Peter Singer-Animal Liberation

teachingwasimplacablyopposedtogladiatorialcombats.The gladiatorwhosurvivedbykillinghisopponentwasregarded asa murderer.Mereatten ...

universal benevolence, independently of any belief in the transmigration of souls.^9 We have to wait nearly sixteen hundredyears ...

Wemaybeginbyaskingwhether,accordingtoAquinas,the Christianprohibitiononkillingappliestocreaturesotherthan humans, and if not, wh ...

Humanbeings,ofcourse,wouldnotkillforfoodunlessthey had first considered the justice of so doing! Sohumanbeings maykill otheranim ...

sufferingatall.Thisviewhasbeenheldbyotherphilosophers and,forallitsapparentabsurdity,toattributeitto Aquinas wouldatleast excuse ...

forthePreventionofCrueltytoAnimalstobeestablishedin Rome,onthegroundsthattodosowouldimplythathuman beingshavedutiestowardanimals ...

include“respect forthebeingswhich constitutethenatural world” and added: The dominion granted to man by the Creator is not an ab ...

gapbetweenthemandhumanswaslessthanotherChristians supposed. But a misleadingimpressionoftheviews ofSaintFrancis maybegainedifone ...

sentience.Wemaythenthinkthat sincewe haveto eatto survive,andsincewecannoteatwithoutkillingsomethingwe love,itdoesnotmatterwhich ...

So the Renaissance writers wrote self-indulgent essays in whichtheysaidthat“nothingintheworldcanbefoundthatis more worthy of adm ...

Perhaps,then,fromthispointinthedevelopmentofWestern thoughtthestatusofnonhumanswasboundtoimprove?The oldconceptoftheuniverse,and ...

things of a physicalor material nature. Human beings are conscious,andconsciousnesscannothaveitsorigininmatter. Descartes identi ...

inheritedAdam’ssin,norarerecompensedinanafterlife—to suffer.^25 Descartes was also aware of more practical advantages: Myopinion ...

theirfourpawstovivisectthemandseethecirculationofthe blood which was a great subject of conversation.^27 Fromthispoint,itreallyw ...

“Gentleusage”is,indeed,aphrase thatnicely sumsupthe attitudethatbegantospreadinthisperiod:wewereentitled touseanimals,butweought ...

customhimself.^31 Rousseau,too, seemstohaverecognized the strength of the arguments for vegetarianism without actually adopting ...

battlesforlegalrightsforanimalswerefoughtinBritain,and the initial reactionof the British Parliament indicates that Bentham’s id ...

next,whichcausedafurtherroarofmirth,andacry “And cats!” sent the House into convulsions.^35 This bill failed too, but in the fol ...

fact,Darwinalreadyhadextensivenotes onthetheorythat Homo sapiens had descended from other animals, but he decidedthatpublishingt ...

foundinanincipient,orevensometimesinawell-developed condition, in the lower animals.^39 The fourth chapter of the same work goes ...