Many philosophers consider favouritism toward humans in the context of moral choice to be a prejudice. Several terms are used for it – ' speciesism ', 'human chauvinism', 'human racism', and 'anthropocentrism' – with somewhat varying and often blurred meanings, which brings confusion to the issue. This essay suggests that only one term, ' speciesism ', be used, and it attempts a conceptual clarification. To this end it proposes a set of conditions of adequacy for a concept that would be (...) acceptable to the parties of the controversy. Through an examination of various forms of alleged speciesism it eventually proposes a rather precise concept. On this definition some positions believed not to be speciesist perhaps should be so called, and some positions believed to be speciesist perhaps should not be so called. The latter would better be referred to as 'humanistic ethics' or 'non-speciesist humanism'. (shrink)

I critique Peter Singer’s view that equality across species is a natural extension of equality. Singer presents one minor and two major arguments. The first major argument is that equality across species is implied by the traditional principle of equality. The second is that it follows from a conception that is behind the principle of equality, namely the moral “point of view of the universe.” The minor argument is a theory of the altruistic character and expanding circles of ethics.

Even though respect for integrity is hailed in several authoritative legal and ethical documents, and is typically presented as a complement to respect for autonomy, it is largely neglected in many leading works in ethics. Is such neglect warranted, or does it express a prejudice? This article argues that the latter is the case, and that this is due to misplaced conceptual concerns. It offers some proposals as regards the conceptualization of integrity in social ethics in general and in biomedical (...) ethics in particular. Five main directions of interpretation of “integrity” are discerned and shown to be relevant for different areas of biomedical ethics. The defense of respect for integrity is served by a softening of principlism and by greater attention to context among the initial critics of this principle. (shrink)

To show favouritism toward humans has been considered a prejudice, otherwise known as 'human chauvinism', 'anthropocentrism' or 'speciesism'. Peter Singer is one philosopher in particular who holds this view. In this paper I argue that there is a lack of coherence between his ethical ideology and his actual ethical theory. Singer's ethics in crucial respects exhibits favouritism toward humans, which is something he fails to justify non-partially and plausibly. It would thus be an instance of speciesism, in a sense of (...) this term that he probably would accept. This, however, does not mean that his ethics should be rejected or is impossible to defend. (shrink)

This essay offers a way to avoid a clash between reasons of love and reasons of ethics that stems from a difference in the conception of the moral value of people. In moralities of lovers, the loved ones are due to be accorded a value superior to that of other people, whereas in ethics there is an inescapable presumption that people have a value that is equal among them. The usual way to avoid this clash has been either to make (...) room in the ethical arsenal for reasons relating to particular agents, agent-relative reasons, or to acknowledge that love-grounded reasons legitimately compete with ethical reasons and that we need a method of negotiating them. Both escapes have serious problems. The essay proposes a third way. The first step is to reshape the notion of ’love,’ in a direction where important characteristics of our common understanding are kept, notably the loved ones’ uniqueness and incomparability, while the characteristic that is problematic in the present context would be eliminated, namely the you-and-me character of love that gives rise to reasons that are wholly personal and partial. The second step is to show how such a reformed notion of love coheres with the assumption of equal value. And the third step is, through this connection, to change our understanding of love as reason-giving, from generating reason directly to generating reason indirectly. This involves a shift of focus from reason to meta-reason, viz. that which makes our system of, or competence for, normative reasons reasonable. The advantage of the proposed solution would not only be that clash between reasons of love and reasons of ethics is avoided, but also that ethical reasons are seen as underpinned by love, which moreover offers the best ultimate explanation of them. (shrink)