Books on Animal Liberation Theory

The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory

by Carol J. Adams

An examination of the historical, gender, race and class implications of meat culture, making the links between the practice of butchering/eating animals and the maintenance of male dominance. This tenth anniversary edition includes a new preface by Carol Adams that answers the question she is most often asked: why did you write this book? Adams also discusses new developments in feminist thought and animal rights, and updates the statistics and information provided. [1990]

Neither Man Nor Beast: Feminism and the Defense of Animals

by Carol J. Adams

In 1990, The Sexual Politics of Meat was published. In just a few years, the book became an underground classic. Neither Man Nor Beast takes Adam's thought one step further. It represents her collected reflections on animal rights, vegetarianism, and ecofeminism from the often-difficult-to-locate sources in which many originally appeared, and includes two important and completely new chapters. More than a book of theory, Neither Man Nor Beast is an enlightened call to action. Topics covered include: animal experimentation and patriarchal culture; abortion rights and animal rights; responding to racism in a human-centered world; ecofeminism and the eating of animals; the need to integrate feminism, animal defense, and environmentalism; the interconnected abuse of women, children, and animals; institutional violence; feminist ethics, and vegetarianism; a beastly theology: the place of animals in God's universe

Animals and Women: Feminist Theoretical Explorations

Edited by Josephine Donovan and Carol Adams

Animals and Women is a collection of pioneering essays that explores the theoretical connections between feminism and animal defense. Offering a feminist perspective on the status of animals, this unique volume argues persuasively that both the social construction and oppressions of women are inextricably connected to the ways in which we comprehend and abuse other species. Furthermore, it demonstrates that such a focus does not distract from the struggle for women’s rights, but rather contributes to it. This wide-ranging multidisciplinary anthology presents original material from scholars in a variety of fields, as well as a rare, early article by Virginia Woolf. Exploring the leading edge of the species/gender boundary, it addresses such issues as the relationship between abortion rights and animal rights, the connection between woman-battering and animal abuse, and the speciesist basis for much sexist language. Also considered are the ways in which animals have been regarded by science, literature, and the environmentalist movement. A striking meditation on women and wolves is presented, as is an examination of sexual harassment and the taxonomy of hunters and hunting. Finally, this compelling collection suggests that the subordination and degradation of women is a prototype for other forms of abuse, and that to deny this connection is to participate in the continued mistreatment of animals and women.

Beyond Animal Rights: A Feminist Caring Ethic for the Treatment of Animals

Edited by Josephine Donovan and Carol Adams

This collection of essays seek to extend and further explore the feminist ethic-of-care theory to the issue of animal well-being. Together the contributors suggest ways that theorists may move beyond the limited concept of "rights", establishing care as a basis for the ethical treatment of animals.

The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader

Edited by Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams

In Beyond Animal Rights, Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams introduced feminist "ethic of care" theory into contemporary philosophical discussions concerning the ethical treatment of animals. In this revised edition of the volume, seven essays from the original book are joined by nine new articles-most of which were written in response to Beyond Animal Rights-and a new introduction that situates feminist-animal-care theory within feminist theory and the larger debate over animal rights. Contributors critique theorists' reliance on natural-rights doctrine and utilitarianism, which, they suggest, have a masculine bias. They argue for humility and sympathy in our relationships with animals and establish a link between the continuing subjugation of women and the human domination of nature. Beginning with the earliest articulation of the idea in the mid-1980s and continuing to the theory's most recent revisions, this volume presents the most complete portrait of the evolution of the feminist-care tradition., reviewing a previous edition or volume

Animal Liberation

by Peter Singer

Since its original publication in 1975, this groundbreaking work has awakened millions of people to the existence of "speciesism"―our systematic disregard of nonhuman animals―inspiring a worldwide movement to transform our attitudes to animals and eliminate the cruelty we inflict on them. In Animal Liberation, author Peter Singer exposes the chilling realities of today's "factory farms" and product-testing procedures―destroying the spurious justifications behind them, and offering alternatives to what has become a profound environmental and social as well as moral issue. An important and persuasive appeal to conscience, fairness, decency, and justice, it is essential reading for the supporter and the skeptic alike.

Practical Ethics

by Peter Singer

Peter Singer's remarkably clear and comprehensive Practical Ethics has become a classic introduction to applied ethics since its publication in 1979 and has been translated into many languages. For this second edition the author has revised all the existing chapters, added two new ones, and updated the bibliography. He has also added an appendix describing some of the deep misunderstanding of and consequent violent reaction to the book in Germany, Austria and Switzerland where the book has tested the limits of freedom of speech. The focus of the book is the application of ethics to difficult and controversial social questions.

One World: The Ethics of Globalization, Second Edition

by Peter Singer

One of the world's most influential philosophers here considers the ethical issues surrounding globalization, showing how a global ethic rather than a nationalistic approach can provide illuminating answers to important problems. In a new preface, Peter Singer discusses how the recent Iraq war and its aftermath have changed the prospects for the ethical approach he advocates. Addresses the ethics of the impact of globalization on humans, animals, and the planet.

In Defense of Animals: The Second Wave
by Peter Singer

In Defense of Animals: The Second Wave brings together the best current ethical thinking about animals. Edited by Peter Singer, who made "speciesism" an international issue in 1975 when he published Animal Liberation, this new book presents the state of the animal movement that his classic work helped to inspire. Long hailed as a brilliant and controversial philosopher, Singer has assembled incisive new articles by philosophers and by activists. In Defense of Animals is sure to inform and inspire all who want to understand, or contribute to, the unfolding moral revolution in the way we treat animals.

Writings on An Ethical Life

by Peter Singer

Love him or hate him, you certainly can't ignore him. For the past twenty years, Australian philosopher and professor of bioethics Peter Singer has pushed the hot buttons of our collective conscience. In addition to writing the book that sparked the modern animal rights movement, Singer has challenged our most closely held beliefs on the sanctity of human life, the moral obligation's of citizens of affluent nations toward those living in the poorest countries of the world, and much more, with arguments that intrigue as often and as powerfully as they incite. Writings On An Ethical Life offers a comprehensive collection of Singer's best and most provocative writing, as chosen by Singer himself. Among the controversial subjects addressed are the moral status of animals, environmental account-ablility, abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, and the ultimate choice of living an ethical life. This book provides an unsurpassed one-volume view of both the underpinnings and the applications of Singer's governing philosophy.

The Ethics of What We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter

by Peter Singer and Jim Mason

Ethicist Singer and co-author Mason (Animal Factories) document corporate deception, widespread waste and desensitization to inhumane practices in this consideration of ethical eating. The authors examine three families' grocery-buying habits and the motivations behind those choices. One woman says she's "absorbed in my life and my family...and I don't think very much about the welfare of the meat I'm eating," while a wealthier husband and wife mull the virtues of "triple certified" coffee, buying local and avoiding chocolate harvested by child slave labor, though "no one seems to be pondering that as they eat." In investigating food production conditions, the authors' first-hand experiences alternate between horror and comedy, from slaughterhouses to artificial turkey-insemination ("the hardest, fastest, dirtiest, most disgusting, worst-paid work"). This sometimes-graphic exposé is not myopic: profitability and animal welfare are given equal consideration, though the reader finishes the book agreeing with the authors' conclusion that "America's food industry seeks to keep Americans in the dark about the ethical components of their food choices." A no-holds-barred treatise on ethical consumption, this is an important read for those concerned with the long, frightening trip between farm and plate. (Also published as The Way We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter)

Bioethics: An Anthology (Blackwell Philosophy Anthologies) (Paperback)

Edited by Helga Kuhse and Peter Singer

The expanded and revised edition of Bioethics: An Anthology is a definitive one-volume collection of key primary texts for the study of bioethics. Brings together writings on a broad range of ethical issues relating such matters as reproduction, genetics, life and death, and animal experimentation.

Rethinking Life and Death: The Collapse of Our Traditional Ethics

by Peter Singer

The new commandments according to Rethinking Life and Death.
--If you must take human life, take responsibility for the consequences of your decisions.
--All human life is not of equal worth; treat beings in accordance to the ethical situation at hand.
--Respect a person's desire to live or die.
A profound and provocative work, Rethinking Life and Death, in the tradition of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, examines the ethical dilemmas that confront us as we near the twenty-first century.

Matters of Life and Death: new introductory essays in moral philosophy ( Third Edition)

Edited by Tom Regan w/ essays by J. Baird Callicott, James Rachels, Hugo Adam Bedau, Thomas L. Beauchamp

MATTERS OF LIFE AND DEATH,, is a collection of original essays by leading philosophers devoted to the major moral issues of the day, including abortion, euthanasia, the death penalty, famine, war, suicide, the environment, and animal rights.

How Are We to Live?

By Peter Singer

'Imagine that you could choose a book that everyone in the world would read. My choice would be this book.' Roger Crisp, Ethics

Many people have an uneasy feeling that they may be missing out on something basic that would give their lives a significance it currently lacks. But how should we live? What is there to stop us behaving selfishly? In a highly readable account which makes reference to a wide variety of sources and everyday issues, Peter Singer suggests that the conventional pursuit of self-interest is individually and collectively self-defeating. Taking into consideration the beliefs of Jesus, Kant, Rousseau, and Adam Smith amongst others, he looks at a number of different cultures, including America, Japan, and the Aborigines to assess whether or not selfishness is in our genes and how we may find greater satisfaction in an ethical lifestyle.

A Companion to Ethics, edited by Peter Singer

Lori Gruen's essay (pp. 343- 53) provides a good summary of animal ethics issues along with a bibliography. (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991)

Animal Rights and Human Obligations by Peter Singer and Tom Regan

Edited by the two leading philosophers in the animal protection movement, this volume provides a comprehensive overview of historical and contemporary writings that address both the nature of nonhuman animals as well as our duties to them.

A Companion to Bioethics Edited by Helga Kuhse and Peter Singer

Includes an essay on the ethics of animal experimentation by Bernard Rollin

The Great Ape Project: Equality Beyond Humanity Edited by Peter Singer and Paola Cavilieri

A compelling and revolutionary work that calls for the immediate extension of our human rights to the great apes. The Great Ape Project looks forward to a new stage in the development of the community of equals, whereby the great apes-chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans-will actually receive many of the same protections and rights that are already accorded to humans. This profound collection of thirty-one essays by the world's most distinguished observers of free-living apes make up a uniquely satisfying whole, blending observation and interpretation in a highly persuasive case for a complete reassessment of the moral status of our closest kin.

In Defense of Animals Edited by Peter Singer

Surveys the arguments of the animal rights movement, discusses laboratory animals, factory farming, and endangered species, and considers the actions of animal rights activists. Authors include Peter Singer, Tom Regan, Marian Stamp Dawkins, Stephen R.L. Clark, Mary Midgley, Ricard D. Ryder, Harriet Schleifer, Jim Mason, Dale Jamieson, Lewis Regenstein, Lewis Regenstein, Dexter L. Cate, Donald J. Barnes, Clive Hollands, Philip Windeatt, Henry Spira

Ethics

Edited by Peter Singer

Not an anthology about animal rights, but rather a very interesting anthology about ethics from the standpoint of a philosopher who holds that the suffering of animals counts in the utilitarian calculus. (New York: Oxford, 1994)

Singer and His Critics (Philosophers and their Critics)

Edited by Dale Jamieson

This is the first book devoted to the work of Peter Singer, one of the leaders of the practical ethics movement, and one of the most influential philosophers of the twentieth century. Singer's metaethical views, his normative theory and his substantive positions on such matters as the moral status of animals, the sanctity of human life and famine relief are all subjected to scrutiny. The volume contains new essays by leading philosophers from three continents. Singer's reply to his critics importantly supplements what he has previously written and will be essential reading for anyone who wants to fully understand his views.

Rethinking Peter Singer: A Christian Critique

by Gordon R. Preece

Who is Peter Singer?What does he say about issues like abortion, infanticide, euthanasia and animal rights? What does he say about Christianity? What exactly is his philosophy?"Peter Singer is probably the world's most famous or infamous contemporary philosopher," says Gordon Preece. Recently appointed as professor of bioethics at Princeton University's Center for Human Values, Singer is best known for his book on animal rights, Animal Liberation, and for his philosophical text Practical Ethics. But underneath his seemingly benign agenda lies perhaps the most radical challenge to Christian ethics proposed in recent times.In Rethinking Peter Singer four of Singer's contemporaries, fellow Australian scholars Gordon Preece, Graham Cole, Lindsay Wilson and Andrew Sloane, grapple with Singer's views respectfully but incisively. From a straightforwardly Christian perspective, they critique Singer's thought in four major areas: abortion and infanticide, euthanasia, animal rights, and Christianity.Rethinking Peter Singer is not only for those who want to understand Singer's views but also for all who want to challenge the thinking that more and more informs our society's stance on moral issues.

The Case for Animal Rights

by Tom Regan

More than twenty years after its original publication, The Case for Animal Rights is an acknowledged classic of moral philosophy, and its author is recognized as the intellectual leader of the animal rights movement. In a new and fully considered preface, Regan responds to his critics and defends the book's revolutionary position. "Tom Regan's now classic Case For Animal Rights blends careful argument with intense moral concern. For two decades, where Regan has been taken seriously, animals have been better off and people have become better persons. This new edition is a welcome sign of this influence continuing."-Holmes Rolston, III, University Distinguished Professor, Colorado State University

Empty Cages: Facing the Challenge of Animal Rights

by Tom Regan

Described by Jeffrey Masson as "the single best introduction to animal rights ever written" this new book by Tom Regan dispels the negative image of animal rights advocates perpetrated by the mass media, unmasks the fraudulent rhetoric of _humane treatment_ favored by animal exploiters, and explains why existing laws function to legitimize institutional cruelty.

Defending Animal Rights

by Tom Regan

More than a contest of wills representing professional and economic interests, the animal rights debate is also an enduring topic in normative ethical theory. In paperback for the first time, "Defending Animal Rights" addresses the key issues in this sometimes acrimonious debate. Tom Regan responds thoughtfully to his critics while dismantling the conception that "all and only" human beings are worthy of the moral status that is the basis of rights. Systematically unravelling claims that human beings are rational and therefore entitled to superior moral status, Regan defends the inherent value of all individuals who are "subjects of a life" and decries the speciesism that pretends to separate human from nonhuman animals.

All That Dwell Therein: Essays on Animal Rights and Environmental Ethics

by Tom Regan

The moral basis of vegetarianism -- Utilitarianism, vegetarianism, and animal rights -- Animal experimentation -- Animal rights, human wrongs -- Why whaling is wrong -- An examination and defense of one argument concerning animal rights -- Animals and the law -- What sorts of beings can have rights? -- The nature and possibility of an environmental ethic --Environmental ethics and the ambiguity of the Native Americans' relationship with nature. Papers and lectures written and delivered over t six years or so on the general topic of human obligations to nonhumans.

