Chapter 17 The Ethics of Eating Meat

Critical perspectives about factory farming---conceptual framework, ways of thinking

●Christian Ethics: “dominion” compassion, non-violence

Philosophical perspectives:
Defenses of factory farming/eating meat + rebuttals
●Contractarian defense: animals cannot recognize duties so we have no duties to them.
Only those that can recognize moral duties deserve moral consideration.
Rebuttal: marginal persons cannot recognize duties either yet we have duties to
them. What about future generations?
●Animals eat other animals: what is done in the wild entitles us to act in similar ways
Rebuttal: we don’t usually take wild animal behavior as a model for human
civilized behavior. Humans can choose.
●Argument from nature: predator behavior is part of the natural order.
Rebuttal: has been used to justify social/political hierarchies and injustices
Might makes right thinking
What’s so natural about factory farming?
●Tradition: central to Western diet, long time practice
Rebuttal: practices that are harmful should be discontinued. Appeal to tradition
fallacy. Slavery.
●Cheap food:
Rebuttal: eating less meat is a good thing

Should we be vegetarian/vegan?
A utilitarian argument and the principle of utility
The relevant moral criterion is the capacity to suffer or experience happiness (i.e.,
sentience). Therefore, all sentient beings should have their interests considered when
an action affects them.

Non-relevant moral criteria: race, sex, intelligence, etc. Neither of these attributes entitles
one to use another for their own ends.

Principle of equality: we should consider all interests equally.

Speciesism violates this principle. Read page 9 in AL. Call for logical
consistency.

Expanding the sphere of moral consideration. Defines moral progress.

When we consider the amount of harm (environmental degradation, human health,

corporate influence, animal suffering) caused by factory farming on balance with the
amount of satisfaction from eating animals, the calculus results in disutility. Therefore,
factory farming and its corollary, meat eating, is wrong.
Further considerations:
1. Utilitarianism does not demand vegetarianism. Explain.
Critique: Humane meat/animal welfarist position
What does Singer/Mason say about eating humane meat? Page 257.
Suffer during transport/slaughter; humane enough?; meat on plate,
can’t tell the difference.
2. Is it better to exist and live well than not to exist at all?
3. If an animal feels pain, the pain matters as much as it does when a human feels
pain. Evaluate.

Chapter 18—questions?