Animal Ethics

JUNE 3, 2008

In setting out to write this paper, my intention was to fill a gap in my book Animal Liberation. There I argued that the interests of animals ought to be considered equally with our own interests and that from this equality it follows that we ought to become vegetarian.

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Killing Animal Liberation Vegetarian Animal 40

Animal Ethics

AUGUST 4, 2008

For the record, I am opposed to violence in behalf of animals. I can't think of anything that does more harm to the cause of animal liberation. In the long run, the best thing we can do for animals is engage in rational persuasion. I leave you this fine evening with a column by Debra Saunders.

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Animal Rights Rights Animal Liberation Animal 40

Animal Ethics

DECEMBER 10, 2009

ones to do with the painfulness of the methods of rearing and killing.) It is worth noticing that my proposal does not rule out killings which have the effect overall of fostering the wants of the largest subset of some group like a wild herd where otherwise the wants of an even larger subset will be thwarted.

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Killing Animal Morals Animal Liberation 40

Animal Ethics

FEBRUARY 3, 2009

Baird Callicott , "Animal Liberation: A Triangular Affair," Environmental Ethics 2 [winter 1980]: 311-38, at 335-6 [italics in original]) Note from KBJ: My "outrage at vivisection and factory farming" has nothing to do with "the transmogrification of organic to mechanical processes."

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Factory Farm Factory Farming Factory Farming 40

Animal Ethics

AUGUST 1, 2008

Baird Callicott , "Animal Liberation: A Triangular Affair," Environmental Ethics 2 [winter 1980]: 311-38, at 326 [ footnote omitted])

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Animal Ethics

NOVEMBER 12, 2008

Concern for animal (and plant) rights and well-being is as fundamental to the land ethic as to the humane ethic, but the difference between naturally evolved and humanly bred species is an essential consideration for the one, though not for the other. (

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Animal Ethics

FEBRUARY 6, 2008

Michael Fox , "'Animal Liberation': A Critique," Ethics 88 [January 1978]: 106-18, at 116-7)

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Vegetarian Fox Factory Farm Factory Farming 40

Animal Ethics

JUNE 20, 2008

If, in other words, any genuine ethic is possible, if it is possible to value people for the sake of themselves, then it is equally possible to value land in the same way. (

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Ethics Morals Animal Liberation Humane 40

Animal Ethics

JANUARY 9, 2009

A third of a century ago, when the modern animal-liberation movement was in its infancy, Martin published an essay entitled “A Critique of Moral Vegetarianism,” Reason Papers (fall 1976): 13-43. His book on atheism is among the best I have read on that topic, which is why I used it in my Philosophy of Religion course many years ago. (I

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Vegetarian Morals Meat Vegan 40

Animal Ethics

FEBRUARY 6, 2007

As Peter Singer so aptly put it in Animal Liberation : The people who profit by exploiting large numbers of animals do not need our approval. The purchase of the corpses of the animals they rear is the main support the factory farmers ask from the public. They need our money.

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Factory Factory Farm Factory Farming Gestation Crates 40

Animal Ethics

MARCH 23, 2009

There are intractable practical differences between environmental ethics and the animal liberation movement. Very different moral obligations follow in respect, most importantly, to domestic animals, the principal beneficiaries of the humane ethic. I hope you enjoyed them and learned from them.

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Ethics Animal Liberation Animal Rights Movement Morals 40

Animal Ethics

FEBRUARY 15, 2009

KBJ: Nobody in the animal-rights or animal-liberation movement views intelligence as a morally significant property, at least intrinsically. What should our moral attitude be toward eating members of these species? This problem becomes crucial when the notion of consent is brought in.

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Morals Vegetarian Meat Killing 40

Animal Ethics

JUNE 4, 2009

As he puts it, “Until we boycott meat we are, each one of us, contributing to the continued existence, prosperity, and growth of factory farming and all the other cruel practices used in rearing animals for food” ( Animal Liberation, 167).

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