Transcript

1. Introduction

00:00

Now our speakers this afternoon has met with some of you from time to time, but a number of
you have not yet met our speakers, so you're in for quite a pleasure and an informative
pleasure, I should say. But what's going to happen, I think, when you hear professor Singer, who
will be our first speaker Professor Singer is vast professor, at, I'm sorry. Professor Singer is
Ingram professor, de camp professor at, Princeton University, and also laureate professor at the
University of Melbourne. He has a joint appointment and splits his time between both places to
the good fortune of the United States and Australia. And, Professor Singer will speak to us first
about, the ethical uses, the proper uses of animals.

00:51

To what extent are we as humans, entitled to exploit animals for our own purposes, whether
those purposes be nutritional or those purposes be purposes of research. And then after, we
hear about, animals and animal exploitation, we'll turn our attention, more directly to genetic
engineering. So, Professor Singer, if you would chat with us first. Thank you. Thank you.

01:31

I just want to speak, briefly, to outline some of the issues in this topic. I know some of you have
heard me speak today, but others haven't. But I also wanna make sure that we have plenty of
time for Professor Sandell and and, I'd have to have a discussion to talk about the issues which
will be different, I hope, for all of you. So, why do animals raise an ethical issue? I think,
essentially, we should recognize that we are not the only beings on this planet who have lives
that can go well or badly.

02:08

And that's the basic point that we very often overlook in our attitudes to animals. Let me start
maybe by raising a slightly different question, and which is really what what led me first to think
about the question of animals. As philosophers, we often discuss the question of equality. What
is it that we really mean when we say all humans are equal? How can we justify that statement?
02:41

Because once we start to think about that philosophically, once we go beyond the idea of,
thinking of it as a nice piece of rhetoric, that we can sign declarations about, it’s obvious that
human beings differ in whole lot of capacities, a whole lot of ways. Almost anything you can
think of that might be morally relevant, Human beings are different. You try and see how fast
they can run, a mile, they'll differ in that. Youtry and see how well, they can shoot a basketball,
they'll differ in that. You try and see how well they can solve math problems; they'll differ in that.

03:14

You try and measure how likely are they respond to respond to somebody in need, how altruistic
they are they; they'll differ in that. Essentially, everything that you can can think of, that you
could measure in some way, human beings will differ. Yet we still say humans are equal. We still
think there's some important fundamental moral principle about human equality. What can be
left that makes us equal?

03:42

Well, to to cut a very long story short, I think that when you explore all the suggestions that have
been made, the one that most plausibly remains is that we are all beings with interests. We are
all beings whose lives can go well or badly, so that, there are things that matter to us about how
our lives might go. And what's wrong with those views that we've taken as, inegalitarian,
typically, say, racist views or sexist views or or something of that sort, is that they have given
less, weight to the interests of others who are outside the preferred group. So, ratios typically
would give less weightless to the interests of members of other races, and and you can think of
other ways in which this has been the case. But if that's true, if I'm right in saying that that's
really the, sort of, the solid rock basis of of human equality, then we can, we we have to go back
to the point that I mentioned right at the beginning.

04:52

We're not the only beings on this planet with interests. We're not the only beings on this planet
whose lives can go well or badly. And, I think that when we say all humans are equal, although
this is a very progressive idea when we say that as a counter against racists or sexist. It also,
unthinkingly, perhaps, we exclude all of these other beings on the planet. We exclude other
beings who have interest and whose lives can go well or badly.
05:23And, from that aspect, I think we're we're saying something which actually we can't really
defend. So, I don't think we can draw a line around our own species and say, these are the
beings who matter. These are the beings who are entitled to some equality or entitled to a whole
set of rights, which we call human rights. And if you're not a member of this group, you don't
have that moral status. You you're not entitled to equal consideration.

05:53

I think that the basic principle, the principle of equal consideration of interest, has to be one that
extends to all beings who have interests. At least all beings who have been conscious, can feel
pain, whose lives can go well or badly from for them, from their own perspective. Now that
doesn't necessarily mean that there are no differences between beings that roughly, very
roughly, related to to species differences. So that, at least a typical mature human may have
interests that nonhumans don't have. People here living in in Amherst, may have a range of
interests that might involve, for example, going down to New York to listen to the opera or
concert or going to the theater or just, you know, enjoying the the sights of the crowds on Fifth
Avenue.

06:54

On the other hand, you may have some cattle grazing in the fields around here, which have no
such interests. So, their interest could be met by living peacefully in fields around, this area.
Perhaps your interests cannot be fully met. So, so we we recognize, of course, that there are
differences. But where we're talking about similar interests, where we're talking about interest in,
not suffering, in, having a life that's a life that can content you and so on, I think we are not
justified in saying because beings are not humans, we're not, we can we're entitled to disregard
their interests.

07:36

So, obviously, this sets standards on how we can use nonhuman animals. Basically, it says we
can't use them in ways that fail to give the proper weight to the interest that they do have. So, if
we're considering a piece of scientific research that we wish to perform on non human animals,
we can't just say, well, here's something that might benefit humans, and animals are available,
so let's just get a batch of animals and do the research tested on animals. We would have we
we should have a much more stringent standard of of, requirement which says, how does this
affect the interest of animals? Does it affect them adversely?
08:24

If so, are there other things we can do, other ways in which we can advance our goal without
affecting their interests adversely? And we should certainly explore those options and see what
the possibilities are. Now we might, of course, get to a point where we say, well, we've tried
everything else, but we have still reached a point where either this research is not going to be
done or it's going to be done and animal interests are going to be harmed. How could we how
could we decide whether we have given the proper weight to animals in those circumstances? I
think that there's at least a hypothetical test here, and it it's a test that may seem shocking to
some of you.

09:06

But because I believe that, we're wrong to discriminate against the interests of of nonhuman
animals where they're similar to to those of human beings. I would say that we if we think that
research is justified on animals, we ought to think that it's justified on humans, who would suffer
in a similar way and only in a similar way. Now that comparison may often be different to difficult
to make because normal humans, have, as I said, different abilities and perhaps have different
kinds of anticipation of suffering, different memories of suffering, different kind of awareness of
what's happening to them, maybe are capable of being humiliated or having their dignity
affronted in ways that would not apply to non human animals. But that's not true of all animals.
Sorry.

09:58

That's not true of all humans. There are humans who are intellectually disabled to the point
where their capacities for the things that I just mentioned do not surpass those of nonhuman
animals. So, if an experimenter thinks that an experiment is justified on nonhuman animals, I
think he or she ought to think that it would also be justified to perform that on humans at a
similar level of development. That is that there shouldn't be a simply a difference of species that
says it's okay to use one kind of being and not another. There may be other practical
differences, certainly there are legal differences why that can't be done, but at least as a thought
experiment, that's one way I would suggest of determining the limits and your sincerity in saying
that you're not influenced by a bias of species in deciding that animals can be used here,
because the experiment is so important that it outweighs the adverse effects on the interests of
animals.

