Should Animals Do Not Have Rights - 1005 Words

Humans have always had a relationship with animals. Animals have always been and continues to be a source for food, work, clothing, experiments, and much more. To that, we owe them a great deal of gratitude. There has been much and ongoing debate over whether these practices are morally justified or not. Do non-human animals actually have rights? In this paper, I will argue that animals do not have rights. I will defend my claim by including arguments made by Carl Cohen and I will include possible arguments in which I address. To begin this argument, a definition of what a right is would be helpful to have a uniform understanding throughout this paper. A right is â€Å"a valid claim, or potential claim, made by a moral agent, under principles that govern both the claimant and the target of the claim† (Cohen, 91). By this definition, a right has three parts. 1. A right is a valid or potential claim. 2. The claim is made by a moral agent. 3. It is made by the claimant and the ot her party under governing principles. It is clear that animals immediately fail to bear rights because they do not have the ability to claim, they are not moral agents, and they do not have higher reasoning to understand the concept rights under governing principles. In the following paragraphs, I will go provide details of the three parts of the definition of a right and why animals do not qualify to have rights. Animals do not have the ability to claim. Animals do not have rights because they do notShow MoreRelatedThe Ethics Of Animal And Animal Rights990 Words   |  4 PagesThe study of good and bad, right and wrong, moral principles or value held by a person or society, promoting human welfare, maximizing freedom minimizing pain and suffering is called ethics. The discipline that studies the moral relationship of human beings and also the value and moral status of the environment and its non-human contents is called environmental ethics. 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