Classical Theism, Philosophy, and Religion Forum / Thomism on meat-eating, animal farming methods, and hunting.

**Posted by Jeremy Taylor** 6/26/2015 5:10 pm

This was a question I wanted to ask on Dr. Feser's blog, but it would have been off-topic, so I will post it here.

Does anyone have any information on the Thomist/Natural Law arguments surrounding meat-eating, animal farming, and hunting (especially fox hunting)?

I was reading a discussion on facebook between vegans and meat-eaters recently, and I had to admit that when I thought about meat-eating, I can admit it needs some justfication, especially if one excludes arguments about nutrition.

I'd be especially interested in how Natural Law would approach farming methods, most especially factory farming (which John Seymour, not entirely without cause, liked to refer to as Belsen farming)? Is there a moral duty to, as far as possible, eat and use only humanely sourced animal products? What does this mean for modern farming?

Finally, I am not much of a hunter myself, but I am a traditionalist and would like to think hunting, especially fox hunting, morally acceptable. Does anyone have information or links to a Natural Law treatment of the issue? The only contemporary philosophical treatment I know of is Roger Scruton's.

**Posted by DanielCC** 6/26/2015 6:25 pm

I'm not sure it will be quite what you're looking for but Oderberg discusses the issue of Animal Rights in his Applied-Ethics: A Non-Consequentialist Approach.

**Posted by iwpoe** 6/26/2015 6:29 pm

I'm at work right now, so I can't consult my detailed references, but a search online and filtering out modern ideology about animals, seems to indicate that Thomas thought, as I think, that animals are not objects of moral concern per se, but that they are also morally relevant because cruelty to animals is both reflective of bad character and corrupting of character. Kant held the same, if I recall correctly. Can anyone source all that?

**Posted by Jeremy Taylor** 6/27/2015 12:10 am

Daniel,

Coincidentally I have that work of Oderberg's out from the university library at the moment. I will check it for its comments on this topic.

Iwpoe,

That does sound familiar, but I do not have sources to support it.

What most interests me is the ethics of meat farming methods.

**Posted by iwpoe** 6/27/2015 12:52 am

Well, we might have to do that research ourselves, given the general bent of natural law researchers.

**Posted by Mateus** 6/27/2015 5:51 pm

See the Summa Theologica on murder. The first question is about animals and plants. I would post the link here, but the forum doesn't allow me to.

**Posted by John West** 6/27/2015 6:09 pm

To control spam, at least two posts [...]"

That's unfortunate. One more, I guess. Here's the link: Summa Theologica. "Whether it is unlawful to kill any living thing?".

**Posted by GeorgiusThomas** 6/29/2015 1:41 pm

I've found Oderberg's discussion of animal rights in Applied Ethics to be very informative.
I suppose it can be considered an elaboration of Aquinas' treatment of the issue (absent the biblical references and with less explicitly Scholastic wording).
I've lent the book, so I can't check the correctness of my presentation (in any case, I consider my argument to be correct), but the key theme of it is that the ability to know purposes-as-reasons-for-action is a precondition of having rights. The goods of brute animals do not amount to reasons for rational human actions, therefore there is no 'conflict of rights' (the one present in murder situations, for example). The reasons for thinking that something is morally wrong when it comes to animals, therefore, concern privations of human goods, private or common.

If this reasoning is correct, instances of animal killing for purposes other than procuring food that make moderns cringe, like bullfighting or fox hunting, are not immoral per se, but only per accidens (if pursued for vanity, love of cruelty etc.). I personally believe the mentioned traditions to be very good, as they are arguably conducive to growth in virtue and are reported to be good sport.

P.S.
There are other considerations, such as risk, obviously pertinent to the cases of the corrida de torros and (sport) hunting , but I'm yet to find a detailed treatment of the ethics of risk, so I confess I don't have much to say on that topic.

Last edited by GeorgiusThomas (6/29/2015 4:22 pm)

**Posted by Etzelnik** 6/29/2015 2:25 pm

Although I don't have much to contribute in the way of Aquinas, I'm currently scouring my memory to put together a comprehensive account of killing and harming animals (for food, resources, or leisure) in both the Jewish philosophical and legal traditions.

It may take some time though- I'm essentially collating the material purely from memory. I will have to check all my original sources before posting them.

I would've simply linked you to something had I something to link. Unfortunately, I don't, as the current trend in Jewish scholarship tends to make a clear distinction between Halakha and philosophy. As a result, rarely are our theologians Talmudists, nor our talmudists, theologians, which leads to deficiency in both fields.

Last edited by Etzelnik (6/29/2015 2:51 pm)

**Posted by Jeremy Taylor** 6/29/2015 4:48 pm

Thank you all for your replies. I will definitely have to read Oderberg's work closely.

Some of the arguments against hunting and meat-eating I have read seem to anthropomorphise animals a little too much.