11:03
Now, having said that, and I said I didn't wanna go on too long, I did wanna say something
about, a little more about the the issue of of animals and research, as I think that perhaps
connects in some ways better with the the common theme that Professor Sandell and I are
discussing. But I also wanna say this, if you're, moved by the general principle that I've talked
about of, equal consideration of interest and, avoiding the bias of speciesism, of of thinking that
just because being is a member of our species, somehow it's automatically got an elevated
moral status, then you should be aware that while the issue of research on animals is a
significant issue, in that something like 25 to 40,000,000 animals are used for research in this
country each year, The issue of the use of animals for food is a far larger issue, far larger in
terms of numbers because about 10,000,000,000 animals are killed for food in this country each
year, dwarfing the number used for experiments. And also, an issue in which the quantity of
suffering is much greater, because because of intensive farming, I think actually, you know, if
you had to choose between being reincarnated as, let's say, an egg laying hen in a factory farm
or a rat in a laboratory that was eventually gonna get sacrificed for an experiment, although both
of them would be pretty awful fates, I think the suffering of the rat might be more acute, but it's
certainly a much shorter duration.

12:36

You'd probably do better to be the rat than the hen. So, I think the quantity of suffering is vastly
greater. And finally, the justification is much weaker, because for at least some scientific
research, I don't think this is true by any means of all scientific research, but at least some
scientific research can be defended in terms of advancing our knowledge of, major diseases or
problems that, face us, which have a large cost, an unavoidable cost in terms of death and
suffering to large numbers of human beings. That it no such necessity can be provided for the
food industry that raises and kills animals for food. It, overall, does not increase the amount of
food available to us.

13:26

It reduces it because we grow vast quantities of grain and soybeans to feed 2 animals. And in
the process of simply living, they burn up most of the food value that we feed them, and we get
back just a small fraction of the food value that we put into them. So, it's not necessary in any
sense for producing our food. And, it's there are available alternatives which are both, as I say,
more efficient, also more environmentally friendly. The livestock industry produces more
greenhouse gas emissions globally than the entire transport sector, all kinds of transport.

2. Think the Reason

14:06
So globally, from a climate change point of view, we'd be better to reduce our meat
consumption. And, from a health point of view, there certainly are costs from the high quantity of
animal, products that we consume. So let me close by saying to you, I think there are the limits
of animal use. There are strict ethical limits on what we can justify justifiably do to animals. And,
while they certainly apply and lead to difficult decisions in the area of the use of animals in
research, I think they ought to actually lead to the abolition, at least, of large-scale intensive
farming, factory farming, as it exists today, which is a much larger enterprise than the use of
animals for research.

14:55

And also, finally, one that each of us can contribute towards reducing by our personal
consumption choices, which is not something that each of us can do in the area of use of
animals in research. I'll stop there. Thank you very much. I wanna thank professor Singer very
much. He's certainly given us food for thought.

15:25

In fact, I might say something to chew on. You might not have all looked at, the use of animals
for food, in quite the same terms that I think you've got to look at it after professor Singer's
remarks. We turn now to the consideration of powerful new technologies, genetic engineering,
and the, contemplation of the use of those technologies, for the alteration, some of us might say,
for the improvement, for the perfection of human beings. And to comment on these potential
applications, we are very fortunate to have professor Michael Sandel from Harvard University.
He's past professor of government there.

16:11

And professor Sandel is going to address these topics for us. Thank you. Well, we've we've had
it's been it's a great pleasure to have been here for this very intense and stimulating and
demanding day of colloquia and exchange with, the Amherst College students and faculty, as as
well as with my friend, professor Singer. And we were invited, each of us, to talk about a
somewhat different topic, which we've done. We've discharged, I think, that responsibility.

16:56

Professor Singer has been talking about, animal ethics, the ethical treatment of animals, and
I've been focusing mainly on genetic engineering, the use of biotechnology for enhancement of
human beings. But there are some common threads, I think, in our respective arguments about
these different topics. And since our assignment here this afternoon is to engage with one
another, I would like to say something about what I take to be the common threads, the
buoyancy of agreement and disagreement, and then perhaps we'll have an exchange about it. I
wanna begin by saying that I agree very much, first on the subject of ethical limitations on the
treatment of animals. I agree with 2 of the central points of emphasis of professor Singer.

17:55

1st, that there are ethical limitations on, the way we treat animals and in particular that the
cruelties and the sufferings, that are perpetrated in factory industrial farming are morally
objectionable. And, professor Singer has really been a world leader in bringing attention to the
problem of factory farms and the ethical treatment of animals, and I agree very much with his,
case against them. I also agree with part of the philosophical apparatus or argument that
professor Singer brings to bear in arguing for ethical limitations on the treatment of animals his
opposition to what he calls speciesism, the idea that there is, for moral purposes, a complete
and utter separation between human beings on the one hand and nonhuman animals on the
other. I think he's right that that, to he's right to remind us that we do have moral obligations not
only to other human beings but also to animals. So, we agree on those two fundamental ideas.

19:15

But I think we disagree, and here I'd like to see whether I'm on the right track here to detect a
disagreement about the underlying reasons, the underlying ethic, the philosophical reasons that,
the 2 of us bring to bear in thinking both about animals, the treatment of animals, and also about
the subject of genetic engineering for enhancement. Let me just summarize very briefly. Some
of you have been at other parts of this day of colloquia, let me summarize the argument that I've
tried to make against the use of genetic technologies and bioengineering for human beings for
the purposes of enhancement. I distinguish between using genetic technologies to promote
health, to cure, to repair injuries. Stem cell research, for example, is something that I'm very
much in favor of.

20:14

It's a way of using new genetic technologies and discoveries to advance human health and to
combat disease. I think that's, entirely to be encouraged and welcomed. What I'm critical of is
the use of new genetic technologies, not for medical purposes, but for purposes of non medical
enhancement. For example, to use genetic technologies which can be done today to choose
whether to have a boy or a girl. It's possible now to choose in advance the s** of one's child.
20:50

And people have historically had strong desires to choose a boy or a girl, usually, alas, they've
wanted boys. And now through the use of preimplantation genetic diagnosis or embryo
screening, it's possible with a 100% certainty to do that, also through sperm sorting and other
techniques. And though it isn't possible now, it's easy to imagine the desire to use whatever new
genetic knowledge and technologies we may acquire, not just to choose the s** of your child,
but also to enhance the intelligence or the physical strength of the child, the height to pick and
choose the hair color or eye color. Why would people want to do this? Well, we see already with
even the use of human growth hormone, which is a, is a drug that is used to treat children with a
hormone deficiency who are very short.

21:53

Parents of perfectly healthy but short children go to the pediatrician and say, my child is short.
There's nothing wrong with him. It usually is a him in the case of those who seek out health
enhancement. He wants to play on the basketball team or maybe it's the parent who wants them
to play on the basketball team. It's sometimes hard to know why can't he also have the human
growth hormone.

