Katie Prosser

Several candidate species for de-extinction are extinct predator species. Jeff McMahan argues that we have reason to eliminate predator animals because of the suffering they cause to prey animals. I argue that if we accept McMahan’s argument, we have a parallel argument opposing the creation of extinct predator animals. The non-identity problem and countervailing reasons in favor of creating animals of extinct predator species affect the overall strength of this argument. I nevertheless conclude that the creation of animals of extinct predator species is only permissible if we can mitigate the harms they would otherwise cause once they come to exist.