when is it morally acceptable to kill animals? · when is it morally acceptable to kill animals 213...

Journal of AgriculturalEthics, Volume 1, pp. 211-224 0893/4282/88 $3.00 + .00 Printed in the UK. All rights reserved. Copyright © 1988 Taylor & Francis

When is it Morally Acceptable to Kill Animals?

EVELYN B. PLUHAR

Associate Professor of Philosophy Penn State University-Fayette Uniontown, PA 15401

Abstract Professor Hugh Lehman has recently argued that "the rights view," according to which nonhuman animals have a prima facie right to life, is compatible with the killing of animals in many circumstances, including killing for food, research, or product-testing purposes. His principle argument is an appeal to "lifeboat" cases, in which certain lives should be sacrificed rather than others because the latter would allegedly be made worse-off by death than the former. I argue that this reasoning would apply to so-called "inferior" humans just as much as to animals, and that this appeal is unsuccessful in any case. I distinguish two versions of the rights view: the "equal" and the "unequal" rights views. Although the "unequal" rights view, unlike the "equal" rights view, would sanction the killing of animals (and some humans) for food under severely restricted circumstances, neither rights view sanctions the raising of animals Jbr their meat. Moreover, neither rights view would sanction the killing of animals for research or product-testing purposes. I con- clude with a brief discussion of the merits of phasing out the meat production industry.

Keywords: The rights view, lifeboat situations, the worse-off principle, the equal rights view, the unequal rights view, killing for research and product-testing, the meat production industry.

Professor Hugh Lehman has recently issued a startling challenge to advocates of (nonhuman) animal rights.t The routine exploitation and killing of animals in laboratories and factory farms cannot be morally justified, they have reasoned, if animals can be shown to have a prima facie right to life. Philosopher Tom Regan, in his complex, carefully reasoned book The Case fo r Animal Rights, 2 argues that "the rights view" (i.e., the view that animals have a prima facie right to life) clearly has such implications, although he grants that killing animals is permissible under certain very restricted circumstances. Unlike others who disagree with Regan's conclusions, Lehman does not attack the case for animals having a prima facia right to life: he argues instead that Regan's view is actually compatible with the widespread exploitation and killing of animals.

Lehman argues ingeniously for his astonishing conclusion. Agreeing with Regan that animals can never merit treatment which violates their rights (and hence that they are always innocent in that respect), Lehman reasons, again in agreement with Regan, 3 that their prima facie right to life (assuming they have such a right) may nevertheless be overridden under the following kinds of circumstances: (1) they pose innocent threats to human life; (2) they serve as innocent shields to threats to human life; and (3) we and the animals are in a "lifeboat" type of situation in which all cannot survive. Lehman departs from Regan in arguing that such situations are actually commonplace rather than excep- tional. Moreover, unlike Regan, he believes that "lifeboat" case reasoning can justify

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raising and killing animals for food, research, and product-testing purposes. However, I shall argue here that, although Lehman is correct in holding that animals with a prima facie right to life may be killed by us under certain circumstances, he has not shown that they may also be sacrificed for research and product-testing purposes or be raised and slaughtered for food. In the course of this discussion, some disturbing questions about the comparative value of different human lives will also be raised.

Let us first turn to Lehman's discussion of animals who are innocent threats and shields. Unless one is a strict pacifist, one must agree with both Lehman and Regan that it is sometimes morally acceptable to kill those with a prima facie right to life, even when they intend us no harm. But - -and this cannot be emphasized too strongly--this holds for all who have a prima facie right to life, including humans. One is just as morally justified in killing an insane human who would otherwise kill one as one is in killing a rabid dog who is lunging at one's throat. Similarly, if a homicidal maniac intending mass murder can only be stopped by killing the innocent youngster who is shielding him, it is permissible to'kill the hostage, regardless of whether she is a human or a puppy. One hopes that such circumstances rarely occur, but, as Lehman correctly cautions us, innocent bystanders, even though they need not literally be shields, are not infrequently put in dreadful positions. In some cases, unfortunately, their prima facie rights to life may justifiably be overridden.

However, we must not forget that the killing of an innocent threat, shield, or bystander with a prima facie right to life is permissible only if no feasible alternative course of action can be taken. If the only alternative to killing in such a situation is one's own or another's (e.g., one's spouse's) death, endangerment, or risk of severe injury, one is justified in killing. 4 But we should not kill the insane attacker, be he human or canine, if he can be trapped without great risk instead, nor should we murder hostages if we can secure their release without endangering other innocents. Moral agents who reflect on these matters generally agree about the necessity of seeking alternatives when humans are involved, but are frequently far less concerned when animals are the potential victims. If animals do have a prima facie right to life, as Lehman assumes in his article, we should be equally concerned to seek alternatives when their lives are placed in direct conflict with ours. Let us take his discussion of animal "pests" as a ~.ase in point.

