Planet Debate 2011 September/October l-d release Animal Rights
AT: “Animal Rights Counterproductive for Animals- Trades Off With Species Protection”
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AT: “Animal Rights Counterproductive for Animals- Trades Off With Species Protection”TURN - THE LOGICAL CONCLUSION OF HOLIST PHILOSOPHY WOULD BE TO SELECTIVELY “CULL” HUMAN POPULATIONS IN AREAS WHERE IT THREATENS BIODIVERSITY Tom Regan, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, North Carolina State University, 2003, The Animal Ethics Reader, eds. Armstrong & Botzler, p. 457-8 Holism—or, to speak more precisely, the unqualified, unequivocal version of holism sketched above—takes a strong moral stance in opposition to whatever upsets the diversity, balance and sustainability of the community of life. Unquestionably, it is the human presence and the effects of human activities that have by far the most adverse effects on the diversity, balance and sustainability of the life community. Now, as we have seen, the holist’s response to such effects when these are allegedly caused by nonhumans (for example, by an overabundance of deer) is to recommend a limited hunting season, to cull the herd, and thereby restore ecological balance. Why, then, should holists not advocate comparable policies in the face of human depredation of the life community? In other words, why should holists stop short of recommending that the human population be culled using measures no less lethal than those used in the case of controlling the population of deer? Granted, the latter is legal, the former is not. But legality is not a reliable guide to morality, and the question before us is a question of morals, not a question of law. And it is the moral question that needs to be presented. ANIMAL RIGHTS ETHICS FOSTERS INCREASED RESPECT FOR ECOSYSTEM—CONNECTIONS TO OTHER BEINGS Kyle Ash, lobbying strategist at the European Environmental Bureau, 2005 Animal Law (INTERNATIONAL ANIMAL RIGHTS: SPECIESISM AND EXCLUSIONARY HUMAN DIGNITY,) 2005 (lexis) The main problem with Mill's utilitarianism is that he did not allow for morality to be based on any type of intuition, n46 for the same reason that Kant displaced humanity from nature. Neither person realized that humanity is part of and created in biology. The intuitive basis for morality is not entirely that which is purported by religious zealots, n47 but is subject also to what we call in other animals "instinct." For instance, Zane refers to one instinct of primordial humans: the "intense tendency in each individual to preserve [her] social community as an organization." n48 Surely some remnants of this instinct remain today, for example, in the form of human emotions that support natural sympathy. Viewing ourselves as one of many primates, instead of viewing humanity as composed of transcendental beings somehow set apart from our evolutionary kindred, makes it easier to better understand our social behavior. Our valuation a priori of an action, i.e., our morality, is determined not simply by our ability to reason, but also by the same biological mechanisms we use to explain the instinctive actions of other animals. These biological mechanisms may influence intuition as Mill referred to it and as it is commonly understood. ANIMAL RIGHTS RESTORES LINK BETWEEN THE LAW AND NATURE Kyle Ash, lobbying strategist at the European Environmental Bureau, 2005 Animal Law (INTERNATIONAL ANIMAL RIGHTS: SPECIESISM AND EXCLUSIONARY HUMAN DIGNITY,) 2005 (lexis) 13 Humans and nonhumans alike suffer from the orthodoxy that "the role of law and the role of rights is to elevate, to bring us up above the law of nature." Separating law from nature, or attempting to rise above nature, reflects a predicament arising from what we have misnamed "social Darwinism," and is ill-conceived. Darwin's discoveries were not of a brutish "might makes right" natural world, as our Hobbesian psychological associations have misinterpreted. Darwin saw an interdependent society of organisms that includes humans.
Tom Regan, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, North Carolina State University, 2003, The Animal Ethics Reader, eds. Armstrong & Botzler, p. 458 Either holists mean what they say, or they do not. If they do not, then there is no reason to take them seriously. If they do, then they cannot avoid embracing the draconian implications to which their position commits them… As was true in that earlier case, it is no good attempting to defend zoos in particular by appealing to a moral outlook that is morally unacceptable in general. Thus, because holism is not a morally acceptable outlook, it is not an acceptable basis for assessing the moral justification of zoos. RESPECT FOR INDIVIDUAL ANIMALS’ RIGHTS DOES NOT PROHIBIT ACTIONS TO PROTECT THE SPECIES AS A WHOLE Bryan G. Norton, professor of philosophy, science and technology, School of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2003, Searching for Sustainability: interdisciplinary essays in the philosophy of conservation biology, p. 389-90 Now consider again the situation of a captive animal that will be used as a part of a captive breeding program. This animal is a wild animal, but we have accepted responsibility for its care and brought it into the context of the conservation community, and in that context we have obligations to respect its considerable ontological value, which requires that we respect the sentience of the animal by limiting its pain, especially in the extremity of death. But full respect for a truly wild animal, an animal that exists with integrity in its traditional niche and still inhabits the least disturbed areas of its traditional range, requires that we recognize also the intergenerational aspect of the great striving toward life. The struggle of animals to exist in the wild is both a struggle to survive individually and a struggle to perpetuate their species. A reasonable concept of animal altruism must account for the natural instinct of animals toward individual survival and, in addition, their natural instinct to perpetuate their species. It is an awkward truth that humans must decide which members of the community will be sacrificed in the furtherance of their species and of the ecological community that constitutes their niche. The problem of exploding human population and destruction of habitats for other species is in a profound sense a human problem. It is anthropogenic in its causes, and we must accept responsibility for our past and present actions that inevitably shape the future. But the solution is surely not to domesticate all animals. If we accept responsibility for a wild animal and then reduce that animal to a creature incapable of noble acts in service of its community, this too is an act of disrespect, because in the wild the animal acted both to survive and to perpetuate its species. We can now see the error in individualistic and extensioninst positions on interspecific ethics. By denying that animal altruism in the service of higher ideals can ever be justified because the crucial condition of voluntarism cannot be fulfilled, the individualists, respect only the drive toward individual preservation and ignore the equally powerful drive of animals to perpetuate their species. Individual members of every social species (which includes at least every sexually reproducing species) live in existential paradox—the drives to survive and to reproduce one’s kind, usually mutually reinforcing, can conflict, forcing a choice between individual preservation and contribution to species perpetuation. Directory: file -> view view -> Western Europe after wwii view -> Author study: paul fleischman view -> Qpa1 7ela study Guide view -> Arctic Oil/Gas Neg view -> November 1970 Approximately 150,000-500,000 deaths Bhola Cyclone Bangladesh view -> Grade Level: 6 Unit of Study: Caribbean glce view -> Citation: Duffield, Katy view -> Table of Contents Lesson # view -> Chinese Wind Energy Disad Download 1.43 Mb. Share with your friends:
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