One of the most controversial and influential philosophers alive today, Peter Singer is DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University, and laureate professor at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, University of Melbourne. He writes a regular column for Free Inquiry magazine, and is the author of dozens of books, including Practical Ethics, Rethinking Life and Death, Animal Liberation, and Writings on an Ethical Life.
In this discussion with D.J. Grothe, Peter Singer defends vegetarianism, arguing that we should give equal consideration to all “beings who have interests.” He draws ethical distinctions between human fetuses and animals, such as dogs and cats. He argues against “dominionism,” which is the idea that humanity is special, and that other animals were made by God for humanity’s benefit. He attacks “speciesism,” and explains why he did not sign the Humanist Manifesto 2000. He describes factory farming, and the commercial imperatives that he says cause animals to be treated as mere property. He talks about the decision to become a vegetarian, and what keeps secularists and scientists from making the decision, in terms of the question he posed to Richard Dawkins at a recent Center for Inquiry conference. And he considers how working with the religious may advance vegetarianism in society.
This, among other things,is what makes this man a world leader in Fringe Scientific Worldviews.Is he throwing out the complete history of animal evolution?Is he stating that we must now conscientiously “evolve” a new moral ethic? Perpendicular to the known world facts,concerning diets and man-animal relationships?Is he stating that the progenitor species of man,who were omnivores,were evolving incorrectly?Where in the timeline of man,were we supposed to stop using animals?Now!Now is the time for this evolutional “correction”?
One other point.In stating that we should beholden ourselves as equal to animals(which I do believe),how do we view the process of other animals preying upon other animals?Are we to state that we are “above this utility”,and in doing so aren’t we proclaiming that we ARE better than other animals?
If vegetarianism can stand on its own,regarding rationality and “moral ethic”(?!!?),then does one need to include the religous(???@!!??)to bolster these views?
What could have been alternatives to man hooking up a yoke to a team of oxen and plowing a field?What were the alternatives for using animal fur to insulate man on his migration northward out of Africa?Would we be here today if humans stopped eating meat thousands of years ago?
For anyone to argue against these past utilities,is an exercise in negative-time realities.
Now,here at the present,how can the human inhabitants of Earth be “taught”(?)that using animals for food,pets,or horsepower is morally unethical?Or does this code of ethics only apply to white,educated,comfortable peoples?Upper-end bourgeoise,and the intelligentsia?
What could have been alternatives to man hooking up a yoke to a team of oxen and plowing a field?What were the alternatives for using animal fur to insulate man on his migration northward out of Africa?Would we be here today if humans stopped eating meat thousands of years ago?
For anyone to argue against these past utilities,is an exercise in negative-time realities.
Now,here at the present,how can the human inhabitants of Earth be “taught”(?)that using animals for food,pets,or horsepower is morally unethical?Or does this code of ethics only apply to white,educated,comfortable peoples?Upper-end bourgeoise,and the intelligentsia?
I would add to your list the theory among EP and cognitive scientists that eating meat was a determinant in the development of our brains. Specifically, the observation that relatively large brains are massively energy-demanding and it would have been very difficult for purely vegetarian early hominids to feed increasingly larger brains. In modern humans, the brain consumes 20% of all energy while accounting for only 2% of body weight. It could be that the faculty for advanced abstract moral reasoning by which we now become vegans would have been biologically impossible to evolve without a meat diet.
Of course, VYAZMA, vegans will brush these arguments off as obsolete- what is true then is not true now so why play by rules which no longer exist? Police, books and internets didn’t used to exist either. So what?
I enjoyed this podcast and find Singer cogent and plain spoken.
I like and agree with the idea of a moral continuum- that there is a degree of moral value and that we do not need to impose black & white standards. To the Christian right Terri Shivo has equal moral value to any conscious, healthy person. This is madness to me, even though I would never say her moral quotient was zero. An embryo is not equal to an adult human and it is also not equal to nothing. I take these points as banal.. but surprisingly many do not.
I was a bit bored in digressions about religion-spawned speciesist bias in both that I think it is not correct and that it is not relevant to a serious discussion of ethics, but that is my atheistic bias I suppose.
Most surpising is what I did not hear: any reason to think meat-eating is inherently unethical. Singer said he became a vegitarian because he did not want to be complicit in the factory farming atrocity. He also said his chief concern is the conditions of life for the animals, that they do not suffer and participate in whatever social organization typifies their species and so on. These are reasonable points. Neither forbid imaginable (if not existant) cruelty-free meat-eating. This past election in California was a win for chickens (but humans, not so much) and is part of the increasing evidence we can successful reform our agriculture practices without destroying them and the economy with it. One small step forward.
[Most surpising is what I did not hear: any reason to think meat-eating is inherently unethical. Singer said he became a vegitarian because he did not want to be complicit in the factory farming atrocity. He also said his chief concern is the conditions of life for the animals, that they do not suffer and participate in whatever social organization typifies their species and so on. These are reasonable points. Neither forbid imaginable (if not existant) cruelty-free meat-eating. This past election in California was a win for chickens (but humans, not so much) and is part of the increasing evidence we can successful reform our agriculture practices without destroying them and the economy with it. One small step forward.
