Animals and Ethics in the History of Modern Philosophy

Abstract

This article examines the history of early modern philosophy, principally in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It explains why early modern philosophers and jurists seldom reflected deeply about animal life and why the arrival of a decent theory of animal rights in early modern philosophy was a remarkable development. It begins with the general background of rights theory as it was developing in political philosophy. It uses as an instructive example eighteenth-century experimentalist Robert Boyle and his thesis that there is a duty to experiment on animals. It describes the steady movement toward both a rejection of Boyle's view and toward the view that we have moral duties to animals. It argues that this historical trend led to the “invention” of animal rights at the hands of Scottish moral philosopher Francis Hutcheson.

How Should We Categorize Approaches to the History of Political Thought?

“…Also useful is Don Garrett's typology of contextualization (which he treats as an end in its own right), interpretation (recovering authors' intended meanings and seeing how ideas fit 13 together), evaluation (seeing how well texts work), and application (to other philosophical problems). 39 This is superior to the other categorizations above, especially by including evaluation. However, contextualization need not be an end in its own right: as discussed above and below, it is also a means to recovering authors' meanings, beliefs and motivations.…”

Animals in the study of public administration

“…One place to look for interesting topics is in Peter Singer's acclaimed 1975 book (reissued in Singer, 2009)— Animal Liberation: The Definitive Classic of the Animal Movement . A consequential subject is whether animals should have a moral standing in legal and regulatory decision‐making (Garrett, 2011). Most textbooks have a section on environmental policy, which could include a discussion of the Anthropocene, the sixth major species extinction.…”

The Virtue of Consistency

“…9–10). A very elucidating discussion of the evolution of these distinctions and approaches is found in Garrett (2004), which seeks in part to offer a history of the philosophy of the history of Philosophy.…”

“…9–10). A very elucidating discussion of the evolution of these distinctions and approaches is found in Garrett (2004), which seeks in part to offer a history of the philosophy of the history of Philosophy. More recently, Lærke (2013a, p. 1) raises a similar distinction between ‘appropriationist’ and ‘contextualist’ approaches to Philosophy's history. The former studies the history of Philosophy as a source of ideas in service of contemporary philosophy while the latter studies the history of Philosophy for its own sake and on its own terms, with little concern for making a positive contribution to current philosophy.…”