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I've always been a little uneasy with the idea that we should assign rights (or personhood, or whatever) to animals in a graded way in proportion to their intel
by joeyo 16y ago
I've always been a little uneasy with the idea that we should assign rights (or personhood, or whatever) to animals in a graded way in proportion to their intelligence. It implies that humans should be deprived of those same rights when their intelligence doesn't meet some similar threshold.
- jpwagner 16y agoIsn't a threshold defined by one line? I guess you are arguing that implementing a threshold later evolves into a continuous gradient. I disagree.
- alanh 16y agoEmotional capacity is another axis that matters a lot. But we do deprive people of rights if they are really lacking, mentally. We put crazies in madhouses (are bad at doing so accurately). We deny minors most rights of self-determination (more than strictly based on intelligence, but the idea’s the same). Heck, to sign your will, you have to represent that your noggin isn’t fried. Edit (response to pyre): I never said we treat unintelligent people the same way we do animals. Psychologically we don’t even like to disrespect dead people (intelligence: 0). I’m just saying that intelligence does affect the rights we afford other humans.
- pyre 16y agoSo, if you are deemed unfit to make decisions for yourself, can we send you to the slaughterhouse to end up in a shrink-wrapped package at a supermarket? Taking away your ability to sign a will is a lot different than the way we treat animals/non-humans.
- joeyo 16y agoI absolutely agree that emotional processing is an important component of intelligence. But I'm still not convinced that it's a good way of ascribing rights. Regarding your examples: we certainly do act in the interests of the insane, mentally disabled and children. But that is not because they have fewer rights or have less personhood. We act for them because and in defense of their rights. We do this because they are unable to protect themselves and need guardians to defend them from abuses to their dignity, bodily integrity, etc.
- anigbrowl 16y agoUp to a point. You can't vote on behalf of an incompetent relative, for example. Some rights are not delegable.
- LaGrange 16y agoI think the real problem is that once you start looking at animals as intelligent (in some capacity) and capable of suffering (in some capacity) every decision similar to "ok, now lets eat it" start to seem horrendous. But we still need to eat them, because not everyone can be a vegetarian. The "intelligence threshold" or "emotional threshold" are imperfect, but they're the best we came up until now. They have clear imperfections and consequences that we don't want, but if we keep in mind that those are stop gaps and not real solutions, we shouldn't try to follow "logical consequences" that seem insane. We should try to find better solutions. I'm all for vat-grown meat. I'd never eat an animal again.