So now, religious or philosophical conviction is 'special pleading', and the secular view is normative. — Wayfarer

It depends on whom you want to convince.

It's a philosophy forum, I'm exploring the philosophical question of the nature of rights. The fact that this is so dimly apprehended says something in my view.

My point is that in order for people to treat animals better, people would need to adopt a whole different outlook on life. It's why popular slogans at protests can't possibly make a difference, as they are too particular, have too small a scope.

It's a philosophy forum, I'm exploring the philosophical question of the nature of rights. The fact that this is so dimly apprehended says something in my view. — Wayfarer

People in general are reluctant to acknowledge the rights of other people or the wellbeing of other people to begin with. It's ... romantic to expect them to extend such consideration to animals when they won't even do it for humans. Generally, people don't believe in the rights of others, regardless what the laws say, so it's no surprise that they don't think about the nature of rights.

As for the nature of rights: I personally don't believe there exist rights, only privileges, conferred by those with more power onto those with less power, regardless whether those with less power are of the same species as those with more power.

This might sound strange, but how is a person to overtly state that animals are innocent bystanders of our desires for the goods produced from their cultivation? — Shawn

Kant's end-in-itself is reserved for rational beings, meaning humans. So, we can't cite Kant here. To overtly state that animals are innocent bystanders of our desires for the goods produced from their cultivation, just say so. No one can dispute it -- we just don't accept it that it is the way it is. We use the notion of rational human beings to justify our actions.

Humans would need to sacrifice some (or much) of their comforts. Material ones, such as space and natural resources. And psychological ones, such as the feeling of human superiority over animals. — baker

No contest.

It's a philosophy forum, I'm exploring the philosophical question of the nature of rights. The fact that this is so dimly apprehended says something in my view. — Wayfarer

And so if we can't confer rights to animals meaningfully, what's left?

Conviction. That's what's left. Those who advocate for the protection of animals would be the divergent group. We will now be the man who stole a loaf of bread. And so we would be under the scrutiny of Pluralism as a moral system.

And so if we can't confer rights to animals meaningfully, what's left? — Caldwell

Humane treatement, animal welfare, environmentalism. Plenty.

Interesting article on this question https://www.animallaw.info/article/animal-rights-theory-and-utilitarianism-relative-normative-guidance

Good read. I like Peter Singer.

[...]This completely changed their way of life. We did not domesticate wheat. It domesticated us. The word “domesticate” comes from the Latin domus, which means “house.” Who’s the one living in a house? Not the wheat. It’s the Sapiens. — Yuval Noah Harari (Book Sapiens - Agriculutural Revolution)

A similar argument maybe made for domesticated animals. We, humans, are the ones who have to do the dirty work - torturing, killing animals - but animals, they can pretend to be innocent - oh no! we (animals) are the victims of mankind's inherently wicked nature - and get away wiith it all.

Here we are, all guilt-ridden, that we're, dialing it down a bit, mean to animals but isn't it a possibility that they (animals) are the ones who make us so?

Fruits are so sweet! Meat too is, if you know what I mean. Why? Why?

Maya!

God moves in mysterious ways. — William Cowper

‘If God wanted us to be vegetarian, why did He make animals out of meat?’ ~ bumper sticker

Forgive me if this has already been said. But on the subject of farming, yes. Farming in general will harm animals in some ways, whether it be the plot of land, or the insects. However, eating plants results in less harm overall. I cannot say whether or not plants "feel" pain. However, eating a plant based diet (with some exceptions such as things that would require deforestation,) is greater than taking the life of an animal. Why? Because to raise the animal you need even more land for themselves, and so that you can grow even more plants for them to eat. As such, imagine if both are equally cruel. Then, I would suggest that eating plants is still better as it is not being used as a means to an end.

@Caldwell @James Riley @baker @Wayfarer

I have heard some arguments for animal rights....
* * *
There really is no perspective to prefer in terms of point of view on the matter. — Shawn

Cavell has an essay in the book Philosophy and Animal Life, in response to a fictionalized speech making a plea for the moral treatment of animals. In response (piggy-backed on Cora Diamond's response to other essays setting out arguments for the proposition), Cavell starts from Wittgenstein's finale in the Philosophical Investigations where Witt looks at our capacity to see an aspect of something (PI, p. 193-208, 3d), to see something in one regard rather than another (the dawning of a re-cognizing of the same thing with no proper case as cause (yet, at other times, constrained, PI, p. 208-9)). " 'To me [some abstract lines] is an animal pierced by an arrow.' That is what I treat it as; this is my attitude to the figure." (PI, p. 205 3rd Ed) Our "attitude" is the vantage we take towards something, how we value it in our standing to it. "My attitude towards him is an attitude towards a soul. I am not of the opinion that he has a soul." (PI, p. 178, iv) An attitude to animals is not intellectual (say, about our biological similarities or dissimilar rights); it is not a matter of learning something (the horror of farming practices), of knowledge of information (facts), thus not in the form of a traditional argument.

