In Search of Consistency: Ethics and Animals [Human–Animal Studies] Part 10 pptx

488 chapter nine
For this reason, triage is not representative of contemporary Western
morality regarding the protection and preservation of innocent human
life. We must look elsewhere.
Perhaps sentience will be helpful in determining who will live and
who will die in our particular lifeboat scenario. To explore this pos-
sibility, we must alter our constituency: we will replace the naked
mole rat with a daisy. Is the life of this newcomer equally precious?
Must it be preserved and protected along with the life of the needle-
clawed bush baby and the naked mole rat?
Sentience is a morally relevant criterion in Western law—causing
serious unnecessary physical suffering to innocent human beings is
illegal. One is not allowed to starve or beat up dependents, whether
children, the elderly, or “pets.” But pain and suffering are not rele-
vant with regard to the preservation and protection of human life.
The case of Matthew Donnelly (the physicist with cancer) provides
an apt example. He suffered terribly, to the point where he did not
wish to live any longer, yet he was kept alive against his wishes. In
contrast, Baby Theresa could not feel anything. She suffered not one
twinge, not one moment of anxiety, not one second of hunger. She
was not capable of suffering. Yet medical professionals maintained
Baby Theresa even at the expense of other children who might have
lived if they had the organs of this failing, anencephalic infant, organs
that her parents wished to donate so that other families might pre-
serve their beloved children. Many individuals are kept alive in Western
hospitals who can feel nothing, anencephalic infants and innumerable
brain-dead patients, while each day, for want of food and medicine,
human beings who can feel and think and function, suffer and die. In
fact Western nations do not choose to allocate resources in order to
protect against suffering. Nor do we make choices in order to pre-
serve the lives of those who can suffer in favor of those who can-

not feel anything.
The Minimize Harm Maxim is an extension of morality regard-
ing the preservation and protection of innocent human life. Human
life is preserved even if such medical efforts increase suffering. Life
is sustained even if that life suffers terribly in the process, even if
preserving that life causes others to suffer and die as a result. As it
turns out, the daisy will stay on board just as surely as any other
passenger.
Western medical practice, rooted in Western morality that pro-
tects and preserves the life of every innocent human being, does not
contemporary moral dilemmas 489
allow any human being to die so that others might live. While many
innocent human beings die of simple neglect—malnutrition, infec-
tion, diseases for which there are cures—because funds and efforts are
focused elsewhere, medical practice does not permit the loss of any
innocent human life that might be preserved. Our responsibility for
those that die of want, of neglect, is no less because they do not lie
in a hospital bed, but exploring such cases is beyond the scope of
this work.
Western law protects innocent human life. The legal system and
medical practice reflect a Western morality that holds human life to
be precious to a degree that seems beyond calculation. The Minimize
Harm Maxim, rooted in morality with regard to protecting and pre-
serving human life, also provides no means by which to make dis-
tinctions between one life and another. As anencephalic infants aptly
demonstrate, no innocent human life is allowed to die or be killed—
even for the sake of other innocent human lives—if they might go
on living. While there are many cases in which individual doctors
permit patients to die, or even help them to do so, such cases remain
off the books. Law requires that each innocent human life be allowed to

persist for as long as possible.
For the sake of consistency and impartiality, in light of casuistry,
the life of each living entity on our unique lifeboat is as precious as
every other. The harm of exterminating any one of these five enti-
ties is equal inasmuch as the life of Baby Theresa is no more or less
morally considerable than the life of any other patient in the hos-
pital where she lived and died. The Minimize Harm Maxim, an
extension of contemporary Western morality with regard to the preser-
vation and protection of human life, does not discriminate between
the lives of a naked mole rat, a spectacled elephant shrew, a hyrax,
and a needle-clawed bush baby . . . even that of a daisy. Contemporary
Western ethics provide no means by which to decide who will live
and who will die on our bobbing lifeboat.
Conclusion
Western morality, as evidenced by medical practice and law, protects
every innocent human life. In the absence of any morally relevant
distinction between all human beings and all other living entities,
consistency and impartiality require the application of this same strin-
gent morality to all life forms.
490 chapter nine
The Minimize Harm Maxim is a utopian moral theory, rooted in
consistency, extending morality between human beings to all other
living beings that have not been shown to be different in morally
relevant ways. Idealistic theories often seem extreme and unlikely,
but the Minimize Harm Maxim stands as a model of what we ought
to do if we are to be consistent and impartial. If the Minimize Harm
Maxim seems unreasonable, then our only recourse, if we are to
maintain consistency, is to reconsider our current moral ideals with
regard to protecting and preserving innocent human life.
CHAPTER TEN

