The Human Use of the Rest of Nature

The idea that animals may not be used by human beings is now defended by not just certain philosophers but also by legislators who have authorized various departments of the US federal government to ban the human use various forests, lakes, rivers and parks that contain animals thought to be endangered. It is contended that any endangered species must be shielded against harm from us, so even though these forests and so forth are supposedly public property, owned by the citizens of the USA, we aren't permitted by some of our fellow citizens to make use of them. And why?

I am not concerned here with the legal reasons for the bans in question - sure, in democracies the majority of voters have the legal power to impose their will on the rest.  But that is not decisive concerning what is right or wrong for such voters to do.  After all, just because a lot of people want to do something it does not make it the right thing to do. Indeed, unlimited democracy is no less tyrannical than unlimited monarchy! 

What is important is why we are supposed to ban the use of these animals. And in our time there are different arguments afoot in support of such bans.

One of these holds that any kind of hurt inflicted on living beings is wrong, but this is a mistake. Dentists hurt us, as do doctors, coaches and many others who deal with us, but so long as they do not do so wantonly, the hurt inflicted is justified because (a) we consent and (b) it is balanced by the high probability of benefits to us. So arguably, depending on what benefits we obtain from hurting animals -- significant ones, such as those obtained from certain types of animal research -- the same applies. Of course, animals cannot give consent. But if they cannot, why should it be important to worry about it?  Only wanton hurting, which is by its very nature senseless and thus unjustified, is wrong and even that may not be something anyone may ban, only strive to minimize. Some say animals may not be used by us because this thwarts their interests, yet why should that matter?  If that were morally decisive, then we could run roughshod over many of our fellows whose talents and belongings are to our interest.  What counts is not whether what we do with and to animals thwarts their interests, but whether we have the right to take what is to our benefit. If animals have no rights not to be used by us, then we may well have the right to use them for our own benefit. But some defenders of bans on the use of animals will argue that all life is sacred and thus we may not intrude on any of it. Yet this is entirely implausible since without killing some things, we cannot live and thus we would squander our own lives by adhering to such a principle.  There is then an evident contradiction here, especially since all living things devour other living things. To ban our doing so just makes no sense.

There are also those who say that nature as it stands apart from human beings is sacred, so disturbing it is morally and should be legally wrong.  Apart from the earlier rebuttal to this view, there is also the fact that this idea is completely unfounded. How could nature be sacred? Who blessed it and how come we then weren't blessed also, which would make our way of life, the one that constantly involves our use of nature, also blessed?

The only way to solve this conflict is to determine what portions of nature are superior to others and here there is little doubt that human beings are superior to the rest of nature. Why? That's a long story but suffice it here to point out that the very people who are advocating the bans on the use of non-human animals and nature signify the superiority of human life. They do so when they preach only to us about what we should and should not do to the rest of nature. Any being capable of making the choice between acting rightly and wrongly is clearly of a higher form than ones incapable of making such choices. The only plausible argument against the use of nature and other animals, especially banning such use, is if such use endangers us, human beings. Self-defense and paving the way to human flourishing are good reasons for not disturbing some parts of nature, for cultivating it and guarding it against abuse.

This applies to many things, of course, but even here most of it must be left to human discretion since no humans are superior to other humans and thus have no moral authority to dictate to them how to act unless they are being attacked by them.  And now and then it does happen that attacking some parts of nature will ipso facto mean attacking some human beings who may then defend themselves, something that may include defending those parts of nature (for example, their own livestock, pets, lands, forests, etc.).

In any case, banning the human use of animals can only be accomplished justly if due process is used, which means putting those who are charged with doing violence to us by such means on trial and proving the case against them in a court of law, not by just handing down special interest legislation to that end.

Some people decry the stance I have sketched above as specieism, the arbitrary preference of one's own species to others. Are we in fact special enough to care more for ourselves than other animals?

This is answered again, in part, by the very people who want to defend all of nature and other animals. When they address us about these matters, not the rest of nature - when they accept all the carnage that is perpetrated by other living things, including what would come to infanticide and worse if human beings were to engage in it - they clearly show that human beings are indeed special.

Of course the suffering of animals will be of concern to all conscientious human beings but not to the point of sacrificing significant human benefits to spare animals the suffering needed to secure those benefits. Indeed, often certain animals sacrifice others for their own benefit and, clearly, the pain they inflict on other animals will normally be tolerated because of the acknowledged hierarchy of importance in the animal world -- e. g., dolphins versus tuna and such. 

So it is in fact quite natural and justified for us to use other animals and the rest of nature for our own benefit - so to speak, everyone is doing it already!