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What Are Animal Rights For?

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How should we treat animals? The long-held belief that other animals exist solely for human use has undergone radical challenge in the past half century. How much further do we need to go to minimize, and even eliminate, animal suffering? Steve Cooke answers these questions.

Image courtesy of interviewee. March 15, 2024

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This video video discusses the ethical considerations surrounding the treatment of non-human animals and the concept of animal rights. It expresses a concern for the injustices faced by animals and advocates for a persuasive argument to recognize their rights, paralleling the moral foundations of human rights.

Key points include:
- Animal rights protect vital interests, such as the interest in not suffering and the interest in fulfilling social and survival needs.
- The welfare paradigm, which focuses on minimizing suffering, is contrasted with a rights-based approach that restricts practices harming animals for human benefits.
- Historical perspectives on how animals have been treated in law and philosophy are examined, tracing concepts of animal rights back to early thinkers like Pythagoras, Aristotle, and Rousseau.
- Modern discussions emphasize that rights are grounded in the capacity to feel and suffer, suggesting a moral obligation towards animals due to their sentience.
- This video video highlights the societal, cultural, and psychological challenges faced when advocating for animal rights, acknowledging that changing perceptions and practices requires overcoming deep-rooted beliefs and economic interests.
- It suggests that society can evolve towards recognizing animal rights, pointing to examples of recent legal advancements in recognizing non-human entities' rights.
- Trust is depicted as a crucial element in building ethical relationships between humans and animals, and a good society should embody values like openness, understanding, and care beyond mere legal obligations.

Overall, the text argues for a significant shift in how society views and interacts with non-human animals, advocating for their rights as a moral imperative.

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Here are five key points from the video about the ethical issues surrounding animal rights and the treatment of non-human animals:

1. **Injustice Against Non-Human Animals**: The speaker emphasizes a commitment to addressing ethical concerns related to the treatment of non-human animals, arguing that they often face injustice that needs to be acknowledged and acted upon.

2. **Difference Between Rights and Welfare**: The distinction between animal rights and welfare paradigms is highlighted. Animal rights advocate for the protection of fundamental interests of non-human animals, stating that their interests should not be subject to human preferences or decisions, whereas welfare focuses on minimizing harm while allowing some exploitation for human benefit.

3. **Philosophical Roots and Evolution of Animal Rights**: The speaker traces historical and philosophical perspectives on animal rights, discussing influences from figures like Pythagoras, Rousseau, and Bentham. The evolution of the concept of rights, including the recognition of animals as sentient beings deserving of moral consideration, is underscored.

4. **Impact of Agriculture on Animals and the Environment**: The video discusses how the current system of agricultural production has significant ethical and environmental implications. It mentions the negative effects of animal agriculture on climate change and biodiversity, advocating for a shift towards a more ethical and sustainable approach that respects animal rights and benefits the environment.

5. **Trust and Relationships with Non-Human Animals**: The importance of building trust between humans and non-human animals is stressed. A good society, according to the speaker, should foster positive relationships that enable mutual trust and prevent exploitation, suggesting that our interactions with animals reflect broader societal values and norms.

These key points encapsulate the ethical arguments for animal rights, the philosophical underpinnings, and the societal implications of changing our relationship with non-human animals.

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Here are some articles and resources that explore similar themes and topics surrounding animal rights, ethics, and the treatment of non-human animals:

1. **"The Case for Animal Rights" by Tom Regan** - This philosophical video argues for the inherent rights of animals, focusing on their capacity for suffering and the moral obligations humans have toward non-human animals.

2. **"Animal Liberation" by Peter Singer** - This influential book critiques practices such as factory farming and animal testing, advocating for an ethical approach based on the interests of animals and their capability to feel pain.

3. **"Animals and Ethics: A Brief History of the Animal Rights Movement"** - This article details the evolution of animal rights philosophy, discussing key historical figures and movements that have shaped contemporary views on animal ethics.

4. **"Sentience and Supramateriality: A New Framework for Animal Rights"** - This scholarly paper discusses how the concept of sentience should inform our ethical obligations to animals, emphasizing their right to live free from suffering.

5. **"Ethical Veganism and the Rights of Non-Human Animals"** - This article explores the ethical implications of veganism as a stance against the exploitation of animals, offering a perspective that aligns with the rights-based approach mentioned in your video.

6. **"Comparative Analysis of Animal Welfare Legislation Around the World"** - This comprehensive review examines how different countries legislate animal rights and welfare, highlighting recent advancements in recognizing non-human entities' rights.

7. **"The Psychological Barriers to Animal Rights Advocacy"** - This piece delves into the societal and cultural challenges faced by advocates of animal rights, discussing how entrenched beliefs affect public perception and policy.

8. **"Compassionate Conservation: Understanding the Intersection of Animal Rights and Conservation Efforts"** - This article discusses how efforts to protect wildlife can align with the principles of animal rights, emphasizing the importance of ethical relationships with all living beings.

9. **"The Role of Trust in Human-Animal Relationships"** - This exploration covers how building trust between humans and animals can lead to better ethical treatment and recognition of animal rights in society.

10. **"Historical Perspectives on Animal Philosophy: From Aristotle to Modern-Day Debates"** - This resource reviews philosophical arguments about animals throughout history, linking classical ideas to contemporary discussions on animal rights.

These articles and videos provide a broad perspective on the ethical, philosophical, and practical issues surrounding animal rights, reflecting the themes presented in the original video you referenced.

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There's two reasons.

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One, one is because I care about the ethical

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issues inside it.

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So I'm interested in responding to injustice,

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particularly injustice against non-human animals.

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Um, and so I want to try

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and persuade people to agree with me,

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that non-human animals are treated unjustly

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and we should do something about it.

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And also because I think a lot of the things

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that I discussed in the book are to do

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with the nature of rights.

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And when I speak to other people

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and in my own experience, right?

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Rights can be a, a, a tricky concept, to understand.

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People struggle with thinking about things like,

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where does the moral force for rights come from?

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What, what is a right?

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Uh, and I wanted to help explain that to people as well.

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So an animal rights. Uh, when we talk about animal rights,

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we're expressing the idea that the vital interest,

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the fundamental interests of non-human animals, those kind

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of things that animals can't live without.

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Those things ought to be protected.

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And if they're that important that they,

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they shouldn't be just left

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to people's preferences or choices.

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Um, when we talk about fundamental human rights,

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for example, and they're the, I think they're the same

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and they're grounded in the same, moral place.

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They, they come from our interests.

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Um, we don't think that those are the sorts of things

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that can be sacrificed, for the sake

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of promoting some common good.

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Um, a a a right protects you against being used

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to benefit other people.

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Um, and that's what I think animal rights do

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as well and ought to do.

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They ought to protect the vital interest,

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the interest in not suffering,

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and the interest perhaps in, continuing to live,

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perhaps in some cases, the interest

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that animals might have in particular habitats,

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if they really need them and they can't live without them,

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or for animals that are social beings that can't flourish

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and live without good quality relationships,

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then they ought to have rights

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that protect those from being interfered with

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and destroyed by, by us.

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So, welfare ISTs. Traditionally, when we think about animal,

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how we treat animals, we, we, we tend to think in a,

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in a, what we call a welfare as paradigm.

