In fairness, she grants that Singer's *conclusions* could be shared from a wide range of theoretical starting points. It seems to be specifically the welfare-based reasoning: maybe you shouldn't poke others in the eye because it violates their rights, and the pain you cause is strictly irrelevant. (Whereas I think even a fan of fundamental rights should recognize that causing pain is an *additional* reason against poking people in the eye! If you had to poke someone, better to go for the person under anesthetic, after all...)
Love this (and your articles in general). Often brought this up with my EA friends when discussing vegetarianism and utilitarianism. Like even Tolstoy was a vegetarian, and he def wasn't a utilitarian.
i generally agree, tho think the idea could've been presented way more simply, without a bunch of fancy logic and terminology, for example:
"utilitarianism is controversial because sometimes the optimal way to help people is to things that seem unkind/psychopathic/too cold and calculating (and there are easy strawmen standing around, like, 'if youre a utilitarian why dont you think hospitals should steal patients' organs and redistribute?'. but the core is is just, 'you should try to help people'."
a related thought:
"you should try to help people and make the world a better place", is a disturbingly rare and controversial opinion.
so rare that you can expect people to claim you're lying or exaggerating for "social points", when you make such a statement
Disclaimer: I haven't read Animal Liberation Now, only the original, years ago and years before I went vegan.
Depending upon which of Singer's specific claims about animals, factory farming and human motivation in consuming animal products he's claiming to be mostly independent of utilitarianism, I can see her being right.
For example, it seems prima facie reasonable that a single chicken's capacities for positive and negative well-being matter at least somewhat less than a single (average) human's. For a utilitarian, it's still easy to derive the conclusion that what's happening to chickens is worse than all of the badness that's happening to humans. That's because the utilitarian accepts the additive property of well-being. But non-consequentialists often deny the additive property. Some claim that human well-being is lexically higher than non-human well-being; others claim that well-being of different individuals cannot be compared on a single scale.
Of course, it would've been helpful if the review had pointed out the specific, allegedly utilitarianism-bound, claims that Singer was referring to.
Some non-utilitarians would reject his arguments. But that doesn't mean that only utilitarians could accept them. There are a wide range of non-utilitarian views!
In Animal Liberation, Singer bases his rejection of speciesism (as well as sexism and racism) on the equal consideration of interests principle. This is the principle of preference utilitarianism. Singer even introduces it by citing two utilitarian philosophers as offering some kind of formulation of it:
"Jeremy Bentham, the founder of the reforming utilitarian school of moral philosophy, incorporated the essential basis of moral equality into his system of ethics by means of the formula: 'Each to count for one and none for more than one.' In other words, the interests of every being affected by an action are to be taken into account and given the same weight as the like interests of any other being. A later utilitarian, Henry Sidgwick, put the point in this way: 'The good of any one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view (if I may say so) of the Universe, than the good of any other.' More recently the leading figures in contemporary moral philosophy [such as R.M. Hare, presumably] have shown a great deal of agreement in specifying as a fundamental presupposition of their moral theories some similar requirement that works to give everyone’s interests equal consideration—although these writers generally cannot agree on how this requirement is best formulated."
In "Utilitarianism and Vegetarianism" (1980), Singer is explicit that the equal consideration of interests principle, and thus his argument against specieism, is utilitarian. He opens the essay with this: "I am a utilitarian. I am also a vegetarian. I am a vegetarian because I am a utilitarian. I believe that applying the principle of utility to our present situation—especially the methods now used to rear animals for food and the variety of food available to us—leads to the conclusion that we ought to be vegetarian."
Later in the essay, he links utilitarianism with the equal consideration of interests principle:
"The only principle of equality I hold is the principle that the interests of every being affected by an action are to be taken into account and given the same weight as the like interests of any other being—what Regan calls the 'equality of interests' principle. As Regan grants, utilitarianism presupposes this principle. The principle of equality of interests merely makes it explicit that, because the principle of utility is the sole basis of morality, no other principle will limit the application of the principle of utility, or affect the way in which it operates" (328–329).
Utilitarianism incorporates the equal consideration of interests principle. But it doesn't follow that the principle is *exclusive* to utilitarianism. (Especially since Singer's use of the principle in animal ethics is compatible with a version that is restricted in scope to our ethical relations to strangers, rather than those with whom we have meaningful personal relationships.)
