I have been thinking recently about the difference between animal welfare and the ethics surrounding our relationship with animals, in particular, with those we consume. Of course, the two concepts - welfare and ethics are linked; many people feel that it is not ethical to eat animals, due to the potential impact on welfare; but the two concepts also have large differences. To use an analogy; ethics is one end of a rope, whilst welfare is the other end of the same rope. At the welfare end is the animal involved. The question regarding welfare is “Does it suffer?” At the ethics end is the person. The question here is less about if the animal can suffer, but if I as a person care that the animal at the other end of my rope is suffering. That might be an obvious difference, but I have read quite a few papers and seen some arguments that cannot be resolved as the two concepts are confused.
Let me give an example of the difference in concrete terms. In the UK there is a programme Called I Am A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here. Within this programme animals such as crickets, cockroaches and maggots are eaten live. Recently this practise has been stopped, with the reason being discussed as if it were an animal welfare issue.
If a stance on animal welfare is taken it means the viewpoint of the animal and their experience is central. In this situation taking an animal-centric view we need to ask, does the animal suffer or have reduced welfare from being part of this? To answer this, we need to consider the concept of suffering and the concept of pain. Do we know this animal can feel pain? Do we know if this animal has a sense of anticipation about what is to come and thus can have a sense of suffering over and above pain? Some research has been undertaken on invertebrate welfare, considering concepts such as boredom, personalities and pain perception in animals as diverse as cephalopods, crustaceans, spiders and honey bees, (Carere & Mather, 2019; Mather, 2016), but this is the exception rather than the rule. Alternative views have been put forward suggesting that invertebrates have nociception – that is they are sensitive, but this is different to pain (Adamo, 2016, 2019) and as such we cannot prove they experience pain in the same way we do. I would suggest that in the case of I Am A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here the research on the concept of an invertebrate’s suffering is not sufficiently developed to fully understand the welfare implications. So we cannot state that the animal’s welfare is compromised.
To complement the view that welfare is not the big issue for invertebrate consumption in I Am A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here, these animals are kept and sold in pets shops as live food for many other animals. For example, they are fed to lizards and spiders and it is rare that the welfare question is raised when they are animal food. Yet the animal centric experience differs little between being eaten by a lizard or being eaten by a person. The welfare state of live prey animals is probably no different to the welfare state of the same animal being eaten for a television programme. If we cannot prove an invertebrate has reduced welfare from being part of an entertainment show, why should they not be a part of it, and why have people protested against it?
To answer this welfare conundrum, we need to look along the rope of welfare to the ethics end. At this end is the person. And at this end the person needs to ask, not if the animal is suffering, but if they can accept that potential suffering. In this case, rather than relying on being able to determine the animal’s experience we are questioning our own beliefs about whether any potential suffering is of value. Given that here we are talking about animals being used for a television programme, the need for the animals is tenuous. Our ethical considerations may lead us to a very different conclusion on eating animals than if we were in a situation where that was the only food!
The situational inconsistencies highlights another difference between welfare and ethics; welfare is a fixed entity. The welfare of the animal in one situation is no different to the welfare of the animal in an identical situation that is set up for a different purpose. Ethics meanwhile is fluid and varies widely from case to case. I would argue, that whilst welfare is important to research because it gives us knowledge to base our ethics on, ethics should take centre stage, and be the first question we ask.
So; before asking if something suffers, the question to ask is, how much suffering is acceptable to me in this situation? Is my existence important enough for something else to suffer, even if I cannot prove that it suffers?
Take the case of fish. Billions of fish are caught by trawlers each year for human consumption, and the fish are emptied on the dry deck of the boat, where they are left to die. Normally this is quick, but sometimes as the fish are stored on ice it can take a long time (Diggles, Cooke, Rose, & Sawynok, 2011). Some researchers argue that as fish have a brain structure that varies widely from our own, it is unlikely that they have the ability to feel pain (Key, 2016), and therefore the fish are not suffering. Conversely other researchers argue that as fish are complex sentient beings it is not conceivable that they do not experience pain (Huntingford et al., 2006), and indeed that there is evidence for pain in fish (Braithwaite, 2010). I would say this is the wrong end of the ethics-welfare rope to focus on, as it is focuses on welfare. What is more relevant is to ask ourselves, if we assume that we cannot know for certain that fish do not feel pain, should we take the decision to presume they can experience pain, and if so are we still happy to continue with the same fishing practises? On the one hand the current practise maybe causing fish pain, whilst on the other hand we as a human species rely heavily on fish as a food source. Thus there is some value on both sides of the argument. Is it thus acceptable for it to continue, or should we, as Braithwaite, (2010) has recommended seek to reduce suffering by amending practises whilst still harvesting fish?
