Ethical arguments that support intentional animal killing
Abstrak
Killing animals is a ubiquitous human activity consistent with our predatory and competitive ecological roles within the global food web. However, this reality does not automatically justify the moral permissibility of the various ways and reasons why humans kill animals – additional ethical arguments are required. Multiple ethical theories or frameworks provide guidance on this subject, and here we explore the permissibility of intentional animal killing within (1) consequentialism, (2) natural law or deontology, (3) religious ethics or divine command theory, (4) virtue ethics, (5) care ethics, (6) contractarianism or social contract theory, (7) ethical particularism, and (8) environmental ethics. These frameworks are most often used to argue that intentional animal killing is morally impermissible, bad, incorrect, or wrong, yet here we show that these same ethical frameworks can be used to argue that many forms of intentional animal killing are morally permissible, good, correct, or right. Each of these ethical frameworks support constrained positions where intentional animal killing is morally permissible in a variety of common contexts, and we further address and dispel typical ethical objections to this view. Given the demonstrably widespread and consistent ways that intentional animal killing can be ethically supported across multiple frameworks, we show that it is incorrect to label such killing as categorically unethical. We encourage deeper consideration of the many ethical arguments that support intentional animal killing and the contexts in which they apply.
Penulis (52)
Benjamin L. Allen
Benjamin L. Allen
Andrew J. Abraham
Robert Arlinghaus
Robert Arlinghaus
Jerrold L. Belant
Daniel T. Blumstein
Christopher Bobier
Michael J. Bodenchuk
Marcus Clauss
Stuart J. Dawson
Stuart J. Dawson
Stuart W. G. Derbyshire
Sam M. Ferreira
Sam M. Ferreira
Peter J. S. Fleming
Peter J. S. Fleming
Tim Forssman
Vanessa Gorecki
Christian Gortázar
Andrea S. Griffin
Jordan O. Hampton
Jordan O. Hampton
Peter M. Haswell
Graham I. H. Kerley
Christopher H. Lean
Christopher H. Lean
Frédéric Leroy
John D. C. Linnell
John D. C. Linnell
Kate Lynch
Kate Lynch
Celesté Maré
Haemish Melville
Liaan Minnie
Liaan Minnie
Yoshan Moodley
Danial Nayeri
M. Justin O’Riain
Dan Parker
Stéphanie Périquet-Pearce
Gilbert Proulx
Frans G. T. Radloff
Alexander Schwab
Sarah-Anne Jeanetta Selier
Sarah-Anne Jeanetta Selier
Samuel Shephard
Michael J. Somers
T. Adam Van Wart
Kurt C. Vercauteren
Erica von Essen
Erica von Essen
Akses Cepat
- Tahun Terbit
- 2025
- Sumber Database
- DOAJ
- DOI
- 10.3389/fevo.2025.1684894
- Akses
- Open Access ✓