22:18

That's enhancement. That's not health. And yet it's hard. The FDA had to wrestle with the
question whether to approve the use of human growth hormone, for those who simply wanted to
be taller rather than for those who had a medical or or hormonal, deficiency. So why shouldn't
why shouldn't, genetic technologies be available to parents who want to pick and choose the
genetic traits and to manipulate the genetic traits of their children for enhancement to improve
their well-being, to make their lives go better, to be more successful, to keep compete more
effectively in an intensely competitive society, whether to be taller or stronger or more
handsome or to have greater, intelligence.

23:09

Well, the reason and here I will just quickly summarize the reason that it's that seems to me
morally troubling. And I think most of us are, in one way or another, uneasy about that kind of
use of genetic technologies. I think the reason that we shrink from the idea of genetically
empowered, technologically empowered designer parents is that there is something important
about the good of the parent child relationship. What makes it special and precious, is that
parents, good parents, accept their children as they come. They don't design them.

23:56

We pick and choose our friends, even our spouses on the basis of qualities that we like or find
attractive, but we don't pick and choose our children. We accept them as they come, and that
fact about the parent child relation teaches something important that is actually a quality difficult
to come by with few resources in modern society, which is a certain humility, a a humility in the
face of what's what's given. The ideal of unconditional love of parents for children teaches
parents to be open to the unbidden. We live in a society and in a moral culture where in most
parts of our lives we aspire to to a kind of mastery, to control in our careers, in our professions,
in our everyday pursuits as students, we think of being free and being successful as exerting
our will, our control over everything we can manage to control. But that is a partial human ideal,
that aspiration to mastery or dominion.

25:14

It's a kind of Promethean aspiration. And while it has fueled important human discoveries,
especially in the realm of science and medicine, it also lends itself in certain domains to
overreaching, to a kind of hubris. And one area where we see already a kind of overreaching in
hubris is in the heavily managed childhoods that hyper parents of our day are prone to create, to
mold, to form, to push. We know about hyperparenting, even low tech hyperparenting. That
seems to me a kind of it's it's a defect in our moral culture.

25:58

It's a tendency we should lean against, and the way to lean against it is to remind ourselves of
the moral importance of being open to the unbidden. And that's why the unconditional love of
parents for children not matters not only for the welfare of the children, but also for the
character, for the virtue, for the habits of mind, for the dispositions of parents as parents and for
human beings generally, because that kind of openness to what is unbitten is important in other
realms of life as well. So that's my argument against genetic engineering for enhancement, but I
wanna turn now to the difference as I see it in the underlying philosophical orientations that
professor Singer and I would bring to bear both on the question of the treatment of animals and
on the question of genetic engineering for enhancement. As I understand professor Singer's
view, what matters is that we are all being with beings with interests. We all, human beings and
animals, have lives that can go well or badly, and so we should give equal consideration to
interests, equal weight to similar interests.
27:13

Animals have interests in avoiding pain and suffering, and so we should include in our moral
calculus consideration of that fact about them. Lying behind this idea is a certain view that
everything worth caring about, everything that contributes to lives going well, can be captured in
the language or in the concept of interests or of welfare or of utility or the balance of pleasure
over pain. This is an underlying, utilitarian idea and it explains why we should care about pain
and suffering of animals. I think we should care, but I don't think the reason we should care is
fully captured by the utilitarian calculus of pleasure and pain and welfare and, satisfaction and
suffering for two reasons. 1st, I think it wrongly assumes that the that the fundamental good that
we should aim at is unitary.

28:21

A single thing that can be captured or summed up and compared in the language of interests or
utility or welfare maximization. It seems to me that the goods that we rightly cherish and prize
and seek are plural, not singular, and they can't all be translated into a single uniform measure
of pleasure and pain, utility and disutility, welfare, and the like. There there are many ways of
valuing. Use is 1, but so are respect, honor, reverence, awe, love, to name half a dozen that
can't be translated, it seems to me, into welfare or utility or use. A second way of describing the
question I would raise about the utilitarian background principle is that the way of valuing that's
characteristic of the utilitarian principle is use, and weighing up, toting up, calculating, the the
interests.

29:33

What the reason I would say that we should there are ethical limitations on our treatment of
animals is that there is that regarding the universe or the world or the natural world or for that
matter animals, but not only animals, is open to any use provided it satisfies the the maximizing
principle of of least pain, most pleasure. The reason we should care about that is that the world,
the natural world, is not just at our disposal. The proper stance of human beings toward the
natural world should include not only mastery and dominion and use and manipulation, the
Promethean stance, but also a certain restraint. A certain restraint that reminds by which we
remind ourselves that to live a good life is not to consider that everything, including animals, are
simply at our disposal, objects of our will or of our dominion. Let me give 4 quick concrete
examples of how these two different approaches, the utilitarian one and the ethic of restraint, as
I would call my view, make a difference.
3. Think of Roman

30:54

1st, in the, case of designer children, what's wrong with enhancing, say, the height and the
intelligence and the athletic ability and the music ability of children if it made their lives go better,
if it increased their welfare, their happiness, and didn't didn't decrease somebody else's more
than it increased theirs, then it would be morally defensible on the utilitarian view. But
maximizing welfare isn't the only thing that matters morally. Consider traditional eugenics, not
the free market privatized eugenics where individual parents choose the genetic traits.
Traditional eugenics was the attempt to control the genetic traits to improve the genetic traits of
societies as a whole, and they often included forced sterilization laws. Most American states in
the 19 twenties thirties had laws for forced sterilization.

31:57

Why? To improve the gene pool, to make people better. And so so-called imbeciles and
criminals and feeble-minded people were subject to forced sterilization. Now on the utilitarian
calculus, is there anything wrong in principle with eugenic laws mandating for sterilization? It
causes unhappiness.

32:22

Now you'd have to do it painlessly because if it were very painful, that would inflict suffering, and
that might lead to a net disutility. But suppose the sterilization were not painful, it could be done
painlessly. And suppose it really did improve the or enhance the genetic composition or the level
of intelligence and accomplishment of the society, would a utilitarian have any grounds for
rejecting it? That's question number 1 that I would put to professor Singer. Question number 2, if
you accept an ethic of restraint rather than the utilitarian calculus, it seems to me you would be
concerned not just with animals capable of feeling pain, you might also recognize that certain
human uses of the natural world, of the non animal natural world are morally troubling.

33:19

Take an example of an ancient sequoia tree. A thoughtless hiker carves his initials wantonly, just
for the fun of it, into an ancient sequoia tree. Isn't there something wrong with that? It seems to
me there is. Now let's assume, you might say, well, passersby might have their utility diminished
if too many of them saw and disliked this carving in the sequoia tree.
33:45

But suppose it were deep in the forest, and the person who carved the initials derived more
pleasure than the passersby derived disutility seeing it. On the utilitarian calculus, since the
Sequoia tree doesn't suffer pain, physical pain, it's not clear to me there is any objection in
principle to that. And yet, if you think there is something to an ethic of restraint, the world is not
simply at our disposal, you will have a way of explaining why there is something that's not so
good about something, in fact, morally dubious about carving the initials in the ancient Sequoia,
independent of any concern about the pain, let's assume it's probably is true. Someone can
maybe prove me wrong that the tree doesn't feel pain. Question number 2 for professor Singer,
is that okay?