REVIEW AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS
We have explored the work of four prominent scholars. Although a
critical analysis is offered for the best-known and most respected pro-
tectionist theories available, this work attests to and affirms the value
of the contribution that each of these scholars has made to the ongo-
ing process of seeking and establishing a more consistent, compas-
sionate morality. We have also explored an idealistic protectionist
theory based on consistency and impartiality, the Minimize Harm
Maxim. In this final chapter, we look back to the previous chapters,
and forward to what might lie ahead in the field of anymals and
ethics. What fundamental concepts have been further explored and
developed? What possible directions might be beneficial for future
work in protectionist ethics?
A. Overview
1. A Conspicuous Problem
Protectionism is an “idea that is easy to ridicule but hard to refute”
(Ryder, Animal 332).
In the West, both civil law and accepted morality protect human
conatus, the urge “to preserve our existence as persons” (P. Taylor “Inherent”
25). Predominant Western morality holds the strong conviction that
there is no legitimate reason to deny moral standing to any human
being; ideally, each human being is maintained even at tremendous
expense to society. But we do not extend this protection to anymals,
and there is a conspicuous absence of any morally legitimate reason
for treating human life differently from how we treat all other life-
forms. Moral philosophers have as yet been unable to establish any
satisfactory morally relevant difference between anymals and human
beings—one that would justify denying basic protection to other
species while maintaining such stringent protection for human life.
Yet Western ethics, as revealed in the actions of most people, per-

sist with this flagrant inconsistency. The lives of anymals remain
492 chapter ten
almost completely unprotected. “Current legal consensus seems to
be that nearly any human interest can in principle qualify as an
acceptable justification for animal use Whether there is a moral
consensus in society to this effect is more doubtful” (Orlans 317). As
a result, in the United States, “given the quantity of non-human ani-
mals suffering, the extent to which they are suffering, and the rea-
son they are intentionally made to suffer animal liberation is the
moral imperative of our time. Our focus should be on ending
the suffering as efficiently and quickly as possible” (Ball 4). We are
living in a time of great moral reckoning, a time of moral reflection
leading to eye-opening moral imperatives previously overlooked. We
are, slowly, bit by bit, coming to see that our treatment of anymals
in relation to our treatment of human animals constitutes an unjustified,
flagrant inconsistency. Some have come to see that those who cling
to the maximum moral significance of human beings while denying
such significance to anymals have no philosophical leg to stand on.
We can either accept anymals into the fold or deny full moral
significance to certain human beings. Tom Regan writes:
[T]he moral beliefs we accept cannot all be true if they include two
or more inconsistent beliefs. This much, too, seems clear: our com-
mitment to search for and, when we find them, to address such incon-
sistencies offers a fair indication of the seriousness with which we
respond to the challenge to develop an informed, thoughtful moral
outlook. (Defending 101)
Western morality is currently inconsistent; we are inconsistent in our
treatment of life and in our expressed “respect for life.” Peter Singer
notes:
People often say that life is sacred. They almost never mean what they

say. They do not mean, as their words seem to imply, that life itself
is sacred. If they did, killing a pig or pulling up a cabbage would be
as abhorrent to them as the murder of a human being. When people
say that life is sacred, it is human life they have in mind. But why
should human life have special value? (Writings 125)
Indeed, what is so important about us in a universe of such beauty
and diversity? Why do we persist with—and even defend—this
flagrantly immoral status quo? The cases of Baby Theresa, Tracy
Latimer, Matthew Donnelly, and Samuel Linares (let alone jellyfish
babies) make a startling contrast with the indifference we show toward
the lives of stray pets, anymals exploited for science and the farming
review and future directions 493
industry, or any variety of anymals left alongside the roadway. “What
justifies the difference?” (Singer, Writings 126).
In the first century, the Greek philosopher Plutarch wrote, “For
what sort of dinner is not costly for which a living creature loses its
life? Do we hold a life cheap?” (“On” 997). Sound ethics do not
entail flagrant inconsistencies. For those with a critical eye, “it is
hard to see a long and beneficial future for an ethic as paradoxical,
incoherent, and dependent on pretense as our conventional ethic of
life and death has become” (Singer, Writings 210).
2. A Cooperative Enterprise
It is the task of moral philosophers to either rectify moral inconsis-
tencies or justify them; the works of Regan, Singer, Linzey, and
Taylor are central contributions to this ongoing effort. Only by
exploring diverse options might we find possible solutions to our
ongoing moral dilemma—our flagrant inconsistency. Each theory
offers insights that “tend to lead us in the right direction” (L. Johnson
197). Each moral theory offers valuable insights and worthy possi-
bilities. As an environmental activist colleague noted, “We must lis-