The Animal Rights Debate

by Tom Regan and Carl Cohen

Here, for the first time, the world's two leading authorities--Tom Regan, who argues for animal rights, and Carl Cohen, who argues against them--make their respective case before the public at large. The very terms of the debate will never be the same. This seminal moment in the history of the controversy over animal rights will influence the direction of this debate throughout the rest of the century

The Thee Generation: Reflections on the Coming Revolution

by Tom Regan

The revolution examined in this collection of essays is a revolution of the human spirit. In this revolution, Tom Regan passionately contends that the expansive ethic of service is replacing the suffocating ethic of greed. Unlike previous generations, "The Thee Generation" asks, "What do I have to give?" rather than "What can I get to Keep?" Regan defines "Thee" as those to be served: the handicapped, the poor, the illiterate, the homeless, the starving and the abused, those newly born, and those soon to die. This generation is generous enough to include the animal kingdom, and even the earth itself, for the world of "The Thee Generation" is a place where a shared sense of community replaces the void of individual estrangement. Each of these provocative, readable essays, most of which have not been previously published, offers answers to important moral questions and attempts to identify the right reasons for those answers. Regan addresses such topics as child pornography, feminism, deep ecology, vivisection, Christian theology, and career choice. The questions he raises force us to consider the boundaries of the moral community, and what it means to be human in our own generation: "The human is but one life form among many, and what distinguishes us from the larger community of life is not our power to subdue but our responsibility to protect." (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1991),

The Struggle for Animal Rights

by Tom Regan

Animals' Rights Considered in Relation to Social Progress

by Henry Salt

Salt's classic Animals' Rights is a practical book. Initially Salt sets forth the principle of animals' rights. He then describes the ways and means of the suffering imposed on animals as an inevitable consequence of the denial of rights. In the course of the book he refutes, often with humour, every argument advanced against animal rights in his lifetime and anticipates and refutes those still to be made. The conclusion offers guidance on "Lines of Reform" in which he explains the importance of an intellectual, literary and social crusade against the central cause of oppression: the disregard of the natural kinship between man and the animals and the consequent denial of their rights. He urged his readers to look back to the days when human slaves were excluded from the common pale of humanity, with the same hypocritical fallacies used to justify that exclusion as are invoked in the case of animals. By then looking forward; the moral can hardly be mistaken, he said. The 1980 edition contains a preface by Peter Singer "A masterpiece; it remains one of the most lucid and persuasive of all the books written in defense of animals," Keith Thomas, New York Review of Books

The Unheeded Cry: Animal Consciousness, Animal Pain and Science

by Bernard Rollin with a Foreword by Jane Goodall

Text confronting animal rights: do experimental animals feel pain and suffer, and if so, what ought humans do about it? Forwarded by Jane Goodall. For veterinary students, educators, and anyone who cares about animals and the way they are treated in our society. surveys changing attitudes toward animal consciousness and deals specifically with the issue of how we can know and measure animal pain, and his

Animal Rights and Human Morality

by Bernard Rollin

It's been more than two decades since the first edition of this landmark book garnered public accolades for its sensitive yet honest and forthright approach to the many disquieting questions surrounding the emotional debate over animal rights. Is moral concern something owed by human beings only to human beings? Drawing upon his philosophical expertise, his extensive experience of working with animal issues all over the world, and his knowledge of biological science, Bernard E Rollin - now widely recognised as the father of veterinary ethics - develops a compelling analysis of animal rights as it is emerging in society.The result is a sound basis for rational discussion and social policy development in this area of rapidly growing concern. He believes that society must elevate the moral status of animals and protect their rights as determined by their natures. His public speaking and published works have contributed to passage of major federal legislation designed to increase the well-being of laboratory animals. This new Third Edition is greatly expanded and includes a new chapter on animal agriculture, plus additional discussions of animal law, companion animal issues, genetic engineering, animal pain, animal research, and many other topics.

(2^nd edition: Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1992).

(3^rd edition: Prometheus Books, 2006)

Created from Animals: The Moral Implications of Darwinism

by James Rachels.

From Bishop Wilberforce in the 1860s to the advocates of "creation science" today, defenders of traditional mores have condemned Darwin's theory of evolution as a threat to society's values. Darwin's defenders, like Stephen Jay Gould, have usually replied that there is no conflict between science and religion--that values and biological facts occupy separate realms. But as James Rachels points out in this thought-provoking study, Darwin himself would disagree with Gould. Darwin, who had once planned on being a clergyman, was convinced that natural selection overthrew our age-old religious beliefs. Created from Animals offers a provocative look at how Darwinian evolution undermines many tenets of traditional philosophy and religion. James Rachels begins by examining Darwin's own life and work, presenting an astonishingly vivid and compressed biography. We see Darwin's studies of the psychological links in evolution (such as emotions in dogs, and the "mental powers" of worms), and how he addressed the moral implications of his work, especially in his concern for the welfare of animals. Rachels goes on to present a lively and accessible survey of the controversies that followed in Darwin's wake, ranging from Herbert Spencer's Social Darwinism to Edward O. Wilson's sociobiology, and discusses how the work of such influential intellects as Descartes, Hume, Kant, T.H. Huxley, Henri Bergson, B.F. Skinner, and Stephen Jay Gould has contributed to--or been overthrown by--evolutionary science. Western philosophy and religion, Rachels argues, have been shaken by the implications of Darwin's work, most notably the controversial idea that humans are simply a more complex kind of animal. Rachels assesses a number of studies that suggest how closely humans are linked to other primates in behavior, and then goes on to show how this idea undercuts the work of many prominent philosophers. Kant's famous argument that suicide reduces one to the level of an animal, for instance, is meaningless if humans are, in fact, animals. Indeed, humanity's membership in the animal kingdom calls into question the classic notions of human dignity and the sacredness of human life. What we need now, Rachels contends, is a philosophy that does not discriminate between different species, one that addresses each being on an individual basis. With this sweeping survey of the arguments, the philosophers, and the deep implications surrounding Darwinism, Rachels lays the foundations for a new view of morality. Vibrantly written and provocatively argued, Created from Animals offers a new perspective on issues ranging from suicide to euthanasia to animal rights. [1990]

Morals, Reason and Animals

by Steve Sapontzis

This book criticizes the common belief that we are entitled to exploit animals for our benefit because they are not as rational as people. After discussing the moral (in)significance of reason in general, the author proceeds to develop a clear, commonsensical conception of what "animal rights" is about and why everyday morality points toward the liberation of animals as the next logical step in Western moral progress. The book evaluates criticisms of animal rights that have appeared in recent philosophical literature and explains the consequences of animal liberation for our diet, science, and treatment of the environment. The issue of animal rights has become of increasing philosophical and popular importance over the past decade. Morals. Reason, and Animals is the first extensive, second-generation contribution to this debate. Focusing exclusively on the fundamental philosophical issues, Sapontzis both undermines the arguments that have been raised against animal rights and constructs a rebuttal that avoids the pitfalls encountered by earlier defenses. (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1987)

Political Theory and Animal Rights

Edited by Paul A.B. Clarke and Andrew Linzey.

A book of 30 extracts from major political philosophers from Plato to Russell, on the nature of animals and their relation to humanity. The book aims to demonstrate the major shifts in thinking about the place of animals in society which have taken place over 2500 years. Theories about the nature of animal life have always been reflected in philosophy, particularly in philosophies of the social realm and the ideal political structure. This book aims to explore notions of animals as property, the use of animal analogies, the concept of hierarchies of species, and the political concept of "animal" which has been used to separate human beings from each other. [1990]

The Nature of the Beast: Are Animals Moral?

By Stephen Clark.

Hardly a month goes by without a judge or journalist proclaiming that someone has 'become an animal' or 'lives like an animal'/ Indeed most of us are liable to brand uncouth behaviour as animal-like. Dr. Clark's new book is an attemt to come to grips with these contradictory tendencies, and to look for a rational reconciliation between them. The author discusses the mrerits and failures of purely 'objective' description of animals, the evidence of animal intelligence (including the ability to use language, which has been claimed for chimpanzees), and the applicability in the animal realm of concepts such as 'freedom', 'self' and 'obligation. He also analyses sexual behaviour, parenting and dominance, and argues that human moralizing rests on sentiments that we experience because we are mammals." But he sees no reason to suppose that 'sociobiology', the study of social behaviour in the light of evolutionary theory, could take over the roles either of ethics or of moral philosophy.

Animals, Men and Morals

Edited by Stanley and Rosalind Godlovitch and John Harris.

“Animals, Men and Morals is a manifesto for an Animal Liberation movement. The contributors to the book may not all see the issue this way. They are a varied group. Philosophers, ranging from professors to graduate students, make up the largest contingent. There are five of them, including the three editors, and there is also an extract from the unjustly neglected German philosopher with an English name, Leonard Nelson, who died in 1927. There are essays by two novelist/critics, Brigid Brophy and Maureen Duffy, and another by Muriel the Lady Dowding, widow of Dowding of Battle of Britain fame and the founder of "Beauty without Cruelty," a movement that campaigns against the use of animals for furs and cosmetics The other pieces are by a psychologist, a botanist, a sociologist, and Ruth Harrison, who is probably best described as a professional campaigner for animal welfare.. It is a demand for a complete change in our attitudes to nonhumans. It is a demand that we cease to regard the exploitation of other species as natural and inevitable, and that, instead, we see it as a continuing moral outrage.” Peter Singer [1971]

Fettered Kingdoms: An Examination of a Changing Ethic by John Bryant

Fox Press Publishers, Winchester. Includes a well-known indictment of pet keeping. [1990]

The Savour of Salt--A Henry Salt Anthology

This selection offers insights into Henry Salt, the humanitarian reformer whose thinking was so far ahead of his generation, the biographer and critic whose essays and books were highly influential and the poet whose wit and perception could "turn a rhyme and overturn a fool". A child of privilege in Victorian England, Henry S. Salt (1851-1939) relinquished his conventional life as an Eton master to live and work for causes such as animals' rights, vegetarianism, socialism, conservation and other humanitarian movements now better understood than they were during his lifetime. Salt was also a committed man of letters, writing on Shelley, Thoreau, De Quincey and James Thomson ("B.V.") amongst others. His friendships included Edward Carpenter, Mahatma Gandhi and George Bernard Shaw. This anthology celebrates the anniversary of a remarkable and compassionate man who may be said to have died at least 50 years before his time. (G. and W. Hendrick, Centaur Press Publishers, Fontwell, 1989)

Animals and Why They Matter: A Journey Around the Species Barrier

by Mary Midgley

"Animals and Why They Matter" examines the barriers that our philosophical traditions have erected between human beings and animals and reveals that the too-often ridiculed subject of animal rights is an issue crucially related to such problems within the human community as racism, sexism, and age discrimination. Mary Midgley's profound and clearly written narrative is a thought-provoking study of the way in which the opposition between reason and emotion has shaped our moral and political ideas and the problems it has raised. Whether considering vegetarianism, women's rights, or the "humanity" of pets, this book goes to the heart of the question of why all animals matter. Penguin Publishers, London. [1983] / (Athens, GA.: University of Georgia Press, 1983)

Animal Rights - A Symposium

Edited by David Paterson and Richard Ryder

A record of the prceedings of the Symposium hemd under the auspices of the RSPCA at Trinity College, Cambridge on the The Ethical Aspects of Man's Relationships to Animals, 18^th and 19^th, August, 1977. Includes sections on Historical and Social Perspectives, Religions and Theological Perspectives, Philosophical Perspectives, The Three Major Areas of Concern (Farming, Wildlife, and Experimentation), and Political and Legal Perspectives. Authors include Professor Peter Singer, Richard D. Ryder, John Aspinall, Rev J. Austin, Rev Andrew Linzen, Canon E. Turnbull, Dr. Michael W. Fox, Brigid Brophy, Professor Tom Regan, Dr. T.L.S. Sprigge, Dr. Stephen R. L. Clark, Professor R. G,. Frey, Maureen Duffy, John Harris, Ruth Harrison, Peter Roberts, Jon Wynee-Tyson, D. A. Paterson, W. J. Jordan. J. M. Bryant, Dr. David W. Macdonald and L. Boitani, Dr. Bernard Dixon, Dr. Lewis Goldman, Dr. Jenny Remfry, Dr. David Sperlinger, Clive Hollands, The Rt. Hon. Lord Houghton of Sowerby CH, and Bill Brown. (Centaur Press Publishers, Fontwell, 1979.)

Inhumane Society: The American Way of Exploiting Animals by Michael W. Fox

A wide-ranging indictment of current practices and a consideration of ethical issues in factory farming, laboratory testing, wildlife management, zoos, genetic engineering and patenting, and other human uses of animals. Among Fox's concerns are whether vegetarianism is an ethical ...More imperative; whether humans have the right to keep ""companion animals"" (""the word 'pet' is demeaning""); how veterinarians can reconcile their commitment to animal well-being with their service to animal exploiters: how the views of conservationists, preservationists, deep ecologists, and animal rightists conflict and agree; and the fine points in what can and cannot be permitted

St. Martins Press, New York. [1990]

Rape of the Wild: Man's Violence against Animals and the Earth

by Andree Collard with Joyce Contrucci.

Argues that the masculine outlook towards nature has led to pollution, exploitation, and extinction, and suggests an alternate, more humane viewpoint [9Indiana University Press, 1989 - Nature - 187 pages 1989)

The Dreaded Comparison: Human and Animal Slavery

by Marjorie Spiegel

Spiegel, executive director of the Institute for the Development of Earth Awareness, has revised her 1989 book to present an in-depth exploration of the similarities between the violence humans have wrought against other humans and our culture's treatment of animals. Using considerable scholarship, she makes a strong case for links between white oppression of black slaves and human oppression of animals. Her thesis is not that the oppressions suffered by black people and animals have taken identical forms but that they share the same relationship between the oppressor and the oppressed. These comparisons include the brandings and auctions of both slaves and animals, the hideous means of transport (slave ships, truckloads of cattle), and the tearing of offspring from their mothers. Her illustrative juxtapositions are graphic, e.g., a photograph of a chimpanzee in a syphilis experiment beside a photo of a black man in the Tuskegee Syphilis Study. As Alice Walker writes in the preface, "This powerful book...will take a lifetime to forget." Chilling yet enlightening, this provocative book is vitally important in our efforts to understand the roots of individual and societal violence. It belongs in all libraries. [The book received a special award from The International Society for Animal Rights.?Ed.]?Eva Lautemann, DeKalb Coll. Lib., Clarkston, Ga.

(Mirror Books, NY., 1988)

Ethical Vegetarianism: From Pythagoras to Peter Singer

Edited by Kerry Walters and Lisa Portmess

For vegetarians seeking the historical roots of vegetarianism, for animal rights activists and the environmentally concerned, and for those questioning their consumption of meat, here's a book that provides a deep understanding of vegetarianism as more than just a dietary decision. This is the first comprehensive collection of primary source material on vegetarianism as a moral choice and includes the writings of Carol Adams, Bernard de Mandeville, Mohandas Gandhi, Oliver Goldsmith, Anna Kingsford, Frances Moore Lappe, Porphyry, Pythagoras, Tom Regan, Albert Schweitzer, Seneca, Peter Singer, Leo Tolstoy, and Richard Wagner, among others. (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1999).

The Animals Issue: Morality in Practice by Peter Carruthers

Defends a contractualist account of ethics and argues that animals do not have direct moral significance. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992).

Taking Animals Seriously: Mental Life and Moral Status by David.DeGrazia

This book distinguishes itself from much of the polemical literature on these issues by offering the most judicious and well-balanced account yet available of animalsā moral standing, and related questions concerning their minds and welfare. Transcending jejune debates focused on utilitarianism versus rights, the book offers a fresh methodological approach with specific and constructive conclusions about our treatment of animals. David DeGrazia provides the most thorough discussion yet of whether equal consideration should be extended to animalsā interests, and examines the issues of animal minds and animal well-being with an unparalleled combination of philosophical rigor and empirical documentation. His book is an important contribution to the field of animal ethics and will be read with special interest by all philosophers teaching such courses, as well as biologists, those professionally involved with animals, and general readers concerned about animal welfare. (Cambridge University Press, 1996).

Babies and Beasts: The Argument from Marginal Cases

by Daniel Dombrowski

Both its defenders and detractors have described the argument from marginal cases as the most important to date in defense of animal rights. Hotly debated among philosophers for some twenty years, the argument concludes that no morally relevant characteristic distinguishes human beings - including infants, the severely retarded, the comatose, and other "marginal cases" - from any other animals. Babies and Beasts presents the first book-length exploration of the broad range of views relating to the argument from marginal cases and sorts out and evaluates its various uses and abuses. Daniel Dombrowski analyzes the views of many who are prominent in the debate - Peter Singer, Thomas Regan, H. J. McCloskey, Jan Narveson, John Rawls, R. G. Frey, Peter Carruthers, Michael Leahy, Robert Nozick, and James Rachels are included - in a volume that will be essential to philosophers, animal rights activists, those who work in clinical settings, and others who must sometimes deal with "marginal cases."

(Urbana: The University of Illinois Press, 1997).

The Case for Animal Experimentation: An Evolutionary and Ethical Perspective

by Michael A. Fox

"Fox (Philosophy, Queens Univ., Kingston, Ontario) defends two theses: 1) the fact that animals can suffer yields them no moral entitlements; (2) since animals do not value their own lives, their lives do not have intrinsic value. From these he derives the view that any experiments benefiting humans are justified. Because the book is divided into 56 subsections it is eminently easy to read, but this arrangement inevitably renders the arguments a bit superficial. Proponents of animal welfare causes will not be persuaded by Fox, but neutral persons will find much factual information, not readily available elsewhere, to help them make up their minds. Recommended especially for the general reader. " - Library Journal (Berkeley: The University of California Press, 1986).

