Thursday, July 3, 2008
Right action
Kant sees that animals have natural purpose, but sees no reason to conclude that humans have any direct duty to creatures that are not autonomous and rational.[1] Gandhi argues that our duty of non-violence rationally requires respect for all life, but allows that consequential reasoning may justify setting this presumption aside, if there is an irreconcilable conflict between human life and other forms of life.[2]
Kant and Gandhi agree and disagree, because they have different worldviews. Kant sees nonhuman life as lacking the rationality that defines our moral community, whereas Gandhi sees karma as defining a moral community that includes both nonhuman and human life. Does our worldview affect our understanding of our moral community and our sense of duty?
Darwin’s argument for natural selection emphasizes random change and thus undermines Kant’s reasoning that we should think of every organism as having its own “natural purpose.” Our current view of evolution, however, supports the ecological argument that nature has value for itself. It does not confirm the Hindu belief in karma,[3] but it does give us reason to accept a duty for all life. “Insofar as we regard any organism, species population, or life community as an entity having intrinsic worth, we believe that it must never be treated as if it were a mere object or thing whose entire value lies in being instrumental to the good of some other entity.”[4]
[1] “The plausibility of viewing animals as having value only if or as they serve human ends lessens as we begin to recognize that, like relevantly similar humans, animals have a life of their own that fares better or worse for them, logically independently of their utility value” for humans. Tom Regan, The Case for Animal Rights, 178.
[2] Albert Schweitzer says that Gandhi “compels Indian ethics to come to grips with reality” by making exceptions to the rule of ahimsa: “And through his feeling for reality, Gandhi also arrives at the admission that the commandment not to kill or injure cannot be carried out in entirety, because man cannot maintain life without committing acts of violence. So with a heavy heart he gives permission to kill dangerous snakes and allows the farmer to defend himself against the monkeys which threaten his harvest.” Charles R. Joy, transl. and ed., The Animal World of Albert Schweitzer: Jungle Insights into Reverence for Life (Boston, MA: The Beacon Press, 1951), 155.
[3] Modern science cannot disprove karma or belief in divine justice.
[4] Paul Taylor, “Biocentric Egalitarianism,” Environmental Ethics, 3 (Fall 1981), in Louis P. Pojman and Paul Pojman, eds., Environmental Ethics, 142. Once we “begin to look at other species as we look at ourselves, seeing them as beings which have a good they are striving to realize just as we have a good we are striving to realize,” we develop “the disposition to view the world from the standpoint of their good as well as from the standpoint of our own good.” Ibid., 152. See Paul Taylor, Respect for Nature (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986).
Kant and Gandhi agree and disagree, because they have different worldviews. Kant sees nonhuman life as lacking the rationality that defines our moral community, whereas Gandhi sees karma as defining a moral community that includes both nonhuman and human life. Does our worldview affect our understanding of our moral community and our sense of duty?
Darwin’s argument for natural selection emphasizes random change and thus undermines Kant’s reasoning that we should think of every organism as having its own “natural purpose.” Our current view of evolution, however, supports the ecological argument that nature has value for itself. It does not confirm the Hindu belief in karma,[3] but it does give us reason to accept a duty for all life. “Insofar as we regard any organism, species population, or life community as an entity having intrinsic worth, we believe that it must never be treated as if it were a mere object or thing whose entire value lies in being instrumental to the good of some other entity.”[4]
[1] “The plausibility of viewing animals as having value only if or as they serve human ends lessens as we begin to recognize that, like relevantly similar humans, animals have a life of their own that fares better or worse for them, logically independently of their utility value” for humans. Tom Regan, The Case for Animal Rights, 178.
[2] Albert Schweitzer says that Gandhi “compels Indian ethics to come to grips with reality” by making exceptions to the rule of ahimsa: “And through his feeling for reality, Gandhi also arrives at the admission that the commandment not to kill or injure cannot be carried out in entirety, because man cannot maintain life without committing acts of violence. So with a heavy heart he gives permission to kill dangerous snakes and allows the farmer to defend himself against the monkeys which threaten his harvest.” Charles R. Joy, transl. and ed., The Animal World of Albert Schweitzer: Jungle Insights into Reverence for Life (Boston, MA: The Beacon Press, 1951), 155.
[3] Modern science cannot disprove karma or belief in divine justice.
[4] Paul Taylor, “Biocentric Egalitarianism,” Environmental Ethics, 3 (Fall 1981), in Louis P. Pojman and Paul Pojman, eds., Environmental Ethics, 142. Once we “begin to look at other species as we look at ourselves, seeing them as beings which have a good they are striving to realize just as we have a good we are striving to realize,” we develop “the disposition to view the world from the standpoint of their good as well as from the standpoint of our own good.” Ibid., 152. See Paul Taylor, Respect for Nature (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986).
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