ten to many voices, especially to those issuing from lived realities—even
if what is said challenges us”—indeed, especially if what is said chal-
lenges us (Gloege, Unpublished communication).
Protectionist philosophy benefits from a diversity of theories, and
so do the diverse populations to which these theories speak. For
instance, Linzey’s theory will be irrelevant to an atheist, but is likely
to be of considerable interest, and compelling, for a concerned
Christian. In contrast, theories rooted in scientific understandings of
the natural world and animals, such as the works of Singer and
Regan, are less apt to reach a conservative Christian (Finsen 193).
Meanwhile, if an individual feels strongly about human rights, she
or he will probably find moral concordance in Regan’s work. Each
theory might help someone to recognize, acknowledge, and rectify
this current terrible inconsistency in our morality. For this reason,
each theory is of value—the diversity itself is of value—and we ought
to strive for “more cooperative work, and less competitive philoso-
phizing” (Regan, Animal 61).
This variety of theories in the protectionist movement also reveals
the seriousness with which these ideas are now being taken, and the
strength of the work being published by scholars in this growing
494 chapter ten
field. Each of the philosophers explored in this text objects to the
moral discrepancy between our overarching respect for human life
and our general disregard for all other life-forms. “When taken
together, these arguments pose a fundamental challenge to tradi-
tional morality and its assumption of the superiority of humans and
the primacy of human interests” (Finsen 233). Protectionism can
never again be dismissed as a side issue; change is inevitable, how-
ever slowly it might come to pass.
3. The Minimize Harm Maxim

The Minimize Harm Maxim is part of this ongoing philosophical
exploration and is likely to resonate with those who are interested
in strict philosophical consistency, and perhaps with those who are
invested in the sanctity of life. Consider a person who does not
accept the notion of human rights, does not care about minimizing
suffering, and who is not moved by religious teachings; what is the
most fundamental common ground with regard to life that one might
reach with such an individual?
The answer seems to be conatus: such a person is alive and strives
to persist biologically. Most people will readily acknowledge that they
personally endeavor to survive, and that they wish to protect their
personal endeavor to survive. Common sense tells us that all other
life-forms share this biological urge to persist, and a common ground
is reached not just for all people, but for all life. With this basic
recognition it is easy to establish that all living beings ought to be
protected from harm if human beings are protected on the grounds
that they wish to persist. In the absence of any morally relevant dis-
tinction between all human beings and all anymals, the Minimize
Harm Maxim asserts that ethics ought to protect all life-forms that
share this basic urge to persist if this urge is to be protected among
human beings. For those who assert that only they (or only human
beings) have an interest in persisting biologically, empirical evidence
stands against them, and the burden of proof is theirs.
Philosophic consistency indicates that those who wish to exploit
anymals must justify such actions; in contrast, those who fight for
protectionism are consistent with accepted morality regarding the
protection and preservation of life (in the absence of a morally rel-
evant distinction between all human beings and all anymals) and
need not justify their stance.
review and future directions 495

Summary of Overview
• Predominant Western moral standards and practices are inconsis-
tent and partial with regard to the moral standing of human beings
as opposed to the moral standing of all other life-forms.
• A diversity of protectionist theories is beneficial to the ongoing
search for a more consistent ethic with regard to anymals.
• The Minimize Harm Maxim, developed from a consistent application
of extreme respect for human life in Western ethics, as exemplified
by Western laws and Western medical practice, is part of this
ongoing effort in protectionist moral philosophy, and is based on
the most fundamental common ground with regard to life.
B. Philosophical Standards and the Minimize Harm Maxim
1. Ethical Theories
What is right will not always be apparent, and the temptation will
always exist to rationalize as necessary what we desire or find conve-
nient. (A. Taylor, Animal 262)
Human actions affect the land and every living being. Maintaining
moral standards is linked to a smooth-running, satisfied society
(Horsburgh, Non-Violence 47). Human ethics that guide behavior are
therefore extremely important to each of us and to the larger world.
The practical application of philosophy, determining what one
ought to do in a given situation, is the task of applied philosophy. One
philosophical tool for this enterprise is casuistry, examining situations
on a case-by-case basis and consistently applying ethical standards
in diverse situations that are similar in morally relevant ways.
Ethics entail many ideals that are not only difficult, but perhaps
impossible to realize. Even a saint must at times be lustful, disin-
genuous, or gluttonous; it does not seem feasible to be completely
honest at all times. Yet self-control and honesty remain ethical ideals
to which most of us readily attest. Utopian visions present ideals that