If someone wants to choose the time and place of their dying,it should be completely acceptable,politicaly,and socially.If someone chooses to terminate a pregnancy,so be it.If we can establish sound,non-arbitrarial methods for screening out severely defected fetuses/infants-great!!So on and so forth.As a matter of fact,most of these issues were relevant,thousands of years ago.
So in effect-todays groundbreaking(actually moree breaking)scientists,want to revert to a time when life itself,not laws and religion controlled life.
However,this doesn’t include the use of animals.This topic,somehow we want to move forward.Don’t get me wrong,I love animals.I hate cruel situations concerning the animal/human relationship.I don’t feel threatened about someones proposals towards the recognition of animal rights.I just can’t see where this fits into the picture.The whole picture.How does this jibe with the fact that we are animals ourselves?We are not better animals!!
...So in effect-todays groundbreaking(actually moree breaking)scientists,want to revert to a time when life itself,not laws and religion controlled life.
However,this doesn’t include the use of animals.This topic,somehow we want to move forward.Don’t get me wrong,I love animals.I hate cruel situations concerning the animal/human relationship.I don’t feel threatened about someones proposals towards the recognition of animal rights.I just can’t see where this fits into the picture.The whole picture.How does this jibe with the fact that we are animals ourselves?We are not better animals!!
I do not understand your point about us being animals. Yes we are, and? That makes it natural for us to exploit other creatures because thats what animals do? But we’re also inherently reason-capable and consider the short and long term consequences of our actions.. which is certainly as natural and animal-y as anything else about us.
You seem to be saying that if something is “natural” (appears in nature or is part of an evolved set of behaviors), that makes it automatically ethically ok. Animals eat animals, our ancestors evolved eating animals, so eating animals is automatically ok. There are a lot of problems with this approach. For one thing, it’s possible to declare almost anything morally ok based on such an argument. Cannibalism, rape, infanticide all occur in lots of animals besides humans, and these along with slavery, torture, genocide, pedophilia, and lots of other things we don’t think are good today have occurred throughout human history and can be argued to be “natural” human behaviors. Just because other animals do it or our ancestors did doesn’t mean it’s ok. Evolution and history make lousy justifications for moral principles.
As for our being animals, again I don’t think it matters. Of course we are, but that doesn’t mean we have to or should behave like others. We don’t live in burrows, eat our own feces (usually), make nests, or do any of a million other things other animals do. It’s not that we aren’t animals, it’s just that we are like us not like anything else. And the normal human tendancy, built into us by evolution, is to try and figure out the world and make rules for oursleves about how to live. It doesn’t make sense to call those rules “unnatural” just because other animals don’t have them.
There are lots of good argumetns against what SInger is saying, but dismissing him as “Fringe” and claiming eating meat is part of the natural order of things doesn’t work.
...So in effect-todays groundbreaking(actually moree breaking)scientists,want to revert to a time when life itself,not laws and religion controlled life.
However,this doesn’t include the use of animals.This topic,somehow we want to move forward.Don’t get me wrong,I love animals.I hate cruel situations concerning the animal/human relationship.I don’t feel threatened about someones proposals towards the recognition of animal rights.I just can’t see where this fits into the picture.The whole picture.How does this jibe with the fact that we are animals ourselves?We are not better animals!!
I do not understand your point about us being animals. Yes we are, and? That makes it natural for us to exploit other creatures because thats what animals do? But we’re also inherently reason-capable and consider the short and long term consequences of our actions.. which is certainly as natural and animal-y as anything else about us.
OK….Singer states he questions speciesm and dominionism.I agree with those concepts.I believe we are animals and we are not better animals than all the other animals.So in this context how can someone who understands that domionism or speciesm is wrong,turn around and say we’re better than animals,we can decide what’s morally right and wrong?If animals eat animals,and people have been eating animals forever,and will continue to do so,why try to protect animals rights in that context.Couldn’t an anti-specieist understand mans relationship with animals,the same way he understands other inter-animal relationships.
I have already spelled this out in the previous posts above.
Sate..on the other hand,Yes!Of course we are more cognizant,and can make less “instinctual"choices.So if someone chooses not to eat meat,I fully understand that,and respect it,on any level.Morally,economically,religously,squeamishly,etc…..!
You seem to be saying that if something is “natural” (appears in nature or is part of an evolved set of behaviors), that makes it automatically ethically ok. Animals eat animals, our ancestors evolved eating animals, so eating animals is automatically ok. There are a lot of problems with this approach. For one thing, it’s possible to declare almost anything morally ok based on such an argument. Cannibalism, rape, infanticide all occur in lots of animals besides humans, and these along with slavery, torture, genocide, pedophilia, and lots of other things we don’t think are good today have occurred throughout human history and can be argued to be “natural” human behaviors. Just because other animals do it or our ancestors did doesn’t mean it’s ok. Evolution and history make lousy justifications for moral principles.