Singer doesn't restrict the principle in scope in "Animal Liberation," even though he neglects to note that the unrestricted principle obligates us to favor the stronger interests of distant strangers over the weaker interests of ourselves and those close to us. It would be bizarre if he did restrict the equal consideration of interests principle that way after he famously rejects that sort of restriction to the principles of preventing bad things in "Famine, Affluence and Morality."
Also, the last sentence I quoted from "Utilitarianism and Vegetarianism" disavows such a scope restriction, and even seems to suggest it's incompatible with such a restriction: "The principle of equality of interests merely makes it explicit that, because the principle of utility is the sole basis of morality, no other principle will limit the application of the principle of utility, or affect the way in which it operates." Doesn't this reject altering the application of the equal consideration of interests principle with claims like that that we are permitted or required to favor our nearest and dearest?
Given that Singer himself claimed that he is vegetarian because he is utilitarian, and that the principle he was arguing from in "Animal Liberation" was a utilitarian principle, Lorna Finlayson's quote is reasonable. It *is* odd that Singer bases his arguments on utilitarianism and then says his arguments, "at no point ... require acceptance of utilitarianism." Of course beneficence isn't exclusively utilitarian, but Finlayson doesn't claim it is in this quote, and I doubt she would if asked.
You're mistakenly assuming that, just because Singer discusses a maximally strong interpretation of the equal consideration principle in a 1980 paper on utilitarianism, he must be invoking that same (unnecessarily strong) interpretation in ALN. Since Singer explicitly says that his arguments in ALN do not presuppose utilitarianism, he clearly does not take the equal consideration of interests *as it is used here* to entail utilitarianism. That seems like much more decisive textual evidence than anything written in a different paper 43 years ago.
We can also just use basic philosophical charity. Since the weaker interpretation suffices for his arguments to go through, it's simply uncharitable to interpret them as invoking stronger, entirely unnecessary, commitments. Again, it's just very obvious that a Rossian pluralist, for example, could be entirely convinced by the arguments Singer offers in ALN, including the argument that speciesism, like racism and sexism, violates an intuitively plausible 'equal consideration' principle *as regards our reasons of beneficence and non-maleficence*. (It's not as though he claims that deontic constraints are like racism and sexism in this way.)
Finally, even if your argument were more convincing, it wouldn't make *Finlayson's* quote any more reasonable, because she isn't making anything like the textual argument that you are.
To expand on the last point, I think Finlayson clearly *is* thinking that appeals to effects on well-being are distinctively utilitarian. (We can see this from the sentence about how Singer's arguments "are certainly not, for example, religious or Kantian ones.")
Of course, once we raise the question: "Do you really think that beneficence is exclusively utilitarian?" the mistake is so obvious that any sensible person will disavow it. So I don't think Finlayson would affirm the error if asked in this (error-exposing) way. But that hardly shows that she didn't previously make the error. And I rather suspect that if you asked whether it is distinctively utilitarian to appeal to effects on well-being (without noting the connection to beneficence), she very well might re-affirm the error.
Just look at all the philosophers who claim that Effective Altruism is just "rebranded utilitarianism". Or the undergrads who insist that Famine, Affluence, and Morality depends on utilitarianism. It's an extremely common philosophical mistake.
Finlayson is reviewing Animal Liberation Now, not Animal Liberation. You can't read in interpretations from a 43 year old paper when they're inconsistent with what he explicitly writes in the 2023 book. It's just not true that the book assumes utilitarianism, for all the reasons I've given.
Did Singer make substantial changes to the "All Animals are Equal" chapter in Animal Liberation Now? That's the chapter that assumes utilitarianism in the earlier editions.
"His arguments often look like utilitarian arguments; they are certainly not, for example, religious or Kantian ones." Odd to hear people refer to "Kantian arguments". Is there such a thing? I was under the impression that there's not.
Maybe there's a more serious element in the Kantian tradition that I've missed (allowing for John Roemer as one exception), but otherwise, I wonder if it'd be best for philosophers to simply leave behind reference "Kantian" anything and just talk about more specific ideas/arguments like the two mentioned in your conclusion or others.
I like to poke people in the eye for no reason because claims that one shouldn't assume a controversial utilitarianism.