34:44

Provided the acceptance so far as the passerby's don't passersby don't like it. Number 3,
chickens, who are confined in battery cages. Professor Singer spoke about them and showed
some vivid slides, and he's surely right that there is something wrong with that way of raising
and using chickens. But suppose there were a way genetically of altering chickens to remove
their impulse to roam, to roam freely. Now part of the frustration, part of the suffering of chickens
in battery cages is that their natural desire to roam freely is frustrated, and so they experience
pain.

35:30

But suppose you could genetically alter them to make factory farming more convenient, more
economical, you would have to worry less about the packing, they'd be maybe less stressed and
so actually, I don't know, lay more eggs or something like that. So, you actually you genetically
alter them to serve human purposes, cheap chickens, cheap eggs, not by changing the battery
cages, but by changing, genetically tweaking the nature of the chicken by removing that desire.
They're no longer frustrated. Let's say that you could do it in a way that they wouldn't even feel
pain, or if they did, it would be now so small that the pleasure derived from the efficiency of
human beings, having cheap eggs would outweigh the small discomfort. You lessen the
discomfort and still wouldn't there be something morally troubling about genetically altering or
creating a sedentary, less frustrated, sedentary chicken.

36:35

It seems to me on the ethic of restraint, there is a way of accounting for what is morally
disquieting about that, whereas on the utilitarian ethic, you make the chicken happier. Question
number 3 for professor Singer. The final one is this, it's an example, a wonderful example that
he presented in his colloquium. He mentioned dogfighting and cockfighting. And, normally, we
kind of recoil when we hear practices of, instances of dogfighting and cockfighting.

37:09

And we recoil, I think, for two reasons. One of them, is in line with the utilitarian idea. Well, it
causes pain pain to these dogs or these, roosters that are being put in a pit, and people are
bedding and cheering and watching and laughing while they're destroying one another. And
surely that's part of what's objectionable. But here's what's wrong with the utilitarian way of
thinking.

37:36

Suppose right here, this actually probably looks like the pit of not that I've been. But it wouldn't it
be something like that? So, the chickens or the dogs would be there. Now there are how many
of us here? There may be a couple of 100 people here.

37:51

And let's assume that everyone here were delirious with pleasure at the sight of those dogs or
those chickens fighting right here. At a certain point, now you might say, well, the pain is so
intense suffered by the the roosters. Is that what they are, roosters? Yeah. Yeah.

38:09

We're talking about Alright. So, if the pain is intense enough, the fact that you all like it, that we
all like it, it probably isn't enough. Our pleasure isn't quite enough to outweigh the intensity of the
pain. On the other hand, we could deal with that ethically by moving to a bigger room. And if
there were, instead of 200 people, a 1000 people, or 2,000 people, or let's go to the Colosseum
in ancient Rome and put them there.

38:39

Tens of thousands of people cheering and really loving it. Then the intense suffering of those
chickens would be outweighed on the utilitarian calculus by the pleasure of the onlookers. And if
there are enough people having enough fun and excitement and pleasure, then on the utilitarian
calculus or the welfare calculus, it would seem that it suddenly becomes morally permissible.
And why stop with talk fighting and dog fighting? Think of the Roman Colosseum.

39:12

They weren't using, roosters and and dogs. They had they threw Christians to lions for sport in
the coliseum. Now that's important. Even before we get into debate over animal rights and
ethics, Of course, we would all deplore that. But if you take seriously the utilitarian way of moral
reasoning that professor Singer appeals to.

39:38

It's the right conclusions on these cases of factory farms. I agree, but the reasoning is wrong,
and the way you can see that the reasoning is wrong is imagining how the moral calculus would
go. Yes, Those Christians thrown to the lions in the Colosseum suffer intense pain, but look at
the collective ecstasy of the Romans packing the Colosseum cheering. Do we really want to say
that if there are enough Romans in the Colosseum getting enough pleasure that the pain of the
Christian's thrones thrown to the lions is morally outweighed by the happiness of those in the
crowd? Question number 4 to professor Singer.

40:31

Now you're going to get your chance to ask questions and your comments are going to be
welcomed. But but you've been preempted by by our speakers who who kind of want to talk
among themselves. So why don't you talk among yourselves? And perhaps, professor Singer,
you would start off. Thank you very much, and and thanks, professor Sandahl, for very
challenging, remarks, which I think you're right do go to the heart of the differences between us
on on both of these issues because, I haven't said anything yet about what you've been talking
about about, designer children.

41:11

But you're right that I don't really share your objections to, this. I mean, I I I suppose let me say I
share some of your objections again as as you accept some of my case. I certainly think that
there are worries about tendencies like hyperparenting, because I think that puts pressure on
children, makes, everything very competitive, probably doesn't give them the ideal childhood,
and, maybe has other consequences for the way in which society evolves. So, I can certainly
agree with that. I'm also concerned about some of the things that you talked about, a market
based, market based genetic selection, where, for example, you talked in your earlier session,
there is statistical evidence that people who are taller actually earn more, it's not quite clear
whether there's a correlation or causation.

42:05

I think we haven't really done studies that would separate that. But let's assume that parents are
influenced by this and therefore in some way select or genetically engineer their children to be
taller. Clearly, what we get into then is a kind of an arms race. Right? I mean, the average height
just increases.

4. Think the Utilitarian

42:25

It's a relative advantage. No one's thinking that there's an absolute advantage in having taller
children. And even if you want them to play basketball, well, it'll be no good being 7 feet tall.
That'll just be ordinary. You've got to be at least 7 foot 6 and so on.

42:39

And then we're going to have problems in terms of you know, no doubt we'll have problems with
actual physical problems with those very tall children. We also just will be bigger people, we'll
consume more resources, we have more pressure. I don't you know; I think there's good
reasons to object to purely market based genetic enhancement. But there may be other
characteristics that are not just relative goods. There might be arguable that some forms of
intelligence and, you know, as Professor Sandel said, there isn't really a unitary thing that we
call intelligence, but certainly some problem-solving abilities may be useful for the species to
have to to get us out of some of the mess that we've created for ourselves.

43:23

That, I think, could be useful. And if that were available to all parents, so not just those who
could afford it, which would kind of reinforce the, turn the economic class division into a genetic
class division. I don't think any of us want to see that. But if it was available for all parents, I'm
not at all sure that that would be a bad thing. It might well be that the advantages of that would
outweigh, whatever disadvantages we have.
43:52

And I guess from that you will see that I am more prepared to say that we should we're justified
in taking control of our reproduction, which at present is to some extent a lottery, that we would
be justified in changing that for good purposes. So, let me move from that to the first of of
Professor Sandahl's challenges to me, the first of his examples, which was to say, well, if, you
judge this on a utilitarian basis, then what was wrong with the early, eugenics movement which
led to forced sterilization? And Professor Sandahl talked about, well, the sterilization has to be
painless and so on. So let me just clarify first, the classical form of utilitarianism, as developed
by Jeremy Bentham, was hedonistic. It's simply taught in terms of pleasure or pain.