To continue this idea, take the case of plants. Should we be cutting and eating plants? Are we happy to do this, even if there was a possibility that the plant could be suffering? This may sound slightly extreme, but there is some evidence that plants have sentience (Gagliano, 2017), can communicate with one another about danger (Jost & Jost-Tse, 2017) and even that they respond to pain by emitting ultrasonic sounds (Khait et al., 2018), which creates an “interesting” image of a wheat field being harvested for your sandwich or even mowing the lawn! Thus, it is possible the ethics of plant consumption maybe as relevant as the ethics of eating fish.
If we hold out for proof of suffering, are we in effect subjecting other organisms to experimentation of the worst kind? Should we not say instead, that as we can’t prove suffering, we should assume suffering and, as such, how much suffering are we willing to allow for our own survival? If we can ask this question then the answer lies in ethics, not in welfare. This is a more important question than how something feels pain.
However, the answer just got harder! If we are unhappy with the concept of causing pain, a potential approach to the ethics of consumption is to only eat things that have already died. This is pretty extreme and could lead to illness or even starvation. On a more moderate stance some vegans choose not to eat animals due to their take on ethics related to animal welfare. However, it could be said to be an attitude that places the human outside of the natural world. It seems arrogant to believe that I as a human am a pristine entity outside the natural world, and I in the dominion of being human have the choice to prevent suffering in the world. This is a fallacy. I would argue that it is more important to adopt ethical pragmatism (Ethical Pragmatism Institute, 2019) and accept, Nietzsche’s point of view that “to live is to suffer” (www.the-philosophy.com, 2019) or maybe even take this a step further; “to live is to [cause] suffer[ing].” If we accept that our life is the cause of another organism suffering, then we also by default accept that we are a part of the world. We take an equal rather than paternalistic approach to nature.
Once there is an acceptance of potential suffering, the ethics don’t stop. We are a part of a much larger whole – that of the natural world. As part of that whole we should aim to reduce suffering as much as possible. In order to do this, we need to return to welfare and the research on pain!
So finally, remember, as Dread Pirate Roberts (aka Wesley) states “Life is Pain, Princess” (The Princess Bride). If we can accept our existence causes pain we can then move towards reduced suffering.
References
Adamo, S. A. (2016, August 1). Do insects feel pain? A question at the intersection of animal behaviour, philosophy and robotics. Animal Behaviour. Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2016.05.005
Adamo, S. A. (2019). Is it pain if it does not hurt? on the unlikelihood of insect pain. Canadian Entomologist. https://doi.org/10.4039/tce.2019.49
Braithwaite, V. (2010). Do Fish Feel Pain? Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Carere, C., & Mather, J. (2019). Animal Welfare The Welfare of Invertebrate Animals. (C. Carere & J. Mather, Eds.). Switzerland: Springer. Retrieved from http://www.springer.com/series/5675
Diggles, B. K., Cooke, S. J., Rose, J. D., & Sawynok, W. (2011, December). Ecology and welfare of aquatic animals in wild capture fisheries. Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11160-011-9206-x
Gagliano, M. (2017). The mind of plants: Thinking the unthinkable. Communicative & Integrative Biology, 10(2), e1288333. https://doi.org/10.1080/19420889.2017.1288333
Huntingford, F. A., Adams, C., Braithwaite, V. A., Kadri, S., Pottinger, T. G., Sandøe, P., & Turnbull, J. F. (2006). Current issues in fish welfare. Journal of Fish Biology. Blackwell Publishing Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0022-1112.2006.001046.x
Jost, J.-P., & Jost-Tse, Y.-C. (2017). Le langage secret des plantes. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319553551_Le_Langage_Secret_des_Plantes_Jean-Pierre_Jost_et_Yan_Chim_Jost-Tse_Editions_Cabedita_140_pages
Key, B. (2016). Why fish do not feel pain. Animal Sentience, 003, 1–33. Retrieved from http://www.uq.edu.au/sbms/staff/brian-key
Khait, I., Sharon, R., Perelman, R., Boonman, A., Yovel, Y., & Hadany, L. (2018). The sounds of plants – Plants emit remotely-detectable ultrasounds that can reveal plant stress. BioRxiv, 507590. https://doi.org/10.1101/507590
Mather, J. A. (2016). An invertebrate perspective on pain Commentary on Key on Fish Pain. Animal Sentience (Vol. 018). Retrieved from http://directory.uleth.ca/users/mather
Pragmatic Ethics vs Ethical Pragmatism - What is the Difference ? | Ethical Pragmatism Institute. (n.d.). Retrieved December 11, 2019, from http://epinstitute.org/pragmatic-ethics/
www.the-philosophy.com. (2019). Nietzsche Quotes. Retrieved December 11, 2019, from https://www.the-philosophy.com/nietzsche-quotes
Let me give an example of the difference in concrete terms. In the UK there is a programme Called I Am A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here. Within this programme animals such as crickets, cockroaches and maggots are eaten live. Recently this practise has been stopped, with the reason being discussed as if it were an animal welfare issue.