Beyond Prejudice: The Moral Significance of Human and Nonhuman Animals by Evelyn Pluhar

"Evelyn Pluhar has written an important book that discusses key issues in developing moral thought about our treatment of non-human animals. Arguing that past writing in the area has failed to justify the moral significance of non-humans, Pluhar offers an original contribution designed to provide that justification. Her scholarship is exacting; her writing style lively, lucid, and accessible. There can be no doubt that "Beyond Prejudice" will stimulate much important debate about the topic of the rights of nonhumans."--Gary L. Francione, Rutgers University, School of Law

(Durham: Duke University Press, 1995).

Biology, Ethics, and Animals

by Rosemary Rodd

This book utilizes both philosophical and biological approaches to address the various attitudes in the debate over animal rights. Rodd justifies ethical concern within a framework that is firmly grounded on evolutionary theory, and provides detailed discussion of practical situations in which ethical decisions have to be made. For moral philosophers, the book offers a biological background to the ethical questions involved. Biologists will find that it provides an approach to the ethics of animal rights which is rooted in biological theory. This much-needed volume will be an invaluable guide to anyone who is concerned with animal welfare. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990)

Moral Status: Obligations to Persons and Other Living Things

by Mary Anne Warren

This book is well written, synoptic in its coverage of existing theories of moral status, and most useful for a beginning Contemporary Moral Problems or Medical Ethics class. Ethics The logic of the application of the principles she sets forth is clear. Her theory should prompt discussion and help clarify the concept of moral status. Her multicriterial approach for determining moral status has the potential to assist in the struggle to handle the complex moral issues prevalent today. Mary Anne Warren's enterprise, to delineate "obligations to persons and other living things" is potentially fruitful, and of considerable importance. Mary Warnock, Times Higher Education Supplement This is a thought-provoking book with much to recommend it. Liam Clarke, Nursing Ethics This book is ambitious in the ground it covers, attempting to discuss a number of theories of "moral status", and offer one of its own. It has much in it to interest people concerned about health care (particularly the discussions of euthanasia and abortion), as well as those interested in animal rights and environmental issues. Journal of Medical Ethics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997).

Animal Revolution: Changing Attitudes Towards Speciesism by Richard Ryder

When Richard Ryder coined the term 'speciesism' over two decades ago, the issue of animal rights was very much a minority concern that had associations with crankiness. Today, the animal rights movement is well-established across the globe and continues to gain momentum, with animal experimentation for medical research high on the agenda and very much in the news. This pioneering book ― an historical survey of the relationship between humans and non-humans ― paved the way for these developments. Revised, updated to include the movement's recent history and available in paperback for the first time, and now introducing Ryder's concept of 'painism', Animal Revolution is essential reading for anyone who cares about animals or humanity.

Ethics and the Beast: A Speciesist Argument for Animal Liberation by Tzachi Zamir

Many people think that animal liberation would require a fundamental transformation of basic beliefs. We would have to give up "speciesism" and start viewing animals as our equals, with rights and moral status. And we would have to apply these beliefs in an all-or-nothing way. But in Ethics and the Beast, Tzachi Zamir makes the radical argument that animal liberation doesn't require such radical arguments--and that liberation could be accomplished in a flexible and pragmatic way. By making a case for liberation that is based primarily on common moral intuitions and beliefs, and that therefore could attract wide understanding and support, Zamir attempts to change the terms of the liberation debate.Without defending it, Ethics and the Beast claims that speciesism is fully compatible with liberation. Even if we believe that we should favor humans when there is a pressing human need at stake, Zamir argues, that does not mean that we should allow marginal human interests to trump the life-or-death interests of animals. As minimalist as it sounds, this position generates a robust liberation program, including commitments not to eat animals, subject them to factory farming, or use them in medical research. Zamir also applies his arguments to some questions that tend to be overlooked in the liberation debate, such as whether using animals can be distinguished from exploiting them, whether liberationists should be moral vegetarians or vegans, and whether using animals for therapeutic purposes is morally blameless.

Without a Tear: Our Tragic Relationship with Animals by Mark H. Bernstein (Author)

In "Without a Tear", Mark H. Bernstein begins with one of our most common and cherished moral beliefs: that it is wrong to intentionally and gratuitously inflict harm on the innocent. Over the course of the book, he shows how this apparently innocuous commitment requires that we drastically revise many of our most common practices involving nonhuman animals. Most people who write about our ethical obligations concerning animals base their arguments on emotional appeals or contentious philosophical assumptions; Bernstein, however, argues from reasons but carries little theoretical baggage. He considers the issues in a religious context, where he finds that Judaism in particular has the resources to ground moral obligations to animals. "Without a Tear" also makes novel use of feminist ethics to add to the case for drawing animals more closely into our ethical world. Bernstein details the realities of factory farms, animal-based research, and hunting fields, and contrasting these chilling facts with our moral imperatives clearly shows the need for fundamental changes to some of our most basic animal institutions. The tightly argued, provocative claims in "Without a Tear" will be an eye-opening experience for animal lovers, scholars, and people of good faith everywhere.

Beast and Man by Mary Midgley

Philosophers have traditionally concentrated on the qualities that make human beings different from other species. In Beast and Man Mary Midgley, one of our foremost intellectuals, stresses continuities. What makes people tick? Largely, she asserts, the same things as animals. She tells us humans are rather more like other animals than we previously allowed ourselves to believe, and reminds us just how primitive we are in comparison to the sophistication of many animals. A veritable classic for our age, Beast and Man has helped change the way we think about ourselves and the world in which we live. (Harvester Press Publishers, Brighton, 1979)

(Routledge; 1 edition (November 15, 2002)

Animal Rights: Opposing Viewpoints

Edited by Janelle Rohr (San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1989)

Contains an excellent collection of short articles; it also includes a list of organizations involved in the animal rights issue and how to contact them.

Animal Rights and Welfare

Edited by Jeanne Williams in the series The Reference Shelf, Vol. 63, No. 4., is a well-edited, short (168 pages) collection of short and often popular articles on the issues of animal rights, animals in research, and changes in the animal rights movement. (New York: H. W. Wilson Company, 1991)

Ethics and Animals (Contemporary Issues in Biomedicine, Ethics, and Society)

Edited by Harlan B. Miller and William H. Williams In this text, a full spectrum of views on how humans ought best to treat non-human animals is presented. The defences of animal rights set out here are based not only on classical ethical principles, but also on firmly grounded scientific notions of evolutionary continuity among species. And, uncommon in works on these themes, there is also a modern defence of the use of animals in research, testing and farming. The contributors - a cohort of animal behaviourists, scientists, philosophers, economists, psychologists, and animal welfare activists - bring equally as wide a diversity of approaches, methodologies, and conclusions to these always moving questions of the human uses of animals. Among the specific topics treated are: animal rights; killing of non-humans; animal suffering; speciesism; animal intelligence; animal experimentation; humans as hunting animals; the limits of moral community; animals as models of the human; moral status of animals; ethics of meat eating; animal liberation; and animals in human law, philosophy, and literature. The survey identifies the key issues in human-animal relationships, sorts out their meanings, and bridges ethical and utilitarian views. It demonstrates unequivocally that those who use animals have serious obligations of care and respect toward them, even while showing that - where human interests go beyond those of other creatures - at least some human interests ought to prevail. All those concerned with animal rights - traditionalists and advocates of animal liberation alike - should find this book a valuable source of insight and understanding into these often difficult problems. Includes philosophical articles by well-known philosophers (including Tom Regan, Jan Narveson, Annette Baier, Bernard Rollin, Dale Jamieson, Lawrence Becker, James Rachels, R. G. Frey, and many others) and includes a very good bibliography. (Clifton, New Jersey: Humana Press, 1983)

On the Fifth Day: Animal Rights and Human Ethics

Edited by Richard Knowles Morris and Michael W. Fox

Sponsored by the Humane Society of the United States and contains twelve essays on the moral status of animals and a statement of the Principles of the Humane Society. (Washington, D.C.: Acropolis Books, 1978)

The Animal Rights/Environmental Ethics Debate

Edited by Eugene C. Hargrove

Contains eleven articles dealing specifically with the question of the relationship between animals rights issues and issues about environmental ethics. "This book traces the Animal Rights/Environmental Ethics dispute through the key steps of its history, in the form of the most important original articles, and points the way to a resolution. It is useful to the scholar interested in the animal rights issue and it is appropriate as a textbook in a course in Environmental Ethics at any level, from beginning to graduate. For the beginner, it teaches the key issues in non-technical language and for the scholar it traces the history of an important dispute and clearly distinguishes basic ideas in their historical context."-- Donald C. Lee, University of New Mexico

"The best thing about this book is that it brings together (for the first time) the most important articles concerning the debate between animal rights and environmental ethics. A wide variety of views is represented, which provides significant amounts of material for classroom discussion." -- Eric Katz, New Jersey Institute of Technology

(Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992)

Animal Experimentation: The Moral Issues

Edited by Robert M. Baird and Stuart E. Rosenbaum

Contains fifteen articles on animal rights and experimentation and a short bibliography. (Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1991)

Interests and Rights: The Case Against Animals

by R. G. Frey

Argues that animals are part of the moral community, but that their lives are not of equal value to adult human lives (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1980).

Rights, Killing, and Suffering. Moral Vegetarianism and Applied Ethics

by R. G. Frey

Argues against vegetarianism from a utilitarian perspective. (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1983);

Animal Sacrifices: Religious Perspectives on the Use of Animals in Science,

Edited by Tom Regan (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1986)

Moral Inquiries on the Situation of Man and Of Brutes

by Lewis Gompertz

This is a reprint of an early attempt to formulate the rational basis of the belief in the rights of animals, written by a vegetarian pioneer of animal protection in Victorian Britain. The author argues that "every animal has more right to the use of its own body than others have to use it". (1824)

Against Liberation: Putting Animals in Perspective

by Michael P. T. Leahy'

Offers a Wittgensteinian critique of contemporary defenses of animal rights. (London and New York: Routledge 1991)

Rights in Moral Lives

by A. I. Melden

A nuanced discussion of these issues by a philosopher whose primary concern is with the concept of rights rather than animals (see Chapter Six) (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988).

Victims of Science

by Richard Ryder

Facts and ethics of animal research; includes a chapter on speciesism. (London: David-Poynter, 1975);

Animal Suffering: The Science of Animal Welfare

by Marian Stamp Dawkins

This book should be of interest to those involved in biology, ethology, animal science, psychology, laboratory animal care, veterinary and human medicine and research. (London and New York: Chapman and Hall, 1980).

The Case for Animal Experimentation

by Michael A. Fox (repeat)

Argues that animals lack the critical self-awareness necessary for membership in the moral community; however, he renounced this view always immediately after publication of the book. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986),

Speciesism

by Joan Dunayer

Defining speciesism as "a failure, in attitude or practice, to accord any nonhuman being equal consideration and respect," this brilliant work critiques speciesism both outside and inside the animal rights movement. Much moral philosophy, legal theory, and animal advocacy aimed at advancing nonhuman emancipation actually perpetuate speciesism, the book demonstrates. Speciesism examines philosophy, law, and activism in terrowms of three categories: "old speciesism," "new speciesism," and species equality. Old-speciesists limit rights to humans. Speciesism refutes their standard arguments against nonhuman rights. Current law is old-speciesist; legally, nonhumans have no rights. "Animal laws" such as the Humane Slaughter Act afford nonhumans no meaningful protection, Dunayer shows. She also explains why welfarist campaigns are old-speciesist. Instead of opposing the abuse or killing of nonhuman beings, such campaigns seek only to make abuse or killing less cruel; they propose alternative ways of violating nonhumans’ moral rights. Many organizations that consider themselves animal rights engage in old-speciesist campaigns, which reinforce the property status of nonhumans rather than promote their emancipation. New-speciesists espouse rights for only some nonhumans, those whose minds seem most like humans’. In addition to devaluing most animals, new-speciesists give greater moral consideration and stronger basic rights to humans than to any nonhumans. They see animalkind as a hierarchy with humans at the top. Dunayer explains why she categorizes such theorists as Peter Singer, Tom Regan, and Steven Wise as new-speciesists. Nonspeciesists advocate rights for every sentient being. Speciesism makes the case that every creature with a nervous system should be regarded as sentient. The book provides compelling evidence of consciousness in animals often dismissed as insentient―such as fishes, insects, spiders, and snails. Dunayer argues that every sentient being should possess basic legal rights, including rights to life and liberty. Radically egalitarian, Speciesism envisions nonspeciesist thought, law, and action.

Corporal Compassion: Animal Ethics and Philosophy of Body

by Ralph A. Acampora

Emphasizes the phenomenal and somatic commonality of living beings; a philosophy of body that seeks to displace any notion of anthropomorphic empathy in viewing the moral experiences of nonhuman living beings. Acampora employs phenomenology, hermeneutics, existentialism and deconstruction to connect and contest analytic treatments of animal rights and liberation theory. He focuses on issues of being and value, and posits a felt nexus of bodily being, termed symphysis, to devise an interspecies ethos. Acampora uses this broad-based bioethic to engage in dialogue with other strains of environmental ethics and ecophilosophy. He examines the practical applications of the somatic ethos in contexts such as laboratory experimentation and zoological exhibition, and challenges practitioners to go beyond recent reforms and look to a future beyond exploitation or total noninterference--a posthumanist culture that advocates caring in a participatory approach.

Animal Ethics Reader

by Susan Armstrong, Richard G. Botzler

The Animal Ethics Reader is the first comprehensive, state-of-the-art anthology of readings on this substantial area of study and interest. A subject that regularly captures the headlines, the book is designed to appeal to anyone interested tracing the history of the subject, as well as providing a powerful insight into the debate as it has developed. The recent wealth of material published in this area has not, until now, been collected in one volume. Readings are arranged thematically, carefully presenting a balanced representation of the subject as it stands. It will be essential reading for students taking a course in the subject as well as being of considerable interest to the general reader. Articles are arranged under the following headings: Theories of Animal Ethics; Animal Capacities; Animals for Food; Animal Experimentation; Genetic Engineering of Animals; Ethics and Wildlife; Zoos, Aquaria, and Animals in Entertainment; Companion Animals; Legal Rights for Animals. Readings from leading experts in the field including Peter Singer, Mary Midgely and Bernard Rollin are featured as well as selections from Donald Griffin, Mark Bekoff, Jane Goodall, Raymond Frey, Barbara Orlans, Tom Regan, and Baird Callicott. There is an emphasis on balancing classic and contemporary readings with a view to presenting debates as they stand at this point in time. Each chapter is introduced by the editors and study questions feature at the end. The foreword has been written by Bernard Rollin.

Created Equal: Animals and Us

by Ernie Bringas

Ably written by United Methodist minister Ernie Bringas, Created Equal: A Case For The Animal-Human Connection persuasively argues for the concept of animal-human equality. For millennia, the majority of human society has regarded animals as inferior, and used this point of view to justify unspeakable cruelty and exploitation. Created Equal explores a different philosophy and path, the better to enlighten ourselves with respect to human/animal relationships and interdependencies, and to make the world a better place for all forms of life sharing Planet Earth.

No Room, Save in the Heart: Poetry and Prose on Reverence for Life--Animals, Nature and Humankind

by Ann Cottrell Free

Selections in this beautifully illustrated and presented book reflect moments of deep sorrow and bright joy over the animal, nature and human condition. The author bears witness in these poems and brief essays to irreverence for life as she has done - in a different writing style - in newspaper and magazine articles, other books and testimony before legislative bodies. She brings new vision to the commonplace. Controlled and compelling, she speaks the language of the heart, where most meaningful action begins. The book is divided into five sections: "The House of Life," "Sunlight Still in His Eyes," "The Quality of Mercy," "Joy to the World," and "The Ways of Love."

Animal Rights: A Very Short Introduction

by David DeGrazia

This volume provides a general overview of the basic ethical and philosophical issues of animal rights. It asks questions such as: Do animals have moral rights? If so, what does this mean? What sorts of mental lives do animals have, and how should we understand welfare? By presenting models for understanding animals' moral status and rights, and examining their mental lives and welfare, David DeGrazia explores the implications for how we should treat animals in connection with our diet, zoos, and research. Animal Rights distinguishes itself by combining intellectual rigor with accessibility, offering a distinct moral voice with a non-polemical tone.

