Pet Quizzes

Was just wanting to do some memes. These ones are about pets, since I’m wishing I had a pet here, and I spent a while this evening cuddling with another girl’s guinea pig. But guinea pigs ar enot for me…

You Would Be a Pet Cat

Independent and aloof, you don’t like to be dependent on anyone. And as for other people, you can take them or leave them. You often don’t care. You live your life by your own rules. And you have deep motivations that no one truly understands. Why you would make a great pet: You’re not needy or greedy… unlike other four legged friends. Why you would make a bad pet: You’re not exactly running down to greet people at the door What you would love about being a cat: Agility and freedom What you would hate about being a cat: Being treated like a dog by clueless humans

What Kind of Pet Would You Be?

Your Ideal Pet is a Cat

You’re both aloof, introverted, and moody.
And your friends secretly wish that you were declawed!

What’s Your Ideal Pet?

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What If Chimps Are Granted Human Status?

I just found out about a court case that would be important on many fronts. The primatologists who brought up the case may be primarily concerned with the biological resemblance between humans and apes. However, if this chimp is granted human rights, it will shift our perspective on humanity on quite a few fronts. Religion will be affected, cause many religions (most prominently, christianity) hold that humans have a special place within the Kingdom of God. But if only it were just this – that humans would be considered “just another animal in the forest”! Peter Singer, who is a well-known philosopher and Princeton professor, already holds this view. However, the picture is much wider: if this chimpanzee is granted human status, it requires us to define “humanity” all over again, which so far is being defined as “belonging to the species homo sapiens”. More precisely, we would have to find non-biological characteristics that make up the essence of humanness. The people who brought up this case, already use several of these: the fact that Hiasl recognizes himself in a mirror, enjoys painting, giggles when tickled, etc. You see where this is going already? Yes, these are all abilities that not all beings that belong to the species homo sapiens have. As a result, we would have to draw the line somewhere, and thereby, we run the risk of excluding certain beings belonging to our species from the realm of humanity. Peter Singer likely has no problem with this, but most people do not support his views on the worth of disabled children – or at least, I’m still naive enough to hope that they don’t. So we would have to draw the line somewhere where all beings belonging to the species homo sapiens, would be included. Possibly that means some beings belonging to other species will not, while others belonging to that species will. Will we get humans to stand up for these beings who, after all, belong to the same species as those who do have human rights? So where does it end? Will we eventually draw a biological line different from the current one – ie. those belonging to our species and such and such other species -, or will we draw a philosophical line? I’m afraid a judge cannot make this decision on her own.

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Peter Singer on Animal Rights

I was just reading the article All Animals Are Equal by Peter Singer. In this article, the Australian-born philosopher and professor at Princeton argues for equality between humans and nonhuman animals. He argues that the capacity to suffer and enjoy should be the only requirement for consideration of one’s interests (which is what counts in utilitarian ethics), because some being who can’t suffer or enjoy, can’t have interests. “Sentience” is the word Singer contends to use. If a being is sentient, it means it has interests. That is a more plausible requirement than reason, or moral capacity, or any other characteristic, for it is what is at the core of the idea of considering interests: if a being can’t suffer or enjoy, that means intrinsically that it has no interest. On the other hand, however mentally defective or morally incapable a being may be, if it can still suffer or enjoy, it has an interest, for it will be affected by what happens to it. In this case, mental capacity or moral ability is equally arbitrary to, for instance, skin colour. Therefore, this is the defining characteristic of whose interests should be considered, and according to these standards, nonhuman animals should be given equal consideration to humans.

Throughout the article, I remained suspicious, for I know Singer for being quite prejudiced against a particular group of human beings: the disabled. I kept wondering why he does argue for equal rights of animals, but still advocates infanticide on the profoundly retarded. Singer however does mention the retarded, although in this article he uses the argument that we wouldn’t do experiments on the retarded to state that we shouldn’t do the same on animals, either.

Still, I seem to have to take it that Singer thinks that, apparently, profoundly retarded people have no sentience. He does not discuss this in this article, but he does say that reason, apparently, is not needed for sentience, since we suspect that some animals do not have reason (or, traditionally, that no animals have reason). Having said that, I still feel a little puzzled, for it is determined by some other standard whether someone has sentience.

Cause how does one determine whether someone has sentience? I heard sometime that fish could feel pain. That didn’t surprise me, but it makes me wonder how they found out, especially since a philosopher who argues for animal rights as well as infanticide on the retarded, now is using sentience as an argument for the former. It is generally by getting some sort of reaction that it is found out that someone is sentient. And, even though no conventional communication may be needed to indicate that one has feeling, the being’s reactions (if any) must be interpreted as indicating that it can feel. This is even a controversial issue with people who are in a coma, so how controversial it must be with animals! Is there any reliable means of measuring whether a being is sentient? Aren’t we biassed by our own standards? I am afraid we are.

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