44:52

And I probably somehow sound like that, especially when I'm talking about animals, because I
think their interest in not feeling pain and not suffering is the most obvious of the interests that
they have. But I'm, in fact, a preference utilitarian rather than a hedonistic utilitarian, which
means that what I'm trying to maximize is the satisfaction of preferences overall, not just the net
surplus of pleasure over pain as a hedonist would. So, in the case of forced sterilization, it's
certainly not enough for me that the sterilization should be painless because I would be
concerned about the fact that the people being sterilized presumably do not wish to be
sterilized. If there has to be forced sterilization, that implies that they are not willing to consent to
being sterilized. So, there is an overriding of their preferences.

45:43

The question is whether that can be justified by greater satisfaction of other preferences. I am
doubtful certainly I don't think on the grounds that anyone had in the '20s or '30s, I don't think
the science was really there. And if you look at the details of what happened, there were
certainly abuses and there were certainly racial biases and class biases in who was sterilized.
So, I think that, there is indeed we are concerned about the birth of people with who are in some
way not going to be contributors to the benefit of society, I think there are much better and ways
of changing that which appeal to people's autonomy, make things available to them. Essentially,
I don't think we're we're at a position where we really need to contemplate coercing anyone to
be sterilized, certainly no one who is capable of giving or refusing their consent.

46:44

There may be justified cases in people who are not capable of giving consent, not capable of
understanding the issue where indeed, you know, having a child may be bad for them,
especially if it's a woman, and, as well as indicating a burden on the community. So, I think that
there are there are practical reasons in this case why a utilitarian would not go to coercive
sterilization, given the availability of other tools and given questions about how we can care for
the problems. But that's not to say that, you know, one rejects all of the ways in which people
may choose to select their children. And, so I think we probably do have a disagreement, on
some of those questions. And the thing that you seem to value so much, the idea that, the child
comes as an unconditional kind of gift, is not something that I would place that much value on if,
you know, if that's not how parents want it.

47:51

If parents want to have more of a role, I think they can do that. And and, in fact, I'd when we had
the discussion earlier, you emphasized the idea that you were prepared to use genetic selection
to avoid a variety of diseases, including perhaps an expanding variety as our knowledge of
genes and diseases and risks of diseases expands. But that is also, in a way, wanting to tilt the
lottery. That's also not saying I will accept and love my child unconditionally no matter how that
child comes. And I think there will probably be some people who would say you've gone too far
there and they want to say you have to accept your child unconditionally, whatever health status
the child comes with.

48:35

So clearly, for you, that's one value among others, and I suppose that's consistent with what you
said about value pluralism, but I think value pluralists do need to get pushed as to what you say
when there's a conflict of your values. Are the values actually comparable in some sense? If so,
it sounds like you have some sort of scale for comparing them, which isn't too far from a unitary
metric. If you think they're not comparable, then does that make the choices arbitrary when you
have conflicting values that are not comparable? I mean, what does that tell us about how we
could actually choose?

49:11

Is any choice then as good as any other? However, I do want to move on because you've given
me 3 other challenges as well, and I want to give you a chance to reply and then we'll no doubt
still have time for questions. So, carving your initials in the ancient sequoia in a lonely corner of
the forest where almost no one can see it, and let's assume also, of course you know, I agree
with you, I don't think sequoias can feel pain, I don't think they have that kind of nervous system
we have to assume that it's not going to damage the sequoia. It's not so deep that it's going to
cause some infection in the sequoia that will cause the tree to die, which would be a bad thing in
ecological terms, I think that would outweigh the benefits you get. I guess I think if in this case, if
we really assume that the case is as you described, I think it's, you know, I think it's ugly.
50:02

I think it's petty. It's it's kind of a sort of vandalism, of something beautiful, so it shows extremely
poor taste. But is it morally wrong? I don't I don't really know that it is morally wrong. I can't see
if if if the conditions are really as you as you describe it.

50:24

Genetically modifying the chickens, look, you'd you'd have to do more than remove their impulse
to roam freely. I mean, there's a whole lot of other impulses that they have that they can't satisfy
in those cages, including laying their eggs in a kind of sheltered private nesting area, which they
will always do if you give them a chance, but they can't in the cage, getting away from other
aggressive chickens in the cage, and so on and so forth. But but no doubt you could just say,
okay. Fine. Well, we'll we'll modify all of that as well.

50:52

We basically end up turning the chicken into a kind of a a zombie, I suppose, that, is content in
the cage. I actually do think that you've now removed the objection to battery cages that I
described when I was talking earlier today. In other words, you've now removed the animal
welfare objection, because the chickens have been so modified that they enjoy life in the cages.
You haven't removed maybe, you know, resource use objections or environmental objections
and so on to intensive farming, and they would have to be balanced against how much we enjoy
getting these eggs and the eggs being cheaper than other eggs and so on. But, yes, I mean, if
you really could do that, then the kind of argument that I put today has been, you know, no
longer has a target.

51:42

I think I think you're right about that. But I don't want to just remove the target for your argument.
I want to suggest that that would none would still be a monstrous thing to do. You don't seem to
think it would be. No.

51:53

You will have to explain to me more fully why it would be a monstrous thing to do. I mean, we've
already modified domestic animals in a whole variety of ways, to make them more productive for
us. So, I wonder actually whether, you know, if you're against mastery, dominion, if you think
there's hubris in this, whether turning what was the Burmese jungle fowl into the modern
chicken is already not an exercise of that sort of mastery, and whether it's not already
objectionable in just the same way that taking the further steps that you talked about would be
objectionable. I don't know if you want to reply to that or shall I I've only got one more. Right?

52:37

The dog fighting. Yeah. Okay. So, I think, when philosophers talk about examples like this, we
can talk about, them in 2 different ways. We can talk about them in a purely hypothetical way in
which we say, look.

52:51

So suppose we had these dogs or roosters, whatever they were, they're fighting here, they
suffer, intensely from their fighting, but there's thousands of people enjoying it, as there were,
you know, in the in the Roman Colosseum, where incidentally there was lots of animal fights as
well before they started introducing Christians or other captives. There were lots of, they
imported all sorts of exotic beasts to fight against each other in in vast numbers and
depopulated North Africa of a lot of its wild animals to ship them over for the amusement of
Romans. But, you know, we can talk about those cases in a hypothetical way where we we say,
well, just imagine you've got this situation. There's 10,000 people watching these animals tear
each other to pieces. They get lots of pleasure from it.

53:35

The pleasure outweighs the suffering of the animals. Is everything okay? How could a utilitarian
object? And if that's all you're talking about, if you just say, just imagine this as an example and
we specify that there are no further consequences other than the pleasures of the people and
the suffering of the animals, then I think the utilitarian has to say, okay, I have to accept that.
That, you know, does produce a maximum of pleasure.

