Philoscopia

← See the axis · Moral circle

ObjectionAttacks the position

Grief for the animal

When your dog suffers, it is for the dog that you ache, not for your own humanity: our duties regarding animals cannot be merely indirect.

Objects to

  1. For anthropocentrism, we have only regarding animals: in its clearest version, 's, cruelty is wrong because "he who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men."
  2. But look at what we feel before an injured dog or a mistreated animal: not concern for our own character, but pity for the creature. And we judge guilty whoever tortures an animal in secret, even if it hardens him in no way.
  3. Suppose a cruelty without witness, which changes its author in no way: if the wrong lay only in its effects on us, it would be innocent; no one believes that. So it is indeed the animal that is wronged.

Therefore So the suffering animal counts for its own sake: the moral circle cannot stop at persons without contradicting our firmest judgments.

Possible resolutions of the objection

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Challenges
The dignity of the person
Problem
The privilege of the species
Same position
The argument from marginal cases
Other positions
The antibioticA good, but for whom?Reverence for lifeThe whole against the individualThe land ethicThe return of the wolf'Can they suffer?'The fox and the rabbitSentience, an arbitrary boundary?