In principleāthough I canāt say Iāve been consistent about it. Iāve supported ending our family dogās misery when she was diagnosed with pretty bad cancer, and I still stand behind that decision. On the other hand I donāt think I would ever apply this to an animal one has had no interaction with.
On a meta level, and Iām adding this because itās relevant to your other comment: I think itās fine to live with such contradictions. Given our brain architecture, I donāt expect human morality to be translatable to a short and clear set of rules.
On the other hand I donāt think I would ever apply this to an animal one has had no interaction with.
Would you be against painlessly enthanising a stray dog with a similar condition as your familyās dog? If you would support ending their misery too, why not supporting efforts to decrease the number of wild animals with negative lives?
If I somehow ran into such a dog and decided the effort to take them to an ultrasound etc. was worth it, then probably yesābut I wouldnāt start e.g. actively searching for stray dogs with cancer in order to do that.
No, thatās not what I think. I think itās rather dangerous and probably morally bad to seek out ānegative livesā in order to stop them. And I think we should not be interfering with nature in ways we do not really understand. The whole idea of wild animal welfare seems to me not only unsupported morally but also absurd and probably a bad thing in practice.
In principle, or only in practice?
In principleāthough I canāt say Iāve been consistent about it. Iāve supported ending our family dogās misery when she was diagnosed with pretty bad cancer, and I still stand behind that decision. On the other hand I donāt think I would ever apply this to an animal one has had no interaction with.
On a meta level, and Iām adding this because itās relevant to your other comment: I think itās fine to live with such contradictions. Given our brain architecture, I donāt expect human morality to be translatable to a short and clear set of rules.
Thanks for sharing, Guy!
Would you be against painlessly enthanising a stray dog with a similar condition as your familyās dog? If you would support ending their misery too, why not supporting efforts to decrease the number of wild animals with negative lives?
If I somehow ran into such a dog and decided the effort to take them to an ultrasound etc. was worth it, then probably yesābut I wouldnāt start e.g. actively searching for stray dogs with cancer in order to do that.
Makes sense. I think that suggests you consider decreasing the number of negative lives good in principle, although not always worth it in practice.
No, thatās not what I think. I think itās rather dangerous and probably morally bad to seek out ānegative livesā in order to stop them. And I think we should not be interfering with nature in ways we do not really understand. The whole idea of wild animal welfare seems to me not only unsupported morally but also absurd and probably a bad thing in practice.