Forums → WEPR → Should Animals Have Rights? Why?
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Strop: (with only 1 o this time)
I based my judgment of the "highest orders of human brain functionality" on FMRI scanning (I believe I mentioned this). FMRI or Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging allows one to look at the amount of brain activity required to produce a desired effect. (Reading, speaking, thinking, writing). It has been shown that "critical thinking" skills that I've mentioned earlier use the largest amount of our cortex, and not only large amounts, but require good coordination between different areas. This highly advanced brain functionality is what I will define as high order. These types of activities allow for what I defined to be my definition of "conscious thought." The example I will use is this:
This very argument is a prime example of conscious thought. On average, most of the people sitting down at their computers creating this argument are experiencing relatively few environmental stimuli. (Hopefully) Each person's argument isn't based upon how cold their body temperature is, how much longer they can go without eating, their blood pH, or any physical dangers which may befall them while typing it out. I'm assuming every person is in a relative state of homeostasis, and this argument is completely superfluous to their well being. Therefore nothing about their physical environment should be influencing their arguments here what-so-ever. This is mostly the case when dealing with subjects such as rights and morality, and herein lies my definition of conscious thought. If your thoughts and actions are under no influence of your physical environment, and they will in no way influence your physical environment, then it can be deemed as conscious thought. And from my experience very few, if any, animals display this sort of behavior, it is almost unique to humans, and those animals that do display it, do not show it nearly as often as an average human does. Certainly there are no great debates of morality amongst the termite community. No other animal has displayed a vague understanding of rights beyond basic territorial possession. Therefore, no other animal would have the ability to enforce rights upon themselves. If a species can not make and enforce rights amongst themselves, why should we protect them with our's? As a whole animals have few reservations about climbing over others to reach the top of the food chain, even if we did put them in place, they would not be able to respect the rights we've granted to themselves and to other animals. So why waste time and energy on giving rights to beings that won't be able to appreciate them nor enforce them.
As a side note to my argument of conscious thought: Of course I mean this is a relatively broad sense, I'm sure one could provide many counter-examples to once again nit-pick away at my stance instead of providing an actual counter-argument *cough* zophia *cough*. As a matter of fact I'll beat you do it, driving. Yes, I would consider driving a conscious exercise, despite the fact that most if not all of what you do pertains to environmental stimuli (ie. green light, lane lines, presence of other cars), as I said, I mean my definition in a very broad, within one standard deviation sense, I'm sure there are examples which could be deemed conscious that do not call under my categories and many that do that might not be considered conscious.
To Master256:
First I would like to thank you for your obviously well thought out and articulated response. Your brilliance, which allows you to deem me as a "moron," truly shines through your argument of such great intellect.
Anyways to address your point, why is it unreasonable to expect those who we grant rights to to be able to understand and enforce them upon themselves? Rights are not a intrinsic property of all creatures, they are a privilege granted by society in order to protect its members. (in the U.S., those who are convicted of crimes forfeit their rights). Why should creatures that are unable to understand and enforce them upon themselves (which I see as just holding up their end of the deal) be given them?
Honistly I hate hunting animals , and I would never want to kill an animal.
But the thing is , we need MEAT to live.
We need to hunt to survive.
And yes I do belive animals should have rights.
You know I remember I started this thread because my sister turned vegetarian. LOL.
Uhm, thanks master. donosld and I are having quite a constructive conversation here:
If your thoughts and actions are under no influence of your physical environment, and they will in no way influence your physical environment, then it can be deemed as conscious thought.
This requires something akin to a Platonic dualist conception of being to make any sense and I find this extremely problematic. Do you notice that you're making an arbitrary distinction on what is a 'hysical environment' and what isn't? You further realise that by extension, if you stick to these kinds of premises you can't rely on talking about imaging techniques such as FMRI to reflect degrees of functionality, since the premise of the purported efficacy of such techniques is a necessary relation between physical and behavioral traits?
Reacting to a 'green traffic light' has nothing to do with making decisions based on 'non-physical stimuli' because in my opinion, strictly in the context of this discussion, that phrase is not meaningful. At the best one could say that we are modulating our "lower-order" processes. If anything that's what a "higher-order" process would be, and I have further words to say on this matter if need be- at this point it's only tangentially relevant.
But let's be clear, I'm not a physical reductionist. To this end my arguments are compatible with monism, which bypasses said problem and is therefore a more powerful model.
I realise that while I've cited Dennett, I haven't given you my own definition of consciousness. That's because I believe there is no single definition (same applies to such concepts as 'life', but I can make a generalised statement: that consciousness is a self-fulfilling feature; it compels one to believe they are conscious. I believe this effectively bypasses the 'hard problems' of consciousness that I mentioned earlier and as of yet I'm not convinced you've navigated sufficiently: I am no longer obliged to look for some kind of function or trigger, or the equivalent of the Higgs-Boson (in other words, possibly a wild-goose chase). In the moral sense I also don't get caught up in superfluous free-will arguments. Therefore I no longer have to make qualified statements like these:
I mean my definition in a very broad, within one standard deviation sense
Which just seem inelegant. This is one place where I believe Ockam's razor is a good starting point. In a nutshell, we are always being exposed to environmental stimuli by definition, regardless of whether we're salivating at a burger or arguing about the import of consciousness on animal rights.