Lehman argues that, in some circumstances, the only way to protect the gardens on which we may depend for food from animal "pes ts" such as rabbits or deer is to override the animals' prima facie rights to l i fe : To test this assertion, let us imagine that human "pests" threaten our garden. Suppose that an unarmed, hungry band with whom we cannot reason has been pillaging the garden in the dead of night. Suppose further, as we must, that as a result we no longer have enough food to survive. [This is a pretty huge assumption. Few animal "pests" (apart from insects, which are not postulated here as rights-bearers) threaten our lives in this way, although we routinely deprive them of the habitat they need to survive.] Would we be entitled to kill these human "pests?" Only as a last resort, surely. We should first seek to make our garden inaccessible to them by using good fences, alarms, nonlethal measures to frighten them away, etc. We could, if necessary, try to catch them humanely (not with steel-jawed traps) and relocate them (possibly in prison). We might even consider letting them share some of our food. If all else fails, we would be forced to kill them, but we would hardly take such an action lightly. We would make strenuous efforts to avoid killing, even if the humans were not entirely innocent in their actions. By parity of reasoning, we should--and can--pursue the same actions when obviously innocent animals endanger our food supply.

Lehman argues that seeking alternatives to killing animal "pes ts" can be a very

When Is It Morally Acceptable to Kill Animals 213

difficult matter. For example, he points out that making a garden inaccessible to animals may cause some to starve to death, resulting in a less humane death than shooting would have brought them. 6 Would we use this reasoning to justify killing unreasoning human intruders in our garden? One hopes not. This argument, sometimes used by hunters and trappers, cannot be used to justify the killing of a being which has a prima facie right to life. We have no way of knowing whether the very animal who is killed is otherwise going to die of starvation, nor can we be so sure that the animal would prefer a shooting (or clubbing, or poisoning) death above all others. We should be just as cautious about performing involuntary euthanasia on animals as we are in the case of humans!

Another alternative to killing which Lehman believes would be far more harmful in the long run is the attempt to control the reproduction of animal "pests."7 Certainly, this is not an alternative to employ very easily: one shares Lehman's fears about the ecolog- ical repercussions of such manipulations. On the other hand, we humans have already badly upset the balance of nature in many instances, leading to the "pes t " problem in the first place. For example, Pennsylvania has an overabundance of deer because humans have crowded out their natural predators. Some state deer reserves, damaged by the deer's browsing, are consequently regularly " thinned" (all too enthusiastically) by hunters. Animal birth control should be considered here as a possibly far more morally responsible (considering that it is humans who have caused the problem) course of action. Scientists have recently been giving this proposal very serious attention. Good results have already been achieved with deer and wild horses. 8 Surely we should continue to give this proposal very serious consideration, with all due caution, rather than dis- missing it out of hand. Although it would probably only be effective and feasible for some species, it would still save many innocent lives. At least in the case of their own species, most humans believe that birth control is a morally preferable solution to the problem of overpopulation than killing. If scientific studies of animal birth control continue to be encouraging, we should apply the same reasoning to other species.

Thus, although Lehman is quite correct to warn us about the difficulty of finding good alternatives to killing innocent animal threats, we are nevertheless obligated to seek those alternatives, just as we do in the case of humans who have a prima facie right to life. One must agree with him and Regan, however, that killing would be morally acceptable as a last resort in genuinely life-endangering situations. Animals and humans alike can justifiably be killed in such tragic circumstances.

Not many advocates of animal rights would disagree with this conclusion. However, all, including Regan, would be quite disturbed by Lehman's discussion of "l ifeboat" cases. All his far-reaching conclusions about the moral acceptability of using animals for meat, research, and product-testing purposes are based on Regan's proposed resolution of a classic type of moral dilemma.

Imagine that five survivors of a sea catastrophe, four humans and a dog, are huddled together on a lifeboat. Unfortunately, the boat is overloaded and sure to sink unless one of the five passengers is killed. Since inaction would doom all five, one of the passengers has to go. But who? Regan appeals to the "worse-off" principle, which he claims is derivable from the "respect" principle (according to which inherently valuable beings should be treated as ends in themselves), to resolve the dilemma. According to this plausible moral principle, when one must cause harm either to one innocent individual or to another, and one has the choice to either inflict greater harm on one individual or lesser harm on another, one should inflict the lesser harm. 9 Now, all the passengers on the lifeboat have, by hypothesis, a prima facie fight to life. Moreover, on Regan's view, all are equally inherently valuable. Nevertheless, it seems obvious to Regan that the dog


must perish, because he would allegedly be harmed less by death than would any of the humans. Why? Regan claims that "the harm that death is, is a function of the opportunities for satisfaction it forecloses," 10 or, more specifically, "o f the number and variety of opportunities for satisfaction it forec loses . . . "11 Any of the humans would lose far more than the dog would in the event of death,. Regan asserts, so surely the dog should be the one to go.

Lehman correctly points out that this reasoning applies to another type of lifeboat case, one which Regan doesn't consider. We may be faced with a different choice than letting all die or killing only one. We are more likely to face a situation in which a scarcity of resources (e.g., of food or drinkable water) would make it impossible for all to survive. Some are sure to die, although we do not know who. In such a situation, wouldn't the worse-off principle enjoin us to kill those who would be less harmed by death, following Regan's reasoning above? 1~ Once again, it seems that the dog should be killed.

Lehman's next move, and his radical departure from Regan, is to argue that we face many situations in which we must choose between human and animal lives, most notably in the course of providing food for ourselves (the area he most emphasizes in his article), during scientific research, and in consumer product-testing. If animals in general, due to their relatively impoverished opportunities for satisfaction, would be less harmed by death than humans, we ought to override the animals' prima facie rights to life.

