Comparative Analysis - Essay Example

But it is precisely this step that many philosophers, and the majority of mankind, find problematic: how can we give rights to beings that, according to our customs, are to be used merely as ends to our satisfaction? This view was first introduced in the 18th century by the German philosopher Immanuel Kant who, in his article “Rational Beings Alone Have Moral Worth”, proposed that only rational beings are subjected to the famous categorical imperatives because only rational beings can discover the moral laws that govern all action.

Non-rational animals, then, are to be excluded from the moral equation, subtracted out based on their inherent limitation. This view, oddly, still dominates the modern mindset, even though it is a two hundred year-old theory. Modern theorists, however, disagree on Kant’s points about rationality being the criterion of moral worth. Peter Singer and Tom Regan, of course, are two who dispute Kant’s claims, and have productively advanced the contemporary debate on the rights of animals. However, as we shall see, their arguments are not without their own problems, and perhaps go too far in what they hope to accomplish.

Peter Singer, in his “A Utilitarian Defense of Animal Rights”, and Tom Regan, in his “The Radical Egalitarian Case for Animal Rights”, both focus on the central focus of Kant’s paper: that of the distinction between direct and indirect duties. Kant’s position is clearly that humans have no direct duties to animals, but only indirect duties. For instance, if a person runs over his neighbor’s dog, then we should not say that we have wronged the dog in some way, but rather that we have wronged the owner, a man to whom one does have direct duties toward.

And since the dog was of value to the man, we have an indirect duty not to run over the dog. This, of course, justifies the usage of animals in testing harmful products, meat and dairy consumption, and other