But we've slightly digressed:
Anyways to address your point, why is it unreasonable to expect those who we grant rights to to be able to understand and enforce them upon themselves?
As I said before, it's not necessarily unreasonable in some kind of sense (you can reason your way into nearly anything if you're good/bad enough), but it is more reasonable, IMO, to view rights as...well I'm going to be more precise here...a social tool that represents the formal acknowledgment of moral sentiment.
There are two things I want to communicate at this point. One is a reiteration, the other is a development.
1) It's all well and good to argue that as stated, rights are only discussed and 'understood' by humans. It would be perfectly reasonable if the effects of rights were only restricted to humans. But they don't have to be. It makes more sense to me to talk therefore about rights in their domain of effect, and then perhaps make a distinction about which ones are exclusively human. The very reason that we're discussing this now is because rights also reflect the social state. You could say that advocates for animal rights are primarily motivated by being able to empathise or relate to certain animal species due to the commonalities in our behaviors, hence those animal rights are definitely relevant to those humans.
Short version: rights are relevant to far more than those who can understand them in (approximately) the parameters they were conceived. Properly used, they shape the social conscience and advocate social responsibility, a pillar of cohabitation.
2) The new point: previously I spoke of "granting rights" which is accurate in a legal sense. However it is now important that I point out one other thing- what engenders rights? It's not as if we 'talk' about rights and then they pop into existence. These are merely the acknowledgment of cultural sentiments (as I alluded to above) which reflect upon the thrust of my previous argument: there is no concrete differentiation between the stimuli and our responses and that 'magical' or 'distinctive' consciousness. The same goes for rights- talk of that is merely that: talk, the domain of humans.
This reflects upon why I asserted you do not understand animal behavior. Because if you did understand them, I believe you would have to acknowledge that despite your quasi-Descartean inclinations, various animal species have varying social networks, and by definition, therefore their own morality and, depending on your definition then, their own 'consciousness'.
I guess so but animals eat other animals you know some people need meat to eat some people eat vegetables we all have different tastebuds I guess so I guess they have rights to live but what do you care about more you living or an animal living?When I put it that way I wish I could be a vegetarian but I wouldn't last a week without meat.
I guess so but animals eat other animals you know some people need meat to eat some people eat vegetables we all have different tastebuds I guess so I guess they have rights to live but what do you care about more you living or an animal living?When I put it that way I wish I could be a vegetarian but I wouldn't last a week without meat.
Well, one very important distinction: Rights doesn't necessarily mean 'rights to live'.
Or, for that matter, the preeminent 'human' rights as stated in the Declaration of Independence, the right to "life liberty and happiness".
These are human values. We can furthermore assume (from my super-inclusive definition of life anyway) that life desires to keep on living but when where there is life, there is competition. We live at the expense of other lives, simply put.
So it makes sense to consider that there are perhaps separate sets of values, not least because what is important to us is different from what is important to other animals, and also because what is important to us with regard to those other animals also differs.
In this context, the declaration of "rights" can be seen as a driving force to "cooperation", a counterbalance to the forces of "competition".
I won't go into discussion of plant rights now :P
I think the only right an animal needs is the right to survive as a species. Different from the right to live which applies to individuals.
So treating animals like dirt would be okay to you, as long as the species itself survives?
o treating animals like dirt would be okay to you, as long as the species itself survives?
Well obviously one couldn't treat those as entirely separate, that would be an artificial distinction.
Right to survive as a species is also an arbitrary standard and I do have to sometimes call into question some of the premises of hard-line conservationism.
Well, in order to have rights, some philosophers say that animals must be capable of having reason and rationality above simple instinct. If they have these characteristics, they deserve to have their interests taken into account. It's what you call being a moral agent: someone who is responsible for their actions. Most animals, save for higher levels of apes, do not have self-motivation and therefore are not entitled to the same 'rights' as people are.
This, however, does not mean that cruelty is warranted or acceptable towards animals.
Some people say "well, what about insects?" Insects do not have rights; they have no nervous systems and therefore cannot feel pain and they don't have any rationality above "fly around, eat stuff, mate, fly some more". It has nothing to do with cuteness or usefulness to humans; it has to do with physiological capability, self-motivation and animal interests.
So yes, some animals do deserve some basic rights. Most animals deserve, at the very least, negative rights such as the right not to be harmed or treated poorly.
Most animals, save for higher levels of apes, do not have self-motivation and therefore are not entitled to the same 'rights' as people are.
This, however, does not mean that cruelty is warranted or acceptable towards animals.
Hooray! Somebody put two and two together!
Jury's actually been sent out on the matter of cognitive function on a number of the species though; on a philosophical level this may or may not be significant.
they have no nervous systems and therefore cannot feel pain
I thought they did have a nervous system. Not entirely sure about the feeling pain, but at this point I'd assert that the debate is too nascent and introducing insects (and plants) into the equation would be far too complex.
Honestly, when it comes to insects, all due care taken but I consider getting squashed by newspaper to be an acceptable form of selection and population control.
animals are alive, like trees, and like people. if you hurt one of them you can feel it suffer, and nobody should be happy hearing an animal suffer, neither the animals hurt themselves just to see what happens...
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