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We think that the interest of animals,

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their wellbeing ought to count for something.

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Um, and the welfares thinks that animal interest,

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animal welfare really matters.

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Um, and we can't just sacrifice it trivially.

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We can't do can't, you shouldn't be able

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to treat animals cruelly.

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Um, you should care about them in some way,

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but it stops short protecting them, right?

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If we can identify a good, some benefit

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that we can gain from causing a very serious harm, then

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that justifies calling, causing the harm.

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Now, the welfare position says we should always, like, try

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and avoid unnecessary harm.

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We should try and minimize harm.

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So we might use, if we're going to carry out a procedure

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that will benefit us, we have to do so in ways

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that will reduce the amount of suffering

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or minimize the number of lives lost or something like that.

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But ultimately, the benefits can be, you know,

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fairly wide ranging, from cosmetics to food,

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to medicine, to almost anything really,

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provided we take steps to not be excessive in the amount of,

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suffering we caused.

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And the rights position says, no, you, you simply,

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there are limits on what you can do.

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And when they're not in the interest of the animal itself,

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that's a very hard limit, on what you can do.

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And there's a lot of money to be made from agriculture.

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But I think not all of the things are

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sort of selfish reasons, right?

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People have good moral reasons for using non-human animals.

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You know, it, it, it's, it's about, medical research

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that might benefit lots of people, right?

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That's, that's a good moral reason.

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Now, I think the rights case

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of animals outweighs those, some of those reasons.

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Um, but they're not trivial. They are, they do count.

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Um, they're happiness.

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The kind of, that we get from using animals.

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Uh, people use them for food.

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They're important parts of our, culture,

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our day-to-day life.

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Those things matter. Uh, they want to count for something.

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Um, so I don't, yes, I'm not sure. It's just about money.

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Money does count, and it's

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useful for gaining good things too.

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Uh, so I'm not necessarily against people making money

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from, from things either.

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Um, but yeah, I think the rights position says

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what you can't do is you can, you can't use another

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and cause it to suffer,

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to suffer in order to benefit yourself.

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Um, that's, that's using, using a, a creature that has a,

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a value for its own sake, just as a tool.

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The first thing I would say is that I'm not a historian,

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so take everything I say about this

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with a, with a pinch of salt.

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Um, and I guess there's two

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things you could think about in this.

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One is to think about how we treat animals in law

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and in society.

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And then the other sort of question is, how's the idea

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of an animal, right, evolved?

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And that's the the question I've really focused on,

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because it has philosophical roots

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and I work in that sort of philosophical area.

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Um, and the idea that we should treat animals well

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for moral reasons and not be cruel to them.

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It's a really old one. It's found across cultures.

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Um, you can start seeing it.

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We don't have any of his original writings.

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Um, we sort of pieced together from, from other scholars,

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but in the work of Pythagoras, so that's nearly two

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and a half thousand, around two

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and a half thousand years ago.

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Um, and he says that a healthy diet,

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and that's one for him, that doesn't involve much

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in the way of animal products.

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I mean, he's not himself a vegetarian, we don't think.

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Um, but, and a, a diet of, of fruits and nuts

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and vegetables, leads to a pure soul

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and a peaceful character.

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And part of that is, is also based on the idea that

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he thinks that sometimes when we die, our souls then become,

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transfer into the bodies of animals

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or reborn into an animal body, so

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that if you consume an animal,

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sometimes you risk eating your neighbor, your friend,

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or a relative, and that's,

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that's gonna harm your soul, right?

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So you get this sort of idea that it damages your,

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your spirit, and you get similar ideas about how diet leads

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to peaceful characters and the connection with the soul

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and Jainism and Hinduism and Buddhism.

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Um, you see it in, the choral, that's a, a text

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by an indie, an Indian philosopher, to Valvar.

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And he has a little section in there on

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vegetarianism and meat eating.

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And he says that to eat meat makes you callous.

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It makes you violent. Um, a little bit later from,

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Pythagoras, you see works from the poet.

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And Oculus, again,

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this is someone we read about in other person's writings.

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There's a little bit in Aristotle,

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there's some writings from the Roman philosopher Cicero,

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and he makes a claim that looks a lot like the idea

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that animals are owed justice and rights

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and should be protected in law.

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Uh, and then a few hundred years, a few hundred years later,

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we're talking nearly 2000 years ago now, we have plu tar.

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And he writes several texts that have survived about

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how we ought to treat animals.

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He responds to an argument from stoic philosophers that,

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humans are superior, because they can reason

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and they can comply with moral principles

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and laws that animals can't.

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And, Pythagoras,

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or sorry, Plutarch, says, right,

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it's a bit like Darwin in this respect.

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He says, the differences between human

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and in animals are degree, not in kind,

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that we animals can actually reason a great

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deal more than we think they can.

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And, and there's a similar sort

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of argument from other thinkers

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around those sorts of times as well.

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Um, but primarily,

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and those, those, those writings really

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influence later scholars.

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Um, it's hard to say though,

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that they represent animal rights, very much.

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They're talking about the impact on us

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as individuals, right?

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Eating animals makes us crawl.

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Uh, it's a kind of ethics that's about our character.

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Um, and it's much harder to be definitively say,

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this is about how we should treat animals for their sakes.

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It's more about treating them well

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for our sakes a lot of the time.

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Um, and the closest we see is in the 11th century in

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a Syrian poet.

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He's a, a blind poet and philosopher known as Al Mai.

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He's a first recorded vegan.

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Um, and he, we know about his works.

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He, he writes a series of letters to a Shiite missionary,

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about how we should treat non-human animals.

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Um, and many of those arguments, they're sort of similar.

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Some of are about health, some of them are about purity

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of the soul and how it makes us relate to other people.

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Um, but some of them are, are direct claims about

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what we owe to animals for their own sakes.

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So he says, we shouldn't steal from bees

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and shouldn't take animals, milks

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because it counts as theft, and we are harming them,

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and they can feel and they can suffer.

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Now, he stops short of saying they have rights,

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and that's probably

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because he's worried about, making claims

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that will have him branded as an apostate,

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and put to death, for abandoning his,

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his, his faith.

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Um, so we, we can't definitively say

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that's an animal rights position, I don't think.

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Um, and it's not until we actually see clear articulations

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of natural rights, the idea of moral rights

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and natural rights for humans in,

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the mid 17th century, Hobbes grocers.

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Um, and then in the 18th century,

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we have the American Declaration of Independence.

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Men are created equal and endowed with unalienable

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and unalienable rights.

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We see the French declaration of the rights of man,

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the rights are sacred, and unalienable again.

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When we start seeing those, that's

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after that, we start seeing these articulations of rights,

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and i, i, for, for non-human animals as well.

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And I think quite interestingly, the first one

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that I think's really clear is in the work

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of Jean Jacque Rousseau, in the, he writes a,

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a text the discourses on, on social inequality,

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in 1755.

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And he says, animals, you know,

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they can't obey the law like humans can,

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but they do have the power, the capacity to feel,

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and they have natural rights,

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and humans have duties towards them

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because they're sentient,

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because they can feel they can suffer.