If a stance on animal welfare is taken it means the viewpoint of the animal and their experience is central. In this situation taking an animal-centric view we need to ask, does the animal suffer or have reduced welfare from being part of this? To answer this, we need to consider the concept of suffering and the concept of pain. Do we know this animal can feel pain? Do we know if this animal has a sense of anticipation about what is to come and thus can have a sense of suffering over and above pain? Some research has been undertaken on invertebrate welfare, considering concepts such as boredom, personalities and pain perception in animals as diverse as cephalopods, crustaceans, spiders and honey bees, (Carere & Mather, 2019; Mather, 2016), but this is the exception rather than the rule. Alternative views have been put forward suggesting that invertebrates have nociception – that is they are sensitive, but this is different to pain (Adamo, 2016, 2019) and as such we cannot prove they experience pain in the same way we do. I would suggest that in the case of I Am A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here the research on the concept of an invertebrate’s suffering is not sufficiently developed to fully understand the welfare implications. So we cannot state that the animal’s welfare is compromised.
To complement the view that welfare is not the big issue for invertebrate consumption in I Am A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here, these animals are kept and sold in pets shops as live food for many other animals. For example, they are fed to lizards and spiders and it is rare that the welfare question is raised when they are animal food. Yet the animal centric experience differs little between being eaten by a lizard or being eaten by a person. The welfare state of live prey animals is probably no different to the welfare state of the same animal being eaten for a television programme. If we cannot prove an invertebrate has reduced welfare from being part of an entertainment show, why should they not be a part of it, and why have people protested against it?
To answer this welfare conundrum, we need to look along the rope of welfare to the ethics end. At this end is the person. And at this end the person needs to ask, not if the animal is suffering, but if they can accept that potential suffering. In this case, rather than relying on being able to determine the animal’s experience we are questioning our own beliefs about whether any potential suffering is of value. Given that here we are talking about animals being used for a television programme, the need for the animals is tenuous. Our ethical considerations may lead us to a very different conclusion on eating animals than if we were in a situation where that was the only food!
The situational inconsistencies highlights another difference between welfare and ethics; welfare is a fixed entity. The welfare of the animal in one situation is no different to the welfare of the animal in an identical situation that is set up for a different purpose. Ethics meanwhile is fluid and varies widely from case to case. I would argue, that whilst welfare is important to research because it gives us knowledge to base our ethics on, ethics should take centre stage, and be the first question we ask.
So; before asking if something suffers, the question to ask is, how much suffering is acceptable to me in this situation? Is my existence important enough for something else to suffer, even if I cannot prove that it suffers?
Take the case of fish. Billions of fish are caught by trawlers each year for human consumption, and the fish are emptied on the dry deck of the boat, where they are left to die. Normally this is quick, but sometimes as the fish are stored on ice it can take a long time (Diggles, Cooke, Rose, & Sawynok, 2011). Some researchers argue that as fish have a brain structure that varies widely from our own, it is unlikely that they have the ability to feel pain (Key, 2016), and therefore the fish are not suffering. Conversely other researchers argue that as fish are complex sentient beings it is not conceivable that they do not experience pain (Huntingford et al., 2006), and indeed that there is evidence for pain in fish (Braithwaite, 2010). I would say this is the wrong end of the ethics-welfare rope to focus on, as it is focuses on welfare. What is more relevant is to ask ourselves, if we assume that we cannot know for certain that fish do not feel pain, should we take the decision to presume they can experience pain, and if so are we still happy to continue with the same fishing practises? On the one hand the current practise maybe causing fish pain, whilst on the other hand we as a human species rely heavily on fish as a food source. Thus there is some value on both sides of the argument. Is it thus acceptable for it to continue, or should we, as Braithwaite, (2010) has recommended seek to reduce suffering by amending practises whilst still harvesting fish?