The observation is that issues like the treatment of animals are not on the level of a rational conclusion (particularly given it is not even a moral issue like abortion, but a sea-change in our everyday behavior, our vision). Such an expression Cavell calls a passionate utterance in his essay with that name from the book Philosophy the Day after Tomorrow (excerpt attached), drawn along the lines of Austin's performative act (the criteria of which is outlined in the excerpt)--which, like an apology, can be true in that it is done appropriately, though not in the way a statement is true/false. A passionate utterance is done to affect the feelings, thoughts, or actions of another (technically, an Austinian perlocutionary act--@Banno). Plato calls this persuasion (by rhetoric), and he is right in the sense that there is no accepted conventional procedure (as with Austin's examples of other performative acts) like with a promise, or a bet.

However, in this case, I am nevertheless moved by my passion to (appropriately) claim to have the standing to single you out and demand a response ("what I expect from you" PI, p. 205) that you may be moved to offer (or the exchange falls apart at any point--fails to be made "alive" for you, PI, p. 205). Appropriate because we are friends, or I am an institution with a history of involvement, or I accuse you of inhumanity, etc. Witt will say that the alternative concept forces itself on us (PI, p. 204), which I take as the pressure put on you to respond as a function of the appropriateness of my claim, which structurally amounts to, not my argument, but my, say, cry of pain (PI, p. 197)--to which a similar class of response may be only to be "repelled" (PI, p. 205)

I am moved to expose my interests and needs and desires (what is "important to us" PI, p. 205) as they are the means of the production of our self (Marx), that they comprise us (or fail to), and to that extent, that we are what compromises the social contract, thus our lives require an accounting--for our want and waste and false necessity--in the face of our real need and, to put it in place for philosophy, the good (roughly). In this case, what am I, in terms of: at what (whose) expense? That we may know the good but not behave or feel accordingly (be virtuous); we may be incapable of an ideal yet still yearn to attain our better self. I am not morally more competent than you to judge monstrousness, but also you cannot absolve yourself by generalizing guilt rather than providing the intelligibility of a specific response to being singled out by a call to imagine (PI, p. 207) animals, say: as present company; or as sacrifice; etc.

As with Kant's aesthetic judgement and the method of Ordinary Language Philosophy, seeing an aspect is for you to see for yourself " 'I see a likeness between these two faces'—let the man I tell this to be seeing the faces as clearly as I do myself." PI, p. 193.

Section of Philosophical Investigations, 3rd Ed. pp. 193-208, attached.

Cavell essays - Companionable Thinking, and excerpt from Performative and Passionate Utterance, attached

‘If God wanted us to be vegetarian, why did He make animals out of meat?’ ~ bumper sticker — Wayfarer

:lol: :up:

Animals are innocent - they don't intend to harm (injure/kill) for the sake of harm. They only participate in actions that are immoral out of necessity (defense/food).

Perhaps a link to Cavell's article would help.

It's unusual to see mention of the second part of PI. There's much there to unpack. Well worth further discussion.

@Sam26?

I attached the Philosophical Investigations section XI on aspects and the Companionable Thinking essay by Cavell to my original comment, though the book starts with Diamond responding to a fictional speech (I believe made elsewhere) and, en masse, to four other responses, then Cavell responds to her with the essay provided, then McDowell responds to Cavell, then Ian Hacking tries to wrap it all up, so the context is not entire with just Cavell's essay, but he does directly quote all that may be necessary. Also, Cavell had a tendency in his later work to drop a lot of unpursued possibilities without fleshing them all the way out (and to simply refer back to previous works where he worked out an issue completely) and he is not taking a position on the welfare of animals so much as the philosophical analysis of this type of ethical discussion in the face of skepticism of its possibility. Finally, the reference to passionate utterance is actually to an essay "Performative and Passionate Utterance" the core of which I am also attaching to the original post

I made a mistake: the reference to "passionate utterances" in the essay on animals is just a mention of an essay called "Performative and Passionate Utterance" in Philosophy the Day After Tomorrow. I have edited the original post and attached the pages of the core argument of that essay to it.

That said, there's a story breaking in Australia about shocking treatment of livestock in the live animal trade, by abbatoirs in Indonesia. I'm standing with the animal rights acitivists in calling for that abhorrent trade to be closed down, it is absolutely heart-wrenching to see animals treated that way, and completely inhumane. But it's not a matter of violation of the animal's rights, it's cruelty on the part of humans. — Wayfarer

What's wrong with being cruel to animals if we don't think it is because they have a right not to be treated cruelly? What about children who are not of an age to understand the notion of a right? If what you are claiming is that animals don't have rights because in order to have rights they would have to be able to conceive of themselves as having rights, then that is a self-serving tautology.

