animal ethics by Angus Taylor
Broadview Press, 2009
Can animals be regarded as part of the moral community? To what extent, if at all, do they have m... more Can animals be regarded as part of the moral community? To what extent, if at all, do they have moral rights? Are we wrong to eat them, hunt them, or use them for scientific research? Can animal liberation be squared with the environmental movement? Taylor traces the background of these debates from Aristotle to Darwin and sets out the views of numerous contemporary philosophers – including Peter Singer, Tom Regan, Mary Anne Warren, J. Baird Callicott, and Martha Nussbaum – with ethical theories ranging from utilitarianism to eco-feminism. The new edition also includes provocative quotations from some of the major writers in the field. As the final chapter insists, animal ethics is more than just an “academic” question: it is intimately connected both to our understanding of what it means to be human and to pressing current issues such as food shortages, environmental degradation, and climate change.
The emergence of an ecological consciousness is not in itself enough to resolve the issue of our ... more The emergence of an ecological consciousness is not in itself enough to resolve the issue of our treatment of non-human creatures. An ethical principle of a non-exploitative, sustainable civilization is the right of all sentient beings to exercise their natural powers in pursuit of their flourishing as individuals. To this end, this essay articulates the “vital-needs rights view” as a philosophical basis for reconciling animal rights with the satisfaction of human vital needs. The vital-needs rights view supports a defensible environmental ethic. Only by ascribing rights to sentient animals can an environmental ethic avoid an unacceptable degree of anthropocentrism. This is because only a rights-based environmental ethic can prohibit humans from significantly interfering with sentient animals where human vital needs are not at stake. Further, a rights view that permits significant interference where this is required for the satisfaction of human vital needs avoids problems that would otherwise plague a rights view. This rights-based environmental ethic suggests an alliance of animal rights with ecofeminism and with deep ecology, and necessitates an understanding of the connections among vital needs, capitalism, and environmental degradation.
Animal Subjects: An Ethical Reader in a Posthuman World (ed. Jodey Castricano), 2008
The movement for animal liberation involves the attempt to break down the traditional conceptual ... more The movement for animal liberation involves the attempt to break down the traditional conceptual boundaries between human beings and animals, in order to include the latter within the moral community. But this breaking down of boundaries is a double-edged sword that is simultaneously being wielded by opponents of animal liberation to uphold the notion of human domination over other species. I use the fiction of Philip K. Dick as illustrative material for discussing what is now the most influential grounds for rejecting animal liberation: what I call "the new argument from nature".
Philosophy Now, 2008
Count Lucarda, a descendant of Vlad the Impaler, invites me to an unusual feast that forces me to... more Count Lucarda, a descendant of Vlad the Impaler, invites me to an unusual feast that forces me to question my ethical consistency.
Canadian Perspectives on Animals and the Law (ed. Peter Sankoff, Vaughan Black, and Katie Sykes), 2015
What is the case for implementing strong legal protections for (non-human) animals? At root, this... more What is the case for implementing strong legal protections for (non-human) animals? At root, this question is a philosophical one. Legal protections for human beings are grounded in our conviction that every individual has a fundamental worth, or dignity, that must be respected. Whether at least some animals have the sort of non-instrumental value that ought to afford them protection from exploitation has been the subject of vigorous debate among philosophers. I highlight some features of this debate that may be relevant to issues of animals and the law.
Land, Value, Community: Callicott and Environmental Philosophy (ed. Wayne Ouderkirk and Jim Hill), 2002
J. Baird Callicott has argued that environmental ethics and the animal-liberation movement should... more J. Baird Callicott has argued that environmental ethics and the animal-liberation movement should make common cause against the forces ravaging the non-human world. However, in his view this alliance is to be “on terms...favorable to ecocentric environmental ethics”, which means the rejection of both the utilitarian and the rights versions of animal liberation. By contrast, I hold that an ethic of the general type that Callicott wishes to advance does not require rejection of a strong animal-liberation position. Specifically, the values of ecosystemic integrity and the exercise of autonomy can and should jointly form the basis of a new environmental ethic.
