Debunking the idyllic view of natural processes:population dynamics and suffering in the wild
ISSN: 1132-0877, 2255-596X
Ano de publicación: 2010
Volume: 17
Número: 1
Páxinas: 73-90
Tipo: Artigo
Outras publicacións en: Telos: Revista iberoamericana de estudios utilitaristas
Resumo
It is commonly believed that animal ethics entails respect for natural processes, because nonhuman animals are able to live relatively easy and happy lives in the wild. However, this assumption is wrong. Due to the most widespread reproductive strategy in nature, r-selection, the overwhelming majority of nonhuman animals die shortly after they come into existence. They starve or are eaten alive, which means their suffering vastly outweighs their happiness. Hence, concern for nonhuman animals entails that we should try to intervene in nature to reduce the enormous amount of harm they suffer. Even if this conclusion may seem extremely counter-intuitive at first, it can only be rejected from a speciesist viewpoint.
Referencias bibliográficas
- Allen, Colin and Bekoff, Marc, Species of Mind: The Philosophy and Biology of Cognitive Ethology, Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997.
- Bonnardel, Yves, “Contre l’apartheid des espèces: À propos de la prédation et de l’opposition entre écologie et libération animale”, Les Cahiers Antispécistes, 14, 1996, http://www.cahiers-antispecistes.org/ article.php3?id_article=103;
- Bookchin, Murray, The Philosophy of Social Ecology: Essays on Dialectical Naturalism, Montreal: Black Rose Books, 1990;
- Broome, John, Weighing Lives, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
- Callicott, John Baird, In Defense of the Land Ethic: Essays in Environmental Philosophy, Albany: State University of New York, 1989.
- Cascorbi, Alice and Steven, Melissa M., Atlantic Cod (Gadus morhua) Northeast Region (U.S. and Canada): Seafood Report—Seafood Watch, Monterey: Monterey Bay Aquarium, 2004, p. 6, http://www.seachoice.org/files/assessment/report/48/MBA_SeafoodWatch_ AtlanticCodReport.pdf.
- Cowen, Tyler, “Policing Nature”, Environmental Ethics, 25, 2003, 169–82. 22
- Dawkins, Richard, River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life, New York: Basic Books, 1995, ch. 4.
- Fink, Charles K., “The Predation Argument”, Between the Species, 13 (5), 2005, http://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/bts/vol13/iss5/3/;
- Griffin, Donald R., Animal Minds, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992;
- Hargrove, Eugene C. “Foundations of Wildlife Protection Attitudes”, in Hargrove, Eugene C. (ed.), The Animal Rights/Environmental Ethics Debate, The Animal Rights/Environmental Ethics Debate: The Environmental Perspective, Albany: State University of New York, 1992, 151–83.
- Horta, Oscar, “The Ethics of the Ecology of Fear against the Nonspeciesist Paradigm: A Shift in the Aims of Intervention in Nature”, Between the Species, 13 (10), 2010, 163–87, http://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/bts/vol13/iss10/10/.
- Horta, Oscar, “What Is Speciesism?”, Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, 23, 2010, 243–66.
- Jørstad, Knud E.; Fjalestad, Kristinne T.; Ágústsson, Thorleifur and Marteinsdottir, Gudrun, “Atlantic cod—Gadus morhua”, in Svåsand, Terje (ed.), Genetic Impact of Aquaculture Activities on Native Populations, 2007, 10–16, p. 11, http://genimpact.imr.no/__data/page/7650/atlantic_cod.pdf.
- Leopold, Aldo, Sand County Almanac, with Essays on Conservation from Round River, New York: Ballantine Books, 1966 [1949];
- Leopold, Sand County Almanac, with Essays on Conservation from Round River
- Linkola, Pentti, Can Life Prevail?: A Radical Approach to the Environmental Crisis, London: Integral Tradition Publishing, 2009.
- MacArthur, Robert H. and Wilson, Edward O., The Theory of Island Biogeography, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967; Pianka, Eric R., “On r- and KSelection”, American Naturalist, 104, 1970, 592–97.
- Mayo, Ralph K.; Shepherd, Gary; O’Brien, Loretta; Col, Laurel A. and Traver, Michele, The 2008 assessment of the Gulf of Maine Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) stock, Woods Hole: US Department of Commerce, Northeast Fisheries Science Center, 2009, http:// www.nefsc.noaa.gov/publications/crd/crd0903/crd0903.pdf.
- McMahan, Jeff, “A Response”, The New York Times, 19 September 2010, http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/28/predatorsa-response/.
- McMahan, Jeff, “The Meat Eaters”, The New York Times, 19 September 2010, http://opinionator.blogs. nytimes.com/2010/09/19/the-meat-eaters/;
- McMahan, Jeff, The Ethics of Killing: Problems at the Margins of Life, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002;
- Mill, John Stuart, Nature, in his Collected Works, vol. X, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969 [1874], 373–402;
- Nagel, Thomas, “Death”, Noûs, 4, 1970, 73–80;
- Ng, “Towards Welfare Biology”; Dawrst, Alan, “The Predominance of Wild-Animal Suffering over Happiness: An Open Problem”, Essays on Reducing Suffering, 2009, http://www.utilitarian-essays.com/wild-animals.pdf.
- Ng, Yew-Kwang, “Towards Welfare Biology: Evolutionary Economics of Animal Consciousness and Suffering”, Biology and Philosophy, 10, 1995, 255–85;
- Pearce, David, “Blueprint for a Cruelty-Free: Reprogramming Predators”, The Abolitionist Project, 2009, http://www.abolitionist.com/reprogramming/index.html;
- Rolston III, Holmes, Environmental Ethics: Duties to and Values in the Natural World, Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1988.
- Sapontzis, Steve F., “Predation”, Ethics and Animals, 5, 1984, 27–38;
- Shelton, Jo-Ann, “Killing Animals that Don’t Fit In: Moral Dimensions of Habitat Restoration”, Between the Species, 13 (4), 2004, 1–21, http://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/bts/vol13/iss4/3/.
- Smith, “A Question of Pain in Invertebrates”.
- Smith, Jane A., “A Question of Pain in Invertebrates”, Institute for Laboratory Animal Research Journal, 33, 1991, 25–32;
- Stearns, Stephen C., “The Evolution of Life-History Traits: A Critique of the Theory and a Review of the Data”, Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, 8, 1977, 145–71.
- Taylor, Paul, Respect for Nature, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986;
- Varner, Gary E., “Biocentric Individualism”, in Schmidtz, David and Willot, Elizabeth (eds.), Environmental Ethics: What Really Matters, What Really Works, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002, 108–20.
- Verhulst, Pierre-François, “Notice sur la loi que la population poursuit dans son accroissement”, Correspondance Mathématique et Physique, 10, 1838, 113–121.