Utilitarian view on animal research essay

An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Nature is tough and will adapt to this: So someone honest or kind in most situations, and notably so in demanding ones, may nevertheless be trivially tainted by snobbery, inclined to be disingenuous about their forebears and less than kind to strangers with the wrong accent.

In EthicsMoore rejected a purely hedonistic utilitarianism and argued that there is a range of values that might be maximized. Certainly, it is not settled by proclamations that the serious debate is already over.

My position is that if we continue to employ an argument from benefit to justify animal experimentation in medicine, and if we continue to employ a discussion of the comparative value of human and animal life to justify using the animal in preference to the human, then, because not all human life has the same value as normal adult human life, we are faced with the prospect of human experiments, of, that is, using some humans as we currently use animals.

I went back to the plateau and when I got there I found they had put a road right through the middle of it. It involves our saying that, even if the total quantity of pleasure in each was exactly equal, yet the fact that all the beings in the one possessed, in addition knowledge of many different kinds and a full appreciation of all that was beautiful or worthy of love in their world, whereas none of the beings in the other possessed any of these things, would give us no reason whatever for preferring the former to the latter.

Subsequent experiments have shown that most of the behavior in these and similar games can be explained by an expectation of reciprocity or a concern with reputation. We should acknowledge immediately that there is much that we do not know and that our insight into animal minds is partial at best.

On one hand, this drew criticism from some animal advocates, who wanted nothing less than an absolute prohibition and apparently felt betrayed. They were prepared to look upon the customary or traditional with a critical eye and to demand more defense than that things have long been done that way.

To be fair to Bentham's critics, of course, they are free to agree with him that this is the case in many situations, just not all — and that there is still a subset of laws that reflect the fact that some actions just are intrinsically wrong regardless of consequences.

But unless the traits arose from multiple iterations of copying of random errors in a finite pool of replicators, the theory of natural selection adds nothing to ordinary cause and effect. Someone who is generous, honest, compassionate, and courageous might not be a morally good person—or, if it is still held to be a truism that they are, then morally good people may be led by what makes them morally good to act wrongly.

There isn't five times more loss of happiness or pleasure when five die: When we see an act that is vicious we disapprove of it. Given the suffering that this routinely inflicts on millions of animals, and that probably very few of the experiments will be of significant benefit to humans or to other animals, it is better to put our resources into other methods of doing research that do not involve harming animals.

The Origins of the Western Debate. Other things being equal, the more virtuous the parties to the relationship, the more binding the obligation.

We already have a passable idea of which traits are virtues and what they involve. Some cases have seemed easy: If an act is vicious, its viciousness is a matter of the human response given a corrected perspective to the act or its perceived effects and thus has a kind of contingency that seems unsettling, certainly unsettling to those who opted for the theological option.

Utilitarian ethics makes all of us members of the same moral community. A Pluralistic View, Oxford: Further, the basic structures of the theories are the same for more on this see Donner We will become bored and depressed. The Trouble with Wilderness; or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature by William Cronon.

Print-formatted version: PDF In William Cronon, ed., Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature, New York: W.

W. Norton & Co.,The time has come to rethink wilderness. The number of wild animals vastly exceeds that of animals on factory farms. Therefore, animal advocates should consider focusing their efforts to raise concern about the suffering that occurs in nature. In theory, engineering more humane ecological systems might be valuable.

In practice, however, it seems more effective to promote the meme of caring about wild animals to other activists. Utilitarianism is one of the most powerful and persuasive approaches to normative ethics in the history of philosophy.

Though not fully articulated until the 19 th century, proto-utilitarian positions can be discerned throughout the history of ethical theory.

Though there are many varieties of the view discussed, utilitarianism is generally held to be the view that the morally right action is. I regard myself as an advocate of animal rights — as a part of the animal rights movement.

That movement, as I conceive it, is committed to a number of goals, including. John Stuart Mill (—) John Stuart Mill () profoundly influenced the shape of nineteenth century British thought and political discourse.

From the curators: Animal rights activist and scientist Temple Grandin created the serpentine ramp to ensure the humane treatment of cattle. The first ramps that Grandin designed, inwere used during vaccinations of the herd and then, within the same year, for slaughter plants. Grandin.

Utilitarian view on animal research essay