Ethics, Humans, and Other Animals

by Rosalind Hursthouse

Rosalind Hursthouse carefully introduces one of three standard approaches in current ethical theory: utilitarianism, rights, and virtue ethics. She then proceeds to clearly explain how each approach encourages us to think about our treatment of animals. Every chapter is linked to a reading from a key exponent of each approach.

The Animal Manifesto -Six Reasons for Expanding Our Compassion Footprint

by Mark Bekoff

In this inspirational call to action, Marc Bekoff, the world’s leading expert on animal emotions, gently shows that improving our treatment of animals is a matter of rethinking our many daily decisions and “expanding our compassion footprint.” He demonstrates that animals experience a rich range of emotions, including empathy and compassion, and that they clearly know right from wrong. Driven by moral imperatives and pressing environmental realities, Bekoff offers six compelling reasons for changing the way we treat animals -- whether they’re in factory farms, labs, circuses, or our vanishing wilderness. The result is a well-researched, informative guide that will change animal and human lives for the better. (paperback: New World Library, 2010)

Encyclopedia of Animal Rights and Animal Welfare

by Mark Bekoff

Expanded to two volumes, the comprehensively updated new edition, Encyclopedia of Animal Rights and Animal Welfare: Second Edition is an extraordinary publishing event. It remains the only reference to cover the entire scope of animal rights and welfare from a global interdisciplinary perspective, with an international team of contributors assembled by Marc Bekoff covering animal treatment issues in the United States, China, India, Kenya, Australia, and many other nations. With a focused emphasis on fairness and justice for animals evident on every page, Encyclopedia of Animal Rights and Animal Welfare: Second Edition offers clear explanations of hot-button topics like puppy mills, endangered species in zoos, no-kill shelters, dog fighting, factory farming and disease, veganism, conservation ethics, wildlife contraception, and more. The encyclopedia also explores a range of religious, ethical, and philosophical views on using animals, as well as the latest research on animal cognition and sentience. The work helps readers understand the different viewpoints of animal welfare advocates who want to improve conditions for animals and animal rights activists who don't want animals used at all.

Second Edition (Greenwood, 2009)

Wild Justice: The Moral Lives of Animals

by Marc Bekoff and Jessica Pierce

(paperback:University of Chicago Press, April 15, 2010)

(hardcover: University of Chicago Press, 2009)

Scientists have long counseled against interpreting animal behavior in terms of human emotions, warning that such anthropomorphizing limits our ability to understand animals as they really are. Yet what are we to make of a female gorilla in a German zoo who spent days mourning the death of her baby? Or a wild female elephant who cared for a younger female after she was injured by a rambunctious teenage male? Or a rat who refused to push a lever for food when he saw that doing so caused another rat to be shocked? Aren't these clear signs that animals have recognizable emotions and moral intelligence? With Wild Justice Marc Bekoff and Jessica Pierce unequivocally answer yes. Marrying years of behavioral and cognitive research with compelling and moving anecdotes, Bekoff and Pierce reveal that animals exhibit a broad repertoire of moral behaviors, including fairness, empathy, trust, and reciprocity. Underlying these behaviors is a complex and nuanced range of emotions, backed by a high degree of intelligence and surprising behavioral flexibility. Animals, in short, are incredibly adept social beings, relying on rules of conduct to navigate intricate social networks that are essential to their survival. Ultimately, Bekoff and Pierce draw the astonishing conclusion that there is no moral gap between humans and other species: morality is an evolved trait that we unquestionably share with other social mammals. Sure to be controversial, Wild Justice offers not just cutting-edge science, but a provocative call to rethink our relationship with -- and our responsibilities toward -- our fellow animals.

Animals Matter: A Biologist Explains Why We Should Treat Animals With Compassion and Respect

by Mark Bekoff
Non-human animals have many of the same feelings we do. They get hurt, they suffer, they are happy, and they take care of each other. Marc Bekoff, a renowned biologist specializing in animal minds and emotions, guides readers from high school age up -- including older adults who want a basic introduction to the topic in looking at scientific research, philosophical ideas, and humane values that argue for the ethical and compassionate treatment of animals. Citing the latest scientific studies and tackling controversies with conviction, he zeroes in on the important questions, inviting reader participation with "thought experiments" and ideas for action.

(Shambala, November 2007)

The Emotional Lives of Animals: A Leading Scientist Explores Animal Joy, Sorrow, and Empathy - and Why They Matter

by Mark Bekoff

Based on Marc Bekoff’s years of experience studying communication patterns of a wide range of animals, this important book shows that animals have rich emotional lives. Not only can animal emotions teach us about love, empathy, and compassion, argues Bekoff -- they require us to radically rethink our current relationship of domination and abuse of animals. Bekoff skillfully blends extraordinary stories and anecdotes of animal grief, joy, embarrassment, anger, and love with the latest scientific research confirming the existence of emotions that commonsense experience has long implied. The author also explores the evolutionary purposes of emotions, showing how science is discovering brain structures that produce emotions, how we can track an evolutionary continuum based on shared brain structures between species, and how new information is being revealed by noninvasive neurological research techniques. Filled with Bekoff’s light humor and touching stories, The Emotional Lives of Animals is a clarion call for reassessing both how we view animals and how we treat them. (New World Library , February 2007)

The Ten Trusts: What We Must Do to Care for the Animals We Love

by Mark Bekoff and Jane Goodall

Combining their life's work living among chimpanzees and coyotes and studying animals with a spiritual perspective on the interrelationship between humans and animals, world-renowned behavioral scientists Jane Goodall and Marc Bekoff set forth ten trusts that we as humans must honor as custodians of the planet. They argue passionately and persuasively that if we put these trusts to work in our lives, the whole world will be safer and more harmonious for all. The central theme of the trusts is one that both authors have been writing about for years - the importance and value of the individuals of all species. The Ten Trusts expands the concept of our obligation to live in close relationship with animals - for of course, we humans are part of the animal kingdom - challenging us to respect the interconnection between all living beings as we learn to care about them as individuals. The world is changing. Humans beings are gradually becoming more aware of the damage we are inflicting on the natural world. We are moving toward a world where cruelty and hatred are transformed into compassion and love. At this critical moment for the earth the authors share their hope and vision for humanity and all Earth's creatures. They dream of when scientists and non-scientists can work together to create a world in which human beings can live in peace and harmony with each other, animals, and the natural world. Simple yet profound, The Ten Trusts will not only change our perspective on how we live on this planet, they will establish our responsibilities as stewards of the natural world and show us how to live with respect for all life.

(paperback: HarperOne, 2003)

(hardcover: HarperCollins, 2002)

Minding Animals: Awareness, Emotions, and Heart

by Mark Bekoff

Thinking bees, ice-skating buffaloes, dreaming rats, happy foxes, ecstatic elephants, despondent dolphins--in Minding Animals, Marc Bekoff takes us on an exhilarating tour of the emotional and mental world of animals, where we meet creatures who do amazing things and whose lives are filled with mysteries. Following in the footsteps of Konrad Lorenz and Niko Tinbergen, Bekoff has spent the last 30 years studying animals of every stripe--from coyotes in Wyoming to penguins in Antarctica. He draws on this vast experience, as well as on the observations of other naturalists, to offer readers fascinating stories of animal behavior, including grooming and gossip, self-medication, feeding patterns, dreaming, dominance, and mating behavior. Many of these stories are truly incredible--chimpanzees medicating themselves with herbal remedies, elephants clearly mourning a dead group member--but this is not simply a catalog of amazing animal tales, for Bekoff also sheds light on many of the more serious issues surrounding animals. He offers a thought-provoking look at animal cognition, intelligence, and consciousness and he presents vivid examples of animal passions, highlighting the deep emotional lives of our animal kin. All this serves as background for his thoughtful conclusions about humility and animal protection and animal well-being, where he urges a new paradigm of respect, grace, compassion, and love for all animals. Marc Bekoff has gone deep into the minds, hearts, spirits, and souls of animals, giving him profound insight into their lives, and no small insight into ours. Minding Animals is an important contribution to our understanding of animal consciousness, a major work that will be a must read for anyone who loves nature.

(paperback: Oxford University Press, 2002)

(hardcover: Oxford University Press, 2002)

Species of Mind: The Philosophy and Biology of Cognitive Ethology

by Mark Bekoff and Colin Allen
The authors of this book, a philosopher and a cognitive ethologist, approach their work from the perspective that many animals have minds and rich cognitive lives. They also believe that arguments about evolutionary continuity are as applicable to the study of animal minds and brains as they are to comparative studies of kidneys, stomachs, and hearts. Cognitive ethologists study the comparative, evolutionary, and ecological aspects of the mental phenomena of animals. Philosophy can provide cognitive ethology with an analytical basis for the attribution and assessment of cognition to nonhuman animals. Cognitive ethology can help philosophy to explain mentality in naturalistic terms by providing data on the evolution of cognition.

The heart of the book is this reciprocal relationship between philosophical theories of mind and empirical studies of animal cognition. All theoretical discussion is carefully tied to case studies, particularly in the areas of antipredator vigilance and social play, where there are many points of contact with philosophical discussions of intentionality and representation. The authors make specific suggestions about how to use philosophical theories of intentionality as starting points for empirical investigation of animal minds. They also discuss cognitive ethology's relevance to questions of ethics, as our beliefs about the mental lives of animals strongly affect our attitudes toward their moral status.

(paperback: MIT Press, 1999)

(hardcover: MIT Press, 1997)

Animal Rights: The Changing Debate

Edited by Robert Garner

Do animals have rights and, if so, what exactly are they? Further, how do these rights relate to human rights? These questions have long bedeviled scientists, philosophers, and animal advocates and today remain as contested as ever. Combining the writings of leading academics and activists such as Peter Singer and Michael W. Fox, this anthology examines the development of animal rights discourse over the past quarter century to anticipate the future of the debate. Touching on every aspect of human-animal relations, from agriculture and animal experimentation to the animal rights movement in the United States and abroad, the contributors both question and affirm the utility of the concept of rights. Informing this volume is the belief that, regardless of where one stands on the issues of animal rights, it is simply indisputable that how we perceive and treat animals is fundamentally and inextricably related to how we define ourselves.
Animal Ethics Reader

Edited by Susan Armstrong and Richard G. Botzler (repeat)

Animal Rights: Current Debates and New Directions

Edited by Cass R. Sunstein and Martha C. Nussbaum
Cass Sunstein and Martha Nussbaum bring together an all-star cast of contributors to explore the legal and political issues that underlie the campaign for animal rights and the opposition to it. Addressing ethical questions about ownership, protection against unjustified suffering, and the ability of animals to make their own choices free from human control, the authors offer numerous different perspectives on animal rights and animal welfare. They show that whatever one's ultimate conclusions, the relationship between human beings and nonhuman animals is being fundamentally rethought. This book offers a state-of-the-art treatment of that rethinking.

Why Animal Suffering Matters: Philosophy, Theology, and Practical Ethics
by Andrew Linzey

How we treat animals arouses strong emotions. Many people are repulsed by photographs of cruelty to animals and respond passionately to how we make animals suffer for food, commerce, and sport. But is this, as some argue, a purely emotional issue? Are there really no rational grounds for opposing our current treatment of animals?

In Why Animal Suffering Matters , Andrew Linzey argues that when analyzed impartially the rational case for extending moral solicitude to all sentient beings is much stronger than many suppose. Indeed, Linzey shows that many of the justifications for inflicting animal suffering in fact provide grounds for protecting them. Because animals, the argument goes, lack reason or souls or language, harming them is not an offense. Linzey suggests that just the opposite is true, that the inability of animals to give or withhold consent, their inability to represent their interests, their moral innocence, and their relative defenselessness all compel us not to harm them. Andrew Linzey further shows that the arguments in favor of three controversial practices--hunting with dogs, fur farming, and commercial sealing--cannot withstand rational critique. He considers the economic, legal, and political issues surrounding each of these practices, appealing not to our emotions but to our reason, and shows that they are rationally unsupportable and morally repugnant. In this superbly argued and deeply engaging book, Linzey pioneers a new theory about why animal suffering matters, maintaining that sentient animals, like infants and young children, should be accorded a special moral status.

Animal Ethics in Context
by Clare Palmer

It is widely agreed that because animals feel pain we should not make them suffer gratuitously. Some ethical theories go even further: because of the capacities that they possess, animals have the right not to be harmed or killed. These views concern what not to do to animals, but we also face questions about when we should, and should not, assist animals that are hungry or distressed. Should we feed a starving stray kitten? And if so, does this commit us, if we are to be consistent, to feeding wild animals during a hard winter? In this controversial book, Clare Palmer advances a theory that claims, with respect to assisting animals, that what is owed to one is not necessarily owed to all, even if animals share similar psychological capacities. Context, history, and relation can be critical ethical factors. If animals live independently in the wild, their fate is not any of our moral business. Yet if humans create dependent animals, or destroy their habitats, we may have a responsibility to assist them. Such arguments are familiar in human cases-we think that parents have special obligations to their children, for example, or that some groups owe reparations to others. Palmer develops such relational concerns in the context of wild animals, domesticated animals, and urban scavengers, arguing that different contexts can create different moral relationships.

Creatures of the Same God: Explorations in Animal Theology
by Andrew Linzey

"I don't know why you're spending all your time on this. They re only animals for heaven's sake! That was the reaction of one of Andrew Linzey's fellow students at King s College, London, when he was studying theology in the 1970s. Since then, the now Rev. Dr. Andrew Linzey has been arguing that animals aren't only anything, but rather that they matter to God, and should do so to us. In this collection of essays, Linzey counters with his customary wit, erudition, and insight, some contemporary (and perhaps surprising) challenges to animal rights from ecotheologians, the Church, and politicians. He contends that far from the sometimes shallow judgments of those who think animals unworthy of theological consideration, the Christian tradition has a wellspring of sources and resources available to taking animals seriously. Instead of being marginal to the Christian experience, Linzey concludes, animals can take their rightful place alongside human beings as creatures of the same God.

Animals and Christianity: A Book of Readings

Edited by Andrew Linzey and Tom Regan

Hoping to revive an earlier interest in animal protection efforts on the part of the church, the editors have collected writings by numerous Christian leadersAquinas, Calvin, C.S. Lewis, Albert Schweitzer, John Wesley, Paul Tillich, Karl Barth, and morethat span a range of attitudes on subjects like the problem of animal pain and the question of animal redemption. Some pieces affirm human dominance (the Calvinist view), but more endorse Victor Hugo's "great ethic" that calls for deeper respect for creaturely life. Unusual and intriguing. EC

A Communion of Subjects: Animals in Religion, Science, and Ethics

Edited by Paul Waldau and Kimberley Patton

A Communion of Subjects is the first comparative and interdisciplinary study of the conceptualization of animals in world religions. Scholars from a wide range of disciplines, including Thomas Berry (cultural history), Wendy Doniger (study of myth), Elizabeth Lawrence (veterinary medicine, ritual studies), Marc Bekoff (cognitive ethology), Marc Hauser (behavioral science), Steven Wise (animals and law), Peter Singer (animals and ethics), and Jane Goodall (primatology) consider how major religious traditions have incorporated animals into their belief systems, myths, rituals, and art. Their findings offer profound insights into humans' relationships with animals and a deeper understanding of the social and ecological web in which we all live. Contributors examine Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Daoism, Confucianism, African religions, traditions from ancient Egypt and early China, and Native American, indigenous Tibetan, and Australian Aboriginal traditions, among others. They explore issues such as animal consciousness, suffering, sacrifice, and stewardship in innovative methodological ways. They also address contemporary challenges relating to law, biotechnology, social justice, and the environment. By grappling with the nature and ideological features of various religious views, the contributors cast religious teachings and practices in a new light. They reveal how we either intentionally or inadvertently marginalize "others," whether they are human or otherwise, reflecting on the ways in which we assign value to living beings. Though it is an ancient concern, the topic of "Religion and Animals" has yet to be systematically studied by modern scholars. This groundbreaking collection takes the first steps toward a meaningful analysis.

