Animal pain, suffering, and death: why does it matter?

[mrgold]

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Death is the end of all things - there is nothing after that. There is no soul, no heaven no hell. This is true for all life. Knowing this is all you need to know in order to understand why an animal's death matters. It is the end of its existence for all time and that matters to me (most of the time).

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This the same moral relitvists' arguement I had in my add on post. Your post can be boiled down to the last sentance "it matters to me." Good for you, but honestly, I dont care unless you provide a real reason. Why does it matter that a "life" is ending?

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When attempting to make moral decisions the first questino I ask myself is what do I value? What scenarios are preferable to me over other scenarios? The answer is simply that I value my own happiness and well beeing, I value good food, I like playing basketball and poker, I care deeply for family members, etc... I can then reseaonably assume that every other human beeing has certain preferences and values and care about things in a way that I do. Therefore I consider the morally good option to be the one that gives the most people the most happiness (basic utilitarianism). Ending a life is thus bad in that it eliminated all future positive expereiences a particular individual can have (which is especially worrisome if you don't buy into an afterlife).

In making decisions about the validity of animal rights the important question for me is the level of cognition and abillity to perceive pain and pleasure in a way that is similarly meaningful to a human. Obviously I cannot generalize that my perceptions of pain and pleasure are felt in animals nearly as well as I can that they are felt in all humans. So for me the question is one of biology and a creature's rights are entitled to progressively more consideration as they are of higher intelligence.

[w_alloy]

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Therefore I consider the morally good option to be the one that gives the most people the most happiness (basic utilitarianism). Ending a life is thus bad in that it eliminated all future positive expereiences a particular individual can have (which is especially worrisome if you don't buy into an afterlife).

In making decisions about the validity of animal rights the important question for me is the level of cognition and abillity to perceive pain and pleasure in a way that is similarly meaningful to a human. Obviously I cannot generalize that my perceptions of pain and pleasure are felt in animals nearly as well as I can that they are felt in all humans. So for me the question is one of biology and a creature's rights are entitled to progressively more consideration as they are of higher intelligence.


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I like this (honsestly), I dont think I've ever heard a utilitarian argument including animals and scaling on intellgience and/or awareness. I've heard them seperately but never combined.

The fact you wish to scale on intelligence is common and interesting. How do you feel about mentaly retarded humans? Or people in long term (and probably permanent) commas? How about children? I'm guessing you will say that it is actually scaled for species and not individual orginisms. What is the basis for this, if you choose to make this argument? If you do not, there are certain non-human primated who are more intelligent in most regards then severely handicapped humans. Would you advocate giving these primates more "human rights" then the handicapped?

There is also the issue of your assumtion that life is valuable, which you half-heartedly try to pass off as a provable point in the last 2 sentances of your first paragraph. I'm not gonna go in-depth here but I really would like you to reconsider your logic here and consider that this might actually be an assumption you are making. For starters, look at the jumps from yourself to humanity and all living things as a whole.

Edit: I come off a bit douchebaggish in this last paragraph, I dont claim to know much more then you about this, I just want you to explain yourself in more detail so I can understand how you are making these seeming leaps.

[DougShrapnel]

I agree with your post here and your follow-up post as well. I just don't understand why it needed to bring utilitarian ethics in to this argument. Additionally, once you do bring them into play, resolving your reasoned position of “my life is valuable to me”, with the altruistic ethic of utilitarian ethics “my life is valuable and subjugated to society”. Utilitarian ethics adds nothing to your argument and is the greatest logical jump in your post.

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When attempting to make moral decisions the first questino I ask myself is what do I value? What scenarios are preferable to me over other scenarios? The answer is simply that I value my own happiness and well beeing, I value good food, I like playing basketball and poker, I care deeply for family members, etc... I can then reseaonably assume that every other human beeing has certain preferences and values and care about things in a way that I do. Therefore I consider the morally good option to be the one that gives the most people the most happiness (basic utilitarianism). Ending a life is thus bad in that it eliminated all future positive expereiences a particular individual can have (which is especially worrisome if you don't buy into an afterlife).


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Therefore I consider the morally good option to be the one that gives me what I value, while not taking away what others reasonably are shown to value (basic individualism and objectivism, rejection of hedonism and altruism). Ending a life is thus bad in that it eliminated all future positive experiences a particular individual can have (which is especially worrisome if you don't buy into an afterlife).

Your follow up post was especially insightful in that it explains that ethics will only be as correct as our reason, and knowledge is correct. It is only when we say that mankind is not able to reason or understand does ethics live outside of mans domain.

I would say that it is also important to distinguish between values and desires. As to interchange the two will lead to incorrect ethics.

[malorum]

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"it matters to me." Good for you, but honestly, I dont care unless you provide a real reason. Why does it matter that a "life" is ending?

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"You smell that? Do you smell that? Napalm, son. Nothing else in the world smells like that. I love the smell of napalm in the morning."

[w_alloy]

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"Hey, if hooking up a baby chimpanzee to a car battery somehow helps create a longer lasting deodorant then I have only two things to say. Black is negative, red is positive. BZZZZZZZZZZZT!"

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"You smell that? Do you smell that? Napalm, son. Nothing else in the world smells like that. I love the smell of napalm in the morning."

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Can you defend your stances at all? If not, I think you are much more immoral then me.

[Hamish McBagpipe]

"Hey, if hooking up a baby chimpanzee to a car battery somehow helps create a longer lasting deodorant then I have only two things to say. Black is negative, red is positive. BZZZZZZZZZZZT!"

[purnell]

We have empathy. Seeing an animal in pain makes us imagine our own suffering. It's distasteful.

[w_alloy]

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We have empathy. Seeing an animal in pain makes us imagine our own suffering. It's distasteful.


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I agree, but just because something is distasteful or makes us uncomfortable does not make it wrong. I hate cleaning toilets. I also agree that most people think this is so wrong because hearing an animal suffer, especially if they express it in a humanlike way, reminds us of ourselves. I think a lot of people dont realize that this is the basis for their ethical standing on this subject.

[purnell]

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We have empathy. Seeing an animal in pain makes us imagine our own suffering. It's distasteful.


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I agree, but just because something is distasteful or makes us uncomfortable does not make it wrong. I hate cleaning toilets. I also agree that most people think this is so wrong because hearing an animal suffer, especially if they express it in a humanlike way, reminds us of ourselves. I think a lot of people dont realize that this is the basis for their ethical standing on this subject.

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Just to clarify, I was only making an observation. I don't think a logical argument can be made for the existence of "right and wrong" (without resorting to the supernatural). We have need of some standards of behavior to make society function properly, but these are not absolute and can change according to our needs at the time. Anyway, since I don't believe in any absolute morality, I can't truthfully say "that's wrong".

I object to animal torture on a purely emotional basis.

[KeysrSoze]

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However, I think there is a big difference between feeling that killing bunnies with butterknives is wrong, as I strongly do, and thinking this behaviour is wrong, which I, frankly, don't.

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I think from an evolutionary view that its the opposite, theres nothing wrong with torture/killing bunnies, but the behavior is wrong. In a communal/gregarious society that behavior would be selected against (who wants to live with someone callous/crazy enough to pointlessly torture an irrelevant living being? A lot of serial killers get their start doing this) and taboos and repulsion is manifested toward these actions.