09:31.985 --> 09:35.165
Um, a little bit later on, you see another argument from,

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Mary Wolfsten Craft.

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She draws an analogy between the treatment of women

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and the treatment of animals,

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and says that we should bring up children

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to be vegetarian and be kind.

09:45.065 --> 09:47.805
Um, and then the really famous examples,

09:48.465 --> 09:50.285
you get Bentham Jeremy Bentham,

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famous utilitarian philosopher in 1789.

09:53.345 --> 09:56.365
He says, you know, it doesn't matter whether animals can

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reason or talk, it matters whether they can suffer.

09:59.265 --> 10:01.645
And then he draws an analogy with racism in that.

10:02.185 --> 10:05.205
Um, and then finally, we start seeing in the 19th century

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work from people like, Francis Power Cobb.

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Um, she writes an article in Phrases magazine, the Rights

10:11.605 --> 10:13.125
of Man and the Claims of Brutes.

10:13.545 --> 10:16.325
Um, we see the book of Henry Salt in 1866,

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big English social reformer,

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and they are campaigning against Vivi section,

10:20.665 --> 10:21.965
and they're making arguments

10:21.965 --> 10:24.525
that look a lot like we would be familiar with now as,

10:24.525 --> 10:25.765
as animal writes argument.

10:26.505 --> 10:29.005
And those are all tied up with,

10:29.075 --> 10:30.445
anti section campaigning,

10:30.445 --> 10:33.125
but also the Temperance Movement, working class movements,

10:33.125 --> 10:34.365
social reform movements.

10:34.865 --> 10:38.165
Um, and then finally, I guess the most recent in the sort

10:38.165 --> 10:40.645
of seventies we've, we, we finally see the sort of group

10:40.645 --> 10:42.445
of philosophers we're familiar with today.

10:42.985 --> 10:45.405
Uh, people like Roz Galovich,

10:46.105 --> 10:48.325
and then Peter Singer making arguments

10:48.325 --> 10:49.605
that animals are owe these kind

10:49.605 --> 10:52.085
of singer in the case is saying legal rights.

10:52.545 --> 10:54.725
Um, God Levivitch is saying sort of moral rights

10:54.725 --> 10:55.925
that justify legal rights.

10:56.185 --> 10:57.845
I'm fairly optimistic because, I mean,

10:57.885 --> 10:59.565
I think things have got better over time

10:59.825 --> 11:02.645
for non-human animals, and we are seeing lots

11:02.645 --> 11:05.085
of movement in this right sort of direction.

11:05.305 --> 11:07.005
Um, and you can still see this sort of

11:07.835 --> 11:10.005
very active campaigns going on at the moment.

11:10.145 --> 11:12.125
So there's the, the non-human rights project's,

11:12.125 --> 11:14.805
a very good example of this, the campaigning to try

11:14.805 --> 11:17.285
and give, non-human animals legal rights.

11:17.285 --> 11:19.125
And they've been fighting very hard on this for years

11:19.145 --> 11:22.565
to give non-human, what we call legal personhood think.

11:22.565 --> 11:23.965
I think they'll come onto that in a little bit.

11:24.225 --> 11:27.085
And we see, legislatures across the world starting

11:27.085 --> 11:31.765
to grant legal rights to non-human entities in ways

11:31.765 --> 11:32.765
that are quite unexpected.

11:32.945 --> 11:35.685
Um, so there are jurisdictions, in Canada

11:35.785 --> 11:38.885
and New Zealand where, mountains and rivers

11:38.885 --> 11:41.735
and parks have been granted rights,

11:41.755 --> 11:42.855
and it's a recognition

11:42.855 --> 11:44.215
that they have value for their own sake.

11:44.835 --> 11:47.495
And I think if we can grant rights to a river,

11:48.675 --> 11:50.855
it doesn't seem like an enormous leap to say

11:50.855 --> 11:52.775
that a chimpanzee or a dolphin or an

11:52.895 --> 11:54.085
Elephant can be a rights holder.

11:54.305 --> 11:56.765
Um, we've already made the really difficult imaginative

11:56.765 --> 11:59.645
jump, and now we have an easier one to get to.

11:59.785 --> 12:03.085
So, I'm, I'm confident that it will happen one day.

12:03.205 --> 12:04.725
I mean, I think we'll look back in the past

12:04.825 --> 12:06.245
and think, what on earth were we doing?

12:06.505 --> 12:07.965
The animal rights position is very radical.

12:08.305 --> 12:11.685
It requires us really changing our relationship

12:11.685 --> 12:14.085
with non-human animals and changing a lot of the practices

12:14.085 --> 12:15.445
that we, we take for granted.

12:15.825 --> 12:20.645
Um, so if you can't use another being in

12:20.645 --> 12:24.945
ways that cause it serious harm for the benefit of yourself

12:25.285 --> 12:28.585
or for the benefit of of others, then that's gonna rule out

12:29.415 --> 12:30.545
lots of the things that we do.

12:30.545 --> 12:34.305
It's gonna rule out mass industrialized farming.

12:34.845 --> 12:38.265
Uh, it's gonna rule out most farming, of,

12:38.285 --> 12:39.425
of animals right now.

12:39.455 --> 12:40.825
Farmers also grow plants.

12:41.065 --> 12:42.185
I have to remind people

12:42.185 --> 12:44.025
that it doesn't do away with farming, right?

12:44.255 --> 12:47.665
Farm farming, is heavily plant-based,

12:47.725 --> 12:49.985
and most of the plants that we actually grow are currently

12:49.985 --> 12:51.985
grown for the sake of non-human animals, right?

12:51.985 --> 12:54.585
They're used to like, we chop down the Amazon,

12:54.805 --> 12:56.425
to grow soy, to feed to animals,

12:56.925 --> 12:58.785
and then we blame vegans for eating soy.

12:59.285 --> 13:00.345
You know, it's gonna that. Uh,

13:00.365 --> 13:02.945
and if, if we did that, if we change that sort of structure

13:02.945 --> 13:04.825
of animal agriculture, it's gonna change the kind of things

13:04.825 --> 13:08.665
that we eat and kind of products that we use, a seat

13:08.685 --> 13:10.385
that's covered in leather.

13:11.085 --> 13:14.265
Um, you know, everything from our toilet paper

13:14.285 --> 13:15.705
to our bank notes, to our paint

13:15.705 --> 13:16.865
brushes are made out of animals.

13:16.865 --> 13:18.545
There's a lot of products that would change.

13:19.205 --> 13:21.705
Um, our sort of system of food

13:21.705 --> 13:23.305
and agriculture radically changes,

13:23.645 --> 13:25.665
but at the same time, that brings a lot

13:25.665 --> 13:26.945
of environmental benefits, right?

13:27.045 --> 13:29.265
The, the un amongst others have have said

13:29.265 --> 13:30.745
that if we don't change our diets,

13:30.875 --> 13:32.145
we're effectively all doomed.

13:32.645 --> 13:34.145
Um, because the impact of,

13:34.205 --> 13:36.945
of animal agriculture on the environment, is

13:37.665 --> 13:41.105
devastatingly bad, it contributes an enormous proportion

13:41.105 --> 13:43.705
of our climate change, gases.

