John Hadley

In this chapter I outline a key element of animal neopragmatism: relational hedonism. Relational hedonism is a psychological-cum-anthropological thesis about public concern for pain. The central claim is that to show concern for the pain of an individual is to betray concern for them in a much broader sense. The basic idea is that concern for pain is concern for more than pain. This concern can be variously expressed as concern for life, well-being, intrinsic value, inherent value, or simply concern for the individual for their own sake. The theory of relational hedonism draws upon Helm’s theory of love and friendship. In line with Helm’s view, to show concern for a particular aspect of a person’s life is to show concern for them in a holistic sense. I adapt Helm’s theory to explain the broad-based conception of welfare that the attitudes-to-animals data suggests is the folk’s conception of welfare.

In this chapter I present two theories that stand as putative solutions to the problems of welfare. The two theories are experiential pluralism and expressivism. Experiential pluralism is the view that there are feelings other than pleasure and pain that can impact upon the welfare of an individual. Pluralists can avoid the charge of changing the subject by claiming their view is aligned with the feelings-centred welfare orthodoxy by remaining experientially-focused. Expressivism is a theory of moral language use. In line with expressivism, ethical claims are analysed as simply the expression of the emotions or attitudes of the speaker. Expressivists avoid the charge of changing the subject because, in line with expressionism, when a person uses rights-based terms such as dignity and respect, they are not singling out for ethical attention a consideration that is outside the scope of the welfare orthodoxy.

In this chapter, I argue that orthodox analytic animal rights theory faces two metalevel problems: the equivocation problem and the placement problem. The equivocation problem is that the basic animal rights argument commits a fallacy of equivocation. Following Darwin, it is a truism that human and animal mental states differ by degree. While the degree of difference may not have ethical implications, I argue it must have semantic implications for the meaning of the term sentience in the premises of the basic argument for animal rights. The placement problem is a well-known problem in analytic metaphysics that is passed over by orthodox animal rights theorists. If philosophical realism and scientific naturalism are framing assumptions of orthodox animal rights theory, then it is difficult to find a place for the signature concept of animal rights theory, inherent value, in a naturalistic account of the world. The basic criticism is that, at the metaphysical level, animal rights theory has a similar structure to religious ethical theories.

In this chapter I reiterate the main elements of animal neopragmatism and discuss some of the central themes of the book. The main elements of animal neopragmatism are relational hedonism and expressivism. The former is a theory of folk concern for pain and a related claim about the proper focus of welfare policy; the latter is a thesis about the function of nonhedonistic or rights-based vocabulary. The central themes of the book are (1) the democratic legitimacy of the prevailing welfare paradigm can be called into question (2) fundamental metaphysical, epistemological, metaphilosophical and linguistic questions have serious implications for debates about human-animal relations (3) orthodox animal rights theory faces two serious problems (4) neopragmatism offers scope for reconciling existing ideas about welfare with more progressive ideas; in other words, neopragmatism is a novel way of moving from welfare to rights.

In this chapter I explain the political problem of welfare. There is a question mark hanging over the democratic legitimacy of the prevailing policy conception of welfare. The political problem of welfare arises because of a key difference between the policy conception of welfare and the folk conception of welfare. The policy conception is that welfare is all about feelings, specifically, measurable suffering; the folk conception is that welfare is about more than feelings. The folk view encompasses nonhedonistic considerations such as dignity, respect, and naturalness. I explain the development of the policy conception and identify its origins in animal welfare science and the theory of value known as hedonism. I present a survey of the attitudes-to-animals literature as support for the claim that the folk view of welfare is broad-based.

In this chapter, I address two objections to animal neopragmatism: the anything goes objection and the no practical difference objection. The anything goes objection is in response to pragmatism’s signature rejection of philosophical realism and the correspondence theory of truth. The claim is that neopragmatism entails that there are no epistemic standards against which to evaluate rival claims in public deliberation about animal related issues. In response, I point out how a Peircean view of truth and a warranted assertibility theory of justification are compatible with neopragmatism. The no practical difference objection is that because neopragmatism preserves the vocabulary of welfare and rights, debate about animal protection will proceed in familiar terms in the usual ways. In response to this objection I stress that, consistent with its pragmatic inheritance, neopragmatism is an ameliorative theory. To conclude, I discuss the work of institutional animal ethics committees to illustrate the practical implications of neopragmatism. The inclusion of consensus or resonance in the neopragmatic theory of deliberation generates a hypothetical prudential obligation on the part of deliberators to be cognizant of the motivations of their fellow community of inquiry members.