Anthropocentrism and Its Discontents: The Moral Status of Animals in the History of Western Philosophy
by Gary Steiner

Anthropocentrism and Its Discontents is the first-ever comprehensive examination of views of animals in the history of Western philosophy, from Homeric Greece to the twentieth century. In recent decades, increased interest in this area has been accompanied by scholars’ willingness to conceive of animal experience in terms of human mental capacities: consciousness, self-awareness, intention, deliberation, and in some instances, at least limited moral agency. This conception has been facilitated by a shift from behavioral to cognitive ethology (the science of animal behavior), and by attempts to affirm the essential similarities between the psychophysical makeup of human beings and animals. Gary Steiner sketches the terms of the current debates about animals and relates these to their historical antecedents, focusing on both the dominant anthropocentric voices and those recurring voices that instead assert a fundamental kinship relation between human beings and animals. He concludes with a discussion of the problem of balancing the need to recognize a human indebtedness to animals and the natural world with the need to preserve a sense of the uniqueness and dignity of the human individual.

Animals and the Moral Community: Mental Life, Moral Status, and Kinship

by Gary Steiner

Gary Steiner argues that ethologists and philosophers in the analytic and continental traditions have largely failed to advance an adequate explanation of animal behavior. Critically engaging the positions of Marc Hauser, Daniel Dennett, Donald Davidson, John Searle, Martin Heidegger, and Hans-Georg Gadamer, among others, Steiner shows how the Western philosophical tradition has forced animals into human experiential categories in order to make sense of their cognitive abilities and moral status and how desperately we need a new approach to animal rights. Steiner rejects the traditional assumption that a lack of formal rationality confers an inferior moral status on animals vis-Ã -vis human beings. Instead, he offers an associationist view of animal cognition in which animals grasp and adapt to their environments without employing concepts or intentionality. Steiner challenges the standard assumption of liberal individualism according to which humans have no obligations of justice toward animals. Instead, he advocates a "cosmic holism" that attributes a moral status to animals equivalent to that of people. Arguing for a relationship of justice between humans and nature, Steiner emphasizes our kinship with animals and the fundamental moral obligations entailed by this kinship.

The Moral Lives of Animals

by Dale Peterson

Wild elephants walking along a trail stop and spontaneously try to protect and assist a weak and dying fellow elephant. Laboratory rats, finding other rats caged nearby in distressing circumstances, proceed to rescue them. A chimpanzee in a zoo loses his own life trying to save an unrelated infant who has fallen into a watery moat. The examples above and many others, argues Dale Peterson, show that our fellow creatures have powerful impulses toward cooperation, generosity, and fairness. Yet it is commonly held that we Homo sapiens are the only animals with a moral sense—that we are somehow above and apart from our fellow creatures. This rigorous and stimulating book challenges that notion, and it shows the profound connections—the moral continuum—that link humans to many other species. Peterson shows how much animal behavior follows principles embodied in humanity's ancient moral codes, from the Ten Commandments to the New Testament. Understanding the moral lives of animals offers new insight into our own. Dale Peterson's biography Jane Goodall: The Woman Who Redefined Man was a New York Times Book Review Notable Book and Boston Globe Best Book of 2006. His other publications include Visions of Caliban (with Jane Goodall) and Demonic Males (with Richard Wrangham). Peterson lectures in English at Tufts University.

Beyond Animal Rights: Food, Pets and Ethics (Think Now)

by Tony Milligan

From vegetarianism to scientific experimentation, this book is an ethical exploration of our responsibilities to the animals with whom we share the planet. Issues to do with animal ethics remain at the heart of public debate. In "Beyond Animal Rights", Tony Milligan goes beyond standard discussions of animal ethics to explore the ways in which we personally relate to other creatures through our diet, as pet owners and as beneficiaries of experimentation. The book connects with our duty to act and considers why previous discussions have failed to result in a change in the way that we live our lives. The author asks a crucial question: what sort of people do we have to become if we are to sufficiently improve the ways in which we relate to the non-human? Appealing to both consequences and character, he argues that no improvement will be sufficient if it fails to set humans on a path towards a tolerable and sustainable future. Focussing on our direct relations to the animals we connect with the book offers guidance on all the relevant issues, including veganism and vegetarianism, the organic movement, pet ownership, and animal experimentation. "Think Now" is a new series of books which examines central contemporary social and political issues from a philosophical perspective. These books aim to be accessible, rather than overly technical, bringing philosophical rigour to modern questions which matter the most to us. Provocative yet engaging, the authors take a stand on political and cultural themes of interest to any intelligent reader.

Toward Better Problems: New Perspectives on Abortion, Animal Rights, the Environment, and Justice (Ethics And Action)

by Anthony Weston

In Toward Better Problems, Anthony Weston develops a pragmatic approach to the pressing moral issues of our time. Weston seeks to address practical problems in the spirit of John Dewey: that is, by focusing on specific human concerns and multiple, overlapping values rather than on abstract philosophical principles. Weston showcases his method in sustained discussion of four highly controversial areas: abortion, animal rights, environmentalism, and justice.

Weston takes up uncomfortable issues, such as how we raise food animals; test medicines, cosmetics, and chemicals on animals; and justify speciesism. He engages philosophically the treatment of land and seas as limitless garbage dumps, the creation of radioactive wastes and their disposal, and fundamental problems of social justice. But Weston's aim is not to "solve" such problems as if they were some kind of puzzle. The aim instead is to creatively transform such problematic situations into something more promising and tractable, thereby leaving us with "better problems."

Animals as Biotechnology: Ethics, Sustainability and Critical Animal Studies (Science in Society Series)

by Richard Twine

This book outlines the way in which the molecular turn in animal breeding now attempts to recuperate the major externalizations of meat/dairy production (most obviously human health, ecology and animal welfare) by capturing sustainability within the genome. Situating new modes of molecular capitalization within a broader economic narrative of the knowledge based bio-economy, Twine highlights the tension between questions of limits and sustainability. This book concludes by considering whether growing counter calls to reduce our consumption of meat/dairy products in the face of climate change threats are in fact complicit with an anthropocentric discourse that would marginalize from its understanding of sustainability a more thorough ethical questioning of normative human/animal relations.

On God and Dogs: A Christian Theology of Compassion for Animals

by Stephen H. Webb Foreword by Andrew Linzey

Many of us keep pet animals; we rely on them for companionship and unconditional love. For some people their closest relationships may be with their pets. In the wake of the animal rights movement, some ethicists have started to re-examine this relationship, and to question the rights of humans to "own" other sentient beings in this way. In this engaging and thought-provoking book, Stephen Webb brings a Christian perspective to bear on the subject of our responsibility to animals, looked at through the lens of our relations with pets--especially dogs. Webb argues that the emotional bond with companion animals should play a central role in the way we think about animals in general, and--against the more extreme animal liberationists--defends the intermingling of the human and animal worlds. He tries to imagine what it would be like to treat animals as a gift from God, and indeed argues that not only are animals a gift for us, but they give to us; we need to attend to their giving and return their gifts appropriately. Throughout the book he insists that what Christians call grace is present in our relations with animals just as it is with other humans. Grace is the inclusive and expansive power of God's love to create and sustain relationships of real mutuality and reciprocity, and Webb unfolds the implications of the recognition that animals too participate in God's abundant grace. Webb's thesis affirms and persuasively defends many of the things that pet lovers feel instinctively--that their relationships with their companion animals are meaningful and important, and that their pets have value and worth in themselves in the eyes of God. His book will appeal to a broad audience of thoughtful Christians and animal lovers.

Animals on the Agenda: Questions about Animals for Theology and Ethics

Edited by Andrew Linzey and Dorothy Yamamoto

This encyclopedic volume is the most comprehensive collection of original studies on animals and theology ever published. It tackles many apparently simple issues which raise fundamental questions about theology and how it is done. '

Second Nature: The Inner Lives of Animals

by Jonathan Balcombe, Foreword by J. M. Coetzee

Who knew that chickens and humans find the same faces beautiful? Or that fish choose reliable partners for dangerous predator inspection missions? Referencing such intriguing studies, Balcombe (Pleasurable Kingdom) builds a compelling case for blurring the line between animal and human perception, thereby questioning the prevailing scientific orthodoxy that humans alone possess the ability to reason. Over the years, studies have shown that animals have intelligence (dolphins have been known to teach themselves to delay gratification to get extra treats), emotions (like humans, baboon mothers show elevated levels of glucocorticoids after losing an infant), cunning (gorillas divert the attention of rivals from food, often by grooming); that they can communicate (nuthatches can translate chickadee chirps), can be altruistic (chimps who know how to unlatch a door help those who can't). Yet philosophers have routinely dismissed animals as unthinking, unfeeling beasts—Descartes grouped non-human animals with machines, a line of logic that has been used to justify callous treatment of laboratory animals. Balcombe's brief, marred only slightly by sermonizing, builds to a passionate and persuasive argument for vegetarianism on both humanitarian and environmental grounds. (Mar.)

Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat: Why It's So Hard to Think Straight About Animals

by Hal Herzog

How rational are we in our relationship with animals? A puppy, after all, is "a family member in Kansas, a pariah in Kenya, and lunch in Korea". An animal behaviorist turned one of the world's foremost authorities on human-animal relations, Herzog shows us, in this readable study, how whimsical our attitudes can be. Why do we like some animals but not others? One answer seems to be that babylike features like big eyes bring out our parental and protective urges. (PETA has started a campaign against fishing called "Save the Sea Kittens)." Research has shown that the human brain is wired to think about animals and inanimate objects differently, and Herzog reveals how we can look at the exact same animal very differently given its context--most Americans regard cockfighting as cruel but think nothing of eating chicken, when in reality gamecocks are treated very well when they are not fighting, and most poultry headed for the table lead short, miserable lives and are killed quite painfully. An intelligent and amusing book that invites us to think deeply about how we define--and where we limit--our empathy for animals.

The Animal Rights Debate: Abolition or Regulation? (Critical Perspectives on Animals)

by Gary L. Francione and Robert Garner

Gary L. Francione is a law professor and leading philosopher of animal rights theory. Robert Garner is a political theorist specializing in the philosophy and politics of animal protection. Francione maintains that we have no moral justification for using nonhumans and argues that because animals are property& mdash;or economic commodities& mdash;laws or industry practices requiring "humane" treatment will, as a general matter, fail to provide any meaningful level of protection. Garner favors a version of animal rights that focuses on eliminating animal suffering and adopts a protectionist approach, maintaining that although the traditional animal-welfare ethic is philosophically flawed, it can contribute strategically to the achievement of animal-rights ends. As they spar, Francione and Garner deconstruct the animal protection movement in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe, and elsewhere, discussing the practices of such organizations as PETA, which joins with McDonald's and other animal users to "improve" the slaughter of animals. They also examine American and European laws and campaigns from both the rights and welfare perspectives, identifying weaknesses and strengths that give shape to future legislation and action.

Porphyry: On abstinence from animal Food

Translated from Ancient Greek by Thomas Taylor

Porphyry was, like Pythagoras, an advocate of vegetarianism These two philosophers are perhaps the most famous vegetarians of classical antiquity. He wrote the De Abstinentia (On Abstinence) and De Non Necandis ad Epulandum Animantibus (roughly On the Impropriety of Killing Living Beings for Food), advocating against the consumption of animals, and he is cited with approval in vegetarian literature up to the present day. "- Wikipedia "The longest work by Porphyry to survive more or less intact is this curious tract advocating that animals should not be killed, not even for food. The end of the work seems to be lost, but otherwise it is complete and preserves a mass of detail on pagan religious customs and beliefs. Interestingly it also mentioned the Jewish Essenes....Thomas Taylor, the English Platonist, wrote a very long time ago, and his terminology is somewhat strange but otherwise his English has not dated."- Early Church Fathers

Available free online:

PDF (includes other works): http://www.ivu.org/history/greece_rome/Select_Works_of_Porphyry.pdf

Text: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/pearse/morefathers/files/index.htm#Porphyry_Abstinence

Porphyry: On Abstenence from Animal Food

Translated from the Greek by Thomas Taylor Edited and Introduced by Esme Wynee-Tyson

The works of Porphyrius, a disciple of Plotinus and editor of the Enneads, were considered by some to be greater than those of his Master. We hve no means of confirming this judgement, as his books were publicly burned boy order of Theodosius, and only a few of his treatises are still extant. Probably the best known and most remarkable of these is On Abstinence from Animal Food, which was translated from the Greek by Thomas Taylor, but has for many years been a considerable rarity and so unavailable to the general reader. This treatise, by one who has been called the greatest enemy of the Christian religion, but who was really only an enemy to what had been made of the original Christian gospel by the third century (and indeed reminded the Church of the essence of the creed it was abandoning, i.e. compassion), will surprise many who regards the pagan religion which Christianity superseded as primitive and inferior in its ethics. Its value to scholars also lies in the information it supplies on the ritual and culture of various peoples, and in the fact that it preserves many original statements of the old philosophers and the essence of Theophrasius' On Piety. Includes a 14 page introduction not available in the online edition.

Porphyry: On Abstinence from Killing Animals (Ancient Commentators on Aristotle)

by Porphyry Translated by Gillian Clark

Food for Thought: The Debate over Eating Meat (Contemporary Issues)

Edited by Steve F. Sapontzis

Written by internationally recognized scholars on both sides of the debate, the provocative articles included in FOOD FOR THOUGHT will provide both vegetarians and meat eaters with a thorough grounding in all aspects of this controversial topic. After an introduction to the nature of the debate by editor Steve F. Sapontzis, seven sections examine the finer points of the subject. The first section reviews the history of vegetarianism. The discussion in the second section highlights the health issues and what anthropology has to tell us about human diet. Section three includes classic cases for and against vegetarianism and new essays rebutting these classic arguments. The fourth section examines religious teachings about eating animals drawn from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, as well as Native American and Eastern traditions. Finally, in the last three sections, the authors debate the ethics of eating meat in connection with feminism, environmentalism, and multiculturalism. Contributors: Carol J. Adams, Neal Barnard, John Berkman, Stephen R. L. Clark, Carl Cohen, Randall Collura, Gary L. Comstock, Deane Curtin, Daniel Dombrowski, Johanna T. Dwyer, Jennifer Everett, Fredrick Ferre, Richard Foltz, R.G. Frey, James Gaffney, Kathryn Paxton George, Lori Gruen, Bart Gruzalski, Ned Hettinger, Roberta Kalechofsky, Marti Kheel, Kristine Kieswer, Andrew Linzey, Franklin M. Loew, Evelyn Pluhar, Val Plumwood, Rod Preece, James Rachels, Tom Regan, Roger Scruton, and Peter Singer. (Prometheus)

Rain Without Thunder: The Ideology of the Animal Rights Movement

by Gary L. Francione

Temple University Press, 1996

In this wide-ranging book, Francione takes the reader through the philosophical and intellectual debates surrounding animal welfare to make clear the difference between animal rights and animal welfare. Through case studies such as campaigns against animal shelters, animal laboratories, and the wearing of fur, Francione demonstrates the selectiveness and confusion inherent in reformist programs that target fur, for example, but leave wool and leather alone. The solution to this dilemma, Francione argues, is not in a liberal position that espouses the humane treatment of animals, but in a more radical acceptance of the fundamental inalienability of animal rights.

Introduction to Animal Rights: Your Child or the Dog?

By Gary L. Francione

Temple University Press, 2000

In this easy-to-read introduction, animal rights advocate Gary Francione looks at our conventional moral thinking about animals. Using examples, analogies, and thought-experiments, he reveals the dramatic inconsistency between what we say we believe about animals and how we actually treat them.

Introduction to Animal Rights: Your Child or the Dog? provides a guidebook to examining our social and personal ethical beliefs. It takes us through concepts of property and equal consideration to arrive at the basic contention of animal rights: that everyone—human and non-human—has the right not to be treated as a means to an end. Along the way, it illuminates concepts and theories that all of us use but few of us understand—the nature of “rights” and “interests,” for example, and the theories of Locke, Descartes, and Bentham.

Animals as Persons: Essays on the Abolition of Animal Exploitation

by Gary L. Francione

Columbia University Press, 2008

In this collection, Francione advances the most radical theory of animal rights argued to date. Unlike Peter Singer, Francione maintains that we cannot morally justify using animals under any circumstances, and unlike Tom Regan, Francione’s theory applies to all sentient beings, and not only to those who have more sophisticated cognitive abilities. Francione introduces the volume with an essay that explains our historical and contemporary attitudes about animals by distinguishing the issue of animal use from that of animal treatment. He then presents a theory of animal rights, which focuses on the need to accord all sentient nonhumans the right not to be treated as our property. Our recognition of such a right would require that we stop bringing domesticated animals into existence for human use. He takes a hard look at our “moral schizophrenia” toward animals and our ability to regard some creatures as beloved companions and others as food and clothing. Subsequent essays explore recent changes in animal welfare and the sad fact that these advances have not only failed to bring us closer to the abolition of animal exploitation, but have made the public feel more comfortable about supposedly more “humane” animal treatment. In two essays, Francione explores the importance of sentience as the necessary and sufficient condition for the moral significance of animals and explains how the status of animals as economic commodities prevents the equal consideration of their interests. He also discusses the issue of using animals in experiments, arguing that the empirical necessity of animal use is at best suspect and that animal use cannot, in any event, be morally justified. After a chapter addressing ecofeminism and its ethic of care, Francione concludes by challenging the rationale of Tom Regan’s position that death imposes a greater harm on humans than nonhumans.