13:44.135 --> 13:47.105
It's devastating to our forests and our rivers.

13:48.125 --> 13:50.385
So it, it, it's likely to improve our sort

13:50.385 --> 13:52.025
of general environment,

13:52.165 --> 13:53.585
but requires significant change

13:53.585 --> 13:54.945
to our sort of everyday living.

13:55.325 --> 13:57.705
Now, we might not notice it, right?

13:57.905 --> 14:00.985
I think, so we, a lot of the products that we eat,

14:01.205 --> 14:03.585
we take for granted, they can be

14:04.245 --> 14:06.715
copied quite convincingly, right?

14:06.835 --> 14:10.665
I, I mean, I've, I've been vegan for nearly 25 years,

14:10.685 --> 14:12.225
and I've seen an enormous change, right?

14:12.225 --> 14:13.305
When I started, there was nothing

14:13.305 --> 14:14.825
but the most awful products available.

14:15.985 --> 14:17.265
Nowadays, I can go to a supermarket

14:17.285 --> 14:20.345
and I can get things that look like a convincing sausage,

14:20.605 --> 14:24.545
or I can get a cream or an ice, any number of ice creams

14:24.645 --> 14:27.505
and cheeses and things that are, are vegan.

14:27.565 --> 14:29.225
So, I mean, I might not, I wouldn't notice, right?

14:29.225 --> 14:31.025
It doesn't, it doesn't not sacrifice for me, right?

14:31.085 --> 14:32.785
I'm eating the same sorts of things as my friends.

14:32.785 --> 14:34.625
They're just made out of different products, right?

14:35.045 --> 14:36.705
Um, I'm getting the same tastes

14:36.725 --> 14:40.025
and the same experience, so we might not notice it.

14:40.525 --> 14:43.985
Um, but we might see improvements to our environment.

14:44.125 --> 14:45.825
Um, it might change the kind of things

14:45.825 --> 14:47.145
that we would direct money in our

14:47.145 --> 14:48.665
scientific researcher, right?

14:48.765 --> 14:50.945
So we're gonna be directing more funding towards

14:51.325 --> 14:54.205
alternatives to animal testing would be a, a big area where,

14:54.705 --> 14:57.365
so we'd see more in, in, computer modeling,

14:58.385 --> 14:59.605
those kind of things.

15:00.345 --> 15:01.965
And then the kind of relationships that we have

15:01.965 --> 15:04.575
with non-human animals, like companion animals,

15:05.445 --> 15:07.735
they might change quite drastic drastically.

15:07.755 --> 15:11.175
So some thinkers think that we, we can't, we can't live

15:11.175 --> 15:13.615
with this idea of ownership of non-human animals.

15:13.645 --> 15:17.305
It's incompatible with having a good relationship

15:17.305 --> 15:19.025
that respects an animal's interests.

15:19.365 --> 15:21.585
And so we might have to remodel our, our relationships

15:21.585 --> 15:25.825
with other creatures on things like family,

15:26.665 --> 15:27.925
and guardianship models

15:28.145 --> 15:30.125
or friendship models or something like that.

15:30.825 --> 15:33.485
Um, so you'd have a lot more duties,

15:33.555 --> 15:35.325
towards the animals that you live with.

15:35.825 --> 15:38.985
Um, and they'd have a lot more protections,

15:39.205 --> 15:41.905
but you could still have those, you know, really important,

15:41.905 --> 15:44.705
wonderful relationships with that we now have with pets.

15:45.165 --> 15:46.185
Um, but they, they would,

15:46.285 --> 15:48.065
they'd be much more carefully protected.

15:49.575 --> 15:51.155
So yeah, quite, quite a lot of changes,

15:51.855 --> 15:55.115
but I don't think it requires sort of a radical reform

15:55.135 --> 15:57.195
of like, everything about our lives, right?

15:57.295 --> 16:00.275
So I mean, things like the traditions

16:00.275 --> 16:02.075
where we might eat a Turkey at Christmas, right?

16:02.695 --> 16:03.715
It, the coming together

16:03.785 --> 16:05.555
with the family is the thing that matters there.

16:06.415 --> 16:08.595
Um, the celebration is the thing that matters.

16:08.695 --> 16:11.595
And if you've got a product that looks different

16:12.515 --> 16:14.775
in the middle, but it's still a celebratory meal,

16:15.075 --> 16:17.655
you're keeping the essence of that tradition going.

16:17.935 --> 16:19.535
I think there are lots of, I mean, the,

16:19.535 --> 16:22.355
the explanations are really tricky, difficult,

16:22.355 --> 16:23.435
and wide ranging, right?

16:23.765 --> 16:26.635
First, I mean, I guess the first thing is there's lots

16:26.635 --> 16:27.635
of money to be made.

16:28.575 --> 16:30.475
And, and because there's been lots of money to be made,

16:30.775 --> 16:33.875
we have whole systems of agriculture and production

16:34.215 --> 16:36.315
and marketing and all that around it, right?

16:36.335 --> 16:37.675
So they're really hard to change.

16:38.295 --> 16:41.235
Um, once you sort of start down a path,

16:41.295 --> 16:42.555
and here I'm drawing from the sort

16:42.555 --> 16:44.355
of the political scientists and historians, right?

16:44.595 --> 16:46.555
There's a theory called path dependency theory.

16:46.975 --> 16:48.795
Um, and the idea is once you start going down this

16:48.795 --> 16:50.435
path, inertia builds up.

16:50.435 --> 16:52.235
It's really hard to change, and you need a shock

16:52.895 --> 16:53.995
to change the system, right?

16:53.995 --> 16:55.275
So I, I think there may be, having those

16:55.275 --> 16:56.555
shocks might be coming, right?

16:56.555 --> 16:59.875
Something like, lab grown meats might be the shock

16:59.875 --> 17:01.235
that changes that, for example.

17:01.895 --> 17:03.715
Um, so it's really difficult

17:03.715 --> 17:05.795
to change once you've started going down this path.

17:06.415 --> 17:08.235
Um, there's lots of vested interests

17:08.415 --> 17:10.315
and there's also like human psychology.

17:11.525 --> 17:14.545
We love meat, right? It, it, it tastes good.

17:15.125 --> 17:17.825
Um, it's part of our culture, a part of

17:17.825 --> 17:19.825
what our identity like.

17:19.825 --> 17:22.145
So it's all linked up with all sort of ideas of luxury,

17:22.775 --> 17:23.985
like those leather goods.

17:24.565 --> 17:27.385
Um, it's linked with masculinity, the idea

17:27.385 --> 17:28.865
that you can't be a strong man

17:28.865 --> 17:30.265
unless you eat a sufficient amount

17:30.265 --> 17:31.705
of raw steak or something.

17:32.525 --> 17:35.705
Um, so it, when you say we should change those things,

17:36.405 --> 17:37.425
people are frightened

17:37.785 --> 17:38.905
'cause you're threatening their identity,

17:38.905 --> 17:40.105
you're threatening their masculinity,

17:40.105 --> 17:42.265
you are threatening their traditions,

17:43.445 --> 17:44.625
you are threatening their livelihood.

