![]() ![]() Some science fiction plot lines explore ethical concerns analogous to the concerns of advocates of animal rights. ![]() The words sapience, self-awareness and consciousness are used in similar ways in science fiction. An entity that is sentient will be treated as completely human character, with similar rights, capabilities and desires as any other character. Sentience is being used in this context to describe an essential human property that brings all these other qualities with it. In science fiction, an alien, android, robot, hologram or computer who is described as sentient is often ascribed qualities such as will, desire, consciousness, ethics, personality, intelligence, insight, and so on. The laws of several states include certain invertebrates such as cephalopods (octopuses, squids) and decapod crustaceans (lobsters, crabs) in the scope of animal protection laws, implying that these animals are also judged to be capable of experiencing pain and suffering. The legally-binding Protocol annexed to the Treaty of Amsterdam recognises that animals are ‘sentient beings’, and requires the EU and its Member States to ‘pay full regard to the welfare requirements of animals.’ In 1997 the concept of animal sentience was written into the basic law of the European Union. The Interfaith Association of Animal Chaplains encourages animal ministry groups to adopt a policy of recognizing and valuing sentient beings. He asserts that "all sentient beings, humans or nonhuman, have one right: the basic right not to be treated as the property of others." Īndrew Linzey, founder of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics in England, is known as a foremost international advocate for recognizing animals as sentient beings in Biblically-based faith traditions. Gary Francione also bases his abolitionist theory of animal rights, which differs significantly from Singer's, on sentience. Because many of the suggested distinguishing features of humanity-extreme intelligence highly complex language etc.-are not present in marginal cases such as young or mentally disabled humans, it appears that the only distinction is a prejudice based on species alone, which non-human animal rights supporters call speciesism-that is, differentiating humans from other animals purely on the grounds that they are human. In the 20th century, Princeton University professor Peter Singer argued that Bentham's conclusion is often dismissed by an appeal to a distinction that condemns human suffering but allows non-human suffering, typically "appeals" that are logical fallacies. But suppose the case were otherwise, what would it avail? The question is not, "Can they reason?" nor, "Can they talk?" but, "Can they suffer?" What else is it that should trace the insuperable line? Is it the faculty of reason, or, perhaps, the faculty of discourse? But a full-grown horse or dog is beyond comparison a more rational, as well as a more conversable animal, than an infant of a day, or a week, or even a month, old. The French have already discovered that the blackness of the skin is no reason why a human being should be abandoned without redress to the caprice of a tormentor. ![]() The 18th century philosopher Jeremy Bentham compiled Enlightenment beliefs in An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, and he included his own reasoning in a comparison between slavery and sadism toward animals: Voltaire compared the Hindu treatment of animals to how Europe's emperors & Popes treated even their fellow men, praising the former and heaping shame upon the latter in the 17th century, Descartes, Pierre Gassendi, and Francis Bacon also advocated vegetarianism. Joseph Ritson coupled Tryon's work with Rousseau's for "Essay on Abstinence from Animal Food" as many Rousseauists became vegetarian. Benjamin Franklin's autobiography identifies Tryon's writings as an influence in his decision to try vegetarianism later in the book, he reverts to eating meat while still following Tryon's basic philosophy. Soon thereafter, many philosophers used the anatomical discoveries of the Enlightenment as a reason to include animals in what philosophers call " sympatheia," the principle of who or what deserves sympathy. In the 17th century Thomas Tryon, a self-proclaimed Pythagorean, raised the issue of non-human suffering. Animal rights advocates argue that anything that can suffer is sentient and that anything sentient is deserving of rights. In the philosophy of animal rights, sentience entails the ability to experience pleasure and pain. ![]()
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