To continue this idea, take the case of plants. Should we be cutting and eating plants? Are we happy to do this, even if there was a possibility that the plant could be suffering? This may sound slightly extreme, but there is some evidence that plants have sentience (Gagliano, 2017), can communicate with one another about danger (Jost & Jost-Tse, 2017) and even that they respond to pain by emitting ultrasonic sounds (Khait et al., 2018), which creates an “interesting” image of a wheat field being harvested for your sandwich or even mowing the lawn! Thus, it is possible the ethics of plant consumption maybe as relevant as the ethics of eating fish.
If we hold out for proof of suffering, are we in effect subjecting other organisms to experimentation of the worst kind? Should we not say instead, that as we can’t prove suffering, we should assume suffering and, as such, how much suffering are we willing to allow for our own survival? If we can ask this question then the answer lies in ethics, not in welfare. This is a more important question than how something feels pain.
However, the answer just got harder! If we are unhappy with the concept of causing pain, a potential approach to the ethics of consumption is to only eat things that have already died. This is pretty extreme and could lead to illness or even starvation. On a more moderate stance some vegans choose not to eat animals due to their take on ethics related to animal welfare. However, it could be said to be an attitude that places the human outside of the natural world. It seems arrogant to believe that I as a human am a pristine entity outside the natural world, and I in the dominion of being human have the choice to prevent suffering in the world. This is a fallacy. I would argue that it is more important to adopt ethical pragmatism (Ethical Pragmatism Institute, 2019) and accept, Nietzsche’s point of view that “to live is to suffer” (www.the-philosophy.com, 2019) or maybe even take this a step further; “to live is to [cause] suffer[ing].” If we accept that our life is the cause of another organism suffering, then we also by default accept that we are a part of the world. We take an equal rather than paternalistic approach to nature.
Once there is an acceptance of potential suffering, the ethics don’t stop. We are a part of a much larger whole – that of the natural world. As part of that whole we should aim to reduce suffering as much as possible. In order to do this, we need to return to welfare and the research on pain!
So finally, remember, as Dread Pirate Roberts (aka Wesley) states “Life is Pain, Princess” (The Princess Bride). If we can accept our existence causes pain we can then move towards reduced suffering.
References
Adamo, S. A. (2016, August 1). Do insects feel pain? A question at the intersection of animal behaviour, philosophy and robotics. Animal Behaviour. Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2016.05.005
Adamo, S. A. (2019). Is it pain if it does not hurt? on the unlikelihood of insect pain. Canadian Entomologist. https://doi.org/10.4039/tce.2019.49
Braithwaite, V. (2010). Do Fish Feel Pain? Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Carere, C., & Mather, J. (2019). Animal Welfare The Welfare of Invertebrate Animals. (C. Carere & J. Mather, Eds.). Switzerland: Springer. Retrieved from http://www.springer.com/series/5675
Diggles, B. K., Cooke, S. J., Rose, J. D., & Sawynok, W. (2011, December). Ecology and welfare of aquatic animals in wild capture fisheries. Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11160-011-9206-x
Gagliano, M. (2017). The mind of plants: Thinking the unthinkable. Communicative & Integrative Biology, 10(2), e1288333. https://doi.org/10.1080/19420889.2017.1288333
Huntingford, F. A., Adams, C., Braithwaite, V. A., Kadri, S., Pottinger, T. G., Sandøe, P., & Turnbull, J. F. (2006). Current issues in fish welfare. Journal of Fish Biology. Blackwell Publishing Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0022-1112.2006.001046.x
Jost, J.-P., & Jost-Tse, Y.-C. (2017). Le langage secret des plantes. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319553551_Le_Langage_Secret_des_Plantes_Jean-Pierre_Jost_et_Yan_Chim_Jost-Tse_Editions_Cabedita_140_pages
Key, B. (2016). Why fish do not feel pain. Animal Sentience, 003, 1–33. Retrieved from http://www.uq.edu.au/sbms/staff/brian-key
Khait, I., Sharon, R., Perelman, R., Boonman, A., Yovel, Y., & Hadany, L. (2018). The sounds of plants – Plants emit remotely-detectable ultrasounds that can reveal plant stress. BioRxiv, 507590. https://doi.org/10.1101/507590
Mather, J. A. (2016). An invertebrate perspective on pain Commentary on Key on Fish Pain. Animal Sentience (Vol. 018). Retrieved from http://directory.uleth.ca/users/mather
Pragmatic Ethics vs Ethical Pragmatism - What is the Difference ? | Ethical Pragmatism Institute. (n.d.). Retrieved December 11, 2019, from http://epinstitute.org/pragmatic-ethics/
www.the-philosophy.com. (2019). Nietzsche Quotes. Retrieved December 11, 2019, from https://www.the-philosophy.com/nietzsche-quotes