17:45.665 --> 17:47.365
And those are really big things.

17:47.365 --> 17:49.565
There are things we ought to care about. Um, they do matter.

17:49.965 --> 17:51.525
I mean, obviously I think a lot

17:51.525 --> 17:53.125
of the masculinity stuff is really toxic.

17:53.705 --> 17:55.765
Um, but things like tradition and,

17:55.825 --> 17:58.285
and your livelihood, those kind of things,

17:58.625 --> 17:59.645
the things we ought to look after.

18:00.185 --> 18:02.845
Um, so those are difficult to change.

18:03.425 --> 18:07.685
Um, and human psychology is very good at,

18:07.745 --> 18:11.285
at using strategies to avoid making moral decisions

18:11.285 --> 18:12.365
that require us to change.

18:12.665 --> 18:14.845
We engage in acts of self-deception all the time.

18:15.505 --> 18:19.645
Um, so for example, experiments have been done

18:19.705 --> 18:21.205
to test people's intuitions

18:21.205 --> 18:23.725
and feelings about the wrongness of cruelty.

18:24.545 --> 18:26.165
If you invent a fictional animal

18:26.825 --> 18:29.165
and you give it a certain level of cognitive ability

18:29.505 --> 18:30.565
and say, should we eat this?

18:30.565 --> 18:33.445
People would go, no, no, no, no, no. Uh, that's wrong.

18:34.025 --> 18:36.765
Um, and then if you suggest the same thing about a pig,

18:37.505 --> 18:38.775
which with the same level

18:38.775 --> 18:40.895
of cognitive sophistication, they'll go, no, that's fine.

18:42.165 --> 18:43.465
Uh, and they'll, they'll,

18:43.465 --> 18:44.985
they'll then come up with justifications.

18:44.985 --> 18:48.225
They'll say, it's natural, it's normal.

18:48.885 --> 18:52.025
Or, the, the science is wrong and it's overstated.

18:52.535 --> 18:55.785
They'll do, they'll engage in, in self-deception,

18:55.805 --> 18:57.545
to avoid thinking about, or they'll take steps

18:57.545 --> 18:59.105
to actively not think about

18:59.925 --> 19:01.735
the harm that they do to animals.

19:01.835 --> 19:04.855
So there's psychological problems to overcome as well as all

19:04.855 --> 19:07.855
of these structural things, the, the, the,

19:07.855 --> 19:09.295
the economy, the history.

19:09.915 --> 19:11.615
Uh, and that makes things really difficult.

19:12.755 --> 19:15.335
Um, but I'm optimistic about people, right?

19:15.615 --> 19:17.135
I think we are capable of acting

19:17.165 --> 19:18.775
morally doing the right thing.

19:18.955 --> 19:22.615
And I, I'm optimistic about that because I live in society

19:23.195 --> 19:26.415
and although we're often like really downbeat about

19:26.415 --> 19:28.095
what we see around us, it makes us really angry.

19:28.235 --> 19:29.295
And we look at politics

19:29.295 --> 19:32.015
and think, who are these terrible people in charge?

19:32.035 --> 19:34.055
Or something like that. At the same time,

19:35.445 --> 19:36.785
my neighbors are generally

19:37.565 --> 19:38.785
the kind of people who tell the truth.

19:39.765 --> 19:41.645
I can trust them most of the time.

19:41.745 --> 19:43.165
And if we couldn't trust people, most

19:43.165 --> 19:44.645
of the time we couldn't have a society.

19:44.645 --> 19:47.165
It just wouldn't function. People generally keep their word.

19:47.635 --> 19:50.285
They don't generally go out and murder and steal

19:50.385 --> 19:52.245
and so forth, and they don't just need the

19:52.245 --> 19:53.365
threats of laws to do that.

19:54.315 --> 19:56.005
Generally, most people are pretty

19:56.005 --> 19:57.125
good most of the time, I think.

19:57.625 --> 20:00.125
Um, so I'm confident that we can act morally,

20:00.745 --> 20:02.205
and I think it's just a process of time.

20:02.345 --> 20:04.045
I'd like it to be quicker, but I think it can

20:04.045 --> 20:05.245
be overcome, these kind of problems.

20:05.425 --> 20:07.165
The, the most of the book is focused on rights,

20:07.225 --> 20:08.245
and it's focused on rights.

20:08.405 --> 20:09.925
'cause rights are a big component of justice.

20:10.025 --> 20:11.885
The idea of justice,

20:12.185 --> 20:14.965
and justice is that area of morality that's enforceable.

20:14.965 --> 20:15.965
That's how I think of it, right?

20:16.105 --> 20:18.685
Um, if, if you owe something to someone as a matter

20:18.685 --> 20:21.365
of justice and they don't, don't pr

20:21.365 --> 20:23.245
and you don't provide it, then others can be justified

20:23.245 --> 20:24.325
in coercing you, right?

20:24.325 --> 20:25.525
And that's where the state comes in.

20:25.525 --> 20:28.325
Usually if you break the law, you go to prison, right?

20:28.325 --> 20:29.405
That's the coerce element.

20:30.065 --> 20:33.005
Um, and you can have a just society that's also pretty dull

20:33.505 --> 20:34.935
or pretty bad, right?

20:35.195 --> 20:38.015
Um, we might have people who pay their taxes,

20:38.035 --> 20:39.175
for the wrong reasons, right?

20:39.245 --> 20:41.215
They begrudgingly do so, right?

20:41.435 --> 20:43.935
Or you, everyone's got their rights respected

20:43.935 --> 20:45.135
and then everyone is miserable

20:45.295 --> 20:47.285
'cause there's nothing exciting to do in society, right?

20:47.305 --> 20:49.565
So it's a just, society doesn't have to be a good society.

20:50.505 --> 20:51.765
And so I've also thought about,

20:52.705 --> 20:54.605
and some of the things I talk about in the book are the kind

20:54.605 --> 20:57.125
of things that might make a society good as well as just,

20:57.745 --> 21:00.085
and I think those, a lot of those are about the kind

21:00.085 --> 21:02.845
of attitudes that we embody, the kind of character traits

21:02.845 --> 21:04.125
that we have in our,

21:04.225 --> 21:07.125
and that we exhibit in our relationships with other species.

21:07.985 --> 21:10.365
Um, and trust is, is one of those, right?

21:10.465 --> 21:14.645
Um, I think about what it means to be a good society.

21:14.745 --> 21:17.405
And I think I mentioned to me, I can trust my neighbors.

21:17.405 --> 21:19.245
Most of the time. Our

21:19.245 --> 21:20.485
relationships with animals aren't like that.

21:21.385 --> 21:23.035
They can't trust us most of the time.

21:23.055 --> 21:26.075
And a lot of the things we do, particularly in, in,

21:26.175 --> 21:30.035
in farming and, and research involves building up trust,

21:30.965 --> 21:33.425
acting in ways that animals,

21:33.575 --> 21:35.265
that cause animals to become trusting of us.

21:36.045 --> 21:39.825
Um, and we can't, we can't

21:40.615 --> 21:42.105
have a system of animal agriculture,

21:42.105 --> 21:43.225
for example, without that.