In fairness, she grants that Singer's *conclusions* could be shared from a wide range of theoretical starting points. It seems to be specifically the welfare-based reasoning: maybe you shouldn't poke others in the eye because it violates their rights, and the pain you cause is strictly irrelevant. (Whereas I think even a fan of fundamental rights should recognize that causing pain is an *additional* reason against poking people in the eye! If you had to poke someone, better to go for the person under anesthetic, after all...)
Even Kantians accept or ought to accept a wide duty to promote other people's well being.
Love this (and your articles in general). Often brought this up with my EA friends when discussing vegetarianism and utilitarianism. Like even Tolstoy was a vegetarian, and he def wasn't a utilitarian.
Quite helpful, thanks!
about the article:
i generally agree, tho think the idea could've been presented way more simply, without a bunch of fancy logic and terminology, for example:
"utilitarianism is controversial because sometimes the optimal way to help people is to things that seem unkind/psychopathic/too cold and calculating (and there are easy strawmen standing around, like, 'if youre a utilitarian why dont you think hospitals should steal patients' organs and redistribute?'. but the core is is just, 'you should try to help people'."
a related thought:
"you should try to help people and make the world a better place", is a disturbingly rare and controversial opinion.
so rare that you can expect people to claim you're lying or exaggerating for "social points", when you make such a statement
Disclaimer: I haven't read Animal Liberation Now, only the original, years ago and years before I went vegan.
Depending upon which of Singer's specific claims about animals, factory farming and human motivation in consuming animal products he's claiming to be mostly independent of utilitarianism, I can see her being right.
For example, it seems prima facie reasonable that a single chicken's capacities for positive and negative well-being matter at least somewhat less than a single (average) human's. For a utilitarian, it's still easy to derive the conclusion that what's happening to chickens is worse than all of the badness that's happening to humans. That's because the utilitarian accepts the additive property of well-being. But non-consequentialists often deny the additive property. Some claim that human well-being is lexically higher than non-human well-being; others claim that well-being of different individuals cannot be compared on a single scale.
Of course, it would've been helpful if the review had pointed out the specific, allegedly utilitarianism-bound, claims that Singer was referring to.
Some non-utilitarians would reject his arguments. But that doesn't mean that only utilitarians could accept them. There are a wide range of non-utilitarian views!
In Animal Liberation, Singer bases his rejection of speciesism (as well as sexism and racism) on the equal consideration of interests principle. This is the principle of preference utilitarianism. Singer even introduces it by citing two utilitarian philosophers as offering some kind of formulation of it:
"Jeremy Bentham, the founder of the reforming utilitarian school of moral philosophy, incorporated the essential basis of moral equality into his system of ethics by means of the formula: 'Each to count for one and none for more than one.' In other words, the interests of every being affected by an action are to be taken into account and given the same weight as the like interests of any other being. A later utilitarian, Henry Sidgwick, put the point in this way: 'The good of any one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view (if I may say so) of the Universe, than the good of any other.' More recently the leading figures in contemporary moral philosophy [such as R.M. Hare, presumably] have shown a great deal of agreement in specifying as a fundamental presupposition of their moral theories some similar requirement that works to give everyone’s interests equal consideration—although these writers generally cannot agree on how this requirement is best formulated."
In "Utilitarianism and Vegetarianism" (1980), Singer is explicit that the equal consideration of interests principle, and thus his argument against specieism, is utilitarian. He opens the essay with this: "I am a utilitarian. I am also a vegetarian. I am a vegetarian because I am a utilitarian. I believe that applying the principle of utility to our present situation—especially the methods now used to rear animals for food and the variety of food available to us—leads to the conclusion that we ought to be vegetarian."
Later in the essay, he links utilitarianism with the equal consideration of interests principle:
"The only principle of equality I hold is the principle that the interests of every being affected by an action are to be taken into account and given the same weight as the like interests of any other being—what Regan calls the 'equality of interests' principle. As Regan grants, utilitarianism presupposes this principle. The principle of equality of interests merely makes it explicit that, because the principle of utility is the sole basis of morality, no other principle will limit the application of the principle of utility, or affect the way in which it operates" (328–329).
Utilitarianism incorporates the equal consideration of interests principle. But it doesn't follow that the principle is *exclusive* to utilitarianism. (Especially since Singer's use of the principle in animal ethics is compatible with a version that is restricted in scope to our ethical relations to strangers, rather than those with whom we have meaningful personal relationships.)