In order to see whether the rights view could sanction such implications, we must first return to Regan's initial resolution of the lifeboat dilemma. I shall begin by questioning the consistency of his reasoning. In his book, Regan repeatedly argues that those with prima facie rights to life are equally inherently valuable, regardless of the comparative richness of their experiences. We owe all of them respect as ends in themselves, he says, and the ultimate disrespect is to treat them "as if they were mere receptacles of valuable experiences." 13 The worse-off principle itself is claimed to be derivable from this principle of respect. We must never confuse the value of an individual's life with the value which attaches to his or her pleasures or satisfactions, he warns us: all fights-bearers have equally valuable lives. 14 Yet, isn't this precisely what he appears to do in his application of the worse-off principle to the lifeboat case? The dog is chosen to die because his life contains many fewer varied opportunities for satisfaction than a human's life.

Regan would probably reply that he in no way denies the equal inherent value of the dog and the humans on the lifeboat, and that his way of resolving the dilemma is fully respectful of the dog. It shows no disrespect to inflict a lesser harm on an innocent individual in a lifeboat situation in order not to inflict a greater harm on another in the same situation. For example, suppose three people are being held hostage by armed, sadistic terrorists. The terrorists give one of the hostages a choice: she must either kill hostage A or shoot hostage B in the leg. If she refuses to act, both A and B will be killed by the terrorists. If she abides by the worse-off principle, she will accept the weapon and shoot B in the leg. Her action in no way shows lack of respect for B, whose life is just as valuable as A's. It would simply be grossly unfair, and utterly disrespectful of A, to inflict the far greater harm on him. Similarly, Regan could say, in the lifeboat case the dog is not being treated disrespectfully, as a mere receptacle of experiences, when we throw him overboard instead of a human. We are simply choosing to inflict the least amount of harm on an individual.

Regan must make some such reply in order to defend himself against the charge of inconsistency. The reply does succeed in showing that the worse-off principle is not in itself incompatible with the obligation to treat equally inherently valuable beings with


equal respect. However, the reply does not show that the worse-off principle is applicable in the way Regan claims it to be in the lifeboat case. Although some philosophers doubt that the concept of being harmed by one's own death is logically coherent, let us grant Regan's assumption in this regard. It will still turn "out that death is not a harm in the sense in which he intends it to be. To make this point clear, let us return to the hostage case discussed earlier.

Any reasonable person would agree that being killed is far worse than being shot in the leg. If B were able and willing to take the moral point of view, he would surely concur with our hostage's decision to shoot him in the leg rather than kill A. There is nothing conceptually or morally problematic about this decision. But now imagine that the hostage is instructed to kill either A or B (otherwise, both will be killed). Let us stipulate that both A and B are in the prime of life and would greatly prefer to stay alive. What sense does it make to ask whether the one would be harmed more by death than the other? While an individual who is merely shot is better off than one who is killed, just as the same individual is better off being merely shot than killed, two individuals who are killed are equally badly off in that each loses everything.

It might be replied at this point that (say) A could have more to lose by death than B. If A's life is full of rich experiences, replete with opportunities for many varieties of satisfactions, and B's rather dimwitted life by contrast allows for a much more limited smorgasbord of satisfactions, does it not make sense to say that A would lose more, and thus be harmed more by death, than B would if B were killed? Does the worse-off principle apply here after all?

I think not. Suppose that we alter our case one more time. Instead of being threatened with death, both A and B are snatched from their homes and thrown undeservedly into prison, where they will languish in chains for the remainder of their lives. Consider what each has lost, apart from the company of loved ones. Individual A will never again engage in his favorite activities, such as playing the piano, reading Dostoevsky, program- ming his computer, listening to Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, eating delicately seasoned Indian cuisine, or meditating in a Japanese tea garden. B, by contrast, loses his regularly scheduled pleasures of drinking Iron City beer, watching "Celebrity Wrestling" on TV, and going bowling. Surely it would be wrong to say that A has been harmed more by imprisonment than B has! Although A has lost a richer, more complex way of life than B has, it cannot be said that B valued his way of life any less than A valued his. Each is equally bereft, because each has lost all that made life satisfying. Exactly the same applies if B is (for example) a dog. He would never again know the joys of running across a meadow, feeling the warm sunshine on his back, being nuzzled by his mother, being bombarded by tantalizing smells in a forest, eating his favorite food, wrestling with buddies, having his ears scratched, or keeping company with his loved ones. B might be considerably less intelligent than A, but his joie de vivre does not appear to be any less than A's on that account! The comparative richness of A's and B's experiences and interests is simply not relevant in this context: the degree of harm suffered is a function of how much what has been snatched away matters to them. So it is with death, which forecloses all further experiences and thwarts all opportunities for satisfaction. If A and B both value living and their deaths would be premature, they would be harmed equally by death, no matter how "dul l" B might be in comparison to A.