21:43.395 --> 21:45.985
Where it's really hard to move a big animal

21:45.985 --> 21:48.875
around a farm if it doesn't trust you.

21:48.875 --> 21:50.915
If you have to use fear and violence all the time,

21:51.095 --> 21:53.435
moving a herd of cos around is really difficult.

21:53.475 --> 21:55.075
I mean, I've grown up in farming communities.

21:55.075 --> 21:56.435
That's just not how you do it, right?

21:56.435 --> 21:58.115
You have to get the animals used to you,

21:58.775 --> 22:00.485
you have to get 'em to trust you.

22:00.865 --> 22:02.725
And that, and that makes it safer

22:02.785 --> 22:04.085
for people working with animals as well.

22:04.205 --> 22:05.805
'cause these are big, heavy animals that can,

22:05.825 --> 22:08.725
and that, you know, and they're social animals.

22:09.025 --> 22:11.825
We can't, we can't do industrialized farming

22:11.825 --> 22:12.865
without social animals.

22:13.005 --> 22:15.545
Uh, and so they, they form these relationships with us,

22:16.205 --> 22:17.265
and that makes them vulnerable.

22:18.075 --> 22:19.935
The reason we're forming them a lot of the time is

22:19.935 --> 22:21.735
to make them vulnerable to us, make it easier

22:21.875 --> 22:23.935
to separate them out from their calves, make it easier

22:23.995 --> 22:27.015
to transport 'em, to slaughter, to kill them, and so forth.

22:27.275 --> 22:30.735
And, and I just, I think a good society is one

22:30.735 --> 22:31.735
where we can trust one another.

22:32.355 --> 22:33.375
And the same should be true

22:33.395 --> 22:35.135
of our relationships with other animals.

22:35.195 --> 22:36.255
So trust is one of,

22:36.255 --> 22:37.855
that's the reason I speak about trust in the book.

22:37.855 --> 22:40.215
And I, I think there are other attitudes

22:40.215 --> 22:42.015
that make the societies that may live been better.

22:42.755 --> 22:46.575
Things like openness, like being open to other beings,

22:47.115 --> 22:49.735
as well as other humans, understanding

22:49.875 --> 22:51.775
and putting yourselves in another person's

22:51.775 --> 22:52.975
shoes or another being's shoes.

22:53.755 --> 22:54.575
Um, and trying to

22:54.575 --> 22:56.135
understand the world from their perspective.

22:56.995 --> 22:59.895
Um, so I think, yeah, it's more than about just doing

22:59.895 --> 23:01.255
what you're required to by justice.

23:01.615 --> 23:04.055
I think a good society requires us to go beyond that

23:04.075 --> 23:06.335
and think about what it means to be a good person as well,

23:06.795 --> 23:07.855
in our relationships.

00:00 - There's two reasons. One, one is because I care about the ethical issues inside it. So I'm interested in responding to injustice, particularly injustice against non-human animals. and so I want to try

00:12 - and persuade people to agree with me, that non-human animals are treated unjustly and we should do something about it. And also because I think a lot of the things that I discussed in the book are to do with the nature of rights. And when I speak to other people and in my own experience, right? Rights can be a, a, a tricky concept, to understand. People struggle with thinking about things like,

00:34 - where does the moral force for rights come from? What, what is a right? and I wanted to help explain that to people as well. So an animal rights. when we talk about animal rights, we're expressing the idea that the vital interest, the fundamental interests of non-human animals, those kind of things that animals can't live without. Those things ought to be protected. And if they're that important that they, they shouldn't be just left

00:58 - to people's preferences or choices. when we talk about fundamental human rights, for example, and they're the, I think they're the same and they're grounded in the same, moral place. They, they come from our interests. we don't think that those are the sorts of things that can be sacrificed, for the sake of promoting some common good. a a a right protects you against being used to benefit other people.

01:22 - and that's what I think animal rights do as well and ought to do. They ought to protect the vital interest, the interest in not suffering, and the interest perhaps in, continuing to live, perhaps in some cases, the interest that animals might have in particular habitats, if they really need them and they can't live without them, or for animals that are social beings that can't flourish and live without good quality relationships,

01:44 - then they ought to have rights that protect those from being interfered with and destroyed by, by us. So, welfare ISTs. Traditionally, when we think about animal, how we treat animals, we, we, we tend to think in a, in a, what we call a welfare as paradigm. We think that the interest of animals, their wellbeing ought to count for something. and the welfares thinks that animal interest, animal welfare really matters.

02:07 - and we can't just sacrifice it trivially. We can't do can't, you shouldn't be able to treat animals cruelly. you should care about them in some way, but it stops short protecting them, right? If we can identify a good, some benefit that we can gain from causing a very serious harm, then that justifies calling, causing the harm. Now, the welfare position says we should always, like, try and avoid unnecessary harm.

02:31 - We should try and minimize harm. So we might use, if we're going to carry out a procedure that will benefit us, we have to do so in ways that will reduce the amount of suffering or minimize the number of lives lost or something like that. But ultimately, the benefits can be, you know, fairly wide ranging, from cosmetics to food, to medicine, to almost anything really, provided we take steps to not be excessive in the amount of, suffering we caused.

03:00 - And the rights position says, no, you, you simply, there are limits on what you can do. And when they're not in the interest of the animal itself, that's a very hard limit, on what you can do. And there's a lot of money to be made from agriculture. But I think not all of the things are sort of selfish reasons, right? People have good moral reasons for using non-human animals. You know, it, it, it's, it's about, medical research that might benefit lots of people, right?

03:24 - That's, that's a good moral reason. Now, I think the rights case of animals outweighs those, some of those reasons. but they're not trivial. They are, they do count. they're happiness. The kind of, that we get from using animals. people use them for food. They're important parts of our, culture, our day-to-day life. Those things matter. they want to count for something.

03:46 - so I don't, yes, I'm not sure. It's just about money. Money does count, and it's useful for gaining good things too. so I'm not necessarily against people making money from, from things either. but yeah, I think the rights position says what you can't do is you can, you can't use another and cause it to suffer, to suffer in order to benefit yourself. that's, that's using, using a, a creature that has a,

04:09 - a value for its own sake, just as a tool. The first thing I would say is that I'm not a historian, so take everything I say about this with a, with a pinch of salt. and I guess there's two things you could think about in this. One is to think about how we treat animals in law and in society. And then the other sort of question is, how's the idea of an animal, right, evolved?

04:28 - And that's the the question I've really focused on, because it has philosophical roots and I work in that sort of philosophical area. and the idea that we should treat animals well for moral reasons and not be cruel to them. It's a really old one. It's found across cultures. you can start seeing it. We don't have any of his original writings. we sort of pieced together from, from other scholars, but in the work of Pythagoras, so that's nearly two

04:52 - and a half thousand, around two and a half thousand years ago. and he says that a healthy diet, and that's one for him, that doesn't involve much in the way of animal products. I mean, he's not himself a vegetarian, we don't think. but, and a, a diet of, of fruits and nuts and vegetables, leads to a pure soul and a peaceful character. And part of that is, is also based on the idea that

05:17 - he thinks that sometimes when we die, our souls then become, transfer into the bodies of animals or reborn into an animal body, so that if you consume an animal, sometimes you risk eating your neighbor, your friend, or a relative, and that's, that's gonna harm your soul, right? So you get this sort of idea that it damages your, your spirit, and you get similar ideas about how diet leads to peaceful characters and the connection with the soul

05:41 - and Jainism and Hinduism and Buddhism. you see it in, the choral, that's a, a text by an indie, an Indian philosopher, to Valvar. And he has a little section in there on vegetarianism and meat eating. And he says that to eat meat makes you callous. It makes you violent. a little bit later from, Pythagoras, you see works from the poet. And Oculus, again, this is someone we read about in other person's writings.