offer moral guidance in real-life situations. The role of moral philoso-
phy is to establish “claims on our consideration or respect which we
acknowledge as in some sense ideally determinative” (Goodpaster,
“On Being” 313).
Making concessions for human shortcomings is not a legitimate
approach to moral philosophy. Stringent expectations, and the need
496 chapter ten
for diligence and sacrifice, should not sway us from pursuing moral
ideals. Ethics distinguish ideal ways and preferable actions from both
undesirable behavior and common practice. Morality is about what
one ought to do. While human actions may fall short of moral ideals,
the task of moral philosophy is to stand strong against conventional
practices and moral assertions that fall short of the mark. An ethic
limited to what an individual can reasonably be expected to achieve is a degra-
dation of moral theory.
Moral philosophers are not called upon to justify the way indi-
viduals prefer to live, to appease the masses, or to gratify powerful
individuals benefiting from the status quo. Down through history the
masses and the elite have often claimed freedoms for themselves, in
particular freeing themselves from morality at the expense of others.
But freedom from morality does not equate to actual freedom.
[S]uppose that we had quite different rules, and that more people were
free to hit others in the nose, and correspondingly fewer were free to
enjoy the full beauty and utility of their own unbloodied proboscises.
Would this new arrangement have a greater or smaller “amount” of
freedom in it, on balance . . .? . . . [T]here would be not “less” free-
dom but freedom of a morally inferior kind. (Feinberg, Social 24)
For centuries humans have been freely swinging their fists, while
other species have suffered bruised and broken lives due to a short-
coming that persists in Western morality as practiced by most citizens.

A “major role of morality should be to enjoin the protection
of the vulnerable from the powerful” (Miller 333); establishing moral
codes that respect and protect the comparatively weak from the
strong is one of the definitive duties of moral philosophy. The weak
and silent have interests; morality requires the powerful to respect
the less powerful. Who would condone a moral theory allowing the
strongest and most powerful their preferences at the expense of the
weak, the silent, or the poor? Yet, where other species are con-
cerned, commonly accepted morality permits exactly this.
Common Western ethics and practice fail to protect weak and
vulnerable anymals from powerful, exploitative human beings. This
breach of moral responsibility stands in stark contrast with our moral
standards regarding the protection and preservation of human lives
and is unjust and immoral because we have been unable to put for-
ward a broadly accepted morally relevant distinction between humans
and other life-forms. Down through history and up to the present
moment prominent moral practices have been biased, favoring cer-
review and future directions 497
tain interests. Favored interests “tend to be characteristically human,”
and the “grounds for discrimination are inadequate” (L. Johnson
198). We have failed to establish an ethic that consistently protects
the myriad vulnerable living beings from greedy, powerful, prosper-
ous, exploitative human beings. It is the task of moral philosophers
to offer a more viable (consistent) alternative.
2. Examining the Minimize Harm Maxim
The Minimize Harm Maxim, an idealistic moral theory based on
consistency and impartiality, strives to actualize widely accepted con-
temporary moral ideals.
The Minimize Harm Maxim does not make concessions for priv-
ileged or powerful minorities (human beings as opposed to all other

living entities). It protects all who are powerless. The Minimize Harm
Maxim offers an ideal, consistent with norms of moral philosophy.
For most of us in our daily lives, the ease or difficulty of enact-
ing a moral theory does not add to or detract from the strength or
desirability of that moral theory. (Even though we all lie sometimes,
we generally agree that lying is not morally preferable. Even though
we agree that gluttony is no virtue, most of us eat more than we
ought to at least on occasion.) In the conspicuous absence of any
morally relevant distinction between all people who are morally con-
siderable and other living beings, the Minimize Harm Maxim indi-
cates how we can maintain consistency and persist with our current
ethical standard with regard to human life. The Minimize Harm
Maxim carries current ethical standards with regard to human life
to their logical conclusion—not to suggest what one might prefer to
do, nor what it is “reasonable” to expect, but in order to indicate
what one ought to do.
3. Comparison
The Minimize Harm Maxim entails a number of important philo-
sophical strengths in comparison with other protectionist theories.
The Minimize Harm Maxim
• maintains consistency and impartiality;
• avoids the dubious metaphysical concept of moral rights;
• avoids the epistemological difficulties of assessing consciousness
across species;
498 chapter ten
• avoids the epistemological difficulties of analyzing sentience or sub-
ject-of-a-life status across species; and
• does not depend on the epistemologically perplexing task of assess-
ing and comparing pleasure, pain, harm suffered, or opportuni-
ties for satisfaction.