This is not to say that one individual cannot ever be harmed more by death than another. Death, after alI, is inevitable, and it does matter just when it comes. As Joel Feinberg says, "Young deaths are more tragic than old ones."15 An eighty-year-old who has had a lifetime to formulate and fulfill goals is harmed less by death than a fifteen-


year-old, even if the child has far fewer interests. Moreover, death can sometimes be in one's interest. A terminally ill individual in agony who no longer cares to continue is benefited rather than harmed by death. If we apply the worse-off principle in this way to the lifeboat case, an elderly passenger should be killed rather than a much younger one,16 as should a terminally ill passenger. (Note that this reasoning tells us that a healthy young dog should be spared rather than an elderly or terminally ill human in the lifeboat!) Apart from the special considerations of youth and well-being, however, it appears that any two individuals with a prima facie right to life are equally harmed by death. Each loses all that is precious to that individual; each is utterly destroyed. The worse-off principle would not sanction our killing one rather than the other, contrary to what Regan (and Lehman) assert. Therefore, although the worse-off principle appears to be consistent with Regan's other views, his claim that it applies in the lifeboat case as he has sketched it is mistaken.

If one continues to believe that the richness or poverty of individuals' experiences should decide the issue in a lifeboat situation, then the worse-off principle will be of no assistance. Instead, one must abandon the assumption that everyone who has a prima facie right to life is equally inherently valuable. Some lives, one might hold, are simply less worthwhile than others, even though the individuals involved would be harmed equally by death: those with fewer opportunities for varied satisfactions should die if their lives are in conflict with experientially better endowed individuals. 17 This view is not open to Regan, TM nor would it be accepted by many advocates of animal rights (myself included), but it is a logically coherent view. There is no inconsistency in believing that beings with prima facie rights to life do not all have an equal prima facie right to life. Lehman could argue on this basis for the killing of the dog in the lifeboat rather than following Regan's unsuccessful appeal to the worse-off principle. He could explicitly reject the "equal rights" version of the rights view.

The "unequal rights" view, as I shall call it by contrast, has an implication which is unwelcome to many, however. It implies that in a lifeboat situation, a more intelligent or more educated human, who has many opportunities for a variety of satisfactions, should be preferred to a human who does not do quite so well in those regards. If the richness and complexity of one's experiences is to be the deciding factor, many humans, including ones who are in the normal range of human intelligence, would be at a disadvan- tage. Dogs are not the only individuals who fall short of maximum moral worth on such a view. 19 Let us not forget this unpalatable consequence in the discussion that follows.

Given the reasoning above, what are the implications for the equal and unequal rights views for lifeboat cases? On the equal rights view, the five innocent individuals (four humans and a dog) marooned in the boat have an equal claim to life, and assuming none are already near death or would be benefited by death, would be harmed equally by being killed. If all would die if nothing is done, or if it is not possible for all to live if the number of passengers remains the same, and no one volunteers to leap overboard, lots should be drawn. Given the failure of Regan's appeal to the worse-off principle in his proposed resolution of the lifeboat dilemma, this is the only position compatible with his commitment to the equal inherent value of the parties involved. The same reasoning should be followed in any scarcity of resources situation where not all innocent individuals can survive, e.g., in the competition for organ transplants. Equally needy individuals should have an equal chance to receive an organ, but those who are elderly or who would remain terminally ill after a transplant, should be denied organs which could greatly prolong the lives of certain other individuals. Of course, the equal rights view would never sanction the raising and slaughtering for food of individuals who have a


prima facie fight to life, nor would it allow us to sacrifice them for scientific research or product-testing. If animals and humans have an equal prima facie right to fife, none of these practices is momlty acceptable. If some die as a result of stopping these practices, that is indeed tragic, but, apart from the innocent threat, shield, and bystander cases discussed earlier, no one has the right to live at the expense of another innocent individual who is equally entitled to life.

The unequal fights view tells us that we may lighten our lifeboat by killing those individuals who have fewer opportunities for varied satisfactions than others on board, regardless of what species they may be. Although all have a prima facie fight to life and are worthy of respect as ends in themselves, if they and innocent others are trapped in a scarcity of resources situation, the unequal fights view tells us that they should have their fight to life overridden. Organ transplant policies, on this view, should take into account the intellectual level of the needy individuals, and this should also be a consideration in the rationing of food during famine.

Do the implications of the unequal fights view about lifeboat situations include sanc- tioning the raising and killing of "lesser" individuals for food, research, or product- testing? Lehman thinks so, arguing that " I f lifeboat situations are thought to involve a choice between saving some or saving others, then there are many situations in which the killing of animals would apparently be justified, ''2° including for food, research, or product-testing. To see whether this is so, let us remind ourselves of the salient features of a lifeboat situation.

In a lifeboat, all parties are innocently trapped in a situation in which there is a scarcity of resources for survival. Let us suppose, with Lehman, that some will die if nothing further is done. Each individual, who by hypothesis laas a prima facie fight to life, is at roughly equal risk of dying if no one decides to influence the odds. If one is killed, however, the others will be able to live. One has but two choices: do nothing, in which case someone, who could be any one of the passengers, will die, or choose a victim. In such a situation, the lives of the passengers are placed in conflict: they are competitors for survival. According to the unequal rights view, could it ever be fight, first of all, to kill and eat one of the passengers?