06:08 - There's a little bit in Aristotle, there's some writings from the Roman philosopher Cicero, and he makes a claim that looks a lot like the idea that animals are owed justice and rights and should be protected in law. and then a few hundred years, a few hundred years later, we're talking nearly 2000 years ago now, we have plu tar. And he writes several texts that have survived about how we ought to treat animals. He responds to an argument from stoic philosophers that,

06:34 - humans are superior, because they can reason and they can comply with moral principles and laws that animals can't. And, Pythagoras, or sorry, Plutarch, says, right, it's a bit like Darwin in this respect. He says, the differences between human and in animals are degree, not in kind, that we animals can actually reason a great deal more than we think they can.

06:55 - And, and there's a similar sort of argument from other thinkers around those sorts of times as well. but primarily, and those, those, those writings really influence later scholars. it's hard to say though, that they represent animal rights, very much. They're talking about the impact on us as individuals, right?

07:11 - Eating animals makes us crawl. it's a kind of ethics that's about our character. and it's much harder to be definitively say, this is about how we should treat animals for their sakes. It's more about treating them well for our sakes a lot of the time. and the closest we see is in the 11th century in a Syrian poet. He's a, a blind poet and philosopher known as Al Mai. He's a first recorded vegan.

07:37 - and he, we know about his works. He, he writes a series of letters to a Shiite missionary, about how we should treat non-human animals. and many of those arguments, they're sort of similar. Some of are about health, some of them are about purity of the soul and how it makes us relate to other people. but some of them are, are direct claims about what we owe to animals for their own sakes. So he says, we shouldn't steal from bees and shouldn't take animals, milks

08:01 - because it counts as theft, and we are harming them, and they can feel and they can suffer. Now, he stops short of saying they have rights, and that's probably because he's worried about, making claims that will have him branded as an apostate, and put to death, for abandoning his, his, his faith. so we, we can't definitively say that's an animal rights position, I don't think.

08:24 - and it's not until we actually see clear articulations of natural rights, the idea of moral rights and natural rights for humans in, the mid 17th century, Hobbes grocers. and then in the 18th century, we have the American Declaration of Independence. Men are created equal and endowed with unalienable and unalienable rights. We see the French declaration of the rights of man, the rights are sacred, and unalienable again.

08:56 - When we start seeing those, that's after that, we start seeing these articulations of rights, and i, i, for, for non-human animals as well. And I think quite interestingly, the first one that I think's really clear is in the work of Jean Jacque Rousseau, in the, he writes a, a text the discourses on, on social inequality, in 1755. And he says, animals, you know, they can't obey the law like humans can,

09:22 - but they do have the power, the capacity to feel, and they have natural rights, and humans have duties towards them because they're sentient, because they can feel they can suffer. a little bit later on, you see another argument from, Mary Wolfsten Craft. She draws an analogy between the treatment of women and the treatment of animals, and says that we should bring up children

09:42 - to be vegetarian and be kind. and then the really famous examples, you get Bentham Jeremy Bentham, famous utilitarian philosopher in 1789. He says, you know, it doesn't matter whether animals can reason or talk, it matters whether they can suffer. And then he draws an analogy with racism in that. and then finally, we start seeing in the 19th century work from people like, Francis Power Cobb. she writes an article in Phrases magazine, the Rights

10:11 - of Man and the Claims of Brutes. we see the book of Henry Salt in 1866, big English social reformer, and they are campaigning against Vivi section, and they're making arguments that look a lot like we would be familiar with now as, as animal writes argument. And those are all tied up with, anti section campaigning, but also the Temperance Movement, working class movements,

10:33 - social reform movements. and then finally, I guess the most recent in the sort of seventies we've, we, we finally see the sort of group of philosophers we're familiar with today. people like Roz Galovich, and then Peter Singer making arguments that animals are owe these kind of singer in the case is saying legal rights. God Levivitch is saying sort of moral rights that justify legal rights.

10:56 - I'm fairly optimistic because, I mean, I think things have got better over time for non-human animals, and we are seeing lots of movement in this right sort of direction. and you can still see this sort of very active campaigns going on at the moment. So there's the, the non-human rights project's, a very good example of this, the campaigning to try and give, non-human animals legal rights. And they've been fighting very hard on this for years

11:19 - to give non-human, what we call legal personhood think. I think they'll come onto that in a little bit. And we see, legislatures across the world starting to grant legal rights to non-human entities in ways that are quite unexpected. so there are jurisdictions, in Canada and New Zealand where, mountains and rivers and parks have been granted rights, and it's a recognition that they have value for their own sake.

11:44 - And I think if we can grant rights to a river, it doesn't seem like an enormous leap to say that a chimpanzee or a dolphin or an Elephant can be a rights holder. we've already made the really difficult imaginative jump, and now we have an easier one to get to. So, I'm, I'm confident that it will happen one day. I mean, I think we'll look back in the past and think, what on earth were we doing? The animal rights position is very radical.

12:08 - It requires us really changing our relationship with non-human animals and changing a lot of the practices that we, we take for granted. so if you can't use another being in ways that cause it serious harm for the benefit of yourself or for the benefit of of others, then that's gonna rule out lots of the things that we do. It's gonna rule out mass industrialized farming. it's gonna rule out most farming, of, of animals right now.

12:39 - Farmers also grow plants. I have to remind people that it doesn't do away with farming, right? Farm farming, is heavily plant-based, and most of the plants that we actually grow are currently grown for the sake of non-human animals, right? They're used to like, we chop down the Amazon, to grow soy, to feed to animals, and then we blame vegans for eating soy. You know, it's gonna that.

13:00 - and if, if we did that, if we change that sort of structure of animal agriculture, it's gonna change the kind of things that we eat and kind of products that we use, a seat that's covered in leather. you know, everything from our toilet paper to our bank notes, to our paint brushes are made out of animals. There's a lot of products that would change. our sort of system of food and agriculture radically changes,

13:23 - but at the same time, that brings a lot of environmental benefits, right? The, the un amongst others have have said that if we don't change our diets, we're effectively all doomed. because the impact of, of animal agriculture on the environment, is devastatingly bad, it contributes an enormous proportion of our climate change, gases. It's devastating to our forests and our rivers.

13:48 - So it, it, it's likely to improve our sort of general environment, but requires significant change to our sort of everyday living. Now, we might not notice it, right? I think, so we, a lot of the products that we eat, we take for granted, they can be copied quite convincingly, right? I, I mean, I've, I've been vegan for nearly 25 years, and I've seen an enormous change, right?

