This entertaining and well-informed book is a must for anyone who
has an interest in animal rights. Vegetarians who want to be able to justify
their decision to give up meat, or psychologists who are worried about the
legitimacy of their research on rats, will find food for thought in Rowlands’
book.

The greatest merit of this book is the extreme clarity of style. The
accessibility of the text reflects Rowlands’ interest in reaching a wide
audience and addressing both theoretical and practical problems. Well-known
philosophical arguments for and against animal rights are paraphrased in simple
language and illustrated with vivid examples. When technical terms are
required, their origin and use are carefully explained. This constant effort to
express ideas clearly allows Rowlands to discuss complex issues in applied
ethics without reserving the pleasure of the reading to philosophers alone.

Rowlands’ arguments are not just clearly expressed, they are also sophisticated.
He advances hypotheses, examines them in detail and considers possible
counterexamples and objections. His analysis starts from the claim that animals
are moral patients, that is, they deserve
moral consideration. This does not mean that they are moral agents, that is, morally responsible for
their actions. Animals deserve moral consideration because of their capacity to
feel pain and to suffer, the capacity to have beliefs and desires and the
capacity to engage in practical reasoning. As Rowlands points out, there is
good behavioural, physiological and evolutionary evidence to support the thesis
that animals are conscious. Because of the capacities they possess, animals
have interests: for instance, in a
life without pain.

If (at least some) animals have a mental life, then they are
entitled to enter what Rowlands call ‘the Moral Club’, that is, we are under
the obligation to consider the impact of our actions on them. Rowlands’ cleverest
move consists in deriving some conclusions about what we can or cannot do to
animals from principles that we already accept. These principles are the
principle of equality, according to which we are all created as equal, and the
principle of desert, according to which we should not be praised or blamed for
things that are beyond our control.

Using this method, Rowlands establishes that in our society animals are
treated most unjustly, and goes on to argue that it is wrong to kill animals
for food, to perform animal testing, to hunt and to keep zoological gardens. These
practices are unjustified, because they cause great suffering for animals without
being really beneficial to us. Rowlands then examines several ways in which we
can attempt to change our society by engaging in animal rights activism.
Finally, he reviews the disastrous consequences that our mistreatment of
animals has brought about, for example the spreading of diseases and the damage
to the environment.

There are two ways in which people can disagree with Rowlands and
avoid inconsistencies. One could question the way in which he applies the two
fundamental ethical principles of equality and desert in the case of animals,
or one could challenge some of his empirical claims. Let me introduce an
example. Rowlands argues that experimentation on animals for medical purposes
is objectionable on the ground that it is not useful. It is consistent with
Rowlands’ approach to claim that, given that medical research concerns our
vital interests, it would be justified to an extent to cause some suffering to
animals to preserve or restore the health of humans. However, as it happens,
the effect of most testing on animals is not really informative, given the relevance
of major physiological differences between the animals used for testing and us.
Rowlands supports his claim with very interesting data that reveal how some
drugs that are not harmful to animals have caused many human deaths. It is open
to Rowlands’ critics to challenge such data by providing evidence of the
usefulness of testing on animals in medical research. But if that fails, in
order to resist Rowlands’ conclusion, the only option is to attack his overall
strategy. I do not envy those who have to embark on the task of finding fault
with his rigorous philosophical argumentation.

© 2002 Lisa Bortolotti

Lisa Bortolotti studied philosophy
in Bologna (Italy), London and Oxford (UK) before starting her PhD at the Australian
National University in Canberra. Her main interests are in philosophy of mind,
philosophy of psychology, rationality, mental illness and animal cognition.

Categories: Ethics, Philosophical