David DeGrazia, “The Harms of Suffering, Confinement,
and Death”
§
HARM OF SUFFERING
(causing pain, distress, fear, anxiety, & suffering)
o
Animals better
off with high level of exp well being
o
To cause aversive
mental states in animals harms them.
§
Either directly
(suffering is intrinsically disvalued)
§
Or indirectly
(suffering is instrumentally bad as it gets in the way of achieving goals/aims)
·
Although humans
typically have far more elaborate life goals, still even significantly less
sophisticated animals such as fish have some desires (to get food) and
suffering can interfere with such a pursuit.
o
So thwarting
an animal’s attempt to achieve an aim is to harm it (even if it does not
experience frustration)?
§
Causing suffering
is one main way we harm animals
§
DeGrazia rejects as naïve the idea that causing
suffering is the only way we can harm animals, so that, for example, painless
death is not a harm
§
THE HARM OF
CONFINEMENT AND THE VALUE OF ANIMAL FREEDOM
§
Sentient animals
have desires (to move around and do things)
o
This gives them pleasure/satisfaction
o
When those
desires thwarted, result is frustration (or other disagreeable feelings
§
Liberty–absence
of external constraint on movement–is generally a benefit for sentient animals,
as permits them to pursue what they want and need
§
Confinement–external
constraints on movement that significantly interfere with one’s ability to live
well–is harmful by definition
o
Forcing a monkey
to live alone in a small barren cage, when monkeys like to roam around, explore
things, play and spend time with other monkeys causes suffering
§
Can
deprivation of liberty be harmful for animals (or bad in general) even if it
does not cause causing suffering?
§
Depends on if
animal liberty is itself of value (apart from its effects on experiential well
being of the animal)
o
The answer to
this would help us decide when and if animals might be better off in zoos
§
Consider the zoo kangaroo,
who is more comfortable in the zoo with higher experiential well being than it would
have in the wild
o
If returned to
wild, would have greater liberty, but more hardship (weather, disease, shorter
life)
o
Does captivity
harms this kangaroo?
o
Would Kangaroo be
better off in wild anyway?
§
Does being
wild and free count for something apart from effects on experiential
well-being?
§
That is, even
if animal’s life has lower experienced quality might it be correct to judge
o
One: The animal is better off in the wild?
o
Or two: It is better that the animal be in the wild
even if the animal is not better off (even if animal is worse off)?
§
THE HARM OF DEATH
§
Example: Should we humanely trap or kill a mouse? Depends on if a mouse is harmed by death
o
If not, then
prefer the mouse trap (that kills) to the “humane” cage trap, as this latter
would involve suffering, experiential harm (being stuck in the gage for hours,
fear at what may come, sadness at being separated from social group members?)
o
Need also to
judge if the harm of death for the mouse (if it is a harm) is worse than the
suffering in the humane trap
§
Dog cast
example: Why put a cast on a dog (causing it discomfort and
frustration for a month) rather than euthanize it, unless we assume dog loses
something by death? Thus it appears we
do think death is a harm for animals.
§
Is death a harm? Always? Why?
o
Difference
between death and dying (latter often involves suffering, former can’t)
o
Perhaps death not
for those who lived very full 95 year life
o
Nor is death a
harm for those suffering unbearable pain and no prospect for improved life
quality
§
THREE ACCOUNTS OF
HARM OF DEATH
§
One: Death is a harm when it thwarts a central
desire to stay alive
o
Individuals want
to stay alive (for instrumental or intrinsic reasons)
§
Individuals
cherish life at least instrumentally–life is a necessary means to pursue more
particular aims
§
Many also value
their lives intrinsically
o
On this view,
death only harms those who desire to live, to stay alive
o
Probably very few animals possess even concept of
staying alive, much less desire to do so
§
Efforts of a dog
to escape fire in a house serve to evade death, as she is terribly frightened,
sensing she may soon be badly hurt, but it is not likely she has concepts of
life/death and desire to live
o
Given he
thinks animals have self-awareness, and thus concept of self, he must be
assuming concept of staying alive (as opposed to being dead) is more
sophisticated
§
Two: Death harms when it thwarts future oriented desire
o
Even if lack
desire to stay alive, death can harm if it thwarts central desires do have
o
E.g., Wolf wants
to become dominant member of a pack; Death harms him as thwarts this desire,
even if has no concept of death
o
Can be harmed by
death even if do not have concept of life and desire to stay alive
o
Significantly
broadens the range of animals harmed by death
o
DeGrazia does
say that most vertebrates have temporal self-awareness and so you would think
future oriented desires
o
Does this
account trivialize the harm of animal death?