In this chapter I explain the philosophical problem of welfare. The philosophical problem of welfare is also known as the changing the subject problem. The problem arises as a consequence of the background framing assumptions operative on all sides in the contemporary animal ethics debate. The assumptions are metaphilosophical, metaphysical and epistemological. The most important framing assumption is philosophical realism and its attendant representational view of language. In line with realism, questions have once and for all answers and conceptual definitions are set in stone. The result is that any attempt to broaden the concept of welfare beyond the feelings-focused orthodoxy to encompass nonhedonistic considerations can be fairly accused of changing the subject.

In this chapter I explain the main elements of animal neopragmatism and the theoretical motivations for it. Neopragmatism has both a negative case and a positive case supporting it. The negative case is the critique of orthodox animal rights theory in Chapter 6 and the familiar pragmatist arguments against philosophical realism. The positive case is the theory of relational hedonism in Chapter 4 and the expressivist theory of rights-based vocabulary in Chapter 5. The chief virtue of neopragmatism is that it affords a democratic theory of animal welfare by aligning the specialist or policy conceptions of welfare with the folk or layperson conception of welfare, without falling prey to the problems that beleaguer orthodox animal rights theory. When the usage of terms such as dignity and respect is understood in line with an anti-representational theory of language such as expressivism, there is no sense in which the speakers can be accused of shifting debate about animal protection from the familiar welfare paradigm to an unfamiliar rights-based paradigm.

In this paper I examine the ethics of street photography. I firstly discuss the close-up ‘in-your-face’ style street photography made famous by American photographer, Bruce Gilden. In close-up street photography, the proximity of the camera to the subject and the element of surprise work in tandem to produce a striking and evocative picture. Close-up street photography is shown to be ethically contentious on wellbeing-related and autonomy-related grounds. I next examine the more orthodox ‘respectable distance’ kind of street photography. In orthodox street photography, the photographer positions the camera some distance away from a nonconsenting subject that may or may not be aware a picture is to be taken. The main ethical problem with this form of street photography relates to the subject’s vanity and sense of self. When street photographers produce and publish images without the consent of subjects, they express their own creative freedom at the expense of the subject’s right to editorial control. I discuss the scope and potentially demanding practical implications of a right to editorial control. To conclude, I offer a workable solution to the ethical dilemma facing street photographers and discuss the implications of smart phones and photo-sharing social media platforms.

In this paper I introduce the ‘changing the subject’ problem. When proponents of animal protection use terms such as dignity and respect they can be fairly accused of shifting debate from welfare to rights because the terms purportedly refer to properties and values that are logically distinct from the capacity to suffer and the moral significance of causing animals pain. To avoid this problem and ensure that debate proceeds in the familiar terms of the established welfare paradigm, I present an expressivist analysis of animal rights vocabulary. When terms such as dignity and respect are understood in line with the theory of moral language use known as expressivism, proponents of animal protection that use these terms can escape the charge of changing the subject. Drawing upon Helm’s theory of love, I show how the usage of rights vocabulary can be respectable way for people to register their concern for the welfare of animals, even at times when it is unlikely that the animals concerned are suffering. Tying rights vocabulary to welfare via expressivism aligns the aims of animal rights with welfare without the theoretical problems associated with attempts to ‘reduce’ dignity or respect to natural behaviour or inherent value.

Libertarians concede that non-autonomous sentient beings pose a problem for their theory. But, while they acknowledge that libertarianism denies non-autonomous sentient beings basic moral rights, libertarians have overlooked how their theory also denies non-autonomous sentient beings basic moral powers. In this article, I show how the libertarian entitlement theory of justice, specifically, the theory for the original acquisition of holdings, denies non-autonomous sentient beings the moral power to originally acquire or make property. Attempts to avoid this problem by appealing to interests or preference autonomy are likely to be unsuccessful.

In this paper we make an argument for limiting veterinary expenditure on companion animals. The argument combines two principles: the obligation to give and the self-consciousness requirement. In line with the former, we ought to give money to organisations helping to alleviate preventable suffering and death in developing countries; the latter states that it is only intrinsically wrong to painlessly kill an individual that is self-conscious. Combined, the two principles inform an argument along the following lines: rather than spending inordinate amounts of money on veterinary care when a companion animal is sick or injured, it is better to give the money to an aid organisation and painlessly kill the animal.

