How Should One Live With Other Animals?: An exploration of the ways three philosophers have answered this question

Abstract

"I once asked a woman, an Aboriginal woman in Central Australia, I said, How do we differ, how do we differ from wallaby and kangaroo? And she said, Well mate, we're the ones that can tell the stories about all the others. And that's what we are. I think if any Martian came along and said, Well what are you? We're the storytellers. You know, you get them to tell the story." (Jean Houston, The Spirit of Things, 2001, para. 60) Let us imagine philosophers as storytellers in some fashion. What stories would they tell about animals, about the wallaby and the kangaroo? What would they say to the Martian about how one lives with animals, or because they are philosophers given to thinking seriously about moral questions, about how one should live with animals? And how would these philosophers say it? What approach would they take? In this thesis I am concerned with the ways three philosophers - given to thinking seriously about moral questions - have answered the question about how one should live with animals. Moreover I am keen to explore some of the problems, issues and insights brought about by these 'ways'. The philosophers of which I speak are Daniel Dennett, Peter Singer and Rosalind Hursthouse.