Of course there are problems entailed in the Minimize Harm Maxim.
The Minimize Harm Maxim is based on well-established ethics with
regard to human life. In truth, Western morality is not consistent
on this point. War, capital punishment, and abortion reveal ambi-
guity regarding the preservation and protection of human life. Killing
some individuals is permissible. Such killings indicate that Western
ethics, at least in practice, do not protect all human life in every sit-
uation. However, aside from these comparatively small numbers of
human beings, Western laws and morality hold human life in the
highest regard, as evidenced by common medical practices such as
the care given doomed anencephalic infants. Cases presented previ-
ously, such as those of Baby Theresa, Tracy Latimer, and Samuel
Linares, provide ample evidence of the strong medical practices,
based on Western morality and law, regarding the protection and
preservation of human life.
Others might object that the Minimize Harm Maxim demands
tremendous moral diligence and self-sacrifice. But the effort required
to fulfill a moral obligation is not the concern of moral ideals. What
is convenient, what one might prefer, or the difficulty entailed in
living an ethical life is not relevant. Ethical theories such as the
Minimize Harm Maxim indicate what one ought to do (in this case
for the sake of consistency, if one is to persist with dominant cur-
rent ethical standards regarding human life, in the absence of any
morally relevant distinctions between all human life and all other
life-forms).
Our generally accepted current morality in the West with regard
to human life is extremely costly, and requires tremendous collec-
tive sacrifice. Nonetheless, there is a consensus, rooted to a large
extent in our Christian past, that to protect and defend human life
is morally ideal, and well worth the effort. Generally speaking, we

would not choose to live in a world devoid of notions of “the sanc-
tity of human life,” however spurious such a contention might be.
Therefore, consistency requires us to extend this ethic to all other
living entities that are similar in morally relevant ways. If life is
review and future directions 499
precious, then all life is precious. With regard to the Minimize Harm
Maxim, the entirety of life is morally considerable—all life is granted moral
standing.
C. Reexamining Predominant Western Ethics
The Minimize Harm Maxim is based on the following:
• Generally speaking, Western ethics place supreme value on human
life, with only very few exceptions.
• Philosophers have established no morally relevant distinction between
all human beings and all other living entities.
• Consistency and impartiality are cornerstones of both Western phi-
losophy and applied philosophy.
I have therefore argued as follows:
• If one can find no morally relevant distinction between all people
and all anymals, and
• if one accepts the predominant morality in the West regarding
human life,
• then consistency and impartiality require an extension of the moral
sphere to include all living entities.
The Minimize Harm Maxim is but one solution to the above set of
problems; there are at least three options for correcting this current
inconsistency in the dominant ethic of the West (only the first of
which has been explored in this book):
• Extend our dominant Western ethic so that all living entities are
morally considerable.
• Establish morally relevant criteria that differentiate some or all

human beings from some or all other nonhuman living entities.
• Diminish the moral importance of human life.
Through the viewpoints of prominent scholars, and by exploring the
Minimize Harm Maxim, this book has focused on the first option.
The second option has also been thoroughly explored in moral phi-
losophy, but without satisfactory results. Scholars have found that a
500 chapter ten
change in criteria for moral standing that excludes anymals and other
life-forms from moral protection will result in the loss of moral stand-
ing for at least some human beings if philosophic consistency is main-
tained, usually the very young and the mentally limited. “R. G. Frey,
for example, has argued that vivisection of some of these humans
would be justified, although he is far from gleeful about the prospect”
(Pluhar xiii). Evidence suggests that if we wish to continue to exploit
anymals, philosophical consistency will require sacrificing certain
humans along the way. If it is morally permissible to sport kill, trap,
breed, capture, tamper with biologically, experiment on, cage, eat,
and vivisect anymals, then it must be equally morally permissible to
do this to certain humans beings. Most of us are decidedly uncom-
fortable with this conclusion. More importantly, this possible out-
come is plagued by the epistemological difficulties of assessing the
various capacities of living entities across species.
The third option, in contrast, remains comparatively unexplored.
1. Reconsidering the Value of Human Life
So you are not like a washing machine or a car and are not defined
by the material present at this moment. You are a complex system of
activities that makes temporary use of various kinds of matter, but that
matter is not you. You, and all other organisms, are continuous sys-
tems of material flux, of matter moving in, playing a role, and mov-
ing out. You are more like a candle flame or a whirlpool than like a