In “Do Animals have an Interest in Liberty?” Alasdair Cochrane brings some much needed attention to the ethics of animal confinement (2009a). Of particular significance is the question of whether confinement in itself is bad for nonhuman animal (hereafter, animal) well-being. If confinement conditions cause animals to suffer or frustrate their preferences it is safe to assume that liberty or freedom (following Cochrane, I use the terms interchangeably) would be instrumentally good for them. But, what about seemingly benign conditions of confinement in which animals are not suffering or having their preferences frustrated? Is confinement in such cases bad for their well-being? In other words, do animals have an ..

Recent social science research indicates that animal rights philosophy plays the functional role of a religion in the lives of the most committed animal rights advocates. In this paper, I apply the functional religion thesis to the recent debate over the place of direct action animal rights advocacy in democratic theory. I outline the usefulness of the functional religion thesis and explain its implications for theorists that call for deliberative theories to be more inclusive of coercive forms of activism.

Abstract   Drawing upon evolutionary theory and the work of Daniel Dennett and Nicholas Agar, I offer an argument for broadening discussion of the ethics of disenhancement beyond animal welfare concerns to a consideration of animal “biopreferences”. Short of rendering animals completely unconscious or decerebrate, it is reasonable to suggest that disenhanced animals will continue to have some preferences. To the extent that these preferences can be understood as what Agar refers to as “plausible naturalizations” for familiar moral concepts like beliefs and desires, then they can make moral claims on us and provide support for intuitive opposition to disenhancement. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Paper Pages 1-6 DOI 10.1007/s11569-012-0142-6 Authors John Hadley, School of Humanities and Communication Arts, University of Western Sydney, 7.G.10b, Bankstown Campus, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia Journal NanoEthics Online ISSN 1871-4765 Print ISSN 1871-4757

abstract Most moral philosophers accept that we have obligations to provide at least some aid and assistance to distant strangers in dire need. Philosophers who extend rights and obligations to nonhuman animals, however, have been less than explicit about whether we have any positive duties to free‐roaming or ‘wild’ animals. I argue our obligations to free‐roaming nonhuman animals in dire need are essentially no different to those we have to severely cognitively impaired distant strangers. I address three objections to the view that we have positive duties to free‐roaming nonhuman animals, and respond to the predation objection to animal rights

: J. Baird Callicott's claim to have unified environmentalism and animal liberation should be rejected by holists and liberationists. By making relations of intimacy necessary for moral considerability, Callicott excludes from the moral community nonhuman animals unable to engage in intimate relations due to the circumstances of their confinement. By failing to afford moral protection to animals in factory farms and research laboratories, Callicott's biosocial moral theory falls short of meeting a basic moral demand of liberationists. Moreover, were Callicott to include factory farm and research animals inside the moral community by affording them universal or non-communitarian rights, his theory would fall foul of environmentalists who seek to promote ecosystem stability and integrity via therapeutic hunting. If factory farm and research animals can have rights irrespective of their particular circumstances, then so can free- roaming animals from overabundant and exotic species

In this paper I bring together self-defense theory and animal rights theory. The extension of self-defense theory to animals poses a serious problem for proponents of animal rights. If, in line with orthodox self-defense theory, a person is a legitimate target for third-party self-defensive violence if they are responsible for a morally unjustified harm without an acceptable excuse; and if, in line with animal rights theory, people that consume animal products are responsible for unjustified harm to animals, then many millions, if not billions, of otherwise law abiding and decent people will be legitimate targets for third-party self-defense violence on behalf of animals. I call this problem: the multiple inappropriate targets problem for animal rights.

Recent proposals to improve public communication about animal-based biomedical research have been narrowly focused on reforming biomedical journal submission guidelines. My suggestion for communication reform is broader in scope reaching beyond the research community to healthcare communicators and ultimately the general public. The suggestion is for researchers to provide journalists and public relations practitioners with concise summaries of their ‘animal use data’. Animal use data is collected by researchers and intended for the public record but is rarely, if ever, given significant media exposure. By providing healthcare communicators with specific details about their animal use, researchers can play a role informing people about a matter of serious public interest and help to promote a more open and publicly accountable animal research culture.