Animal Sentience and Equal Consideration of Interests

In his article entitled “Animal Liberation,” Peter Singer suggests that while animals do not have all of the exact same rights as humans, they do have an equal right to the consideration of their interests. This idea comes from the fact that animals are capable of suffering, and therefore have sentience which then follows that they have interests. Singer states “the limit to sentience...is the only defensible boundary of concern for interests of others” (807). By this, he means that the ability to feel is the only grounds for which rights should be assigned because all species of animals, including humans, have the ability, and therefore all animals have the right to not feel suffering and to instead feel pleasure.

Singer suggests that while everyone is created equal, not everyone has the exact same rights. For instance, while men and women are equal, the right of women to have an abortion does not mean men have the right to an abortion since they do not need have the ability to given birth. From this, it follows that while animals do not have the ability to comprehend rights, such as the right to vote, they do have rights. Singer states “Surely every sentient being is capable of leading a

life that is happier or less miserable than some alternate life…” (811). Hence, since both humans and animals have the ability to live a life with more pleasure and less pain, they have a right to a life with more pleasure and less pain. Therefore, all being have the right to equal considerations of their interests, whether it is to experience more pleasure and less pain, the right to an abortion or the right to vote. Each creature’s rights depend on their abilities which then lead to their interests.
On the other hand, Carl Cohen suggests in his article “The Case Against Animal Rights,” that animals do not have rights because they do not have the ability to understand the significance of rights.

Cohen proposes that rights are a claim that must be exercised, and since animals cannot exercise their rights they cannot have rights. Furthermore, Cohen suggests in order to have rights, “the holder of rights must have the capacity to comprehend rules of duty, governing all including themselves” and thus must have a “moral capacity” (817). Hence, it follows that animals cannot have rights since they lack a free moral judgment and are thus are unable to understand morality or laws that govern society. Therefore, Cohen believes rights can only be given to those able to claim

them.
Cohen makes the claim that Singer’s argument is incorrect since right cannot be given any solely on the basis of sentience. Rather, Cohen suggests that rights can only be given to morally autonomous choosers, which means only humans can have rights since they are the only species that can understand laws and morals and choose to act morally. However, the flaw in this argument lies in the fact that there are some humans that cannot be morally autonomous choosers, such as people with Alzheimer's, babies or the mentally insane. This is due to the fact that these people in particular do not have a moral capacity since they lack the ability to reason or use logic. Since Cohen believes only humans can have rights, it can be inferred that he is implying that these types of people are not human, which is an incorrect statement. Therefore, the ability for moral capacity is not a fair judgment to bestow rights onto individuals.
Furthermore, Singer suggests that the experimental use of animals must be taken on a case-by case basis. Singer proposes that for each case, we must determine if the experiment is justified and the experiment is not being a speciesist. Singer states, “If the experimenter is not prepared to use an orphaned human infant, then his readiness to use nonhumans is simple discrimination” (809). By this, Singer is suggesting that if the experimenter is not willing to use a human being to test a study then by using a non-human animal, they are inflicting pain wrongly onto a creature that has just as must sentience.
On the contrary, while Cohen admits to believing animals “...ought not to be made to suffer needlessly,” he suggests that one weight the outcome of experimentation to the pain felt by the animals involved (818). That said, Cohen suggests that experiments on animals are not only necessary for the reduction of pain in humans, but the pain felt by the animals involved in the experiments can be balanced out by the the reduction of pain in humans from the research findings. Hence, since animals cannot have rights and humans do, it is important to just animal research on the beneficial outcomes that are observed from the experiment, and in order to ensure animals do not suffer needlessly, the reduction of pain obtained from the results of the research must outweigh the pain experienced by the animals.
In conclusion, Singer has the better argument because he suggest that rights given to all creatures that are capable of having interests, which comes from the ability to have feelings. This is different from Cohen’s suggestion because this allows all humans to have rights, even if they are not entirely equal rights. Cohen suggests that only humans with moral capacities are allocated rights, which is controversial because this suggests babies or the mentally impaired do not have rights, even though every human has the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness according to the Declaration of Independence of the United States. That said, all human beings are have the right to live and therefore, even babies and the mentally impaired have the right to live. Therefore, rights cannot be allocated simply on the basis of having a moral capacity. Hence, since all humans have rights, even those who lack a moral capacity, rights must not be based on morals, meaning Singer has a more compelling argument in that rights must be based on sentience, which then leads to animals having rights.