The Philosophy of Vegetarianism

by Daniel A. Dombrowski

Every vegetarian society should have one of these in theirlibrary. If you thought vegetarianism started with PeterSinger or even Henry Salt, think again. The ancient Greeks have already said it all: the health argument, the ethics argument, the religious argument, they're all there. If you're a vegetarian and you really want to know why, this is where you start, not Animal Liberation or Animal Rights. Instead, take Dombrowski's advice and look up Porphyry's On Abstinence!

Critical Theory and Animal Liberation (Nature' Meaning)

byJohn Sanbonmatsu

Critical Theory and Animal Liberation is the first collection to look at the human relationship with animals from the critical or _left_ tradition in political and social thought. Breaking with past treatments that have framed the problem as one of _animal rights,_ the authors instead depict the exploitation and killing of other animals as a political question of the first order. The contributions in this volume thus highlight connections between our everyday treatment of animals and other forms of oppression, violence, and domination. Animal domination, the authors suggest, is fundamental to other systems of power, including capitalism and patriarchy. Contributors include well-known writers in the field, such as Carol Adams, author of Living Among the Meat Eaters, and established scholars writing on animals for the first time, such as Carl Boggs and Eduardo Mendieta. The authors draw on critical theory to, among other things, apply Freud's theory of repression to our relationship to the animal, debunk the new "locavore" movement, and expose the sexism of the mainstream animal defense movement.

Weighing Animal Lives: A Critical Assessment of Justification & Prioritization in Animal-rights Theories (Uppsala Studies in Social Ethics)

by Fredrik Karlsson

The project underlying this dissertation aims at analyzing three pro-animal-rights theories, evaluating the theories, and outlining an alternative theoretical account of animal rights. The analytical categories are justification and function of animal rights, the definition of the right holder, and the resolution approach to rights conflict. The categories are applied to a naturalist, a theocentric, and a contractarian approach to defend animal rights. The evaluation is substantiated by the assumption that rights are meant to protect less powerful beings against more powerful aggressors. The constructive segment is an investigation into what extent identified disadvantages of the theories can be avoided by outlining a new model for animal rights.

The analyses and evaluation suggest that all three theories are at risk of contradicting the proper function of rights-based theories. Tom Regan’s naturalist account of animal rights includes a logical possibility to sacrifice less capable beings for the sake of more capable beings. Andrew Linzey’s theocentric case for animal rights may sometimes mean that vulnerable human persons should be sacrificed for more powerful non-human beings. Mark Rowlands’ outlined contractarian model, further reconstructed in this work, fails to provide a way to resolve rights conflicts, making the function of rights inapplicable to conflicts.

In conclusion, it is suggested that defining the right holder as a self-preservative being can be supported by, at least, the contractarian rationale. That would also conform to the proper function of rights-based theories. It is also suggested that this means that rights conflicts should be resolved by a voluntary sacrifice of the most powerful being. Practical circumstances should be created where such voluntarity is both genuine and rationally possible.

Animal Liberation, Environmental Ethics, and Domestication (Dakhleh Oasis Project) [Hardcover]

by Clare Palmer

Applied Animal Ethics

by Leland S. Shapiro

This comprehensive textbook covers the ethical issues involved in using animals for research, food production, sports, and as companions. Although theoretical aspects of animal ethics are presented, the focus of the book is the application of ethics to real-life situations. A balanced presentation of animal rights and animal welfare viewpoints is provided. Review and discussion questions help students develop their critical-thinking skills. Case studies provide the opportunity to consider real-world ethical issues and how they can be resolved.

In Nature's Interests?: Interests, Animal Rights, and Environmental Ethics [Kindle Edition]

by Gary E. Varner

This book offers a powerful response to what Varner calls the "two dogmas of environmental ethics"--the assumptions that animal rights philosophies and anthropocentric views are each antithetical to sound environmental policy. Allowing that every living organism has interests which ought, other things being equal, to be protected, Varner contends that some interests take priority over others. He defends both a sentientist principle giving priority to the lives of organisms with conscious desires and an anthropocentric principle giving priority to certain very inclusive interests which only humans have. He then shows that these principles not only comport with but provide significant support for environmental goals.

Putting the Horse before Descartes: My Life's Work on Behalf of Animals (Animals and Ethics)

by Bernard Rollin

When philosopher Bernard Rollin was six years old, he visited an animal shelter and was told about unwanted dogs being put to sleep. The event shaped his moral outlook and initiated his concern for how animals were treated. In his irreverent memoir, Putting the Horse before Descartes, Rollin provides an account of how he came to educate himself and others about the ethical treatment of animals and work toward improvements in animal welfare. Rollin describes, in witty, often disarming detail, how he became an outspoken critic of how animals were being treated in veterinary and medical schools as well as in research labs. Putting the Horse before Descartes showcases the passionate animal advocate at his best. He recalls teaching veterinary students about ethical issues. He also recalls face-offs with ranchers and cowboys about branding methods and roping competitions in rodeos. In addition, he describes his work to legally mandate more humane conditions for agricultural and laboratory animals. As public concern about animal welfare and the safety of the food supply heighten, Rollin carries on this work all over the worldoin classrooms, lecture halls and legislatures, meetings of agricultural associations and industrial settings, as well as in print. Putting the Horse before Descartes, ultimately, is more than a memoir. Rollin offers a wide-ranging discussion of ethical issues in many settings and he testifies to the myriad ways that people of good conscience accept their ethical responsibility in regard to animals.

Ethics and Animals: An Introduction (Cambridge Applied Ethics) [Paperback]

by Lori Gruen

In this fresh and comprehensive introduction to animal ethics, Lori Gruen weaves together poignant and provocative case studies with discussions of ethical theory, urging readers to engage critically and empathetically reflect on our treatment of other animals. In clear and accessible language, Gruen provides a survey of the issues central to human-animal relations and a reasoned new perspective on current key debates in the field. She analyses and explains a range of theoretical positions and poses challenging questions that directly encourage readers to hone their ethical reasoning skills and to develop a defensible position about their own practices. Her book will be an invaluable resource for students in a wide range of disciplines including ethics, environmental studies, veterinary science, women's studies, and the emerging field of animal studies and is an engaging account of the subject for general readers with no prior background in philosophy.

New Essays in Applied Ethics: Animal Rights, Personhood, and the Ethics of Killing

Edited by Hon-Lam Li and Anthony Yeung

This collection of new essays aims to address some of the most perplexing issues arising from death and dying, as well as the moral status of persons and animals. Leading scholars, including Peter Singer and Gerald Dworkin, investigate diverse topics such as animal rights, vegetarianism, lethal injection, abortion and euthanasia.

Animals as Biotechnology: Ethics, Sustainability and Critical Animal Studies (Science in Society Series)

by Richard Twine (repeat)

In Animals as Biotechnology: Ethics, Sustainability and Critical Animal Studies sociologist Richard Twine places the questioning of human/animal relations at the heart of sustainability and climate change debates. This book is shaped by the incongruous parallel emergence of two approaches to nonhuman animals. The animal sciences concerned with the efficient and profitable production of animals into meat and dairy products now embrace molecular knowledge as a means to extract new sources of biocapital from farmed animal bodies. However the emergence of animal studies and critical animal studies—mostly in the humanities and social sciences—work to question the dominant instrumental character of our relations with other animals. Twine considers the emergence of these approaches to bring into relief the paradox of a novel biotechnological power to breed new forms of animals at the very time when critical animal studies and threats such as climate change pose serious questions of anthropocentrism and hubris. This book outlines the way in which the molecular turn in animal breeding now attempts to recuperate the major externalizations of meat/dairy production (most obviously human health, ecology and animal welfare) by capturing sustainability within the genome. Situating new modes of molecular capitalization within a broader economic narrative of the knowledge based bio-economy, Twine highlights the tension between questions of limits and sustainability. This book concludes by considering whether growing counter calls to reduce our consumption of meat/dairy products in the face of climate change threats are in fact complicit with an anthropocentric discourse that would marginalize from its understanding of sustainability a more thorough ethical questioning of normative human/animal relations.

Ethics of Animal Use

by Peter Sandøe and Stine B. Christiansen

An interesting and accessible introduction to ethical issues raised by various forms of human use of animals. This textbook avoids moral lecturing and presents a range of ethical viewpoints without defending or applying any specific stance. Readers are encouraged and provoked to reflect for themselves, and to sharpen their own points of view regarding the ethical limits on our use of animals. They will also gain further understanding of the views held by other people. Early chapters of this interdisciplinary book cover changes over time in our view of animals, the principles of animal ethics, and different views of what counts as a good animal life. Later chapters apply the conceptual tools to specific issues including: food animal production, advanced veterinary treatment of pets, control of infectious diseases, wildlife management, as well as the use of animals in research. Specifically designed for students of veterinary medicine, animal science, welfare and behaviour, and veterinary nursing. Also of interest to those wanting to combine an up-to-date, science-based account of animal issues with clear-headed moral reflection. "The book covers an impressive range of topics with accuracy and fairness. Despite its ambitious scope, the authors have achieved remarkable unity in the book, and have produced a book that is easy and pleasant to read. Their work will surely provide a major tool for rationalizing the debate about the ethics of animal use, and I commend them for their invaluable contribution." From the Foreword by Professor Bernard Rollin, Colorado State University.

An Odyssey with Animals: A Veterinarian's Reflections on the Animal Rights & Welfare Debate

by Adrian R. Morrison

The relationship between animals and humans is more complex today than ever before. In addition to the animals that have served as household pets, and the farm animals that have provided labor and food, countless monkeys, rabbits, rats, and cats have enabled modern scientists to treat and cure humanity's most devastating illnesses. This aspect of animal-human interaction has engendered a bitter enmity between animal rights activists and the biomedical researchers whose work depends on the use (and oftentimes the killing) of laboratory animals. In An Odyssey with Animals, veterinarian and sleep researcher Adrian Morrison argues that humane animal use in biomedical research is an indispensable tool of medical science, and that efforts to halt such use constitute a grave threat to human health and wellbeing. The target of repeated acts of intimidation by anonymous animal rights activists because of his own research, Morrison is himself an animal advocate, and this volume is the culmination of his years spent negotiating the treacherous divide between a legitimate concern for animals and the importance of biomedical research. Drawing on the disciplines of philosophy, history, biology, and animal behavior, Morrison crafts a multi-faceted argument in favor of using animals humanely in research, the center of which is his staunch belief that human interests must be the primary concern of science and society. Along the way, Morrison delves into other human uses of animals in domains such as agriculture, hunting, and education, examining each use along with its philosophical, moral, and ecological implications. The result is a thought-provoking, intelligent and fair-minded discussion of a charged subject-- of the past and present of animals' relationships with humans, and how and why we should be able to use them as we do.

Animal Rights: What Everyone Needs to Know

by Paul Waldau

In this compelling volume in the What Everyone Needs to Know series, Paul Waldau expertly navigates the many heated debates surrounding the complex and controversial animal rights movement.

Organized around a series of probing questions, this timely resource offers the most complete, even-handed survey of the animal rights movement available. The book covers the full spectrum of issues, beginning with a clear, highly instructive definition of animal rights. Waldau looks at the different concerns surrounding companion animals, wild animals, research animals, work animals, and animals used for food, provides a no-nonsense assessment of the treatment of animals, and addresses the philosophical and legal arguments that form the basis of animal rights. Along the way, readers will gain insight into the history of animal protection-as well as the political and social realities facing animals today-and become familiar with a range of hot-button topics, from animal cognition and autonomy, to attempts to balance animal cruelty versus utility. Chronicled here are many key figures and organizations responsible for moving the animal rights movement forward, as well as legislation and public policy that have been carried out around the world in the name of animal rights and animal protection. The final chapter of this indispensable volume looks ahead to the future of animal rights, and delivers an animal protection mandate for citizens, scientists, governments, and other stakeholders.

With its multidisciplinary, non-ideological focus and all-inclusive coverage, Animal Rights represents the definitive survey of the animal rights movement-one that will engage every reader and student of animal rights, animal law, and environmental ethics.

A Rat Is a Pig Is a Dog Is a Boy: The Human Cost of the Animal Rights Movement

by Wesley J. Smith

Over the past thirty years, as Wesley J. Smith details in his latest book, the concept of animal rights has been seeping into the very bone marrow of Western culture. One reason for this development is that the term “animal rights” is so often used very loosely, to mean simply being nicer to animals. But although animal rights groups do sometimes focus their activism on promoting animal welfare, the larger movement they represent is actually advancing a radical belief system. For some activists, the animal rights ideology amounts to a quasi religion, one whose central doctrine declares a moral equivalency between the value of animal lives and the value of human lives. Animal rights ideologues embrace their beliefs with a fervor that is remarkably intense and sustained, to the point that many dedicate their entire lives to “speaking for those who cannot speak for themselves.” Some believe their cause to be so righteous that it entitles them to cross the line from legitimate advocacy to vandalism and harassment, or even terrorism against medical researchers, the fur and food industries, and others they accuse of abusing animals. All people who love animals and recognize their intrinsic worth can agree with Wesley J. Smith that human beings owe animals respect, kindness, and humane care. But Smith argues eloquently that our obligation to humanity matters more, and that granting “rights” to animals would inevitably diminish human dignity. In making this case with reason and passion, A Rat Is a Pig Is a Dog Is a Boy strikes a major blow against a radically antihuman dogma.

The Philosophy of Animal Rights

by Mylan Engel and Kathie Jenni

In this clear elucidation of the philosophy of animal rights, professors Mylan Engel Jr. and Kathie Jenni explore the fundamental outlines of the debate over our duties and responsibilities toward nonhuman animals. They also examine how the issue of animal rights plays out in a classroom setting and address some of the questions that arise for both students and teachers in presenting and studying this subject. In two course syllabi, Engel and Jenni place animal rights in the context of ethical practice and the environmental movement. The book also contains an extensive bibliography of references and philosophical resources. The Philosophy of Animal Rights grew out of a chapter published in Teaching the Animal: Human Animal Studies across the Disciplines (Lantern, 2010), and contains an introduction to, and appendices on, Human Animal Studies by Margo DeMello.

The Friends We Keep: Unleashing Christianity's Compassion for Animals

by Laura Hobgood-Oster

Hobgood-Oster, a professor of religion and environmental studies at Southwestern University, examines the role animals have played in the history and development of Christianity in an attempt to return them to a more central role within the faith. Readers familiar with this area of study will find little new, as Hobgood-Oster recounts the work of scholars and theologians who have come before her: Andrew Linzey, Marc Bekoff, and Peter Singer. But rather than detract from the book, this foundation only enhances it, as Hobgood-Oster suffers from none of the academic-speak that plagues some of the deeper works on animals and religion. Indeed, the book's great strength is Hobgood-Oster herself, exhibited in her conversational tone and personal connection to the stories of animals in Christian scripture, as well as her experience in shelters and refuges, about which she writes movingly. A study guide will lead laypeople and church groups into a deeper exploration of the gifts animals can bring to the practice of Christianity, something Hobgood-Oster believes can only enrich the faith. --Publishers Weekly

Environmental Philosophy: From Animal Rights to Radical Ecology (4th Edition)

by Michael E. Zimmerman, J. Baird Callicott, John Clark, Karen J. Warren, and Irene J. Klaver

Edited by leading experts in contemporary environmental philosophy, this anthology features the best available selections that cover the full range of positions within this rapidly developing field. Divided into four sections that delve into the vast issues of contemporary Eco-philosophy, the Fourth Edition now includes a section on Continental Environmental Philosophy that explores current topics such as the social construction of nature, and eco-phenomenology. Each section is introduced and edited by a leading philosopher in the field. For professionals with a career within the environmental field including law, politics, conservation, geography, and biology.

