Hume's Animals

The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 1977

1987

Essays in Philosophy, 2004

Hume and Our Treatment of Animals This paper is concerned with the bias in favor of the interests of the members of some species of non human animals and against the interests of the members of other species of non-human animals. This view, which I call modified speciesism, is perhaps related to Singer's speciesism, but neither entails nor is entailed by it. The argument takes the following form: given that exploited animals are morally equivalent to non-exploited animals and given that non-exploited animals are morally entitled to the way that we treat them, exploited animals are entitled to such treatment as well. I will give a descriptive account of how modified speciesism is prevalent in our world today which serves as at least a partial defense of the first premise. I will then give a Humean defense of the second premise based on the notion that it is wrong to inflict unnecessary pain and suffering on animals.

The course pack for a course I offered during Hilary Term 2017: overview, handouts, coursework sheets.

presented at Minding Animals International Conference, Utrecht, July 2012.

Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics , 2005

I argue that animals have rights in the sense of having valid claims, which might turn out to be actual rights as society advances and new scientific-technological developments facilitate finding alternative ways of satisfying our vital interests without using animals. Animals have a right to life, to liberty in the sense of freedom of movement and communication, to subsistence, to relief from suffering , and to security against attacks on their physical existence. Animals' interest in living, freedom, subsistence, and security are of vital importance to them, and they do not belong to us; they are not the things we have already possessed by virtue of our own nature.

The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 1986

Forty years ago academician C.P. Snow noticed and described a gap growing between science professors on the one hand and humanities professors on the other. Studying life with different questions and methods and even languages, each set seemed to be living in a different world. In a time of confidence and excitement caused by the introduction of antibiotics, vaccines, space probes, and electronic gadgets, scientists were "in" and humanities professors "out."