Regan has argued that the four humans in his lifeboat case would be justified in killing and eating the dog in order to survive, zl I have argued that his attempted justification for this (i.e., the claim that the dog would be harmed less by death than any of the humans, and that therefore the worse-off principle requires the sacrifice of the dog) is mistaken. Nevertheless, the unequal rights view (a view Regan cannot consistently hold) offers a very different possible justification for the same conclusion. If the dog's prima facie right to life is not as strong as the humans', it seems that we would be correct to kill and eat the dog if there is no other way to ensure human survival.

By analogy, the unequal rights view would indeed imply that on our planet some killing of animals for food is justified. Note, however, the stringent conditions which would have to be satisfied: there must not be enough food available for all the humans and the animals to survive (i.e., there must be a true scarcity of resources), and there must be no feasible altemative way to solve the problem of starvation (e.g., by birth control). If this is the case, one may--as respectfully and humanely as possible--kill a being whose prima facie fight to life is not as strong as one's own. At times, humans have been in such circumstances; e.g., the Inuit had no way to survive in the past without killing animals who shared their frozen habitat. Early humans in better climes without the knowledge to cultivate nourishing crops also had to hunt if they were to survive. There may be a few areas in the world where such conditions still obtain, as Lehman asserts. 2z


If that is the case, and there truly is no feasible alternative such as birth control, plant agriculture, or distribution of plant foods to the starving area, then killing of animals would be justified on the unequal rights view. Let us remember, however, that the unequal fights view would also sanction the killing and eating of "lesser" humans by "superior" humans in like circumstances! If the fifth passenger in the lifeboat were a human with a lesser opportunity for numerous varied satisfactions in life than the other four humans, the unequal rights view would tell us that the four should kill and eat that human in order to survive. Those who reject the killing of humans for such a purpose should reconsider their acceptance of animal slaughter for food.

Would the unequal fights view also sanction the raising (as opposed to the hunting) of animals for food? It is difficult to see how it could. On that view, animals have a prima facie right to life. How, then, could one justify raising them for the sole purpose of killing them for their flesh; i.e., in what sense would we be recognizing their prima facie right to life? In a scarcity of food situation, hunting an animal (for food) whose right to life is more easily overridden than one's own could be justified, but raising an animal for that very purpose goes much further. It treats the animal as a mere commodity from start to finish, depriving it of the respect which even a being with an unequal right to life is due. Once again, imagine a human parallel. Killing "lesser" humans for food is difficult to stomach, but raising them for that purpose is far more objectionable. Beings with a prima facie right to life are not mere livestock or "harvestable" resources. Of course, there would be no moral problem in raising animals to eat if they have no prima facie right to life at all. This is the view of, e.g., philosopher R.G. Frey, who defends the raising and eating of animals. 23 An animal can have some fights (such as the fight to be treated humanely) without also having any sort of fight to life. But this is not what the unequal rights view maintains.

However, I do believe that the unequal fights view is compatible with some keeping of animals who can supply food to us. We do not ignore a being's prima facie right to life if we engage that being in a mutually beneficial relationship. In exchange for food, shelter, and safety from predators, the animal can supply us with milk or eggs. If the animal is treated respectfully and humanely, not merely as a living milk faucet or egg- laying machine, 24 and is allowed to live out a satisfying life, it is not obvious that we are violating any moral obligations to her. There would be no objection to eating the animal after she has died, either, if that were one's wish. 25 The equal rights view is also compatible with such practices. As in the case of other humans, there is no moral objection to engaging in mutually beneficial relationships. What we are considering here is a far cry from modem factory farming techniques, however. No rights view would sanction such techniques (and Lehman certainly does not defend them).

Thus, if the unequal fights view were correct, it could be used to justify some killing of animals or "lesser" humans for food in certain restricted circumstances. Would its implications for lifeboat cases also extend to the use of animals for research and product- testing, as Lehman believes?

I do not think so. Let us confine ourselves, as Lehman does and as the unequal rights view requires, to such animal research and product-testing as would save human lives. Consider his example of killing an animal in the course of developing and testing a vaccine for a lethal human disease. He claims that this is a lifeboat situation because either an animal will be killed by research or testing, or a human will die from the disease or from unsafe vaccinations, z6 But essential features of a lifeboat situation are lacking here. First, there is no scarcity of resources in this case, as there would be if there were only enough vaccine for one of two needy individuals. The second, related, point is that


the animal and human are not competitors for life in the relevant sense. Unlike the passengers in the lifeboat, they are not (prior to any decisions the parties involved make) at roughly equal risk of dying. The human is the one at risk, not the animal. It is for this reason that Regan, who after all does sanction killing and eating the dog on the lifeboat if there is not enough food for all to survive and this is the only way to save the humans, rejects the option of experimenting on the dog. He imagines a case in which a healthy dog shares a lifeboat with four diseased humans. The humans have the ability to give the disease to the dog, then to test an untried vaccine on her. Regan says this is not compatible with the fights view, because in forcing the dog to run their risks they are treating her as a mere commodity. Unlike the humans, the animal can only lose in this situation. 27 He might have added that the initial conditions (scarcity of resources, rough equality of risk) for a lifeboat decision are not met here. In the lifeboat case, someone---and it could be anyone--will die, if action is not taken to choose a specific victim.

