PHL373H1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Category Mistake, Animal Testing, Circular Reasoning
Wednesday, October 5, 2016
1
PHL373 Lecture 8
Cohen
- Animal testing is morally permissible (in the relevant cases).
• Because:
- (A) if an action is morally impermissible, then either the patient has right or is
covered by someone else’s rights.
- (B) Animals do not have rights.
- (C) In the relevant cases, animals are not covered.
(B) Animals do not have rights.
- Because:
• The proposition animals have rights does not make sense. They cannot have
rights because ascribing rights to animals is a category mistake.
• Animals do not have rights because they do not have moral autonomy.
- Moral autonomy requires acting out of moral understanding. Having a concept of
right and wrong.
- The ascription of rights requires the capacity to act out of moral understanding
because having a right entails making a demand.
- Why do you need to be able to make a demand to have rights? Why should we
believe that animals can’t make demands even if we accept that having a right
entails making a demand.
• Cohen argues that this explains the difference between rights and obligations.
There is a normative difference between the two.
• Why are animals unable to make this type of demand on humans?
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Document Summary
Animal testing is morally permissible (in the relevant cases): because: (a) if an action is morally impermissible, then either the patient has right or is covered by someone else"s rights. (c) in the relevant cases, animals are not covered. (b) animals do not have rights. Because: the proposition (cid:1688)animals have rights(cid:1689) does not make sense. They cannot have rights because ascribing rights to animals is a category mistake: animals do not have rights because they do not have moral autonomy. Moral autonomy requires acting out of moral understanding. The ascription of rights requires the capacity to act out of moral understanding because having a right entails making a demand. Why should we believe that animals can"t make demands even if we accept that having a right entails making a demand: cohen argues that this explains the difference between rights and obligations.