washing machine. (G. Williams 118–19)
What is life? What is the value of human life? As noted in the intro-
duction, suffering and death are not the primary focus of this book.
We live, and we die. We suffer. While moral virtues support a life
of compassion and caring rather than one of wanton killing or unmit-
igated maiming, virtues are not the primary focus of this work. This
book is about consistency in moral practice with regard to our treat-
ment of life.
At what cost ought we to protect life? Some ancient and perva-
sive religious teachings, as well as modern science, indicate that we
are more akin to the mayfly than to our conceptions of an immor-
tal divine. If we were to incorporate a mayfly mentality into Western
morality, an ethic where we accept our own death and the deaths
of our own kind more willingly, it is likely that a more consistent
ethic would emerge. An ethic that treads a more moderate path with
review and future directions 501
regard to human life would not require that we be so extreme with
regard to other species in order to maintain consistency.
In hindsight, pondering the preceding material, is our treatment
of human life extreme, radical, and inimical to common sense? While
many conventional people consider protectionists and protectionism
radical, is it not our conventional ethic with regard to human life that
is extreme and radical?
When faced with the astronomical expense and allocation of lim-
ited resources in cases such as those of Baby Theresa, do we ever
wonder “whether such treatment of an infant human being is or is
not the right thing to do” (Singer, Writings 126)? Our contemporary
ethic concerning human life when applied to any other life-form,
seems excessive, perhaps even ridiculous. Is it reasonable for moral-
ity, law, and medical practice to be so concerned about perpetuat-

ing a living organism simply because it is able to be perpetuated
and because its biology strives to persist?
Protectionist theories tend to extend our stringent Western ethic
concerning human life outward to include at least some other liv-
ing entities. Perhaps we ought to reexamine predominant Western
ethics with regard to the value of human life in order to clarify
where the limits of moral obligation might reasonably lie. In light
of the ongoing, flagrant moral inconsistency concerning the protec-
tion and preservation of life, perhaps our quest for a more moder-
ate and consistent morality will lead us to reevaluate both our ethic
toward anymals and our ethic with regard to human life.
In a recent interview Singer commented that for two thousand
years humans have “enshrined the sanctity of human life, no mat-
ter how compromised” (Specter 46). Western medicine, rooted in
Western morality and backed by Western law, maintains patients
who have been brain dead for years and whose families wish they
might be allowed to die, elderly patients who would prefer to wither
away in peace but are required to live as long as their bodies are
able to biologically persist, and terminally ill patients who have been
maintained even though they suffer terribly and ask to be allowed
the simple option of death. Dominant Western morality encourages
the maintenance of human life even at great cost to the community
and against the will of the individual. (As noted, exceptions include dan-
gerous criminals, “enemy soldiers,” and unborn fetuses up to a cer-
tain level of development.)
502 chapter ten
Philosophic consistency indicates that it might be necessary to con-
sider removing some moral protection granted some human beings in
some situations. If so, the details need to be worked out with extreme
care. But if we are unwilling to modify moral protection for human

life, in the absence of any morally relevant distinction between a
lifeless, brain-dead human being and a protozoan, consistency requires
that we extend moral standing to protozoa. We must not lose sight
of the fact that it is because of our extreme current protection of
human life that philosophic consistency leads us to the extreme ethics
of the Minimize Harm Maxim. If we do not like the look of the
Minimize Harm Maxim, one way to achieve moral consistency is to
alter morality with regard to human life.
2. Continuing the Trend—Moving Ethics Outward
Singer writes of our tendency to view “human beings as the center
of the ethical universe”; he identifies this as part of “a set of ideas
we have inherited from the period in which the intellectual world
was dominated by a religious outlook” (Writings 211). Change is
inevitable. The “moral inadequacy” of narrow principles that limit
“respect for life to a tribe, race, or nation” has become obvious to
the Western world; now we are seriously questioning whether or not
the commonly accepted “boundary of our species marks a more
defensible limit to the protected circle” (Singer, Writings 126). Leena
Vilkka notes that the Enlightenment brought human equality, “the
idea that we are born equal. The second Enlightenment should be
the revolution for nature. It should extend the principle of equality
to the non-human world” (72). And when we do bring all of life
under the umbrella of moral protection, “the comfortable sense of
right and wrong, which securely governs our everyday existence, is
no longer tenable, and we can no longer eat, sleep, and work in the
same untroubled way” (Rollin 4). As with the freeing of the slaves
in the South, so must be the freeing of anymals across the Western
world. As we fight for freedom for all people in all societies, so we
must ultimately seek freedom for all beings in all nations.
It is the task of moral theories to perpetually knock on established