Fear of the Animal Planet: The Hidden History of Animal Resistance (Counterpunch)

by Jason Hribal

A Siberian tiger at the San Francisco Zoo leaps a 12-foot high wall and mauls three visitors who had been tormenting her, killing one. A circus elephant tramples and gores a sadistic trainer, who had repeatedly fed her lit cigarettes. A pair of orangutans at the San Diego Zoo steal a crowbar and screwdriver and break-out of their enclosure. An orca at Sea World snatches his trainer into the pool and holds her underwater until she drowns. What's going on here? Are these mere accidents? Simply cases of animals acting on instinct? That's what the zoos and animal theme parks would have you believe. But historian Jason Hribal tells a different story. In the most provocative book on animal rights since Peter Singer's Animal Liberation, Hribal argues persuasively that these escapes and attacks are deliberate, that the animals are acting with intent, that they are asserting their own desires for freedom. Fear of the Animal Planet is a harrowing, and curiously uplifting, chronicle of resistance against the captivity and torture of animals.

Holy Cow: The Hare Krishna Contribution to Vegetarianism and Animal Rights [Paperback]

by Steven J. Rosen

Hinduism scholar Steven Rosen explores the world of the Hare Krishna movement, which has been instrumental in raising awareness of vegetarianism and the plight of animals in the United States. Holy Cow begins by introducing the Hare Krishna movement and of its colorful singing and dancing, its book distribution program, and especially its restaurants, sacred food distribution, and delicious vegetarian cuisine. Rosen returns to the early days of Indian culture, to a time when daily life was based on Vedic principles and scriptural wisdom, and shows how vegetarianism and animal rights were endorsed by the Vedic texts. Rosen reveals how a tension was created by a concomitant endorsement of animal sacrifices in ancient Indian culture, a tension that led in part to the beginnings of Jainism and Buddhism. Rosen then examines the rise of Vaishnavism—the worship of the god Vishnu, or Krishna—and how Vaishnavites were sympathetic to vegetarianism and animal rights, showing the link between the contemporary Hare Krishna movement (ISKCON), founded in the 1960s, and the ancient Vaishnavaites and all that they have accomplished in between. Rosen looks at the "Food for Life" program, the restaurants and cookbooks, and the various forms of writing about vegetarianism and animal rights. The book also includes recipes for those who wish to taste Krishna. In conclusion, Rosen illustrates how deeply Hare Krishna devotees have influenced the contemporary vegetarian movement and its call for ahimsa, or nonviolence, toward all living beings.

Philosophy and Animal Life

by Stanley Cavell, Cora Diamond, John McDowell, Ian Hacking, and Cary Wolfe

Philosophy and Animal Life offers a new way of thinking about animal rights, our obligation to animals, and the nature of philosophy itself. Cora Diamond begins with "The Difficulty of Reality and the Difficulty of Philosophy," in which she accuses analytical philosophy of evading, or deflecting, the responsibility of human beings toward nonhuman animals. Diamond then explores the animal question as it is bound up with the more general problem of philosophical skepticism. Focusing specifically on J. M. Coetzee's The Lives of Animals, she considers the failure of language to capture the vulnerability of humans and animals. Stanley Cavell responds to Diamond's argument with his own close reading of Coetzee's work, connecting the human-animal relation to further themes of morality and philosophy. John McDowell follows with a critique of both Diamond and Cavell, and Ian Hacking explains why Cora Diamond's essay is so deeply perturbing and, paradoxically for a philosopher, he favors poetry over philosophy as a way of overcoming some of her difficulties. Cary Wolfe's introduction situates these arguments within the broader context of contemporary continental philosophy and theory, particularly Jacques Derrida's work on deconstruction and the question of the animal. Philosophy and Animal Life is a crucial collection for those interested in animal rights, ethics, and the development of philosophical inquiry. It also offers a unique exploration of the role of ethics in Coetzee's fiction.

Animal Rights and Wrongs

by Roger Scruton

A revised and improved edition of a book in continuing demand. Do animals have rights? If not, do we have duties towards them? If so, what duties? These and a myriad of other issues are discussed in this brilliantly argued book, published in association with the leading think-tank Demos. Why are animal-rights groups so keen to protect the rights of badgers and foxes but not of rats mice or even humans? How can we bridge the growing gap between rural producers and urban consumers? Why is raising animals for fur more heinous than raising them for their meat? Are we as human beings driving other species either to extinction or to a state of dependency? This paperback edition is fully updated with new chapters on the livestoick crisis, fishing and BSE and a layman's guide introduction to philosophical concepts, the book presents a radical respponse to the defenders of animal rights and a challenge to those who think that because they are kind to their pets, they are therefore good news for animals.

Animal Rights: Moral Theory and Practice

by Mark Rowlands

In this 2nd edition, the author has substantially revised his book throughout, updating the moral arguments and adding a chapter on animal minds. Importantly, rather than being a polemic on animal rights, this book is also a considered and imaginative evaluation of moral theory as explored through the issue of animal rights. "Those concerned with animal ethics owe a debt of gratitude to Mark Rowlands. He has written what is without doubt the best defense of animal rights from a contractarian position, or perhaps from any position. Rowlands writes in an admirably clear and engaging manner, guaranteed to lure the reader into joining the spirited conversation.' - Susan J. Armstrong, Professor Emerita, Department of Philosophy, Humboldt State University, Arcata, Canada 'Philosophers, in particular, and those interested in animal rights issues, in general, should be grateful for the publication of this book for several reasons. First, familiar defenses of the animal rights position offered by Peter Singer and Tom Regan are examined anew, such that even those who are very familiar with these defenses see them in a new light. Second, the more recent debate in virtue ethics regarding treatment of animals (between Rosalind Hursthouse and Roger Scruton) is treated very insightfully. Third, Rowlands develops his own powerful version of a contractarian account of animal rights based on Rawlsian principles. And fourth, he also treats the animal rights issue in novel terms in light of recent debates in philosophy of mind and in relation to a fantastic thought experiment wherein brilliant aliens start farming and eating human beings because of their intellectual inferiority. This is not a book to be ignored!' - Daniel A. Dombrowski, Professor of Philosophy, Seattle University, USA

Animals Like Us (Practical ethics series)

by Mark Rowlands and Colin McGinn

Foot-and-mouth and mad-cow disease are but two of the results of treating animals as commodities, subject only to commercial constraints and ignoring all natural and moral considerations. Chickens hanging by their necks on conveyor belts, bloated dead sheep with their legs in the air, mutilated dogs waiting to die after undergoing horrendous experiments in the name of science or even just product-testing—these are some of the images that illustrate the indifference of a consumerist society to the suffering of animals. Few are willing to recognize that the packaged, sanitized supermarket meat that materializes on their dinner tables every day is the result of an industrial process involving unimaginable pain and suffering. In this clearly argued book, Mark Rowlands claims that it is simply unjust to harm animals. As conscious, sentient beings, biologically continuous with humans, they have interests that cannot simply be disregarded. Using simple principles of justice, he argues that animals have moral rights, and examines the consequences of this claim in the contexts of vegetarianism, animal experimentation, zoos and hunting, as well as the animal rights activism that has resulted from the recognition by a relatively small group of political activists that animals cannot simply be considered in their relation to humans.

Creatures Like Us?

by Lynne Sharpe

As a child brought up among animals, Lynne Sharpe never doubted they were essentially ‘creatures like us’. It came as a shock to learn that others did not agree. Here she exposes the bizarre way in which many philosophers — including even some great and humane ones — have repeatedly talked and written about animals. They have discussed the topic in terms of non-existent abstract ‘animals’, conceived as defective humans, entirely neglecting the experience of people who have wide practical knowledge of companion animals — such as horses and dogs — through working with them. She testifies to the interesting nature of these creatures’ lives, noting that the usual narrow approach to animals carries with it also a distorted notion of human life as essentially cerebral and language-centred. ‘A lively and astute book which does a badly-needed job in clearing out a pile of bad philosophy' -- Mary Midgley ‘Written with superb clarity as all good philosophy should be. Lynne Sharpe powerfully champions animals' -- Richard Ryder

Worship Not The Creature: Animal Rights and the Bible

by J. Y. Jones, Ronald Kirk (Editor), Kimberley Winters Woods (Editor), Desta Garrett (Editor, Illustrator), Aaron Ford (Illustrator), Digicom Designs

Animal Rights and the Bible delivers the most forthright and engaging presentation of the Biblical view of animals in print. J. Y. Jones, long an accomplished physician, scholar, writer, outdoorsman, hunter, and man of God, is uniquely qualified to offer his cutting-edge treatment of this controversial topic. Don't let the down-to-earth, diverting and friendly style fool you. Just as Americas wise Founding Fathers discovered latent tyranny in a penny tea tax, Dr. Jones powerfully exposes the radical political agenda of the contemporary animal rights movement. With careful argument, he reveals the animal rights movement as a potentially significant menace to liberty and even to Christianity itself. Adding Dr. Joness able apologetic for the Christian faith in reasoned and transparently personal terms, one should prepare for a rich, compelling, and enjoyable read.

The Moral Status of Animals

by Stephen R.L. Clark

In recent years, the efforts of philosophers, scientists and activists to raise public awareness of the treatment of animals has laid the foundation for an enormous change in human practice. Animals and Their Moral Standing traces the development of "animal rights." And brings together, for the first time, many of the writings of Stephen R.L. Clark. ". . . stimulating, original, insightful -- a contribution as much to our understanding of ourselves as it is to our understanding of how we should think about animals and how we should treat them." -- Cora Diamond, University of Virginia "Alongside Mary Midgley, Stephen Clark is our best writer on animals and our proper relationship to them. He writes with enormous erudition, intelligence and controlled passion." -- David E. Cooper, University of Durham

The Political Animal: Biology, Ethics and Politics

by Stephen R L Clark

In The Political Animal, Stephen Clark investigates the political nature of the human animal. Based on biological science and traditional ethics, he probes into areas of inquiry that are usually ignored by traditional political theory. He suggests that properly informed political philosophy must take the role of women and children more seriously, and must be prepared to face up to the ethnocentric and domineering tendencies of the human animal. "Nobody has thought harder than Stephen Clark about what political philosophy would look like if it took animals seriously. He is concerned with two projects: including in our politics the treatment of other animals, and acknowledging the fact that we humans are animals and so may better flourish in a society suitable for the animals that we are. Unlike many across the political spectrum, he is aware that these projects are linked.. –-Seth Crook, Social Theory and Practice "Stephen Clark's book is immensely welcome . . . He gives a fresh and most useful slant to a whole range of apparently familiar topics--anarchism, nationalism, environmentalism, slavery, and above all perhaps the meaning of family. Read him." –Mary Midgley, author of Beast and Man

The Lives of Animals: (The University Center For Human Values Series)

by J. M. Coetzee

Here the internationally renowned writer J. M. Coetzee uses fiction to present a powerfully moving discussion of animal rights in all their complexity. He draws us into fictional novelist Elizabeth Costello's own sense of mortality, her compassion for animals, and her alienation from humans, even from her own family. In his fable, presented as a Tanner Lecture sponsored by the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University, Coetzee immerses us in a drama reflecting the real-life situation at hand: a writer delivering a lecture on an emotionally charged issue at a prestigious university. Literature, philosophy, performance, and deep human conviction--Coetzee brings all these elements into play. As in the story of Elizabeth Costello, the Tanner Lecture is followed by responses treating the reader to a variety of perspectives, delivered by leading thinkers in different fields. Coetzee's text is accompanied by an introduction by political philosopher Amy Gutmann and responsive essays by religion scholar Wendy Doniger, primatologist Barbara Smuts, literary theorist Marjorie Garber, and moral philosopher Peter Singer, author of Animal Liberation. Together the lecture-fable and the essays explore the palpable social consequences of uncompromising moral conflict and confrontation.

Hartshorne and the Metaphysics of Animal Rights (S U N Y Series in Philosophy)

by Daniel A. Dombrowski

Charles Hartshorne is one of the premier metaphysicians and philosophers of religion in the twentieth century. He has written extensively on animals, both as a philosopher of nature and as an expert on bird song. Since the publication of Creative Synthesis and Philosophic Method in 1970, he has devoted a great deal of attention to animals. Among the main issues he advances is that the relationship between human beings and animals helps us to better understand our relationship with God.
http://www.sunypress.edu/p-320-hartshorne-and-the-metaphysics-.aspx

Not Even a Sparrow Falls: The Philosophy of Stephen R. L. Clark [Hardcover]

by Daniel A. Dombrowski

Since the mid-1970s an amazing philosopher has blazed across the philosophic sky-Stephen R. L. Clark. Author of twelve books (including From Athens to Jerusalem, Aristotle's Man, and Animals and their Moral Standing) as well as dozens of articles, hailed by critics as arresting, profound, amusing, and, paradoxically, irritating, Clark's writing has focused on three seemingly distinct philosophical spheres: philosophy of religion, the moral status of animals, and political philosophy. Dombrowski meticulously and critically assesses a wealth of important ideas and philosophical and theological topics to provide us with a firm grasp of Clark's ideas about God, animals, the environment, and politics.

Animal Rights, Human Rights: Ecology, Economy, and Ideology in the Canadian Arctic

by George Wenzel

The campaign to ban seal hunting in Canada won international headlines and achieved its aims to a large extent. Most observers felt instinctively that the campaigners were "right" but little thought was given to the cataclysmic consequences the ban would have on the way of life and economy of a traditional people, the Inuit of Arctic Canada. A distinguished anthropologist who has spent over twenty years living and working with the Inuit Community, George Wenzel provides a reasoned, in-depth, coolly written but powerful critique of this received interpretation and shows how the campaigners 'own cultural prejudices and questionable ecological imperatives brought hardship, distress and instability to an ecologically balanced traditional culture. This book is both a careful academic study and a disturbing comment on how environmental activity may oppress a whole society, which raises serious questions about the motives and methods of the animal rights' movement in a much wider context than the case here studied.

Animal Rights Vs Nature

by Walter E. Howard

Is God a Vegetarian?: Christianity, Vegetarianism, and Animal Rights

by Richard A. Young Foreword by Carol J. Adams

In IS GOD A VEGETARIAN?, a linguist and New Testament scholar attempts to answer the question being asked with greater and greater frequency: "Are Christians morally obligated to be vegetarians?"

Richard Alan Young examines key biblical texts pertaining to dietary customs, vegetarianism, and animal rights, placing the passages in social context. He then provides readers with an in-depth exploration of the ethical dilemmas that Christians face when deciding whether they should be vegetarians. Young also addresses animal testing and experimentation, the fur industry, animal factories, and the effects of meat-eating on human health. Two vegetarian recipes are included at the end of each chapter and an epilogue comprises guidelines for becoming a vegetarian and a recommended reading list. Insightful and challenging, IS GOD A VEGETARIAN? poses provocative questions for vegetarians, Christians, and anyone reflecting upon his personal choices and ethical role in our world today.

About Canada: Animal Rights

by John Sorenson

Casting a critical gaze over the exploitation of animals in agriculture, fashion, and entertainment, this manifesto investigates Canada's antiquated laws for such industries as the fur trade, seal hunting, the Calgary Stampede, puppy mills, horse slaughter, and the virtually unregulated vivisection industry. The book advocates an abolitionist agenda; promotes veganism as a personal and political commitment; shows the economic, environmental, and health costs of animal exploitation; and presents animal rights as a social justice issue.

The Animal Question: Why Nonhuman Animals Deserve Human Rights

by Paola Cavalieri Translated by Catherine Woollard

How much do animals matter--morally? Can we keep considering them as second class beings, to be used merely for our benefit? Or, should we offer them some form of moral egalitarianism? Inserting itself into the passionate debate over animal rights, this fascinating, provocative work by renowned scholar Paola Cavalieri advances a radical proposal: that we extend basic human rights to the nonhuman animals we currently treat as 'things.' Cavalieri first goes back in time, tracing the roots of the debate from the 1970s, then explores not only the ethical but also the scientific viewpoints, examining the debate's precedents in mainstream Western philosophy. She considers the main proposals of reform that recently have been advanced within the framework of today's prevailing ethical perspectives. Are these proposals satisfying? Cavalieri says no, claiming that it is necessary to go beyond the traditional opposition between utilitarianism and Kantianism and focus on the question of fundamental moral protection. In the case of human beings, such protection is granted within the widely shared moral doctrine of universal human rights' theory. Cavalieri argues that if we examine closely this theory, we will discover that its very logic extends to nonhuman animals as beings who are owed basic moral and legal rights and that, as a result, human rights are not human after all.