5. Think the Idea

54:01

It's it's pretty hard exactly how you weigh up pleasures of that sort as against pains because we
don't have a good scale, but let's just assume that somehow, we agree that they outweigh it. We
also, of course, really would have to say, well, okay, here's a pleasure, but it gets a lot of pain as
a result. Couldn't you have equal pleasure without the pain? Couldn't we, for example, invent
football so that instead of having the dogs fighting, the crowds are cheering for their football
team and they might get just as much pleasure out of that? Who knows?

54:30

But then, you know, we can just say, alright. We assume that they wouldn't get so much
pleasure out of that. So, if we really specify the example in that way, I have to say, okay. But if
we then go to the real world and we say, look, we've now got thousands of people cheering on
animal suffering, what is that going to do to, the way in which they think about others, others
who they can dominate? And, you know, I mean, I share your resistance to the idea that we're
entitled to dominate everything, but I share it, I suppose, because I think if we accept that, we're
likely to have consequences that are bad for everyone.

55:09

So, you know, the when I talked earlier today, I I talked about some of the more traditional views
about the treatment of animals, which saw nothing wrong in cruelty to animals, people like
Aquinas and Kant. But in fact, both Aquinas and Kant thought that it was wrong to be cruel to
animals, not for the sake of the animals, but because it would lead people to be cruel to other
humans, and they thought that was bad. Well, for me that's sort of not the real heart of the
argument, obviously. The suffering of animals for me is the heart of the argument. But I can't
really imagine that you could have a culture in which thousands of people enjoyed, watching
animals tear each other to pieces that did not have some effect on their behavior in other
circumstances, both to animals and to subordinate human beings who were in their power, and
that that's why if we shift from the purely hypothetical case to the real world, I would think
dogfighting is something that we ought to stop.

56:11

If I could just reply to to a couple of those points starting with the last one, that they're, that we
should be concerned in the dogfighting case not only with the cruelty the pain sorry, the pain
and suffering of the animals, but we should also be alive to other adverse consequences, effects
on behavior, kind of coarsening. If people get in the habit of thrilling to cruelty to animals, then it
could well be the case that they will that the the coarsening effect will cause them to
countenance forms of cruelty and violence in the streets after they leave the arena and so on.
And those consequences could would themselves be, suffering or pain or the frustration of
people's preferences, and we should crank that in to, increase crank that into the moral
calculus. What I would like to I think that's a perfectly reasonable and legitimate secondary
effect legitimate consideration. The difference is I I would also like to insist on a third kind of
consideration here in addition to the pain suffered by the animals and in addition to secondary
effects, what people do when they leave the stadium having been coarsened in this way, what
isn't there something morally troubling about encouraging a society in which people take
pleasure in this kind of thing.

57:55

A moral something morally troubling that goes beyond what those people may or may not do
when they go out onto the streets mugging or assaulting other people having been coarsened.
We were talking after professor Singer's colloquium talk, about the Puritan grounds for opposing
bear baiting, which was their version of dogfighting. And the Puritans, opposed bear baiting not
not because of the pain it caused the bear, but because of the pleasure it gave the the the
puritans, the bear baiters, the onlookers. I think they were onto something. They were onto
something which really goes to the heart of the difference in our whole approach, I think, to
ethics and moral philosophy.

58:43

I agree we should concern ourselves with the pain to the bears or the dogs and to the
secondary effects, the violence that might be a spillover effect on the streets of Rome after the
spectacle in the Colosseum. But I also think that part of what we should care about, part of what
moral philosophy should attend to are the qualities of character, the habits, the virtues, the
attitudes and dispositions of people. And it seems to me that part of what's wrong with the dog
fighting is that people who become accustomed to taking pleasure in that kind of activity are the
lesser for it. There is a it's a defective character to thrill to a bloody spectacle of that kind, and
that's an independent further reason to to to discourage it. And this worry about character and
habits and dispositions and virtues, I don't think can be collapsed into or fully captured by even
the secondary effects and consequences, and yet it seems to me a great mistake to rule it out of
moral consideration.

59:56

And it's that ethic, an ethic that worries about attitudes, dispositions, qualities of character, the
right way to live a life, the right sort of things to take pleasure in that lead me to take seriously
the the effect on character of the drive to create designer children. What about what about
character, virtue, attitudes, dispositions as an independent moral concern? I mean, I I share
your idea that that there's there's something that we find disquieting about the fact that people
are taking pleasure and cruelty here, but I don't know how to examine that intuition in such a
way that proves that it's an independent value and not simply something that I have and I hope
other people have because of the first two of the reasons that that you talked about, that is the
the fact that that if people have this character, they're more likely to cause unnecessary pain to
animals, and maybe they're they're more likely to cause it to humans as well. I I don't know how
we can examine ourselves and say, look, it's not just that, because, you know, we have evolved
in circumstances, we've developed our culture has developed in circumstances where these
consequences have followed.

01:01:21

So it wouldn't be surprising if we have this sense that something is intrinsically wrong, and yet
that sense is not reliable if we reflect more carefully on what the values are that we really wanna
hold. Let me just push a little further. You say, yes, it's bad that people take pleasure in this kind
of bloody sport, but their pleasure is outweighed typically would be outweighed both by by the
pain to the animal and the secondary consequences. Why would you and yet to decide whether
that practice is morally objectionable or not, you still do weigh preferences overall and you still
do count, don't you? The perverse as I would call them, the perverse preferences.

01:02:18

You count them. I do count them. And you weigh them. And you accord them the same moral
weight as you accord the nonperverse preferences that people have who wanna shut it down
because they're worried about the consequences. Isn't that morally odd?

01:02:35

No. I don't Why why do you want to weigh those perverse preferences at all in deciding whether
this is a good thing? Even if we're lucky and it turns out that the secondary effects are big
enough so that we can condemn it in the end? Right. Well, I suppose the answer is because I
want people to have their preferences satisfied, other things being equal.

01:02:57

Even if they're bad, perverse, awful preferences, why do you want to give them weight at all?
Because the the badness or or well, firstly, I think the idea of perverse is sort of, a difficult one
here. I mean, I'm not quite sure what that means, apparently. But in this case, you don't dispute
that it is a perverse preference, do you? I would not use that term.
01:03:13

I would You wouldn't really? Even in this case. I mean, well, if you're saying perverse, you mean
it's a perversion. Right? I wanna know what a perversion normally means something that is
contrary to what's normal.

01:03:24

I'm not at all sure actually that throughout human cultures and history it's abnormal to take
pleasure from animal suffering. I hope that you're right, but I have no great confidence. I have
no commitment to the idea that we're sort of so basically good that there's not something a cruel
sadistic streak in our nature. So, if it is in our nature, then I don't think you can justifiably say it's
perverse. Well, by normal, I wouldn't say empirically, sociologically, or historically familiar.

01:03:53

I wouldn't define normal that way. There might be certain perverse practices might be normal or
historically prevalent or familiar. Don't we want to what what I think the difference between us is
that you don't wanna judge the quality or the merits or the worth of those preferences. You just
wanna weigh them against the bad effects and hope that the bad effects will be powerful
enough to outweigh these preferences about which you don't really want to be judgmental. I
wanna judge those preferences.