14:12 - When I started, there was nothing but the most awful products available. Nowadays, I can go to a supermarket and I can get things that look like a convincing sausage, or I can get a cream or an ice, any number of ice creams and cheeses and things that are, are vegan. So, I mean, I might not, I wouldn't notice, right? It doesn't, it doesn't not sacrifice for me, right? I'm eating the same sorts of things as my friends. They're just made out of different products, right?

14:35 - I'm getting the same tastes and the same experience, so we might not notice it. but we might see improvements to our environment. it might change the kind of things that we would direct money in our scientific researcher, right? So we're gonna be directing more funding towards alternatives to animal testing would be a, a big area where, so we'd see more in, in, computer modeling, those kind of things.

15:00 - And then the kind of relationships that we have with non-human animals, like companion animals, they might change quite drastic drastically. So some thinkers think that we, we can't, we can't live with this idea of ownership of non-human animals. It's incompatible with having a good relationship that respects an animal's interests. And so we might have to remodel our, our relationships with other creatures on things like family, and guardianship models

15:28 - or friendship models or something like that. so you'd have a lot more duties, towards the animals that you live with. and they'd have a lot more protections, but you could still have those, you know, really important, wonderful relationships with that we now have with pets. but they, they would, they'd be much more carefully protected. So yeah, quite, quite a lot of changes, but I don't think it requires sort of a radical reform

15:55 - of like, everything about our lives, right? So I mean, things like the traditions where we might eat a Turkey at Christmas, right? It, the coming together with the family is the thing that matters there. the celebration is the thing that matters. And if you've got a product that looks different in the middle, but it's still a celebratory meal, you're keeping the essence of that tradition going. I think there are lots of, I mean, the,

16:19 - the explanations are really tricky, difficult, and wide ranging, right? First, I mean, I guess the first thing is there's lots of money to be made. And, and because there's been lots of money to be made, we have whole systems of agriculture and production and marketing and all that around it, right? So they're really hard to change. once you sort of start down a path, and here I'm drawing from the sort

16:42 - of the political scientists and historians, right? There's a theory called path dependency theory. and the idea is once you start going down this path, inertia builds up. It's really hard to change, and you need a shock to change the system, right? So I, I think there may be, having those shocks might be coming, right? Something like, lab grown meats might be the shock that changes that, for example.

17:01 - so it's really difficult to change once you've started going down this path. there's lots of vested interests and there's also like human psychology. We love meat, right? It, it, it tastes good. it's part of our culture, a part of what our identity like. So it's all linked up with all sort of ideas of luxury, like those leather goods. it's linked with masculinity, the idea

17:27 - that you can't be a strong man unless you eat a sufficient amount of raw steak or something. so it, when you say we should change those things, people are frightened 'cause you're threatening their identity, you're threatening their masculinity, you are threatening their traditions, you are threatening their livelihood. And those are really big things.

17:47 - There are things we ought to care about. they do matter. I mean, obviously I think a lot of the masculinity stuff is really toxic. but things like tradition and, and your livelihood, those kind of things, the things we ought to look after. so those are difficult to change. and human psychology is very good at, at using strategies to avoid making moral decisions that require us to change.

18:12 - We engage in acts of self-deception all the time. so for example, experiments have been done to test people's intuitions and feelings about the wrongness of cruelty. If you invent a fictional animal and you give it a certain level of cognitive ability and say, should we eat this? People would go, no, no, no, no, no. that's wrong. and then if you suggest the same thing about a pig, which with the same level

18:38 - of cognitive sophistication, they'll go, no, that's fine. and they'll, they'll, they'll then come up with justifications. They'll say, it's natural, it's normal. Or, the, the science is wrong and it's overstated. They'll do, they'll engage in, in self-deception, to avoid thinking about, or they'll take steps to actively not think about the harm that they do to animals. So there's psychological problems to overcome as well as all

19:04 - of these structural things, the, the, the, the economy, the history. and that makes things really difficult. but I'm optimistic about people, right? I think we are capable of acting morally doing the right thing. And I, I'm optimistic about that because I live in society and although we're often like really downbeat about what we see around us, it makes us really angry. And we look at politics

19:29 - and think, who are these terrible people in charge? Or something like that. At the same time, my neighbors are generally the kind of people who tell the truth. I can trust them most of the time. And if we couldn't trust people, most of the time we couldn't have a society. It just wouldn't function. People generally keep their word. They don't generally go out and murder and steal and so forth, and they don't just need the

19:52 - threats of laws to do that. Generally, most people are pretty good most of the time, I think. so I'm confident that we can act morally, and I think it's just a process of time. I'd like it to be quicker, but I think it can be overcome, these kind of problems. The, the most of the book is focused on rights, and it's focused on rights. 'cause rights are a big component of justice.

20:10 - The idea of justice, and justice is that area of morality that's enforceable. That's how I think of it, right? if, if you owe something to someone as a matter of justice and they don't, don't pr and you don't provide it, then others can be justified in coercing you, right? And that's where the state comes in. Usually if you break the law, you go to prison, right? That's the coerce element.

20:30 - and you can have a just society that's also pretty dull or pretty bad, right? we might have people who pay their taxes, for the wrong reasons, right? They begrudgingly do so, right? Or you, everyone's got their rights respected and then everyone is miserable 'cause there's nothing exciting to do in society, right? So it's a just, society doesn't have to be a good society. And so I've also thought about,

20:52 - and some of the things I talk about in the book are the kind of things that might make a society good as well as just, and I think those, a lot of those are about the kind of attitudes that we embody, the kind of character traits that we have in our, and that we exhibit in our relationships with other species. and trust is, is one of those, right? I think about what it means to be a good society. And I think I mentioned to me, I can trust my neighbors. Most of the time. Our

21:19 - relationships with animals aren't like that. They can't trust us most of the time. And a lot of the things we do, particularly in, in, in farming and, and research involves building up trust, acting in ways that animals, that cause animals to become trusting of us. and we can't, we can't have a system of animal agriculture, for example, without that. Where it's really hard to move a big animal

21:45 - around a farm if it doesn't trust you. If you have to use fear and violence all the time, moving a herd of cos around is really difficult. I mean, I've grown up in farming communities. That's just not how you do it, right? You have to get the animals used to you, you have to get 'em to trust you. And that, and that makes it safer for people working with animals as well. 'cause these are big, heavy animals that can,

22:05 - and that, you know, and they're social animals. We can't, we can't do industrialized farming without social animals. and so they, they form these relationships with us, and that makes them vulnerable. The reason we're forming them a lot of the time is to make them vulnerable to us, make it easier to separate them out from their calves, make it easier to transport 'em, to slaughter, to kill them, and so forth. And, and I just, I think a good society is one

22:30 - where we can trust one another. And the same should be true of our relationships with other animals. So trust is one of, that's the reason I speak about trust in the book. And I, I think there are other attitudes that make the societies that may live been better. Things like openness, like being open to other beings, as well as other humans, understanding and putting yourselves in another person's

22:51 - shoes or another being's shoes. and trying to understand the world from their perspective. so I think, yeah, it's more than about just doing what you're required to by justice. I think a good society requires us to go beyond that and think about what it means to be a good person as well, in our relationships.

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