If We All Think Only Of Our

When You Look At Food As An Ethical Issue In The Christian Tradition, You Don't Find Very Much About It. You Don't Find, As You Do In The Jewish Or Islamic Or Hindu Traditions, A Lot Of Restrictions Saying You Can Eat This But You Can't Eat That. But What You Do Find Is The Idea That Gluttony Is A Sin And That It's Something That We Ought To Be Ashamed Of.

At The Descriptive Level, Certainly, You Would Expect Different Cultures To Develop Different Sorts Of Ethics And Obviously They Have; That Doesn't Mean That You Can't Think Of Overarching Ethical Principles You Would Want People To Follow In All Kinds Of Places.

I Would Not Question The Sincerity Of Vegetarians Who Take Little Interest In Animal Liberation Because They Give Priority To Other Causes; But When Nonvegetarians Say That "human Problems Come First" I Cannot Help Wondering What Exactly It Is That They Are Doing For Human Beings That Compels Them To Continue To Support The Wasteful, Ruthless Exploitation Of Farm Animals.

We Ought To Consider The Interests Of Animals Because They Have Interests And It Is Unjustifiable To Exclude Them From The Sphere Of Moral Concern; To Make This Consideration Depend On Beneficial Consequences For Human Beings Is To Accept The Implication That The Interests Of Animals Do Not Warrant Consideration For Their Own Sakes.

Suppose I Grant That Pigs And Dogs Are Self-aware To Some Degree, And Do Have Thoughts About Things In The Future. That Would Provide Some Reason For Thinking It Intrinsically Wrong To Kill Them - Not Absolutely Wrong, But Perhaps Quite A Serious Wrong. Still, There Are Other Animals - Chickens Maybe, Or Fish - Who Can Feel Pain But Don't Have Any Self-awareness Or Capacity For Thinking About The Future. For Those Animals, You Haven't Given Me Any Reason Why Painless Killing Would Be Wrong, If Other Animals Take Their Place And Lead An Equally Good Life.