no humanos. This paper examines the methodological, axiological and normative assumptions on which Animal Liberation -arguably the most poular work by Peter Singer- rests. It explores the tensions between the normative position this book intends to adopt, which tries to compromise as little as possible with any specific normative theory, and Singer's views on preference utilitarianism and the replaceability argument. In particular, the paper tries to assess the way in which such tensions arise when aggregationism and the question of the interest in living are considered in relation to the use of nonhuman animals. (shrink)