The "argument from species overlap" (abbreviated ASO) claims that some human and nonhuman animals possess similar sets of morally relevant characteristics, and are therefore similarly morally significant. The argument stands as a general challenge to moral theories, because many theories hold that all humans possess greater moral significance than all nonhuman animals. In this thesis I discuss responses to the ASO, primarily those of Peter Carruthers, Tom Regan, Evelyn Pluhar, and Peter Singer. Carruthers denies the conclusion of the ASO, while the other three do not. I argue that the ASO is a sound argument, and that Carruthers's attempts to counter it via his contractualist theory are unsuccessful. I next discuss the rights-based theories of Regan and Pluhar, which agree with the conclusion of the ASO but which, I believe, encounter significant theoretical difficulties. Finally, I address the ASO from a utilitarian perspective, first from Singer's utilitarian formulation and then from a "welfare-utilitarian" formulation. I answer a number of critical objections to welfare utilitarianism, and argue that the theory is most successful in facing the challenge of the ASO. / Master of Arts

Cette recherche vise à fonder les droits des animaux non humains (ou humains) d’une manière hobbesienne. Cette manière est celle du droit naturel (ou jusnaturalisme). Nous montrons tout d'abord pourquoi le droit naturel est un cadre normatif spécifique qui doit être distingué de tout autre système normatif, en particulier de la morale ou de l’éthique. Dans un contexte hobbesien, les droits des animaux non humains ne sont pas des droits moraux mais des droits naturels. Nous montrons ensuite comment on peut écarter grâce au droit naturel toute morale défavorable aux animaux non humains. En fondant les droits naturels des animaux non humains, cette recherche poursuit des travaux déjà engagés sur la voie hobbesienne. Mais nous relions plus particulièrement la question des droits naturels des animaux non humains à la question de savoir quel type de protection juridique doit leur être accordé en vertu d’arguments de type hobbesien. Nous montrons finalement pourquoi l’égalité animale est une nécessité juridique dans le contexte d’une défense jusnaturaliste des animaux non humains, ce qui se traduit en droit positif par leur personnification juridique anthropomorphique. / This research aims to ground nonhuman (or human) animal rights in a Hobbesian way. This is that of natural law (i.e., jusnaturalism). First, we show why natural law is a specific normative framework that should be distinguished from any other normative system, especially morals or ethics. In a Hobbesian framework, nonhuman animal rights are not moral rights but natural rights. We show then how any morals detrimental to nonhuman animals can be eliminated through natural law. By grounding nonhuman animals’ natural rights, this research pushes forward works already engaged in this Hobbesian manner. But we relate more particularly the nonhuman animals’ natural rights issue to the question of what kind of legal protection they should be granted on the basis of Hobbesian-like arguments. Finally, we show why animal equality is a legal necessity in the context of a jusnaturalist defense of nonhuman animals, which legally results in their anthropomorphic legal personification.

In the past forty years, there has been an unprecedented explosion of theological writings regarding the place of the nonhuman creation in ethics. The purpose of this dissertation is to propose a taxonomy of four paradigms of eco-theological thought that will categorize these writings and facilitate the identification, situation, and constructive development of the paradigm of cosmocentric transfiguration. This taxonomy takes shape within the tensions of three theological foundations: cosmology, anthropology, and eschatology. These tensions establish two categorical distinctions between, on the one hand, conservation and transfiguration, and, on the other, anthropocentrism and cosmocentrism. The variations within these poles yield the four paradigms. <br>The first paradigm is anthropocentric conservation, represented by Thomas Aquinas. It maintains that humanity bears an essentially unique dignity and eschatological telos that renders the nonhuman creation resources for human use in via toward that telos. The second is cosmocentric conservation, represented by Thomas Berry. It maintains that humanity is part of a cosmic community of intrinsic worth that demands protection and preservation, not human manipulation or eschatological redemption. The third is anthropocentric transfiguration, represented by Orthodox theologians such as Dumitru Staniloae. It maintains that humans are priests of creation charged with the task of recognizing the cosmos as the eternal sacrament of divine love and using it to facilitate communion among themselves and with God. The fourth is cosmocentric transfiguration, represented by both Jürgen Moltmann and Andrew Linzey. It maintains that humans are called to become proleptic witnesses to an eschatological hope for peace that includes the intrinsically valuable members of the cosmic community. <br>Cosmocentric transfiguration, while under-represented and underdeveloped, provides a unique opportunity to affirm both scientific claims about the nature of the cosmos and the theological hope for redemption. In addition, it offers a powerful vision to address the current ecological crisis with regard to humanity's relationship to both individual nonhuman life forms and the cosmos at large. This vision calls for humans to protest the mechanisms of death, suffering, and predation by living at peace, to whatever extent context permits, with all individual creatures while at the same time preserving the very system they protest by protecting the integrity of species, eco-systems, and the environment at large. These findings warrant further research regarding the viability of cosmocentric transfiguration, in particular its exegetical warrant in scripture, its foundations in traditional voices of Christian thought, its interdisciplinary potential for integration of the sciences, and its internal coherency. / McAnulty College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts; / Theology / PhD; / Dissertation;