Singer doesn't restrict the principle in scope in "Animal Liberation," even though he neglects to note that the unrestricted principle obligates us to favor the stronger interests of distant strangers over the weaker interests of ourselves and those close to us. It would be bizarre if he did restrict the equal consideration of interests principle that way after he famously rejects that sort of restriction to the principles of preventing bad things in "Famine, Affluence and Morality."
Also, the last sentence I quoted from "Utilitarianism and Vegetarianism" disavows such a scope restriction, and even seems to suggest it's incompatible with such a restriction: "The principle of equality of interests merely makes it explicit that, because the principle of utility is the sole basis of morality, no other principle will limit the application of the principle of utility, or affect the way in which it operates." Doesn't this reject altering the application of the equal consideration of interests principle with claims like that that we are permitted or required to favor our nearest and dearest?
Given that Singer himself claimed that he is vegetarian because he is utilitarian, and that the principle he was arguing from in "Animal Liberation" was a utilitarian principle, Lorna Finlayson's quote is reasonable. It *is* odd that Singer bases his arguments on utilitarianism and then says his arguments, "at no point ... require acceptance of utilitarianism." Of course beneficence isn't exclusively utilitarian, but Finlayson doesn't claim it is in this quote, and I doubt she would if asked.
You're mistakenly assuming that, just because Singer discusses a maximally strong interpretation of the equal consideration principle in a 1980 paper on utilitarianism, he must be invoking that same (unnecessarily strong) interpretation in ALN. Since Singer explicitly says that his arguments in ALN do not presuppose utilitarianism, he clearly does not take the equal consideration of interests *as it is used here* to entail utilitarianism. That seems like much more decisive textual evidence than anything written in a different paper 43 years ago.
We can also just use basic philosophical charity. Since the weaker interpretation suffices for his arguments to go through, it's simply uncharitable to interpret them as invoking stronger, entirely unnecessary, commitments. Again, it's just very obvious that a Rossian pluralist, for example, could be entirely convinced by the arguments Singer offers in ALN, including the argument that speciesism, like racism and sexism, violates an intuitively plausible 'equal consideration' principle *as regards our reasons of beneficence and non-maleficence*. (It's not as though he claims that deontic constraints are like racism and sexism in this way.)
Finally, even if your argument were more convincing, it wouldn't make *Finlayson's* quote any more reasonable, because she isn't making anything like the textual argument that you are.
To expand on the last point, I think Finlayson clearly *is* thinking that appeals to effects on well-being are distinctively utilitarian. (We can see this from the sentence about how Singer's arguments "are certainly not, for example, religious or Kantian ones.")
Of course, once we raise the question: "Do you really think that beneficence is exclusively utilitarian?" the mistake is so obvious that any sensible person will disavow it. So I don't think Finlayson would affirm the error if asked in this (error-exposing) way. But that hardly shows that she didn't previously make the error. And I rather suspect that if you asked whether it is distinctively utilitarian to appeal to effects on well-being (without noting the connection to beneficence), she very well might re-affirm the error.
Just look at all the philosophers who claim that Effective Altruism is just "rebranded utilitarianism". Or the undergrads who insist that Famine, Affluence, and Morality depends on utilitarianism. It's an extremely common philosophical mistake.
The 1980 paper is not independent of Animal Liberation. It's a response to Tom Regan's critique of Animal Liberation.
Finlayson is reviewing Animal Liberation Now, not Animal Liberation. You can't read in interpretations from a 43 year old paper when they're inconsistent with what he explicitly writes in the 2023 book. It's just not true that the book assumes utilitarianism, for all the reasons I've given.
Did Singer make substantial changes to the "All Animals are Equal" chapter in Animal Liberation Now? That's the chapter that assumes utilitarianism in the earlier editions.
"His arguments often look like utilitarian arguments; they are certainly not, for example, religious or Kantian ones." Odd to hear people refer to "Kantian arguments". Is there such a thing? I was under the impression that there's not.
Maybe there's a more serious element in the Kantian tradition that I've missed (allowing for John Roemer as one exception), but otherwise, I wonder if it'd be best for philosophers to simply leave behind reference "Kantian" anything and just talk about more specific ideas/arguments like the two mentioned in your conclusion or others.