Let us consider a purely human parallel. A dying woman makes the following statement to a healthy man named Brown: "Brown, you and I are competitors for a scarce resource. Our lives are in conflict. My lungs are fiddled with disease. If I don't have a transplant soon, I will die, but no cadaver lungs are available. Your lungs would suit me splendidly. I have a far more complex, varied life than you do: therefore, your fight to life is not as strong as mine. Either I will live or you will die, so I am justified in killing you for your lungs.'" If this truly were a lifeboat situation, the following statement from an equal rights view advocate would also apply: "Brown, you and I have an equal prima facie fight to life, but our lives are in conflict. You are healthy, but I will die without your lungs. As competitors, the only fair thing to do is flip a coin for your organs." We could reason in the same way about developing and testing vaccines or other human life-preserving products.

The only lifeboat situation to which the reasoning above is parallel is a situation in which an individual who would otherwise be healthy is forced onto a lifeboat at gunpoint to serve as one's lunch, research subject, or vaccine-tester. By contrast, the lifeboat reasoning which gives rise to the distinction between the two kinds of rights views does not support the sacrifice of animals to humans in research and product-testing. Let readers who hesitate about this matter ask themselves if it would be morally acceptable for humans with very complex, interesting lives to shanghai, let alone breed, 28 less well- endowed humans for such purposes, for the principle is exactly the same. There is more to a lifeboat situation than the fact that one or another individual will die, depending on what action is taken.

Therefore, the unequal rights view would not sanction the most common forms of animal exploitation by humans, although it would permit the killing of animals for food in certain very restricted circumstances.

Lehman is quite fight in pointing out that humans will die in some cases if we cease exploiting animals. No one denies that such deaths, especially of the innocent, are tragic. But it has not been shown that this fact licenses us to slaughter other innocents in these ways, even if their prima facie rights to life were not sufficiently strong compared to others' to warrant their survival in a lifeboat situation. Such practices could only be justified by establishing that those innocents (including some humans) have no prima facie right to life after all.

I would like to end this discussion on a more positive note, however. Morally acceptable behavior in the cases we have been considering can actually be beneficial to us. Following Lehman, I will focus on the consequences of abandoning the current practice of raising and slaughtering animals for food. Although Lehman is far from being a de-


fender of current animal agricultural practices, he is much more pessimistic than I am about the effects which a switch to vegetarianism would have on the human population.

We humans would have much to gain by withdrawing from the meat production industry. Lehman fears that many humans would starve if we were to do this, not only from ignorance about proper vegetarian nutrition, but because of food shortages. 29 Al- though he believes that a much reduced human population would probably no longer need to kill animals for food, he thinks that our present numbers can only be sustained by such killings. 3° I believe that is far too pessimistic a view, for a number of reasons.

In the U.S., a major agricultural power, more than half of the croplands are devoted to livestock feed production. 31 For the most part this land is used to grow plants on which humans could thrive. It is estimated that 90% of barley, corn, oats, and unexported soybeans grown in the U.S. annually are used to feed livestock. 32 The animals do not have to eat such foods in those quantities to survive, but they put on weight much faster and have tenderer flesh when they do. Human consumers get little in return for this diversion of usable plant protein. In cattle, only 4% of the plant protein they are fed is converted to animal protein; with pigs, the figure is 12%. Egg-laying chickens are the most "efficient" converters of plant protein, but even in that case, the conversion rate is only 23%. 33 Quite apart from the appalling suffering of animals in the meat production industry and the billions killed (wrongly, as discussed) yearly, humans are shortchanged by the system. According to John Robbins, livestock consume enough grain to feed adequately more than five times the number of people living in the U.S. 34

This sort of waste is particularly inexcusable when one considers the malnourished and starving humans in other parts of the world. Lester Brown of the Overseas Develop- ment Council estimates that the roughly 60 million humans who starved to death in 1987 would have been adequately fed by the grain saved if meat consumption in the U.S. were cut by only 10%. 35

Yet to be mentioned are other costs of the meat production industry, such as the devastation of the land (according to Science News, it costs 35 lbs. of eroded topsoil to produce 1 lb. of beef36), the dangerous additives, including antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which are finding their way into human meat-consumers, the pollution from feedlots, the squandering of water (raising livestock uses half of the water consumed in the U.SY) and fossil fuels. 38

Given these facts, it is simply not the case that there would not be enough food for all humans if we decided to stop consuming meat. The number of animals we decide not to eat would immediately dwindle because they would no longer be bred in the billions, thus freeing enormous quantities of plant protein for human use. Nor would the animals we keep be fed a wasteful grain-legume diet. There would be no need to reduce the human population greatly. However, Lehman is quite correct in saying that a change of this kind would be fraught with difficulty, requiting massive reallocations of resources and a commitment to education about proper nutrition. 39 But how, speaking both morally and pru- dentially, can it be tight not to try?

Lehman is very close to agreeing with this conclusion when he asserts that

It can be contended that some use of domestic animals for human food is permissible. Yet, according to a tights view, the practice of using resources to produce animal feed when such resources could be used to produce food for humans could probably not be morally justified. 4°


I go further. We should take on this enormous challenge for the sake of all the animals on this planet, regardless of how many legs they walk on. 41

In conclusion, Lehman has not shown that the rights view, according to which animals have a pr ima facie right to life, is compatible with the raising and slaughtering of animals for food or other human needs. According to the rights view, it is morally acceptable to kill animals only when it is morally acceptable to kill h u m a n s - - a n d we should make very effort to avoid doing either. 4z

Notes

1. Hugh Lehman, "On the Moral Acceptability of Killing Animals," The Journal of Agricultural Ethics 1 (2), 1988, pp. 155-162.