René Descartes’ 1637 “bête machine” characterization of nonhuman animals has assisted in the strengthening of the Genesis 1:26 and 1: 28 disparate categorization of nonhuman animals and human animals. That characterization appeared in Descartes’ first important published writing, the Discourse on the Method, and can be summarized as including the ideas that nonhuman animals are like machines; do not have thoughts, reason or souls like human animals; and thus, cannot be categorized with humans; and, as a result, do not experience pain or certain other feelings. This characterization has impeded the primary objective of environmental ethics - the extension of ethical consideration beyond human animals - and has supported the argument that not only the nonhuman animal but also the rest of nature has only instrumental worth/value. As is universally recognized, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, just a few decades after Descartes’ death, took issue with Descartes’ dualism by arguing that the Leibnizian monad, with its active power, was the foundation of, at least, all of life. This argument must result in the conclusion that nonhuman and human animals are necessarily categorized collectively, just as Charles Darwin later argued. In fact, when the writings of Descartes and Michel de Montaigne are reviewed, it becomes apparent that Descartes never believed his bête machine characterization but embraced it to achieve not only his philosophical objectives but also his anatomical and physiological objectives. Philosophically, Descartes was answering Montaigne’s skepticism and his use of nonhuman animal examples to discredit human reason. Also, Descartes spent a major part of, at least, the last twenty-two years of his fifty-four year life dissecting nonhuman animals. Finally, the role that the politics and policies of the Christian institutions played in these matters is of primary importance. Similar politics and policies of the Christian institutions have since played, and still play, an important role in the continuing, unreasonable, disparate categorization of human animals and nonhuman animals. Philosophy seems to be the only discipline that can, if it will, take issue with that characterization.

This thesis argues that nonhuman animals are constructive of human societies by virtue of the complex relationships they form with humans, both at an individual and at a community level. This thesis also suggests that particular constructions of human/ nonhuman animal relationships fail to account for animal agency, and that the transgressions of liminal animals highlight this agency. Specifically, this thesis uses two case studies – deer in Oak Bay and bears on the Central Coast – to show how nonhuman animals can be seen as actors and as active shapers of our mixed-species social orderings and communities. This thesis argues that, rather than being passive objects who are subject to government policy and human orderings, these nonhuman animals are shaping political processes in their communities through the relationships they have formed with the humans around them. / Graduate

This study examines lived experiences of veterinarians. A common feature of being a veterinarian is curing and caring for nonhuman animals. It is the love and connection most veterinarians share for animals that ignite their journey to become an animal doctor. Data collected during semi-structured interviews with 17 veterinarians reveal that there are many more intricacies to the job than just animal medicine. These veterinarians suggest that they must treat animals as learning tools during veterinary training and once they complete school, they deal with people and business on a regular basis. Most veterinarians would like their jobs to be animal-centric, but these data show that they are not.

This text aims to place nonhuman animals at the core of urban space and history to provide an insight into the life and materiality of dogs in Stockholm 1824-1920. The theoretical possibilities of more-than-human enquiries into history are discussed along with non-human animals as historical beings together with humans creating a common history (Ingold 2000, Whatmore 2002). Moreover nonhuman animals are discussed and incorporated in an exploration into using what is here discussed as a multispecies narrative and used as an analytical tool to try to avoid the pitfalls of representationalism. It is also introduced as a possible new methodology to approaching the urban landscape within the field of environmental history. The main empirical material of dogs in nineteenth century Stockholm are records from the city dog pound along with records of dog tax and rabies. Other than archive material a wide range of material contemporary to the research period such as art, photography and literature is used as part of a broad exploration of nonhuman animals as integral in materiality of Stockholm and as historical beings. Findings of the study confirm that dogs and other nonhuman animals hugely impacted both the spatial structure and social space of Stockholm and that this impact transformed over the research period defined by societal changes. More specifically the study shows that dogs played an important role as free roaming scavengers and were for this reason accepted as an integral part of the city in the nineteenth century in Stockholm. Later in the research period when the city became more regulated this role started to change and dogs were not accepted loose on the streets to the same degree and transformed into pets and symbols of social mobility and class. Regarding the use of a multispecies narrative the conclusion that can be drawn form this thesis is that is opens up for discussions on the materiality of urban space and history.