An Introduction to Ethics

Applied Ethics: Animal Rights and Abortion

Applied Ethics?Normative ethics aims to answer the question:

‘what principle, if any, should we follow?’, or ‘by what standard should an action be judged good or bad?’.

Applied, or ‘practical’, ethics examines concrete cases and looks at how the normative considerations can guide our judgements in problematic (disputable) cases.

Applied EthicsTopics of interest include:

Abortion

Euthanasia

Animal Rights

Suicide

Free Speech

Drug Use

Applied EthicsThe most prominent applied ethicist is, without a

doubt, Peter Singer whose book ‘Practical Ethics’ raised many of the debates we have today.

Animal RightsOne of Singer’s most important contributions

(and certainly the one he’s most noted for) is to the debate surrounding Animal Rights…

Animal RightsSinger begins his paper ‘All animals are equal’ by

looking at a variety of ‘liberation movements’ (black emancipation, female suffrage, &c.).

Equality is a problematic term – if everyone should have equal rights (e.g. men should have the right to an abortion)…

We do not have equal rights, therefore… we are not equal?

What are we then asserting when we say all human beings, despite race, creed, gender, &c., are equal?

Animal RightsEquality of talents? (obviously not.)

People seem to be different in almost every respect… different physical features, dispositions, feelings, skills, mental capacities, physical capacities &c.

Should we, then, jettison the idea of equality as something to strive for?

Animal RightsWell, no. Knowing a person’s race, sex (or

whatever) will not tell you anything about that person’s capacities – there are no differences between the races and sexes ‘as such’.

Does this help the ‘egalitarian’?

Plea to dignity…

Animal RightsWhat’s all this got to do with animal rights?

We extend certain rights to humans – regardless of that human’s capacity. The Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge has as many rights (generally speaking) as the village idiot.

Why do we stop with humans?

Animal RightsSpeciesism

Talk of humans vs. animals might be problematic…

Two pictures:

{humans} {animals} – humans and animals are distinct (exclusive) sets.

Animal RightsSpeciesism

Talk of humans vs. animals might be problematic…

Two pictures:

{humans} {animals} – humans and animals are distinct (exclusive) sets.

Animals = {humans and non-humans} – humans are a sort of animal.

Animal RightsSpeciesism

We should probably accept picture two – but we act as if picture one were true.

If picture two is true – and if we should be extending rights to things that are different in capacity (animals are different in ‘degree’ not in ‘type’), then why shouldn’t animals be ‘bearers of rights’?

Animal RightsIf women and men have a different set of rights

(men don’t have a right to an abortion – that would be just plain strange), then can’t we say animals have a different set of rights still?

What rights should we grant a non-human person?(person = bearer of rights)

Animal RightsQuick questions

Should animal suffering be regarded as ‘less important’ than human suffering? What justification do we have for this?

Is speciesism as bad as racism/sexism/x-ism?

Break

AbortionTwo thoughts…

1. A woman has a right to decide what happens in and to her body.

2. All persons have a right to life.

Holding these two premises could cause problems for discussing abortion…

AbortionThought one can accommodate the view that

abortion is permissible.

Thought two might not.

Thoughts for thought two?

AbortionAll persons have the right to life.

What counts as a ‘person’?

Does this ‘right’ trump ALL OTHER considerations?

AbortionAll persons have the right to life.

What counts as a ‘person’?

Person from conception?

If not, why not?

‘[…] to choose a point in this development and say “before this point the thing is not a person, after this point it is a person” is to make an arbitrary choice, a choice for which the nature of things no good reason can be given.’

(Judith Jarvis Thompson)

AbortionDoes this ‘right’ trump ALL OTHER

considerations?

1. Threat to mother’s health?

2. Incest/Rape (classic cases)?

3. Inconvenience?

Abortion1. Threat to mother’s health.

Suppose a woman has become pregnant, and now learns that she has a cardiac condition such that she will die if she carries the baby to term. What may be done for her? The foetus, being a person, has a right to life, but as the mother is a person too, so has she a right to life. Presumably, they have an equal right to life?

Abortion2. Incest/Rape.

Why should the circumstances of conception matter to the foetus?

Does the ‘moral status’ of the foetus change depending on how it was conceived?

Imagine:

‘Sorry, you don’t have a right to life as you weren’t conceived in a morally satisfactory way.’

Responses?

Abortion3. Inconvenience/balance of suffering

The (potential) mother might have ‘current projects’ and a goal directed future a child might interrupt. Given (or, perhaps, assuming) the foetus does not feel pain at a certain point of its development, and given that the mother will be aggrieved to abandon her projects, then the balance of suffering weighs in favour of the woman’s right to an abortion.

Good argument?

AbortionA woman has a right to decide what happens in

and to her body.

Do ‘rights to life’ trump a woman’s right to decide what happens in and to her body?

AbortionJJ Thomson’s ‘violinist case’:

You wake up in the morning and you find yourself back to back in bed with an unconscious [famous] violinist. He has been found to have a fatal kidney ailment, and the Society of Music Lovers has canvassed all the available medical records and found that you alone have the right blood type to help. They have therefore kidnapped you, and last night the violinist’s circulatory system was plugged into yours, so that your kidneys can be used to extract poisons from his blood as well as your own.

AbortionThe director of the hospital now tells you, “Look, we’re sorry the Society of Music Lovers did this to you – we would never have permitted it if we had known. But still, they did it, and the violinsit now is plugged into you. To unplug you would be to kill him. But never mind, it’s only for nine months. […]” Is it morally incumbent on you to accede to this situation? No doubt it would be very nice of you if you did, a great kindness. But do you have to accede to it? What if it were not nine months, but nine years?

AbortionWhat if the director of the hospital says, “Tough luck, I agree, but you’ve now got to stay in bed, with the violinist plugged into you, for the rest of your life. Because remember this. All persons have a right to life, and violinists are persons. Granted you have a right to decide what happens in and to your body, but a person’s right to life outweighs your right to decide what happens in and to your body…

AbortionThoughts?