Animals that are treated cruelly are unhappy just as humans that are treated cruelly are. Animals may not be able to articulate the notion of having rights, but they would avoid being treated cruelly whenever possible. Humans don't have rights because they are able to conceive of themselves as having rights, but because, for the sake of compassion and fair play, we grant ourselves rights, just as we should for animals.

That says something, doesn't it? So now, religious or philosophical conviction is 'special pleading', and the secular view is normative. Is that it? — Wayfarer

It's a philosophy forum, I'm exploring the philosophical question of the nature of rights. The fact that this is so dimly apprehended says something in my view. — Wayfarer

The secular view is default because it is the view that grounds ethics in nothing more than arguments that may be derived from empirical and rational consideration of the actual situation on the ground, so to speak, and not on this or that ancient scripture.

Because I am wanting in my ability to parse your post (I don't have the trained academic mind), I did what I have often done with complex statutes that constantly refer/cite to other provisions within themselves, full of caveats, extrapolation and parenthetical explanations, editing out what I perceived as surplusage, and deleting page numbers, etc.. Nevertheless, I found myself getting lost in who said what about what: You, Cavell, Diamond, Wittgenstein, Austin, Banno, Plato, Kant. So I removed the names and tried again to winnow the gist. The end result found me again embarrassingly wanting, and afraid to respond lest I sound even dumber than I am.

So I ask that it be re-written for my lay-eyes; barring that, I will graciously bow out and thank you for an offering, albeit too thick for me to eat. :chin: :smile:

Nevertheless, I found myself getting lost in who said what about what: You, Cavell, Diamond, Wittgenstein, Austin, Banno, Plato, Kant. So I removed the names and tried again to winnow the gist. The end result found me again embarrassingly wanting, and afraid to respond lest I sound even dumber than I am.

So I ask that it be re-written for my lay-eyes; barring that, I will graciously bow out and thank you for an offering, albeit too thick for me to eat. :chin: :smile: — James Riley

Fair assessment. I couldn't respond myself.

I did attach the texts to the original post, and they are very short so I wouldn't be deterred. As well, the antipathy of philosophy is a parred down summary or "thesis"--thinking I could just "tell" you--because plowing through it and noticing what comes to your mind, seeing for and to yourself, is necessary for philosophy to be fruitful at all, to change how you think (not just what, like an opinion), however, with the possibility of getting you further interested, Cavell (following Diamond) takes a moral issue of this magnitude not as a matter of an intellectual argument--that everyone knows the reasons (biological, factual, informational) for or against--but that it takes re-imagining the world in a different way for ourselves, so that the form of claim I make is emotional and revelatory and calls you out to answer in kind (or be the lesser for it); i.e., the comment is not about the subject so much as the form of discussion.

Cavell . . . takes a moral issue of this magnitude not as a matter of an intellectual argument . . . but that it takes re-imagining the world in a different way for ourselves, so that the form of claim I make is emotional and revelatory and calls you out to answer in kind (or be the lesser for it) — Antony Nickles

That (with my redactions) is what I got from your original post. I just got lost in who said what, and did not want to misattribute.

the comment is not about the subject so much as the form of discussion. — Antony Nickles

That was my suspicion, and a cause of a little consternation. I now feel better knowing that what I took from your post regarding the form of discussion applies to how I think about people as well as animals.

I like that form of discussion. It almost seems to put intuition back on equal footing with cognition.

Thanks for the clarification.

P.S. In addition to my last, I got to thinking also about this:

As well, the antipathy of philosophy is a parred down summary or "thesis"--thinking I could just "tell" you--because plowing through it and noticing what comes to your mind, seeing for and to yourself, is necessary for philosophy to be fruitful at all, to change how you think (not just what, like an opinion), — Antony Nickles

I happen to agree, somewhat. As I said 8 months ago: "The mode of travel can matter. I used to be jealous of those people who, after my long cognitive slog to a place, I find already there, having arrived on the wings of intuition. But then I remember I have found along my way; the truth is often counterintuitive. While others may wonder what took me so long, I’d rather arrive knowing what I don’t know. We may be in agreement; we may be in the same place. But if I must have company, I choose those who arrive by foot."

So we are in agreement. But some folks (me for instance) need:

the possibility of getting you further interested — Antony Nickles

in order to initiate the trek in the first place. Too often I have found the educated will wield their knowledge like a sword of intimidation or pride, with a whole lot of form and no substance. I arrive at the end of a journey and find nothing there. Or, as they say out west, "All hat and no cattle."

I am happy to say that with you, such is not the case. You have held my hand and I thank you for it.