As for our being animals, again I don’t think it matters. Of course we are, but that doesn’t mean we have to or should behave like others. We don’t live in burrows, eat our own feces (usually), make nests, or do any of a million other things other animals do. It’s not that we aren’t animals, it’s just that we are like us not like anything else. And the normal human tendancy, built into us by evolution, is to try and figure out the world and make rules for oursleves about how to live. It doesn’t make sense to call those rules “unnatural” just because other animals don’t have them.
There are lots of good argumetns against what SInger is saying, but dismissing him as “Fringe” and claiming eating meat is part of the natural order of things doesn’t work.
I hate to sound brusque,but I haven’t used the word “NATURAL"in any of the above posts.I explained my reasoning well enough.What is your counterpoint?Yes you can dispute my terminology,you can try to hollow out my evolutionary contexts,what you can’t do is provide a template for the education,and implementation for the eradication of the use of animals by humans.
Above quote:“just because other animals do it or our ancestors did doesn’t mean it’s ok"Huhn??What?Are we having the same discussion here?I’m not interested in contrived present day ethics.What does yours and other peoples ethics have to do with the past or the future.(the future being the continued need for many people to rely on animals,in this case)
Again-you used the word “natural"not me.I am speaking from a reality context,not a “natural"context.
McKenz…I would add that on the sum total of all scientific endeavors promoting euthanasia and vegetarianism could be considered fringe.And yes,how could you possibly state that eating meat is not the NATURAL order of “things”(?).
In above:”...claiming eating meat is the natural order of things” I never said “things” but I understand the gist.So…you can claim that eating meat is NOT part of the natural order of things…?
OK….Singer states he questions speciesm and dominionism.I agree with those concepts.I believe we are animals and we are not better animals than all the other animals.So in this context how can someone who understands that domionism or speciesm is wrong,turn around and say we’re better than animals,we can decide what’s morally right and wrong?
It is not about who is superior/inferior as a being so much as who has what capability. Humans have a capacity for both abstract reasoning and connecting that reason to our actions. Few or no other creatures have this property. I don’t tell fish how to swim and they don’t tell me what to abhor. Further, there is no way to be a living human and not decide what is morally right or wrong. Almost every choice you make has at least a tiny moral consideration. I could decide to eat the last donut knowing you want one, but whether I do or not I have made a moral choice. (I’d totally eat it, btw)
What is happening (animal rights movements) is not some new idea or revolution in moral thought.. it is merely the start of us applying ancient moral values in a more consistent way than we previously did.. most likely because previously it was a luxury we could not afford but now we can.
VYAZMA - 16 November 2008 10:47 AM
If animals eat animals,and people have been eating animals forever,and will continue to do so,why try to protect animals rights in that context.Couldn’t an anti-specieist understand mans relationship with animals,the same way he understands other inter-animal relationships.
I have already spelled this out in the previous posts above.
Sate..on the other hand,Yes!Of course we are more cognizant,and can make less “instinctual"choices…
No, because we decide what our relationships will be, within limits of survival. Other animals generally have no capacity to understand the ethical consequences of their actions nor the technology to provide alternatives even if they somehow did. We do, and we do.
Some researchers indicate some non-human primates in fact have some sort of moral reasoning. I must conclude that if this is true, and if these creatures are legally “persons” as in Spain for example.. then certainly some of them should be arrested for their misbehavior (for example, killing an infant after becoming socially dominate in order to produce its own heir). Somehow I don’t think anyone wants to follow this line of thought too far.
Maybe I misunderstood you, but you seemed to be saying that Singer’s point was wrong because animals eat each other and humans evolved as omnivores. Is that not true? If that is what you were saying, than my “counterpoint” was that’s not a good reason for deciding what is right or wrong for the reasons I gave. If you had some other point that I missed, than what was it?
The reason I brought history into it is that you also seemd to say that using animals for work (ploughing, specifically) and wearing their fur was necessary historically for us to survive, and that seemed to be a point you were making to explain why Singer was wrong. Again, was this not what you meant?
As for “fringe” that’s juts your opinion. Anything that is not believed by the majority can be dismissed as “fringe” including the lack of religious belief that brings us both here. So what? The arguments for something are either good or bad, and their popularity has nothing to do with it. I happen to live in a place where lots of people are vegetarians, and it doesn’t seem fring to me, but either way it’s not an argument for or against what Singer is saying.
Is eating meat the “natural” order of things? Depends on what you mean. Is it parft of our evolutionary history and something our bodies are designed to do, sure? Is it the right thing to do? Not necessarily. That’s why again I don’t think you reference to what happens in nature is a good argument against it. Taking antibiotics and getting vaccinated are not “natural,” but they’re a good thing. Rape is “natural,’ but it’s a bad thing. All I’m saying is that what is done in nature or what we evolved to do is not a good reason for or against a particular choice, like eating meat or not eating it.