Animal Rites: American Culture, the Discourse of Species, and Posthumanist Theory

by Cary Wolfe

In Animal Rites, Cary Wolfe examines contemporary notions of humanism and ethics by reconstructing a little known but crucial underground tradition of theorizing the animal from Wittgenstein, Cavell, and Lyotard to Lévinas, Derrida, Žižek, Maturana, and Varela. Through detailed readings of how discourses of race, sexuality, colonialism, and animality interact in twentieth-century American culture, Wolfe explores what it means, in theory and critical practice, to take seriously "the question of the animal."

Other Nations: Animals in Modern Literature

Edited by Tom Regan and Andrew Linzey

The world's first anthology designed to employ the power of fiction to illuminate our moral relationship with animals, Other Nations boasts a superb collection of writings from writers of great distinction -- including Ernest Hemingway, George Orwell, and Alice Walker. By organizing the literary pieces according to the means by which human beings relate to the animals discussed -- as companions, as sources of food, as objects of sport and entertainment, and as subjects in scientific research -- preeminent scholars Tom Regan and Andrew Linzey enable readers to relate these texts (and these animals) to their own experiences and to the manifold issues now discussed in public forums. While the editors believe the time is ripe for radical change in the way human beings see and treat animals, this collection nonetheless presents various and contrary viewpoints, leaving readers to come to their own moral conclusions.

Zoontologies: The Question Of The Animal

Edited by Cary Wolfe

Those nonhuman beings called animals pose philosophical and ethical questions that go to the root not just of what we think but of who we are. Their presence asks: what happens when the Other can no longer safely be assumed to be human? This collection offers a set of incitements and coordinates for exploring how these issues have been represented in contemporary culture and theory, from Jurassic Park and the "horse whisperer" Monty Roberts, to the work of artists such as Joseph Beuys and William Wegman; from foundational texts on the animal in the works of Heidegger and Freud, to the postmodern rethinking of ethics and animals in figures such as Singer, Deleuze, Lyotard, and Levinas; from the New York Times investigation of a North Carolina slaughterhouse, to the first appearance in any language of Jacques Derrida's recent detailed critique of Lacan's rendering of the human/animal divide. Contributors: Steve Baker, U of Central Lancashire; Jacques Derrida, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris; Ursula K. Heise, Columbia U; Charlie LeDuff, New York Times; Alphonso Lingis, Pennsylvania State U; Paul Patton, U of Sydney; Judith Roof, Michigan State U; David Wills, SUNY, Albany.

If You Tame Me: Understanding Our Connection With Animals (Animals Culture And Society)

by Leslie Irvine

Nearly everyone who cares about them believes that dogs and cats have a sense of self that renders them unique. Traditional science and philosophy declare such notions about our pets to be irrational and anthropomorphic. Animals, they say, have only the crudest form of thought and no sense of self at all. Leslie Irvine's If You Tame Me challenges these entrenched views by demonstrating that our experience of animals and their behavior tells a different story. Dogs and cats have been significant elements in human history and valued members of our households for centuries. Why do we regard these companions as having distinct personalities and as being irreplaceable? Irvine looks closely at how people form "connections" with dogs and cats available in adoption shelters and reflects on her own relationships with animals. If You Tame Me makes a persuasive case for the existence of a sense of self in companion animals and calls upon us to reconsider our rights and obligations regarding the non-human creatures in our lives.

Animal Minds and Human Morals: The Origins of the Western Debate (Cornell Studies in Classical Philology-Townsend Lectures , No 54)
by Richard Sorabji
"[Sorabji] starts . . . by examining philosophical treatments of animals in ancient Greece. From there he goes on to current thinking and argues that the animal rights movement is philosophically incoherent. His philosophical analysis is so thorough that anyone who's thinking about these issues has an obligation to read this book."--Vicki Hearne, Lingua Franca
God, Humans, and Animals: An Invitation to Enlarge Our Moral Universe
by Robert N. Wennberg
This is a book about animals and the moral life. The kinds of questions it raises are profound and consequential: Do animals have moral standing? Do human beings have moral obligations to animals? If so, how extensive and weighty are those obligations? Robert Wennberg finds it troubling that society at large seems to care more about such concerns than the Christian community does, and he invites people of faith not only to think more deeply about ethical concerns for animals but also to enter into a richer, more sensitive moral life in general. Over the course of his thought-provoking discussion, Wennberg educates readers about some of the history of ethical concern for animals and the nature of that concern. He also invites serious reflection on the moral issues raised by the existence of animals in our world, while granting readers considerable latitude in reaching their own conclusions. Wennberg arrives at his own conclusions through careful interaction with church history, Christian theology, the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, and the best philosophical thought on the moral status of animals. Two compelling case studies — of factory farming and painful animal research are also included. All in all, "God, Humans, and Animals" offers a complete, balanced, and convincing argument for the moral recognition of animals. Most readers will be challenged — and some may be changed — by this provocative study.
The Moral Menagerie: Philosophy and Animal Rights

by Marc R. Fellenz
A look at the limitations of the philosophy behind animal rights and why it matters
The Moral Menagerie offers a broad philosophical analysis of the recent debate over animal rights. Marc Fellenz locates the debate in its historical and social contexts, traces its roots in the history of Western philosophy, and analyzes the most important arguments that have been offered on both sides.
Fellenz argues that the debate has been philosophically valuable for focusing attention on fundamental problems in ethics and other areas of philosophy, and for raising issues ofconcern to both Anglo-American and continental thinkers. More provocatively, he also argues that the form the debate often takes--attempting to extend our traditional human-centered moral categories to cover other animals--is ultimately inadequate. Making use of the critical perspectives found in environmentalism, feminism, and postmodernism, he concludes that taking animals seriously requires a more radical reassessment of our moral framework than the concept of “animal rights” implies. "Fellenz offers a valuable examination of an important moral dilemma; he reveals where one can no longer turn for answers. Recommended."--Choice "An interesting contribution to the area of animal studies and animal ethics."--Anthrozoos
Animal Rights: A Philosophical Defence
by Mark Rowlands
The question of the nature and extent of our moral obligations to non-human animals has featured prominently in recent moral debate. This book defends the novel position that a contradictarian moral theory can be used to justify the claim that animals possess a substantial and wide-ranging set of moral rights. Critiquing the rival accounts of Peter Singer and Tom Regan, this study shows how an influential form of the social contract idea can be extended to make sense of the concept of animal rights.
Animal Others: On Ethics, Ontology, and Animal Life (Suny Series in Contemporary Continental Philosophy) Edited by H. Peter Steeves, Foreword by Tom Regan

Animal Others brings together original contributions that explore the status of animals from the continental philosophy perspective. Examined are the moral status of animals, the question of animal minds, an understanding of what it is to be an animal and what it is to be with an animal, as well as the roles animals play in the work of philosophers such as Husserl, Heidegger, Nietzsche, Merleau-Ponty, and Derrida. Those already immersed in continental philosophy will find the subject matter of the animal to be a new interest and a promising new venture. Analytic philosophers and other academics will be rewarded by a different approach to old questions, while the general reader interested in animal rights issues will discover new arguments to back up their positions and fresh challenges which may question long-held beliefs.
Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species Membership
(The Tanner Lectures on Human Values)
by Martha C. Nussbaum
Theories of social justice are necessarily abstract, reaching beyond the particular and the immediate to the general and the timeless. Yet such theories, addressing the world and its problems, must respond to the real and changing dilemmas of the day. A brilliant work of practical philosophy, Frontiers of Justice is dedicated to this proposition. Taking up three urgent problems of social justice neglected by current theories and thus harder to tackle in practical terms and everyday life, Martha Nussbaum seeks a theory of social justice that can guide us to a richer, more responsive approach to social cooperation.
The idea of the social contract--especially as developed in the work of John Rawls--is one of the most powerful approaches to social justice in the Western tradition. But as Nussbaum demonstrates, even Rawls's theory, suggesting a contract for mutual advantage among approximate equals, cannot address questions of social justice posed by unequal parties. How, for instance, can we extend the equal rights of citizenship--education, health care, political rights and liberties--to those with physical and mental disabilities? How can we extend justice and dignified life conditions to all citizens of the world? And how, finally, can we bring our treatment of nonhuman animals into our notions of social justice? Exploring the limitations of the social contract in these three areas, Nussbaum devises an alternative theory based on the idea of "capabilities." She helps us to think more clearly about the purposes of political cooperation and the nature of political principles--and to look to a future of greater justice for all.
Beyond Boundaries: Humans and Animals
by Barbara Noske
Beyond Boundaries steps out into hitherto unknown territory in taking an interdisciplinary approach to the subject of animals: the author criticizes the biological determinism characteristic of many biologists as well as the anthropocentrism of many environmentalists and 'greens' who fail to see domestic animals or even humans as part of 'nature.' Vast in its scope and vision, this book synthesizes an array of disparate research and scholarship and in doing so exposes the tensions and inconsistencies in the view of animals in different areas of Western thought. A project of such breadth is unprecedented and there is no existing conceptual structure for a work of this kind: it is certain to spark a furore of philosophical debate.
The Death of the Animal: A Dialogue
by Paola Cavalieri, Foreword by Peter Singer
While moral perfectionists rank conscious beings according to their cognitive abilities, Paola Cavalieri launches a more inclusive defense of all forms of subjectivity. In concert with Peter Singer, J. M. Coetzee, Harlan B. Miller, and other leading animal studies scholars, she expands our understanding of the nonhuman in such a way that the derogatory category of "the animal" becomes meaningless. In so doing, she presents a nonhierachical approach to ethics that better respects the value of the conscious self. Cavalieri opens with a dialogue between two imagined philosophers, laying out her challenge to moral perfectionism and tracing its influence on our attitudes toward the "unworthy." She then follows with a roundtable "multilogue" which takes on the role of reason in ethics and the boundaries of moral status. Coetzee, Nobel Prize winner for Literature and author of The Lives of Animals, emphasizes the animality of human beings; Miller, a prominent analytic philosopher at Virginia Polytechnic Institute, dismantles the rationalizations of human bias; Cary Wolfe, professor of English at Rice University, advocates an active exposure to other worlds and beings; and Matthew Calarco, author of Zoographies: The Question of the Animal from Heidegger to Derrida, extends ethical consideration to entities that traditionally have little or no moral status, such as plants and ecosystems.
As Peter Singer writes in his foreword, the implications of this conversation extend far beyond the issue of the moral status of animals. They "get to the heart of some important differences about how we should do philosophy, and how philosophy can relate to our everyday life." From the divergences between analytical and continental approaches to the relevance of posthumanist thinking in contemporary ethics, the psychology of speciesism, and the practical consequences of an antiperfectionist stance, The Death of the Animal confronts issues that will concern anyone interested in a serious study of morality.
Brute Science:Dilemmas in Animal Experimentation (Philosophical Issues in Science)
by Hugh Lafollette and Niall Shanks
Animal experimentation is one of the most controversial areas of debate on animal rights. Biomedical research is at the hard edge of these debates: it throws up fundamental questions of moral value - of whether human life is more important than that of animals. Much experimentation is defended by its apparent success in terms of increasing medical knowledge. This study investigates whether biomedical research using animals is, in fact, scientifically justified. The authors show that in scientific terms - using the models that scientists themselves use - these claims are exaggerated, or even false. They argue that we need to reassess our use of animals and, indeed, rethink the standard positions in the debate. Their analysis reveals why research using animals might be a source of hypotheses about human biomedical phenomena, yet would never prove or establish anything about this phenomena.
Animal Experimentation: The Moral Issue
by Robert M. Baird (Author, Editor and Stuart E. Rosenbaum (Editor)
YA- Informative and thought-provoking. All sides of the issue from moral philosophy, speciesism, and animal suffering, to proposals for legislation, current medical research, and animal-activist groups are explored. Well-known animal-rights activists are represented, as well as supporters of animal experimentation. Easy to read, well referenced, and well organized. - School Library Journal

Animal Experimentation is a collection of essays discussing the use of animals for experimental purposes from both sides of the issue. The editors address the philosophical question, "Do we have moral responsibilities toward animals?" Included are views of animal rights activists and responses to those views; a defense of the use of animals for research and a critique of same; a statement by deans of medical schools with proposals regarding the conditions of animals used in experimentation; and a final essay challenging assumptions on both sides... Animal Experimentation would be useful in academic and large public libraries.
Animals and Society: The Humanity of Animal Rights
by Keith Tester
Uses a variety of historical sources and a social theory to tell the story of the invention of animal rights. It moves from incidents like the medieval execution of pigs to a discussion of the politics and strategies of modern animal rights organizations. The book also presents radical interpretations of 19th-century animal welfare laws, and the accounts of the Noble Savage. The insights generated by social science are always at the core of the discussion and the author draws on the work of Michel Foucault, Norbert Elias, Claude Levi-Strauss and Mary Douglas. This text provides an account of the relations between humans and animals. It raises questions about the philosophy, history and politics of animal rights.

Magpies, Monkeys, and Morals : What Philosophers Say About Animal Liberation
by Angus Taylor
To what extent can animals be regarded as part of the moral community? To what extent, if at all, do they have moral rights? Are we wrong to eat them or to hunt them? Is the use of animals for scientific research justified? And can the ideas behind animal liberation be squared with those of the environmental movement? This is the first book to provide a thorough and reasonably impartial explication of the arguments put forward on all these issues. It is Taylor's strong belief that, whatever our own views on these contentious issues may be, we benefit by exploring them more thoroughly, and also by understanding and evaluating the arguments of those who may disagree with us. He traces the background of these debates from Aristotle to Darwin, and he provides fair-minded commentaries on the positions of such influential contemporary philosophers as Peter Singer, Tom Regan, R.G. Frey, and Peter Carruthers

Animals and ethics: an overview of the philosophical debate
by Angus Taylor
To what extent can animals be regarded as part of the moral community? To what extent, if at all, do they have moral rights? Are we wrong to eat them or to hunt them? Is the use of animals for scientific research justified? And can the ideas behind animal liberation be squared with those of the environmental movement? It is Taylor's strong belief that, whatever our own views on these contentious issues may be, we benefit by exploring them more thoroughly, and also by understanding and evaluating arguments of those who may disagree with us. He traces the background of these debates from Aristotle to Darwin, and he provides fair-minded commentaries on the positions of contemporary philosophers Peter Singer, Tom Regan, Nel Noddings, Mary Anne Warren, J. Baird Callicott, and numerous others, with ethical theories ranging from utilitarianism to eco-feminism.
\A previous edition of this book appeared under the title Magpies, Monkeys, and Morals. The new edition has been updated throughout. Substantial new material has been added to the text, including discussions of virtue ethics and Rawlsian contractarianism. The bibliography has been significantly enlarged and now includes more than five hundred entries.
Animals and Ethics: an overview of the philosophical debate (Third Edition)
by Angus Taylor

Can animals be regarded as part of the moral community? To what extent, if at all, do they have moral rights? Are we wrong to eat them, hunt them, or use them for scientific research? Can animal liberation be squared with the environmental movement? Taylor traces the background of these debates from Aristotle to Darwin and sets out the views of numerous contemporary philosophers - including Peter Singer, Tom Regan, Mary Anne Warren, J. Baird Callicott, and Martha Nussbaum - with ethical theories ranging from utilitarianism to eco-feminism. The new edition also includes provocative quotations from some of the major writers in the field. As the final chapter insists, animal ethics is more than just an "academic" question: it is intimately connected both to our understanding of what it means to be human and to pressing current issues such as food shortages, environmental degradation, and climate change. "This book is a critically nuanced and meticulous assessment of the philosophical underpinnings of our ethical consideration of non-human animals. The third edition of Angus Taylor's Animals & Ethics not only provides students and the general public with a cogent introduction to the controversial issue of animal liberation but also serves as an invaluable reference work for students with the impressive inclusion of an extensively updated bibliography comprising data from hundreds of relevant publications on the moral status of animals." -- Jodey Castricano, University of British Columbia, Okanagan

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Book List

Edited by Tom Regan w/ essays by J. Baird Callicott, James Rachels, Hugo Adam Bedau, Thomas L. Beauchamp