01:04:28

I wanna criticize those preferences. And and you need to judge them by some standard other
than whether they conduce to maximal preference satisfaction overall. Yeah. Absolutely. And I
don't really There's no way to live or be.

01:04:41

But see, I don't see where that comes from, where that idea that this is somehow no way to live
or be actually comes from. I would want to know more about what's the basis for that judgment.
You need to have a foundation which I haven't yet seen. And if you're well, alright. May I I don't
know.

01:04:58
Are we going on to I'm not sure, whether the I can see some hands waving. Some people are
saying more. Some people are trying to get into the discussion. Alright. Could could I take up
one of the other?

01:05:08

I'll just take up one of the other, points. Back on the, forced sterilization, the traditional eugenics,
you you said, well, there were it wouldn't be enough and you're surely right about this, that it'd
be painless, the forced sterilization, because we also have to take into account that the victims
of the forced sterilization programs in the 30 30 plus American states that did this, there they
didn't want it, and so they were their preferences were overridden. And you pointed out, rightly,
there were abuses, there were racial biases in who was singled out for forced sterilization and
so on. If we accept the idea that what matters morally is to satisfy preferences overall and to
give equal consideration to preferences without judging the preference is is I wanna do, then
let's take the case even of the racially biased and motivated for sterilizations. Let's say that in
some cases, eugenics, even eugenic reasons, were just a cover, were just a, if you can
imagine, respectable fig leaf for sterilizing racial minorities.

6. Think Those Questions

01:06:39

And the the preferences being satisfied or that were motivating the policy were racist
preferences. Now if the victims were few enough, if the minority was small enough, and the
racist preferences were prevalent enough, and if your only standard for morality is satisfying
preferences overall, wouldn't you have to defend and justify morally a purely, unabashedly racist
program of forced sterilization if the preferences were distributed in that way? Well, see, I think
you have to consider how you can produce in the longer run a a better society, a society in
which everyone can live. Now, if there is a racial minority in that society and they're being
discriminated against and they're the victim of racial prejudice in various ways, I think you have
to combat that prejudice because you're never going to get to a state, which produces the
greatest possible satisfaction of the preferences of everyone concerned if you tolerate the racist
prejudices. So, but why why not?

01:08:00

What assures that? It's a small minority, let's say, and there are a great many people who harbor
the racist preferences. But, see, I think I think whereas What gives you that confidence that I
didn't hear you? I think the racist preferences are more malleable than the preferences of the
minority to be able to live a a reasonable life. I I think we've seen that in in recent American
history.

01:08:24

You know, I mean, if people would have said maybe, what, 60 years ago, people would have
said, well, you know, there's the preferences of all these white Southerners. They don't want to
sit down in the same restaurant next to a next to a black person. That's going to be a terrible
thing for them and they're going to hate that and, you know, so we have to sacrifice the
preferences of blacks. In fact, once legislation came in, they were no longer able to maintain,
segregation of that sort. People pretty rapidly adjusted and, you know, nobody thinks twice now,
you know, even in Atlanta or or Birmingham or wherever it might be, nobody thinks twice about
the fact that they're, in a racially integrated restaurant or bus or whatever it might be.

01:09:07

So, I think we can change those preferences and we've produced a better society by changing
them, whereas if we'd simply handed to them and said, look, there's more of more of the whites
than of the blacks and so that should you know, then then the situation would have continued.
We would have had that situation of failure to satisfy the preferences overall. But how do we
know which preferences we should pander to? Actually, even to pander to preferences seems to
presuppose that we can judge independently bad or perverse preferences. We we don't speak
about pandering to elevated preferences.

01:09:48

So even to speak about pandering to preferences presupposes, doesn't it, that you are illicitly on
my side, you judge preferences, which is why you're why you want to change those racist ones
in for independent reasons. And it just turns out that once we do manage to change them, well,
you can say, well, now there's an overall higher level of satisfaction than what than there was at
the time? Maybe, maybe not. How do you measure that? Then there would have been if you
had preserved Jim Crow laws?

01:10:21

Well, maybe, maybe not. That would depend on numbers in large part. Why when you say
pander to preferences, you disputed when I was talking about perverse preferences. Mhmm.
But to pander to preferences without knowing in the future how the calculus will turn out, and
you can't know for sure, then how can you even speak about pandering to preferences without
judging them?

01:10:48

Well, there there are preferences in this case, which said that that we don't give, we don't we
don't give other people, in our in our community the same sort of status, and we don't we don't
we want to keep them in a situation where, they are inferior to us. Now I think that that is
something which is going to go against the general trend that I talked about of equal
consideration of interest. It's conceivable, I agree, that the calculation could come out, but you
can't actually do anything that is going to improve the overall satisfaction. But I think that there
there are preferences that clearly show a prejudice which is not, well founded. You know, you
can you can look at the things that racists say about people of minority races and they generally
tend to be things that, are based on myths and false beliefs, and it's it's in that sense that I
would say you're you're pandering to them, you're accepting them at face value, where really
you should be criticising them because they are a blockage in the way of getting to a state that's
better for all.

01:12:02

I still I agree with you that's dependent on certain facts about human nature. And if, as I said
before in the case of the dogfighting, if the facts about human nature were different, you know,
maybe a racially stratified society would be conceivable, conceivably justified, but but the way
human beings are, that seems to be not the case. I well, let's see whether I can't tempt you to
share some of my intuitions, which is one way of dealing with these kinds of cases. I've I've read
of a sport. It's a variant of of polo that is, I think, played in Afghanistan, if I'm not mistaken,
where the people ride on horses.

01:12:40

Is it horses or camels? I don't know which. And they use a, what is it? It's a dead goat or
something to whack to, I don't know, whack the the polo ball or whatever it is. Now it's a dead I
think it's a goat.

01:12:57

Maybe someone knows who studies sociology about this. So, it's not that the goat is
experiencing pain, it's dead already. And yet there is something grim about that practice.
Wouldn't you agree? And and yet it's not that the interests of that goat are somehow not being
considered.

01:13:23

Let's assume it was killed painlessly before the match began. Well, I mean, it it's still a goat. It
still was a sentient being. Why was it killed? Was it killed to play this game?

01:13:34

You know, I think those questions are are still Well, but those aren't the only questions, Peter.
Look, we can up the ante. We no. Well, we can So be that We can up the ante. No.

01:13:45

Let's assume that the that the creature being used as the polo stick died of natural causes, and
let's assume it's not a goat. Let's assume it's a human being. But diet of natural causes causes
painlessly, not for the sake of this game, but it was available and, oh, the the, the let's say the
the family sold it for the purpose. So, so I I guess we we have cultural traditions of respect for
what we do with the bodies of our ancestors and families that this violates. I think probably it is
because it's a cultural tradition here.