2. Tom Regan, The Case for Animal Rights (Berkeley: U. of California Press, 1983). Regan argues that mammals who are at least two years old have rights because they are "subjects of lives." He suggests that we give others, e.g., birds, the benefit of doubt in this regard. For one different, less restrictive view, see my "Moral Agents and Moral Patients," Between The Species IV (1), Winter 1988, pp. 32-45.

3. Regan, op. cit., pp. 291-297. 4. Perhaps one would also be justified in killing if it is the only way to save something of great

value to one, such as one's lifework or land. To use an example suggested to me privately by Professor Lehman, suppose one's farm will be flooded if one does not destroy a beaver dam. Although one could give up the farm, would one not be entitled to destroy the dam instead, even if some beavers are killed as a result? However, if the beavers have a prima facie fight to life, we should do all we can in this case to allow them to survive, short of losing the farm. We should try to dismantle the dam in such a way as to minimize the risk to their lives. After all, this would be the course we would pursue if humans with whom we could not reason had innocently built the dam on our land. Perhaps we would be unable to avoid the deaths of the innocent dam-builders, but we should certainly try to do so if they have a prima facie fight to life.

5. Lehman, op. cit., p. 157. 6. Ibid. 7. Ibid. 8. See, e.g., "Family Planning for Deer," Discover, December 1984, pp. 35-38; "Birth Con-

trol Proposed for Wildlife Conservation," UPI report, The Pittsburgh Press, January 14, 1987, p. A4; and "Wild-Animal Contraception," Discover, July 1988, pp. 28-29.

9. Regan, op. cit., pp. 307-308. Also see pp. 248-250 for his elucidation of the respect principle. Regan states the worse-off principle slightly differently: "Special considerations aside, when we must decide to override the rights of the many or the fights of the few who are innocent, and when the harm faced by the few would make them worse-off than any of the many would be if any other option were chosen, then we ought to override the rights of the many." However, the principle also applies in situations where we must choose between harming one innocent being rather than another (p. 308).

10. Ibid., p. 324. 11. Ibid., p. 351. (Emphasis mine.) Regan does not offer any further elucidation of "number and

variety," but it must mean more than simply "lots of different opportunities for satisfaction." Dogs normally have a number of different preferred activities, as many as some humans, yet Regan takes it to be obvious that their experiences are much less variagated. He must mean "variety" to imply richness and complexity as opposed to simple-mindedness. On this view, catching a frisbee counts for much less than reading an Emily Dickinson poem.

12. Lehman, op. cit., p. 159. 13. Regan, op. cit., p. 248.


14. Ibid., p. 235. 15. Joel Feinberg, Harm to Others (Oxford: Oxford U. Press, 1984), p. 93. 16. Hugh Lehman makes a similar point for a different purpose in his review of The Case for

Animal Rights in Dialogue XXIII (1984), p. 675. He suggests that Regan's view implies that a fifty-year-old person should be tossed out of the lifeboat rather than one who is ten years younger. This is made as an objection to the worse-off principle, since this implication seems counter-intuitive. I agree that Regan's application of the worse-off principle to death decision cases would have this implication: the number of possible satisfactions foreclosed by death is greater for the individual who has longer to live. Feinberg's way of looking at such cases does not necessarily have this implication, however. Too many other factors could outweigh the ten-year age difference, such as new goals, projects, and other "unfinished business." When the age difference is far greater, however, such as that between an eighty-year-old and a fifteen-year-old human, the worse-off principle would tell us to sacrifice the former. I do not find this result counter-intuitive. It is a matter of justice: other things being equal, every individual should have the opportunity to fulfill as many of his or her goals as possible. The two individuals' lives are equally valuable, but the elderly person's life is already approaching completion. The youngster should have the same opportunities which the elderly person has already enjoyed.

17. See Lily-Marlene Russow, "Regan on Inherent Value," Between The Species IV (1), Winter 1988, pp. 46-54, for one very well-reasoned defense of linkage between inherently valuable experiences and inherently valuable lives. Although she argues that not all individuals are equally inherently valuable, she does not there spell out her views on when killing is morally acceptable.

18. He reserves special scorn for this view, which he calls "perfectionism." See pp. 233-235. However, Russow argues that Regan (although he never says this) lets the quality of individuals' experiences decide the lifeboat dilemma because the postulated equal inherent value of each of the five individuals cancels, leaving nothing else to resolve the issue (Russow, op. cir., pp. 50-51). This is a fascinating idea which suggests that Regan's equal inherent value postulate is vacuous. Regan surely did not intend this to be so, and would refuse to argue in this way to resolve the lifeboat dilemma. On the other hand, Mary Midgeley's views might be compatible with an unequal rights view. See her Animals and Why They Matter (Athens, Ga.: U. of Georgia Press, 1983).

19. One could try to avoid this conclusion by embracing speciesism, the view that we are entitled to prefer members of one species (especially our own) to members of another, but that would be a mistake. For why speciesism cannot be justified, see, e.g., my "Is There a Morally Relevant Difference Between Human and Animal Nonpersons?," The Journal of Agricultural Ethics I (1), 1988, pp. 59-68.

