Basics
- The midterm is on October 18
- It will consist of 5 questions and you will choose 4 to answer.
- They will be 3-part questions like the ones on the quiz. (The quiz questions will not be on the midterm.)
- You should plan on writing for the whole 50-55 minutes
- (a) Peter Singer writes that he's arguing for equality for animals, not rights. What's the difference between saying my cat is my equal and saying my cat has rights, on Singer's view? (b) What is it about my cat that makes her have rights, according to Tom Regan? (c) Does Peter Carruthers agree with Singer or Regan or neither about my cat's moral status? Briefly, what's the basis for his position? Sample Answer
- Use the study guide below. Follow the links to blog posts.
- Use your own notes.
- Reread selectively.
- Make sure you don't repeat any errors that might have been in your RRs or the quiz--read comments and the quiz key.
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MODULE 1: THE MORAL STATUS OF ANIMALS
Study suggestion:
- Study the anti-animalists as a group--Bible, Aristotle, Kant, Carruthers (9.11).
- They all put animals on a pretty low plane, but do they think "anything goes" when it comes to how we treat animals?
- How is Carruthers reasoning different from the other authors? What does he say about marginal cases vs. animals?
8.26 Introduction Saving pufflings, hunting puffins
828 Human superiority The moral status of animals, Aristotle, Bible, similarities and differences
8.30 Do animals count? Kant, categorical imperative, no duties to animals, the basis for obligations involving animals, his psychological theory, applications- Study the animalists as a group. How are Singer and Regan similar and different?
- What do they object to in each others' views?
- How do they argue for their own views?
- Be prepared to select one of their ideas and make an objection.
9.04 Animal liberation Peter Singer, the principle of equality, speciesism, Bentham, drawing the line, sentience
9.06 Life and death Singer's principle of equality, application to issues of pain, applications to painless killing, humans vs. animals, normal humans vs. impaired humans, is Singer's view on killing speciesist?9.09 The rights approach. Singer recap, principle of equality, utilitarianism, utilitarianism vs. the rights view, application to killing puffins for food, Regan's objections to utilitarianism, Regan's argument for animal rights
9.11 No rights for animals Regan recap, analytical response to an argument, possible objections to premises of Regan's argument, how Carruthers cuts tie between animals and marginal cases, contractualism on normal humans, marginal cases, and animalsMODULE 2: ANIMAL MINDS, ANIMAL DEATHS
Study suggestion:
- Pick several of the five capacities we studied.
- Think about which ethicists care about those capacities
- Get a grip on what the capacity is or involves
- Review the evidence we looked at and the conclusions about specific species
9.15 Animal pain Ethicists who care about pain, how pain works, pain in fish and invertebrates, different brains
9.18 Animal pleasure Pain recap, pleasure, who cares about it, pleasure vs. pain
9.20 Animal morality Which ethicists care?, Frans DeWaal on anthropomorphism and anthropodenial, rudiments of morality in animals, DeWaal's evidence, his talk
9.22 Trapped in the present? Which ethicists care? recalling the past and how it's not simply memory; evidence for it in animals; planning for the future, evidence for it in animals
9.27 Animal death Jeff McMahan, time-relative interest in continuing to live; eight alleged reasons why humans have a greater interest in continuing to live
Study suggestion (McMahan):
- Make sure you understand "time-relative interest in continuing to live"
- Then pick several of the eight alleged reasons and make sure you understand them well
- then think of some possible objections to the reasons you chose (it will help if you recollect our debate about McMahan)
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MODULE 3: ANIMALS AND SOCIETY
Study suggestion (D&K):
- Make sure you can explain what D&K are adding to the animalist perpectives in module 1. What's new here?
- How are they using the parallel with human political categories?
- We talked the most about citizens, so feel free to concentrate on that material.
10.2 Animal categories Donaldson and Kymlicka's (D&K) view of human political categories; how they're using those to categorize animals; how this approach compares and contrasts with Regan and Singer
10.9 Animal citizens (and denizens and wild sovereigns) More about animal citizens; which animals are citizens and why; their rights and responsibilities; wild sovereigns; liminal denizens (e.g. mice)
10.11 Where cats and dogs belong D&K say animal citizens should have access to public spaces; countries where they do have greater access; contrast with Dallas laws