Philosophy: Is it Morally Permissible to Kill Animals for Food

In this video, Tyler Doggett (University of Vermont) asks why it is morally permissible to kill animals for food. He offers a few explanations that seem unsatisfactory. So, he asks you for help answering this question about animals ethics.

(intro music)

My name is Tyler Doggett.

I teach at the University of Vermont,

and I'm going to talk about
whether it's morally

permissible to kill animals for food.

One thing I'm not going to talk about is

whether it's morally permissible
to eat animals for food.

I'm also not going to talk
about whether it's okay,

morally okay, to buy animals for food.

What I want to talk about
is whether it's morally

permissible to kill animals
for food in the first place.

And we do kill a lot of
animals for food each year.

Millions of pigs are
killed for food each year.

Is that permissible?

Over twenty million pigs were
killed last year for food.

Is that morally permissible?

In particular, is it morally
permissible to kill pigs

for food that we don't need to eat?

I'm not talking about a situation

where you're all alone on a desert island,

and if you don't kill that
pig, you're going to die.

I'm talking about the
situation where in right now,

which is we don't have
to kill pigs to eat.

We could all eat kale sandwiches.

But instead, because they're delicious,

we kill millions of pigs each year.

Is that morally permissible?

That's what I want to talk about.

But let's talk about a
different question first.

Is it morally permissible
to kill people for food?

Again, I'm not talking about a situation

like the Donner Party, or situations

where people crash land
on a deserted island,

and if they don't eat each
other, they're going to die.

I mean, would it be
permissible for you to keep

some stranger in your house
and kill that stranger

for food, rather
than eat a kale sandwich.

We don't have to talk about
that question for very long

That has an easy answer: no!

It is morally impermissible to kill people

for food you don't need to eat.

So let me ask you this.

If it is permissible to kill pigs for food

but not permissible to
kill people for food,

there must be some difference
between pigs and people

that explains why it's permissible

to kill the pig but not the person.

So what's the difference?

Here's an idea.

The pig is a pig.

The person is a person.

So this difference, I think, is supposed

to be a difference in genetic makeup,

the type of DNA the pig has

that's different from our genetic makeup.

So is that the kind of
difference that explains

why it's morally
permissible to kill the pig

but not morally permissible to kill us?

Let me ask you this.

There's a Twilight Zone
episode called "To Serve Man."

If you want to see that episode,

you should skip this part of the video,

because I'm going to give
away something very important.

In the Twilight Zone episode

"To Serve Man," aliens come to earth and,

to make a long story short,
they're farming us for food.

Is that morally permissible?

You might think, "No!

"It's not permissible for
me to eat people for food

"I don't need. Neither is it
permissible for aliens to eat us."

But then imagine the alien
says, "But don't you see?

"You're a different sort of
creature than we are.

"We have totally different
genetic makeups."

That does not seem like a very good

answer the alien's given.

One thing you might say is, "Yes, I see

"that we have different genetic makeups

"but I'm still the kind of
thing you shouldn't kill."

But a pig might say that to us
if we say, "It's permissible

"for us to kill you because
you're a pig and we are people."

But maybe what you're getting
at when you say, "A pig's a pig;

a person, a person" is people are special

because, well, for one thing,

we're quite a bit smarter than pigs

which isn't to say pigs are dummies.

Pigs are pretty smart.

People are just smarter.

Okay.

One thing you might ask is,

"Why does that make it okay to kill the pig?"

But that's not what I want to ask,

because while I think
you're smarter than a pig,

you're watching a philosophy video.

Not everyone is smarter than a pig.

In fact, we all know some creatures,

some people even probably,
who are not smarter than pigs.

Is it okay to eat those people?

No!

That's not a hard question.

Now, one reason it might be
you shouldn't eat people

who have mental lives as pigs:
we care about those people.

It might be that my brother
has the mental life of a pig,

but it would be wrong to kill him for food,

because I care about him.

But let me ask you two things about this.

First, why does caring about
my brother make a difference?

If the reason it's wrong to
kill my severely mentally

handicapped brother for food
is because I care about him,

then what you're saying
is the reason it's wrong

doesn't have to do with my brother,

so much as it has does to do with me.

And that does not seem correct.

It seems like there's something
about what you're doing

to my brother when you kill him for food

that's objectionable.

that has nothing to do with
what you're doing to me.

Now let me ask you a different question:

what if no one cared about my brother?

What if my brother, with the
mental life of a pig or a hermit,

no one cared about him?

No one even knew about him?

Would it be permissible
to kill him for food then?

I don't think so.

I still think this is not a hard question.

What we're looking for is a difference

between people and pigs that explains

why it's morally permissible
to kill pigs for food

but not permissible to kill people.

And we've tried some differences out.

They're different species,

but that doesn't really
seem to explain it.

People are smarter in general than pigs.

That doesn't seem to explain it either.

We care about people,
don't care about pigs.

That doesn't seem to explain it either.

What else?

Well, here's something people say

sometimes when you talk about this:

"The pig would do it to us."

Put a person with a pig.

The pig might eventually eat the person.

Does that show it's morally permissible

for the person to eat the pig?

Let me ask you a different question.

Have you ever been punched
by a very small child?

I have.

Do you think it was permissible for
me to punch the child back,

reasoning, "He did it to me; therefore,

it's permissible for me to do it to him"?

I think that would not be
very good reasoning.

It would be wrong to punch the child,

even though the child would do it to me.

In fact, I think the child,
if the child is young enough,

doesn't do anything wrong
if it does it to me.

The child is not the kind
of thing that does anything

right or wrong, but still,
we might do wrong to it.

Last difference:

we're at the top of the food chain.

where we live in places where
we can watch philosophy videos.

Obviously, if we lived in the ocean,

we wouldn't be at the
top of the food chain.

But where we are, we're the
top of the food chain,

so isn't it morally permissible
for us to take advantage

of that and kill whatever
we want for food?

It might be that we're in a
position to do various things

to other animals because we're
the top of the food chain,

but that doesn't mean it's morally

permissible for us to do it.

I'm a very small person,

so I'm constantly dealing with people

who are much bigger than I am,

who are much stronger than I am,

who could pound me to a pulp very easily.

Well, imagine they did.

And I said, "You shouldn't have done that!

"That was morally wrong."

And they say, "But don't you see?

"I'm stronger than you."

That's terrible reasoning.

Of course, they're stronger than me.

What I wanted to know is why it was okay

for them to express their
strength in that way.

Similarly, it might be that we're above

the pig on the food chain,

and as you get ready
to kill the pig to eat it,

the pig might say, "Why
are you eating me?"

We just say, "We can.

"We have control over you."

That does not seem like
a very good answer.

Sometimes people say something related

which is "That's just the way nature is.

"That's why it's morally permissible."

But it's natural to do all sorts

of things that are morally wrong.

If you're listening to this video

and getting really frustrated,

it's natural to want to punch me.

It might be natural to punch me.

But that doesn't mean you should do it.

So I'm perplexed.

I started off asking

whether it's okay to kill pigs for food.

To answer that question, I asked,
first, a very easy question:

whether it's okay to kill people for food.

That's an easy question.

The answer is "No."

Then I asked, "What's the
difference between people and pigs,

"such that it's permissible
to kill pigs for food

"even though it's not
permissible to kill people?"

And I've gone through
a bunch of differences.

None of them seem like they
do the work that's required.

None of them seem like they
explain why it's okay to kill

pigs for food but it's not
okay to kill people for food.

So I hope you'll help me
figure out the answer,

or decide it's morally
wrong to kill pigs for food.

Thanks.