Kant Animal Captivity

Philosophers supporting the use of Animal Captivity

I will now move onto arguments supporting the use of animal captivity. I am starting with Kant, who provides a strong argument for animal captivity. Kantian Ethics holds the view that we do not have any direct ethical duties to non-human animals. We only owe ethical duties to rational beings, and non-human animals are not included in this group. The value humanity comes from our capacity to be governed by autonomous, rational choices. Since non-human cannot be part of this, Kant believes we can do as we please with them. This can be demonstrated in Kant’s ‘Political Writings’ when he argues,

When [man] first said to the sheep, ‘the pelt which you wear was given to you by nature not for your

own use, but for mine’ and took it from the sheep to wear it himself, he became aware of a prerogative which…he enjoyed over all the animals; and he now no longer regarded them as fellow creatures, but as means and instruments to be used at will for the attainment of whatever ends he pleased. (Kant, 1991, p.225)
Here, Kant provides an example of his views on non-human animals.

For Kant, we can use non-human animals as we desire, because we are rational beings who are superior to them. Kantian Ethics encourages the view that we should not treat human beings as ends in themselves, ‘act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of another, always at the same time as an end and never simply as a means.’ (Kant, 2012, p.41) However, since non-human animals do not apply to this, Kant believes we have the right to treat them as ends and so we can keep them captive. Kant believes that the only reason we should avoid being cruel to animals is that in doing so we might develop cruel habits that we would inflict on other people. Therefore, it is for our own benefit rather than for the welfare of the animal itself. This proves that for Kant, non-human animals do not possess any rights. This associates with the view that humans have little, if any duty to non-human animals because humans are more important. Therefore, if keeping animals in zoos serves any educational or entertainment purposes, which many claims it does, we can ethically do it according to

Kant.

Another supporter of animal captivity is Aristotle, who wrote about zoology and ethics in a number of different essays, such as, ‘The History of Animals.’ For Aristotle, there are fixed categories of beings and these categories are hierarchically ordered to show which species is the most important, down to the least. This system later became known as the ‘Great Chain of Being.’ Everything in the universe has a specific rank in order of their perceived importance. This importance is based on spiritual nature. The more spirit one has, the more important they are. Therefore the highest on the chain is God, followed by angels, humans, animals, plants then non-living objects. This consequently means that for Aristotle, human beings are superior to non-human animals and we therefore have the right to keep them captive and do as we please with them. As stated by Linda Kalof and Amy Fitzgerald in their book ‘The Animals Reader: The Essential Classic and Contemporary Writings’,
The belief that human beings have dominion over “lower” animals is a pernicious consequence of this conceptualization, exaggerating the distance between humans and other animals and this minimizing our ethical obligation to them. (Kalof & Fitzgerald, 2007, p.1)
Aristotle highlights the superiority of human beings to non-human animals and the lack of duty we have towards them. To due this, Aristotle makes a clear distinction between human beings and non-human animals, showing the two are in no way equal and how this can never be possible. It seems like this is largely to do with the fact that Aristotle believes that non-human animals are not rational beings and consequently will always be less worthy than rational beings. Therefore, in terms of Aristotle’s thinking, keeping animals captive is a completely acceptable thing for human beings to do.

Furthermore, Professor Carl Cohen stands for the view that animals should be held in captivity. Cohen opposes the views of Regan and animal rights that we have previously just read and debates with him on the topic. Cohen agues that animals have no rights at all and that we are mistaken to believe they do. He debates that ‘animals cannot be the bearers of rights because the concept of right is essentially human; it is rooted in the human moral world and has force and applicability only within that world.’ (Cohen & Regan, 2001, p.30) Additionally, for Cohen this results in non-human animals lacking autonomy, as only those who have rights have the ability to make moral claims. Consequently, rights do not exist within the non-human animal world as they are not applicable and therefore animals can be held captive by human beings, as this would not be able to violate their rights. Cohen also states it is ‘morally right to use animals in service of human needs where the great value of such has been proved.’ (Cohen & Regan, 2001, p.226) This idea is similar to those recently provided by Kant. For Cohen, since keeping animals captive shows value to human beings in terms of education and entertainment, this is enough justification to keep animals captive as they are proving a useful service to human beings.

In addition, Ernest Partridge can also be used as an argument for the use of animal captivity due to his attack of Singer and Regan, whose arguments I have both used above.

In his essay ‘Three Wrong Leads in a Search for an Environmental Ethic: Tom Regan on Animal Rights, Inherent Values, and Deep Ecology’, Partridge claims that Singer and Regan both miss a significant element to the nature of rights: they only have a moral basis, not a biological basis. For Partridge, how alike human beings and other animals are in terms of biology is irrelevant. What matters instead is that other animals show no capacities of rationality or self-conscious, which is what makes us moral. For Partridge, this consequently excludes other animals from being rights

holders:
It does follow from this analysis that nonhumans possess no rights whatsoever. Several philosophers have argued that sentient animals have the right to humane treatment. However, no animals can be said to have such ‘person-rights’ as ‘freedom of worship’, or a ‘right to a college education’, simply because they have no capacity to exercise such rights. (Partridge, 1984, p.62)
Here, Partridge goes to the extreme of not only saying animals have no rights, but also that they do not even deserve humane treatment due to the fact they do not have the mental capacity to recognise or use such rights. This seems to suggest that for Partridge it is okay to make animals suffer. Therefore, this implies that since animals have no rights in Partridge’s eyes, we can do as we please with them. Due to this, keeping animals captive is accordingly not an issue.