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Speciesism and the Idea of Equality

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2009

Bonnie Steinbock
Bonnie Steinbock
Affiliation:
State University of New York at Albany
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Most of us believe that we are entitled to treat members of other species in ways which would be considered wrong if inflicted on members of our own species. We kill them for food, keep them confined, use them in painful experiments. The moral philosopher has to ask what relevant difference justifies this difference in treatment. A look at this question will lead us to re-examine the distinctions which we have assumed make a moral difference.

Type
Discussion
Information
Philosophy , Volume 53 , Issue 204 , April 1978 , pp. 247 - 256
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1978

References

1 Singer, Peter, Animal Liberation (A New York Review Book, 1975).Google Scholar

2 Singer, 5.

3 Williams, Bernard, ‘The Idea of Equality’, Philosophy, Politics and Society (Second Series), Laslett, and Runciman, (eds.) (Blackwell, 1962), 110–131Google Scholar, reprinted in Moral Concepts, Feinberg, (ed.) (Oxford, 1970), 153–171.Google Scholar

4 Wasserstrom, Richard, ‘Rights, Human Rights, and Racial Discrimination’, Journal of Philosophy 61, No. 20 (1964)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, reprinted in Human Rights, Melden, A. I. (ed.) (Wadsworth, 1970), 96–110.Google Scholar

5 Ibid., 106.

6 Hart, H. L. A., ‘Are There Any Natural Rights?’, Philosophical Review 64 (1955)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Benn, S. I., ‘Abortion, Infanticide, and Respect for Persons’, The Problem of Abortion, Feinberg, (ed.) (Wadsworth, 1973), 92–104.Google Scholar

7 Singer, , 9.Google Scholar

8 Benn, , ‘Equality, Moral and Social’, The Encyclopedia of Philosophy 3, 40.Google Scholar

9 Singer, 266–267.

10 This conception of altruistic motivation comes from Nagel, Thomas's The Possibility of Altruism (Oxford, 1970).Google Scholar

11 Williams, , op. cit., 157.Google Scholar

12 Donaghy, Kevin, ‘Singer on Speciesism’, Philosophic Exchange (Summer 1974).Google Scholar

13 Singer, , 22.Google Scholar

14 We run into the same problem when discussing abortion. Of what significance are our feelings toward the unborn when discussing its status? Is it relevant or irrelevant that it looks like a human being?

15 I would like to acknowledge the help of, and offer thanks to, Professoi Richard Arneson of the University of California, San Diego; Professor Sidney Gendin of Eastern Michigan University; and Professor Peter Singer of Monash University, all of whom read and commented on earlier drafts of this paper.