boundaries, to push morality to higher standards. Most Westerners
have extended ethics outward from self to family to community—to
the entirety of the human species (Norton, Why 173); we are now
called upon to extend moral standing to other species. Expanding
review and future directions 503
moral standing to include other life-forms is inevitable. Even if we
exclude certain human beings, and even if we fail to protect human
beings in certain situations, consistency will require us to extend the
circle of moral standing to at least some other species.
Whatever way one looks at ethics, morality is advanced by the
inclusion of other species: Moral character, the sum of happiness in
the world, and fairness are all “furthered when nonhuman animals
are included in the moral sphere” (Pluhar 227).
Only a lingering and unprincipled prejudice can now underlie the
exclusion of animals from the kingdom of ends. Principled moral equal-
ity cannot stop with the human race. Thus, animal liberation presents
itself not as a deviant blip in moral theory, but as a compelling out-
come of a long Western moral tradition as it has become progressively
refined through the demands of consistency, through redefinition of
what in human experience we value and want morally protected, and
through developing empirical knowledge regarding similarities and con-
tinuities between the human and other species. Such is the case for
the animals. (Miller 322)
While it remains unclear whether or not every human being in every
possible circumstance ought to be morally considerable, it is clear
that life is precious for each of us, as it is to other living entities. If
we care for our lives, and wish that our lives be preserved and pro-
tected, and if we are willing to extend this understanding to a moral
law and medical practice that protects this same urge in anencephalic
infants, on what grounds might we exclude yaks, okapi, or the endan-

gered Iriomote cat? All things being equal, consistency requires the exten-
sion of moral standing beyond the human circle.
3. Human Limitations
How far are human beings able to extend the circle of moral stand-
ing? Some philosophers assert that we are meant to be anthro-
pocentric, just as “wolves typically conduct themselves in a lupucentric
manner, eagles generally behave aquicentrically, and bees are fer-
vent apiecentrists” (Thiele 178). Perhaps partiality is not only to be
expected but accepted.
In making judgments about the moral status of living things, we are
not (or should not be) seeking to estimate their value from the view-
point of the gods, or that of the universe. We are not gods but human
beings, reasoning about how we ought to think and act. Our moral
504 chapter ten
theories can only be based upon what we know and what we care
about, or ought to care about. (Warren 43)
If this is the case, is it reasonable to expect animals such as human
beings to establish a more inclusive ethical vision?
To accept the human tendency to be selfish seems misguided for
three reasons. First, history and the development of moral philoso-
phy do not support this conclusion. Self-centered partiality has been
the successful target of ethical theory for centuries. The abolition of
slavery in the United States required Southerners “to give up their
biggest economic investment” (“Underground”). Cotton—sown, grown,
and picked by slaves—was the most important export—more impor-
tant than all other exports combined (“Underground”). Today few would
argue that the economic base of the South, or the personal eco-
nomic interests of those involved, were more important than pro-
tecting basic interests of individuals.
Second, if predominant Western morality accepts that human

beings are fundamentally selfish and abandons protectionist ethics as
a consequence, repercussions will come back to nip us in the heels.
In the absence of a morally relevant distinction between all human
beings and all anymals, an affirmation of human selfishness will ulti-
mately lead to the conclusion that individuals who are entitled to
be selfish with other species are no less entitled to be selfish with
one another.
Third, any vision that abandons our ongoing quest for a more
expansive, compassionate ethic runs contrary to the general under-
standing of what it is to be a human being. People tend to identify
bees with an extremely complex social order, whales with gentleness
in spite of tremendous strength, and eagles for grace in flight and
keen eyesight. The majority of Westerners have long held that human
beings are the quintessential rational and uniquely moral animal. If
people accept that they are fundamentally selfish and incapable of
maintaining a consistent ethic of respect for life, then we will need
to reexamine our understandings of who we are. How can the human
animal be praised for attributes we are unwilling, or unable, to
employ or exhibit?
4. An Ongoing Endeavor
The previous few chapters have presented and defended an ethic
that moves beyond persons and rights, beyond vertebrates and sen-
review and future directions 505
tience, and beyond assumed levels of consciousness to include all liv-
ing entities that endeavor to persist. The concept of such an expan-
sive ethic is not new: Ancient religious beliefs, born before the advent
of human history, include ethical teachings that protect all life and
view human beings as just one type of being among many remark-
able entities. This ancient spiritual vision has been supported by
modern science and contemporary philosophers:

[I]t is ethically wrong to suppose that we need and ought to establish
a criterion of moral considerability . . ., [to] persevere in our unethi-
cal Western imperial venture. That is, putting any criterion into prac-
tice is an act of domination, an arbitrary act of power and violence
to the beings that are thereby rendered Other (i.e., constructed as
objects of domination and control).
The assumption that we can and ought to establish a criterion of
considerability should therefore be abandoned. Once it is, however,
we come to the perhaps startling (and to those who are captivated by
this assumption, seemingly bizarre) realization that everything must be
given moral consideration. (Birch 318)
In light of a comparatively inclusive dominant ethic concerning human
life and moral standing, and in light of the conspicuous absence of
any morally relevant distinction between all humans and every other
living entity, the conclusion is inescapable: All living entities ought
to be acknowledged as morally considerable.
If ethical theories are to have practical relevance, those commit-
ted to a more consistent ethic—more specifically an ethic that extends
moral standing to nonhuman life—ought to reflect this commitment
in word and deed. Conscientious individuals are called upon to seek
legal backing in order to force change in a morally negligent world.
“The law must be made to recognize that non-humans have
claims to life, freedom and the pursuit of happiness just as we do;
and among the liberties that individual non-humans should be able
to enjoy is the freedom from exploitation by humankind” (Ryder,
Animal 332).
Growing evidence indicates that a handful of human beings are
ready to rise to this moral challenge. One of the most well-known
lawsuits among protectionists was “on behalf of a small rare fish, the
snail darter, [which] derailed construction of a $100 million dam”

on the Little Tennessee River (Stone 178). Such a legal case would
have been unthinkable fifty years ago. Somewhere in the last half-
century the snail darter, and at least one ecosystem, became a serious
506 chapter ten
moral consideration (even if only to satisfy the human desire to pre-
serve species). A handful of people were willing to expend thousands
of dollars, and considerable time and effort, to protect the lives of
goats and wildflowers on the San Clemente Islands. Protectionist law
is growing; Harvard’s law school now offers a course on this impor-
tant subject. Court cases involving anymals, and anymal issues, are
increasingly common. People are calling others to task for abuse,
neglect, and exploitation. There will come a time when a speeding
driver cannot simply run into a deer, and drive off, leaving her to
what death she will find. The time will come when those who drive
by such suffering, and fail to render assistance, will be called to task
for their indifference, when such behavior will be recognized as
morally abhorrent. Looking to our own past provides a vision of
how we might one day look back on those who have shown indifference
or cruelty to these other beings, how we might view those who have
capitalized on the well-being and lives of millions of anymals:
Slave-owners and Nazis used the same pathetic excuses that cattle
ranchers and vivisectors use today. If I had grandparents who were
slave owners or Nazis, I would be ashamed and I would change my
last name. Who are the heroes? The people that had the guts to stand
up against cruelty and indifference, to speak up against the majority
on issues like slavery, to try to save people from concentration camps.
They are the heroes, they are who I would want as an ancestor. I
look at animal exploiters today their horrid animal torture, and I
think, their grand-kids are going to change their names! They are an
embarrassment to future generations!

Who’s going to be a hero four generations from now? Who are they
going to make movies about movies like Schindler’s List? They’re
going to make movies about those working for the Animal Liberation
Front, about people fighting for the rights of animals, about those who
are now called terrorists, people like Ingrid Newkirk (Founder and
President of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals), Joyce Tischler
(founder and Executive Director of Animal Legal Defense Fund), Carol
Adams, or Jane Goodall. The real terrorists will be exposed peo-
ple like Charlie Bell, CEO of McDonald’s; E. Sander Connolly, assis-
tant professor of neurosurgery at Columbia who has been conducting
stroke experiments on baboons for years; and Burton Tansky, CEO
of Neiman Marcus stores, who still sells fur from animals who were
anally electrocuted or skinned alive. (Bury)
Socrates taught that “the unexamined life is not worth living.” Today
the Socratic injunction to “Know thyself ” entails
review and future directions 507
recognizing that one is a single life form among many and that one
inhabits an environment that is complex beyond our current under-
standing and easily perturbed. It also means recognizing that one is
part of a global community that has existed for centuries and will, one
hopes, exist for many more and that the capacity for an aesthetic
appreciation of the majesty, complexity and wonder of the natural
world is part of what makes us who we are. (Russow 12)
Dominant Western ethics with regard to the moral standing of
anymals are not only unacceptable because they are inconsistent, but
also because they disregard our biological affiliation with anymals;
exemplify a lack of appreciation for the majesty, complexity, and
wonder of life; and reveal a lack of understanding for the fleeting
nature of our personal physical existence.

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