01:14:25

I actually don't think that there's something intrinsically wrong. I mean, there's There's nothing
morally objectionable in that. Not intrinsic. I mean, it's this famous, you know, it's this famous
example, isn't it, in Herodotus where, where, he recounts how the the emperor Darius liked to
challenge people, and he he brought some people from one end of his empire, the Greeks, I
think, and said, how much would I have to pay you to eat the bodies of your dead ancestors?
And they said, don't speak of such a thing.

01:14:49

It's it's the most shocking thing you could imagine. I would you know; some would enable me to
do that. Then he brought in some Indians from the other end of his empire, and he said, how
much would I have to pay you to burn the bodies of your ancestors? And and they said, oh,
don't talk about such a horrendous thing to do. And they, of course, were in the custom of eating
the bodies of their ancestors.

01:15:09

I think, in either of those cultures, either of those practices was perfectly appropriate, which is a
point that Herodotus draws from it. I think in that area where actually there's no suffering
because they are dead and they don't care, and it's what the culture regards as appropriate, to
that extent, the custom custom is king. So, if, in fact, it is the custom in a certain culture that the
most honorable thing that can happen to your dead ancestor is that he'd be used as a polo stick.
It's the culture here to give some people in the audience an opportunity to make a comment or
ask a question. And, there's a student here who's been burning to ask you both a question.

01:15:49

Please. Okay. Did people hear the question? No. That that I'm suggesting that there is a proper
way or an appropriate way for human beings to treat, say, chickens that isn't fully captured by
the interests or the capacity for suffering.

01:16:07

How, apart from culturally determined practices, can we reason about that, rather than just citing
the convention? And it's a it's a great and difficult question. And I would answer in 2 ways. I
think there are 2 ways of going about reasoning about the appropriate or proper way, for human
beings to treat, either human beings, animals, or for that matter, the natural world. What we
need really to rethink, and these are the broader political stakes, are not just the consequences
of despoiling the environment and the natural world, the consequences for ourselves or for
future generations.

7. Conclusion

01:16:59

But also, if we really wanna generate an ethic for the environment and for the natural world, I
think we do have to think about reflect on the proper stance of human beings toward the natural
world, including animals, nonhuman animals, human beings, but for that matter, the natural
world as such. And to generate that kind of ethic, I think we have to reflect not just on interest,
but also on proper attitudes. Now how to reason about proper attitudes rather than just invoke
custom, here’s how they do it here. Here's how they did it back then. 2 ways.

01:17:41

1st, we can reason case by case and reason by analogy and see whether we share certain
moral intuitions about appropriate and inappropriate treatment, whether of the sequoia or of the
dead goat uses the polo stick case by case and explore, as we've just been doing here, whether
we actually do share certain moral intuitions. And then insofar as we do, what account can we
give of the basis of those intuitions? So, in the course of having our exchange, we were inviting
each other offering cases and counterexamples to see whether we could find a case where
there was a shared moral intuition and then whether we could agree on the reasons for that
intuition, or we encounter a case where we have different moral intuitions, or where we have the
same but give different accounts. That's one way in which moral reasoning about proper
attitudes or ways of treating the natural world can proceed. Case by case, exploring the reasons
and principles lying behind shared intuitions where we find them.

01:18:56

But you may also and this is the second way of answering that question. You might say, well, is
there some general approach, general way of thinking, not just case by case appealing to
intuitions, trying to sort out the moral base of those intuitions. And here I would say, I do think I
mean, lying behind the view I've been urging, there is a general principle, which is the meaning
of respect, what it is to respect a person or an animal or a creature or a being or for that matter,
nature, is to treat that creature or being in accordance with its nature. We do wrong when we
treat persons or animals or I would say sequoias or the earth itself in a way that is at odds with
their nature. Now this is a very difficult general principle to make out, not because there are
disagreements about how to apply it, that's true of all principles, but because it does invoke a
certain idea, a certain idea that, teleological idea, going back to Aristotle, that the the way to
think about ethics and proper ways of treating or standing vis a vis the natural world depends on
reasoning about the purpose or the function or the ends of, the natural world or the creatures
and beings within that world.

01:20:36

That's not an easy thing to do. We have to proceed case by case and so on. So that would be
the general answer I would give. Well, I think that's really interesting, that closing remark that
you made or the the point about dealing with things according to their nature, because I think it
does show, the the difference between us in in the kind of approach. And I have to say I'm a
little surprised by it and and puzzled because I actually thought that Aristotle's teleological view
of the universe was exploded by Darwin and that we don't think anymore that the universe has a
purpose, and therefore, we don't think the things in it have an overall purpose in the Aristotelian
sense, in which those of you who are at my early morning sessions, I put up this quote from
Aristotle about plants exist for the sake of man sorry, for the sake of the animals and the animals
exist for the sake of man.

01:21:33

And I think, you know, that was just a mistake. We understand now that these things came into
existence, as a result of a process that had no conscious purpose or direction. They evolved, in
different ways, and, those whose descendants managed to survive and reproduce, there are
many of them, and those that didn't aren't here. But there isn't a kind of moral purpose in nature.
We can certainly, you know, find value in some aspects of it and our own purposes.

01:22:09

But, I don't understand really how you would find a sort of moral valence out of the purpose of
nature there. Right. Alright. So, this is the beginning of maybe next year's colloquium, but
Darwin versus teleological accounts of nature. But I would just reply briefly as follows.

01:22:28

There is a certain Aristotelian idea that was exploded by Darwin, and that's the idea that it's
possible to read a purpose wholesale into nature as such, and that the way we glean the
purposes of things, plants, animals, human beings, the natural world, stones, everything, is to
study biology and to read out the essential purpose from nature through kind of biological
inquiry. That's the part that what that essentialism is what was overthrown by Darwin. I agree.
But I think it's a mistake to conclude from the rejection of that essentialist view of nature, The
teleological explanation and moral reasoning as such has been discredited. So, take, for
example, the discussion about designer children and parents and the relation of parents and
children, and whether the norm of unconditional love is the appropriate way that parents should
treat children.

01:23:37Now we could have an argument about that norm, whether it is the proper way of
characterizing the way parents should relate to children. And that argument would be a
teleological argument. It would be an argument about what good parents are, what parents are
for vis a vis their children. So, it would be teleological, not in the old fashioned pre–Darwinian
Aristotelian sense that we could just read out from nature or from biology the answer to that
question. The argument about the proper what it is to be a good parent, what parents are for,
would be a moral argument, and it would proceed by offering reasons, examples,
counterexamples.

01:24:25

It would involve moral reasoning, not just reading from nature. It'd be an argument about what is
the nature of the practice of parenting. How should it be understood? So, it would be teleological
moral reasoning, though it wouldn't just be saying there is some essence of parenthood that if
we study nature closely enough, we'll know. That is the part that's been overthrown.

01:24:50

But I wouldn't say that teleological reasoning as such has been overthrown in virtue of that. I'm
afraid that the hour is such that we should, hold professor Sandell to his suggestion. And since
we didn't get dissent from professor Singer, assume, his, implicit agreement. That is that we've
got to get both these people back again. We obviously have a lot more to say to you, and you
clearly have an enormous amount to say to us.

01:25:27

And we want to thank you very, very much for