20. Lehman, op. cit., p. I59. Note that most basic animal research, product-testing, and eating of animals is actually unnecessary in these terms. For a scientist's view of the degree to which basic research and product-testing on animals is not needed to save human lives, see Andrew N. Rowan, Of Mice, Models, and Men (Albany, N.Y.: State U. of New York Press, 1984). I will have more to say about using animals for food later in this paper.

21. Regan, op. cit., p, 385. 22. l.~hman, op. cir., p. 160.

23. R.G. Frey, Rights, Killing, and Suffering (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1983). Views such as this are faced with the problem of how to regard humans who are morally relevantly similar to animals. Frey has reluctantly concluded that the vivisection of humans who are as mentally limited as animals would indeed be justified (p. 116). Although he does not say so, it would also follow that we would be justified in raising and eating them.

24. As animals on typical factory farms are. See James Mason and Peter Singer, Animal Factories (New York: Crown Publishers, 1980), Chapter One, for the facts. In this connection, note that Lehman does not think we should try to increase even further our production of eggs in order to


alleviate human hunger, in part because the numbers of chickens killed in the egg industry are so large. At least as far as the hens are concerned, however, killing is the least of their problems. They are treated so abominably in these massive operations that death can only be a merciful release. There would be no objection to increasing the production of free-range eggs, however, provided that the chickens live out satisfying lives.

25. One major problem with "no kill" milk and egg operations, however, is what to do with all the males who are not necessary for breeding. Factory farms deal with these males by suffo- cating male chicks on egg farms, as Lehman mentions, or, in the case of dairy farming, turning young male calves into veal after months of their suffering. What is a farmer dedicated to the rights view to do? In a scarcity of resources situation, it may not be justified to bring such additional beings into the world. I am told that efforts are now being made to manipulate embryos in such a way that animals can bear more daughters than sons. This may become a solution to the problem. An alternative would be to forego eggs and milk. Although they are excellent sources of protein, they are not necessary for human health.

26. Lehman, op. cit., p. 161. 27. Regan, op. cit., p. 385. 28. It would be even more objectionable to raise a "lesser" individual with a prima facie right to

life for the sole purpose of research and product-testing. The reasoning I used earlier con- cerning the raising of animals for their flesh applies here as well.

29. Lehman, op. cit., pp. 159-160. 30. Ibid., p. 161. 31. Science News, v. 133, March 5, 1988, p. 153. 32. James Mason and Peter Singer, Animal Factories, op. cit., p. 72. See also John Robbins, Diet

For a New Planet (excerpt), The Vegetarian Times, July 1988, p. 48. 33. J.T. Reid, "Comparative Efficiency of Animals in the Conversion of Feedstuffs to Human

Foods," New Protein Foods, eds. A.M. Altschul and H.L. Wilcke, v. 3 (New York: Aca- demic Press, 1978), pp. 116-143 (quoted in Animal Factories, p. 74).

34. Robbins, op. cit., p. 48. It is true that animal protein supplies all the amino acids needed by humans, unlike individual plant protein sources other than soybeans. However, it is easy to combine plant sources to get complete protein.

35. Ibid., p. 50. The political barriers to a solution of the problems of malnutrition and starvation are formidable. We are all morally obligated to break down those barriers as best we can.

36. Science News, op. cit., p. 153. 37. Ibid. 38. 78 calories of fossil fuels are required to produce 1 calorie of beef protein, as opposed to 2

calories of fossil fuels to produce 1 calorie of soybeans (a complete protein source). See David and Marcia Pimentel, Food, Energy, and Society, 1979, p. 59. See also Animal Factories, op. cit., pp. 78-82.

39. Lehman, op. cir., pp. 159-160. Those in heavily industrialized nations will probably need more educating than those in the third world. Many in India, China, and Central America, for example, already know how to have healthy vegetarian diets.

40. lbid., p. 160.

41. Unfortunately, plant protein production typically causes the death of animals who are deprived of their habitats, regarded as "pests," or poisoned by pesticides meant for other pests (such as weeds and insects). (Human animals are also adversely affected by some of these products, as it turns out.) As discussed earlier, the killing of innocent threats, shields or bystanders can be justified if there is no other way to produce the food we need to survive. We should strive to keep such killing at a minimum. We should consider technological solutions (e.g., genetically engineering plants which are pest-resistant), so long as these do not create worse problems than they solve. Lehman notes that such solutions are conceivable (p. 161). Some progress is apparently being made along these lines. For example, scientists have created tomato plants whose leaves are toxic to insect pests, and corn which is resistant to disease and insects


("Scientific Advances Lead to Era of Food Surplus Around World," The New York Times, September 9, 1986, pp. C 1, C 10). Another approach is the use of "beneficial" insects to control insect species harmful to crops as a way to greatly reduce the spraying of chemical pesticides. Indonesia has recently had excellent results with this approach to rice-farming. Crop yields are even higher, and wildlife as well as human health are benefited ("Disarming Farming's Chemical Warriors," Science News, v, 134 (8), August 20, 1988, pp. 120-121).

42. I am grateful to Professors Hugh Lehman and Frank Hurnik for their helpful comments on this paper.

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