Abstract:
In this essay we reflect critically on how animal ethics, and in particular
thinking about moral standing, is currently configured. Starting from the work of
two influential ‘‘analytic’’ thinkers in this field, Peter Singer and Tom Regan, we
examine some basic assumptions shared by these positions and demonstrate their
conceptual failings—ones that have, despite efforts to the contrary, the general
effect of marginalizing and excluding others. Inspired by the so-called ‘‘continental’’
philosophical tradition (in particular Emmanuel Levinas, Martin Heidegger,
and Jacques Derrida), we then argue that what is needed is a change in the rules of
the game, a change of the question. We alter the (pre-) normative question from
‘‘What properties does the animal have?’’ to ‘‘What are the conditions under which
an entity becomes a moral subject?’’ This leads us to consider the role of language,
personal relations, and material-technological contexts. What is needed then in
response to the moral standing problem, is not more of the same—yet another, more
refined criterion and argumentation concerning moral standing, or a ‘‘final’’ rational
argumentation that would be able to settle the animal question once and for all—but
a turning or transformation in both our thinking about and our relations to animals,
through language, through technology, and through the various place-ordering
practices in which we participate.