Environmental Ethics, 1996
The Journal of Value Inquiry, 1996
In this essay I argue that Jan Narveson's contractarian view of morality contradicts his professe... more In this essay I argue that Jan Narveson's contractarian view of morality contradicts his professed liberalism, and that a consistently liberal ethic must recognize many (non-human) animals as members of the moral community.
Between the Species, 2023
Between the Species, 2021
In Duty and the Beast, Andy Lamey confronts arguments for what he calls new omnivorism – recent a... more In Duty and the Beast, Andy Lamey confronts arguments for what he calls new omnivorism – recent arguments that profess to undermine the moral injunction against eating meat that is so prominent in the animal protection (animal rights) movement. Instead of rejecting animal protection as such, the new critics claim that in the pursuit of this objective the consumption of some meat is permissible or even obligatory.
Between the Species, 2021
Review of Critical Terms for Animal Studies, edited by Lori Gruen
Between the Species, 2020
Dominique Lestel sets out to demolish the fundamental claims of ethical vegetarianism (including ... more Dominique Lestel sets out to demolish the fundamental claims of ethical vegetarianism (including veganism) and to propose as an alternative what he calls ethical carnivorism. Although he fails to present a logically sound case against ethical vegetarianism, that fact is unlikely to diminish the lure of the “circle of life” ideology that he articulates.
Between the Species, 2012
Between the Species, 2010
Smith argues for "human exceptionalism": the idea that humans possess a unique moral worth that e... more Smith argues for "human exceptionalism": the idea that humans possess a unique moral worth that endows them alone, among all creatures, with the right never to be treated merely as means to the ends of others. He believes that attributing significant moral status to animals necessarily threatens the value we attach to human lives. Hence his concept of human dignity is tied to his view that animals are essentially exploitable resources. Ultimately, Smith's human exceptionalism proves to be not a statement of fact, but simply an assertion of human domination over the other sentient beings on this planet.
Philosophy in Review, 2006
Between the Species, Vol. 17/1 (2014), pp. 140-65. Interviewed by Angus Taylor.
applied ethics by Angus Taylor
Broadview Press, 2020
This book explores a number of controversial ethical issues of interest to Canadians, and allows ... more This book explores a number of controversial ethical issues of interest to Canadians, and allows readers to encounter a variety of perspectives with regard to each. The readings provide clear and powerful contemporary arguments for differing points of view, together with some classic pieces that have helped define all subsequent discussion of these issues.
Marxist theory by Angus Taylor
Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 1989
Marx said that Darwinian theory was a "foundation" or "basis" for historical materialism. Yet the... more Marx said that Darwinian theory was a "foundation" or "basis" for historical materialism. Yet there is no consensus on what Marx meant by his comments on The Origin of Species. Scholars have tended to divide into two broad camps: on the one hand are those, generally hostile to Marxism, who accuse Marx of a naive Social Darwinism. On the other are those, generally sympathetic at least to Marx himself, who belittle the whole notion of a link between Darwinian theory and Marx’s view of human history, and who have therefore been concerned to rescue Marx’s view of history by divorcing it from any relation to natural-scientific theories. In this rendering Engels becomes the scapegoat for the positivist digressions these critics perceive in nineteenth- or twentieth-century Marxism, while Marx himself escapes as the one legitimate author of the ‘materialist’ conception of history. I argue that both camps are wrong: that Marx was no Social Darwinist, and yet did perceive an important link between Darwinian theory and his own. This link had two distinct facets: one essentially ideological, and the other methodological.
Dalhousie Review, 1988
Popper's critique of Marx's alleged "historicism" is vitiated by Popper's failure to distinguish ... more Popper's critique of Marx's alleged "historicism" is vitiated by Popper's failure to distinguish between Marx's analysis of the capitalist mode of production and Marx's general theory of history.
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animal ethics by Angus Taylor
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Marxist theory by Angus Taylor
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