Do animals matter less than humans? It’s not a new idea, but it does imply that there is something special about humans, something intrinsic. It sounds rather mystical to me, but let us entertain the idea. Intrinsic value is a sticky subject, if it’s about the opposable thumbs then our designation of animals as property would amount to bigotry against paws. No, there are deeper differences at play, we are assured by our internet philosopher friends. Something within the human package endows us with our status above animals. That it seems hard to nail down is not discouraging, as we have tools of inquiry at our disposal.
Man as an Animal
If we may for a moment behold a human in his totality and conduct a thought experiment. Say I (or someone) cut off this human’s legs, arms, lower body, to hell with it, say I put their conscious, detached head in a jar a la Futurama. (That such garishness comes into play on this subject is not a coincidence.) Does the human totality amount to something less? Do his rights sever proportionate to his limbs? I daresay no. And yet, save them from a car accident, diagnose them with brain death, and lo, their relatives are allowed to pull the plug. I find this relieving. For if human tissue was the true criteria for ethical consideration, we as a species would be taking our cues from fetishism.
Happily our behavior points to a more fundamental system of values. l think we’ve identified at least the object of origin. That we may think at all, we must credit to the cerebellum.
But then the argument changes again. It is not the human totality which carries intrinsic value, it is the totality of the human brain, consciousness, reasoning, the capacity for joy. Notice how slippery it all becomes, for is there a single attribute of human consciousness which is consistent among our entire species, which being reduced or taken away would result in the loss of their right to life? Perhaps Intelligence? Reasoning? And yet we do not execute the stupid or the insane, in fact both seek higher office in this country.
There is one attribute, which, as far as I know, is the only reason we would place direct ethical value on a life-form, indeed which gives the term ethics any meaning at all: The subjective ability to desire to live. It is rather a good answer, for it is in this blinkered, subjective mattering, (please don’t pretend not to understand what I’m talking about) which constitutes the only known case in this apparently indifferent universe of something caring at all. It is, ethically speaking, both the means and the ends. That one’s ability to care happens to be the reason one should care about them at all seems self-perpetuating because it is, but it’s certainly not arbitrary. Call it a conflict of interest.
All of this is sensible, yet on our path to civilization humans have put aside these qualms in favor of survival. Human customs bear witness to our rationalizations: “We thank this animal for its sacrifice.” As though the buffalo had some say in it. This poses an uncomfortable question: If we need to rationalize killing animals, why do it? And if there is no ethical issue, why all the rationalizations?
Let us not dwell too much on epistemology, it is disingenuous to demand a higher threshold of proof of sentience for animals than we award ourselves, even if such double standards fill books on philosophy. Neither do I have to labor about intellectual equivalences between humans and animals. If they both possess the subjective ability to want to live, the rest is a distinction without a difference.
But humans have already admitted animal sentience, if not in their philosophy quarters than in their behavior with pets. The lavishing of love and attention on the family dog says more about where we stand than the verbal acrobatics used to deny them the ability to enjoy humping a leg. Common sense rules human activity except where it is convenient to ignore, then it is vociferously assaulted.
If we extend the benefit of the doubt to humans not only for how they react analogously to stimuli, but through the similarity of their bodies and brain structures, then we cannot feign ignorance when we find animals meet the same criteria. And animal brain structures are similar to our own. That this is so is no mystery either: We share DNA and common ancestors with them, we evolved within the same continuum. To quote John Searle at length: “The principle by which we ‘solve the other minds problem for animals’ is not that intelligent behavior is proof of consciousness but rather the principle is that if the animal has a causally relevant structure similar to our own, then it is likely to produce the similar mental states in response to similar stimuli. The ‘behavior’ is simply evidence that it is so responding. Nothing more.”
How much more interesting the world is when we realize we are not alone in our subjectivity. How depressingly counter-intuitive is the solipsistic idea of humans being the sole bearers of sentience.
Some humans allow for all this, insisting instead that there is no ethical problem with “humane” animal slaughter, seeking refuge in the nebulous concept of “natural.” We are left to ponder the exact meaning of this and interpret it generously toward our own behavior. It goes something like this: Killing animals has sprung from Nature, our nature, therefore we have the right to continue, albeit while limiting suffering. That such a basis is incompatible with any ethical system seems needless to point out. After all, every human activity; murder, rape, has ultimately derived from Nature and can thus be excused on the same grounds. I advise one to pause and take a breath before leaping into a moral abyss for the sake of chicken nuggets.
I don’t mean to skirt the issue. We are told, frequently, that our brain’s evolution was made possible largely due to the consumption of meat. I will acknowledge the debt. But if we cite the development of our brains as reason not to use them, it kind of defeats the purpose. We have brained our way into a world where veganism is not only a legitimate diet, but is actually healthier and more sustainable to boot.
Killing animals is curious in that there is always someone looking to rationalize it, though it is not subtle where their true tastes lie. Again they cry: We should be permitted to kill cows provided they are given happy lives, since their capacity for suffering may be lower than ours.
On this point I must object: For one, I posit that the happier the life of the cow, the crueler it is to kill it, for you have taken away something rare and precious in this world, a contented person, no less for such pressing needs as wanting a hamburger. Can’t we be honest with ourselves? A news story about murder only outrages the audience further in its descriptions of the good life snatched from its victim.
And does anyone believe, even allowing for the idea of lower capacity for suffering, the cow wants to live less than a human wants to eat a steak? Survival and avoidance of suffering are clearly primal drivers, the chewed off paw in the bear trap emblemizes the animalistic determination to live, there is no reason to think their suffering is less tangible for them than for ourselves, perhaps it is even more so.
That the cow would not have such a life, indeed even exist without their carnivorous “care-taker” is beside the point. One is not permitted to bear children, bring them up in a happy household only to satisfy the parent’s cannibalistic urges, (again, an appropriate garishness, this time Swiftian) utilitarianism be damned.
Let us even suppose a human only lived forty years instead of eighty on a vegan diet. Suppose their health was drastically reduced by not killing animals. I will give them all of that. Yet compare that to the drastic health problems for the cow in being slaughtered and it is still no contest.
Some say that in all this preservation of life and disruption of natural order, vegans are afraid of death. Such an argument could be used against workers bringing food to starving villages in Yemen. But within this ostensibly hard-nosed realist accusation belies the pampered hypocrisy of the apex predator, dealing out death casually while excusing it all for the sake of their precious “health.”
I contend veganism is the better way. And if the accusers themselves are not afraid of death, then being so generous to sacrifice the lives of animals, they should jump at the opportunity to give their own. I hear there are tribes in Papua New Guinea that want their number.
I am not equal to the mailman, in terms of attributes. But we may generally say, my life is to myself as his life is to himself, inasmuch as we both want to live. That a person would not wish to be killed were they transformed into a fish is reason enough to stay their hand from the bludgeon. That a fish may not have the conceptual power to make that same leap to us is irrelevant. (We don’t hold it against one year-olds either.) Do unto others, and all that jazz. The inverse is expressed in the Mosaic law: “Whatever is hurtful to you, do not do to any other person.” It may well be words to live by, and in an age of soy patties, the arguments against veganism wear increasingly thin.
There is one argument I can’t refute, nor do I care to. It is the refuge of the utterly bankrupt opponent, having all the resonance of a dull thud: “Say what you like, I don’t care.” I am not put off though. That a man does not care about ethics or reason is rather a statement about the man than the ethics and reasons.