Be mindful of your feelings Speciesism as a moral illusion Stijn Bruers, IARC, Esch, sept-2012

Overview What are moral illusions? Analogy with optical illusions How to detect moral illusion? Do moral illusions exist? Yes: the trolley problem Can speciesism be a moral illusion?

Moral illusions Moral illusions are obstinate but incorrect intuitive judgments, comparable to the famous optical illusions. Method to detect them: Coherentism (reflective equilibrium): mutual support of intuitions and principles Universalism: translating strong moral intuitions into universalized ethical principles Consistency Knowledge about moral psychological mechanisms

Coherentism More than merely consistency Crossword puzzle (white boxes = situations) Universalism: words (=universal principles) instead of separate letters (=situational intuitions/rules) Consistency: 1 letter per box

Optical illusions Translation-invariance: measure sticks never change length when shifted in any direction

Optical illusions Translation-invariance Context-independence: influence of environment is arbitrary, artificial, fuzzy: never important

Optical illusions Translation-invariance Context-independence Optical mechanism 3D->2D perspective adaptation (heuristics, D.Kahneman) Lateral inhibition (contrasts) Coherent

Moral illusions: the trolley problem

Moral illusions: the trolley problem

Moral illusions: the trolley problem Action allowed: 90% of people A

Moral illusions: the trolley problem Action allowed: 50% of people B

Moral illusions: the trolley problem Action allowed: 10% of people C

Moral illusions: the trolley problem A versus B and C: victim is not used as merely means A and B versus C: victim is not send to threat What distinguishes B from C? The locus of intervention (at victim or at threat): “throwing bomb on a person or throwing person on a bomb?”

Moral illusions: the trolley problem Translation invariance All individuals have Right not to be killed Right not to be used as merely means Moral status of individual is independent from locus of intervention

Moral illusions: the trolley problem Context independence: erase irrelevant details B C

Moral illusions: the trolley problem Psychological mechanism Intervention myopia: “people who are evaluating the morality of options may give victims in the background less weight than victims in the attentional spotlight.” (Waldmann & Dieterich, 2007) Moral heuristic: attribute substitution (Kahneman, 1982; Sunstein, 2005)

Can speciesism be a moral illusion? 5 arguments against speciesism (context independence) 5 arguments pro sentience (translation invariance) Essentialism and heuristics (psychological mechanism)

Against speciesism Who am I? I am: white (population), a Homo sapiens sapiens (subspecies), a Homo sapiens (species), a Homo (genus), a great ape (family), a Hominoid (super family), a simian (infraorder), a dry nosed primate (suborder), a primate (order), a placental (infra class), a mammal (class), a vertebrate (phylum), an animal (kingdom) Too arbitrary

Phylum of chordata and vertebrates Kingdom of animals Phylum of chordata and vertebrates Class of mammals Infra class of placentals Order of primates Suborder of dry nosed primates Infraorder of simians Super family of Homonoids Family of great apes Genus Homo Species of Homo sapiens Subspecies of Homo sapiens sapiens Population of whites

Against speciesism What is a human? What about humanzee hybrids? human-animal chimera? ancestors (Homo habilis, Australopithecus,…)? genetically modified humans,…?

Against speciesism How is a species defined? Interbreeding and fertile offspring? All species are connected into one “temporal ring species”. Is the accidental death of intermediates relevant? Cfr. context independence: speciesism is arbitrary, artificial, intrinsically fuzzy

Against speciesism Genes and bodily properties are not relevant in situation A (e.g. racism), so should not be relevant in situation B (speciesism). Speciesism is a violation of the merit principle

Sentience Well-being and impartiality. Cfr. consequentialist (Singer) and contractualist (Rowlands) ethics: veil of ignorance Empathy is a virtue to be developed (virtue ethics and ethics of care) Cfr translation invariance, using empathy or the veil of ignorance to put yourself into the position of the other

Sentience Rights ethics: the connection between feelings, interests and rights is not farfetched Feelings detect interests (e.g.: pain -> bodily integrity) Rights protect interests Consciousness is special (complex, vulnerable,…) and should be protected Sentience is the only mental capacity that mentally disabled humans share with us

Essentialism The psychological explanation Children and adults (from different cultures and backgrounds) intuitively describe biological entities in essentialist terms. They think that biological categories have invisible essences (Gelman, 2003; Bloom, 2010) Studies about racism also demonstrates that racists think of races or ethnic groups as being essentialized natural groups (Gil-White, 2001) But essentialism is in contradiction with Darwinism and current biology

Speciesism as a moral illusion Moral status of animal Moral status of human (Morally) irrelevant properties The ten arguments are coherent with each other There is no “essence” related to lines with inward pointing arrowheads

Speciesism as a moral heuristic Daniel Kahneman, Cass Sunstein Attribute substitution Target attribute: rationality, self-consciousness,… Heuristic attribute: human Based on Pattern recognition skills: a human is easier to detect than a rational being Most humans have the target attribute Heuristic ‘misfires’ at mentally disabled humans Should people keep this heuristic?