We may be in agreement; we may be in the same place. But if I must have company, I choose those who arrive by foot — James Riley

In Philosophical Investigations, Wittgenstein examines why we want the certainty of picturing language as words connected to objects (including a "meaning"). To unearth our desire he looks at example after example of the ordinary complicated ways the world is meaningful to us.

...In the actual use of expressions [compared to language imagined like math] we make detours, we go by side-roads. We see the straight highway before us, but of course we cannot use it, because it is permanently closed. — Wittgenstein, PI, #426

Fair assessment. I couldn't respond myself. — Caldwell

Literally the point is that my being moved to morally call you out appropriately is a claim upon you that creates a responsibility to respond. You object, you're confused, etc; but, in not making yourself intelligible, you avoid the claim upon you. Though, in all fairness, you don't have to respond; say, being unmoved, uninterested, however, perhaps without any attempt to make yourself known (even to yourself) we can't call it a response (or to have assessed anything, fairly or not). Though having appropriately made the claim, if you do not work to see for yourself, I am unable to move you to, nor argue, nor explain.

This hour I tell things in confidence,
I might not tell everybody but I will tell you...
All I mark as my own you shall offset it with your own,
else it were time lost listening to me. — Whitman, Song of Myself, 1855, p. 29

In Philosophical Investigations, Wittgenstein examines why we want the certainty of picturing language as words connected to objects (including a "meaning"). To unearth our desire he looks at example after example of the ordinary complicated ways the world is meaningful to us. — Antony Nickles

In this regard, animals are indeed innocent. And I too can be an animal.

Large tree plantations sprung up in the wake of America’s rape of her natural forests. Most of these are in the south east. All those who have spent time, in both plantation and forest, know deeply that a forest, by definition, is more than just trees (AWF). Some already knew this. Others had to witness the difference. Thus, when a tree falls in a forest, there is never no one there to not hear it. It always makes a sound.

However, there is a qualitative difference between the sound of a tree falling and that of a tree being felled. Some already knew this. Others had to listen to the difference. The ears of the innocent hear a different sound, a better sound. Whereas the words written on pages, made from the pulp of the wood from the trees? They make no sound that an innocent can hear over the din of the felling. Nor should they.

Sometimes even the logger will set down his tool and listen for a better sound. But it takes time; more for some than others. It’s not merely how long the ringing continues in the ear, but how innocent the ear is.

Depending on who you ask, there is no organism alive on this planet that is anything but. Survival of the fittest, they say. Would you be willing to jump into the ocean during shark feeding time or go toe-to-toe with a gorilla? We don't have to, of course. Allegedly from this very process we now tout as divine law. After all, we have tools and neat little appendages we call thumbs. Innocent? Perhaps but according to who's court? So long as we remain in our own jurisdiction of understanding, perhaps you're right.

Here, the analogous world of trees and plantations would be animals and cattle, wildlife and product. As I have said, for Wittgenstein, to swing from seeing the same thing as something entirely different while it remains absolutely the same, is to see another "aspect" of it by taking a different "attitude" to it--to approach it, take it for ourselves/to ourselves, differently.

Yes, we must "spend time" to "know deeply", which may be to say: be aware of the context of possibilities; for one example: the world that forces our feeling of inevitability that a home of shelter and comfort, built within the safety of tradition, must be out of lumber, which, by seeming destiny, means, or accounts for, a felled tree. Envisioning a tree as wood then comes to us immediately now, as if "already known". So how do we "witness" a difference? We are not testifying, nor speaking, but listening differently (not being argued by [out from our] logical necessity), accepting, receiving rather than acting, rather than making a certain thing of something.

Whereas the words written on pages, made from the pulp of the wood from the trees[...] make no sound that an innocent can hear over the din of the felling. Nor should they. — James Riley

Our ears must be new born, not filled with the loss of the world through so much noise of language and culture and history; our words and arguments and appetites and entitlements are carved with the blood of consequence, so we must find what is important in this position in order to know ourselves, what we have signed on for, whether we welcome it best.

Sometimes even the logger will set down his tool and listen for a better sound. But it takes time; more for some than others. It’s not merely how long the ringing continues in the ear, but how innocent the ear is. — James Riley

Very well stated. Thanks.

So how do we "witness" a difference? — Antony Nickles

I think we have to go sit in the woods and listen.

An argument I've made in the past is that, rather that saying grace before we eat, we should try living in grace with what we eat. There is nothing wrong with felling a tree and using it's wood, or killing an animal and eating it's meat. It's the grace involved in how we go about it. It's what is in our hearts when we do it which matters. We should participate, lest we lose sight (or sound) of where our wood and our meat come from. To the extent we have any remaining gratitude left in our souls, we might end up thanking the wrong person or God for what we receive. We might be takers, rather than receivers. We are. And that is the noise.

Spider-tailed viper. Deception on a whole new level!

One swallow in the sky doesn't a summer make.

Awesome!