§
Consider a cow’s
desire to finish chewing her cud? Or to go
over and see her calf
§
Killing her is
only as bad as thwarting this desire?
§
Counterexample
to above two desire-based approaches:
o
Week-old baby has
no concept of life or future oriented desires.
But clearly death harms her and so need different account.
§
Three: Foreclosed Opportunity Account (Death thwarts possibility of experiencing
satisfaction of interests)
§
Death is an
instrumental harm in so far as it forecloses the valuable opportunities that
continued life would afford
o
So death is
not an intrinsic harm?
§
DeGrazia’s
preferred alternative (and Regan and Sapontzis)
§
Sentient beings
can have valuable experiences, pleasure, contentment, and exercising one’s
natural capacities (depending on view of well being)
o
Death robs cat
and newborn human of the sort of life otherwise available to that individual,
even if no awareness of opportunities in question
§
Sentience
alone entails one can have valuable experiences and since death cuts off such
experiences, death will be a harm to any sentient being
o
In contrast to
view which says death harms only animals with desire to stay alive or with
future oriented projects/desires
§
Debatable whether
mere potential for sentience suffices to make death a harm (relevant to abortion
debate)
§
On this view,
death not harm for an individual with no desire to live, no future oriented
desires, and his future holds experiences that are predominantly negative (full
of suffering)
o
Would this
mean that death is not a harm for the deer shot by the hunter at the beginning of the winter who
would have suffered all winter then died?
o
Or for wild
animals whose life has greater suffering than pleasure?
§
Harm of death
is function of opportunities it forecloses
§
HARMS COMPARABLE
BETWEEN HUMANS AND ANIMALS?
§
Are magnitude of
harms of (death, confinement, suffering of human and animal) roughly equal or
significantly different
§
Suffering comparable: Strong case that certain
amount of suffering counts as a comparable harm no matter what creature suffers
that amount
§
Confinement not comparable: Harm of
confinement (in addition to causing suffering) impedes activities of greater
value or cuts off greater potential enjoyment/satisfaction in case of humans
than at least some animals and thus harms humans more
§
Death is not a
comparable harm for humans and animals
o
Many (including
champions of animal rights) argue human and animal deaths are not comparable
harms
o
Death robs any sentient
being of opportunities
o
But the
opportunities available to humans are more valuable than those available to
significantly less complex creatures, including most or all animals
§
Allegedly humans have
superior capacities for enjoyment and satisfaction and more valuable
characteristic activities and types of functioning than animals
§
Similarly,
opportunity available to a monkey richer than cats, which is greater than
seagulls
§
Differences in
cognitive, emotional and social complexity grounds such comparisons
§
Value of staying
alive to the individual living the life varies across species, so magnitude of
harmed of death varies accordingly
§
Ordinarily death
harms humans more than harms members of sentient beings including at least
animals below mammals
§
Why less wrong
to take animal life (p. 33)
§
Human’s interest
in remaining alive is absolutely central to her welfare
o
Human’s have life
plans projects and deep personal relations all destroyed by death
§
Dog has interest
in remaining alive, but it’s continued life is less central to a dog’s welfare
than to a humans welfare
o
Dogs have at most
truncated plans and their relationships lack the depth and range one finds in
typical humans
o
Death ordinarily
less harmful to a dog than human