Insects and human ethical obligations towards them have been discussed by a number of writers and figures throughout history, many of whom, arguing from a variety of different perspectives, have contended that there exists a moral obligation towards not harming or killing insects. According to generally accepted definitions in animal welfare and agricultural ethics, however, it is argued that individual insects do not have a "right to life".
Jain monks take considerable precautions to avoid, even unintentionally, harming even the smallest living beings, including insects. [1] Breaches of the fundamental principle of Ahimsā (non-violence) impacts one's karma negatively, especially when destruction of life is brought about by carelessness, though violence against insects impacts karma less so than so-called "five-sensed creatures" (e.g. humans); In Jainism, there is a hierarchy of the forms of existence, where beings are categorized according to the amount of senses they possess. Insects may differ in their count, for example, worms have two senses, ants three, and flies four. Thereby, their respective destruction affects karma differently. [2]
According to Buddhist principles, insects, are considered as sentient beings, who should not be harmed or killed. [3] It has been described in a story of the life of the Buddha, that he once commanded monks to discontinue their travels during monsoon season, to avoid the killing of worms and insects on the muddy roads. [4] Following the example of Jainism, Buddhist monks frequently make use of a strainer to avoid killing small animals when drinking water. [1]
Jon Wynne-Tyson, in The Expanding Circle, quotes the Tai-shang kan-yingp'ien : "Have a compassionate heart toward all creatures… Even insects". [5] He also attributes a quote to Wen Ch'ang in Yin-chih-wen, which states: "Whenever taking a step, always watch for ants and insects. Prohibit the building of fires outside (lest insects be killed)". [5]
The Sefer Hasidim , a medieval Hebrew work, instructs its followers to never inflict pain on animals, including insects, and to not kill wasps or flies. [6]
Soame Jenyns, an English MP and writer, argued that: "We are unable to give life, and therefore ought not wantonly to take it away from the meanest insect, without sufficient reason; they all receive it from the same benevolent hand as ourselves, and have therefore an equal right to enjoy it." [7] William Ellery Channing stated in a letter that he would never kill an insect and asserted that insects have been given the same right to life as humans by God; he also argued that killing them would spoil the work of God's creation. [8]
Insects and their Habitations: A Book for Children, published by the Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge in 1833, instructed children that it was a sin against God to unnecessarily harm insects and that if they should encounter one in distress, they should not harm them, but provide them aid. [9] : 241
The 11th-century Arab poet and philosopher Al-Maʿarri described the compassion of releasing a flea from his hand as being kinder that giving money to a human in need. He asserted that both the flea and human take precautions against death and have a passion to continue living. [10]
The early animal rights writer Lewis Gompertz, an early vegan, [11] argued against the killing of silk worms to procure silk. [12]
Peter Singer argues that a lack of knowledge around the capacity for insects to have subjective experiences means that "insect rights" is not yet something that should be campaigned for. [13]
The entomologist Jeffrey A. Lockwood argues that:
Considerable empirical evidence supports the assertion that insects feel pain and are conscious of their sensations. In so far as their pain matters to them, they have an interest in not being pained and their lives are worsened by pain. Furthermore, as conscious beings, insects have future (even if immediate) plans with regard to their own lives, and the death of insects frustrates these plans. In that sentience appears to be an ethically sound, scientifically viable basis for granting moral status and in consideration of previous arguments which establish a reasonable expectation of consciousness and pain in insects, I propose the following, minimum ethic: We ought to refrain from actions which may be reasonably expected to kill or cause nontrivial pain in insects when avoiding these actions has no, or only trivial, costs to our own welfare. [14]
An ethical analysis around the issue of killing harmful animals (other than for meat production or product testing) concluded that it is allowable under the following conditions:
In such a situation, a prima facie right to life of an animal is overridden. In general, insects are not postulated to have such rights anyway, and moreover, agricultural ethics concerns itself with the morality of killing harmful mammals (predators, herbivores) or disease vectors (rats). "Insect killing" is strictly an ecological concern due to the use of potentially harmful insecticides, and the event of killing a single insect is quantitatively neglectable. [15]
It has been argued that Shakespeare expressed sympathy for insects, specifically in his 1604 play Measure for Measure , where the character Isabella states: "The sense of death is most in apprehension. / And the poor beetle that we tread upon, / In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great / As when a giant dies." [9] : 99–100
In the poem "On Cruelty", John Clare refers to rescuing flies from the webs of spiders: "E'en 'plaining flies to thee have spoke, / Poor trifles as they be; / And oft the spider's web thou'st broke, / To set the captive free." [16]
The idiom "wouldn't hurt a fly" is used to refer to someone who is gentle and who would not do anything to cause harm or injury. [17]
Ahimsa is the ancient Indian principle of nonviolence which applies to actions towards all living beings. It is a key virtue in Indian religions like Jainism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Sikhism.
The five precepts or five rules of training is the most important system of morality for Buddhist lay people. They constitute the basic code of ethics to be respected by lay followers of Buddhism. The precepts are commitments to abstain from killing living beings, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying and intoxication. Within the Buddhist doctrine, they are meant to develop mind and character to make progress on the path to enlightenment. They are sometimes referred to as the Śrāvakayāna precepts in the Mahāyāna tradition, contrasting them with the bodhisattva precepts. The five precepts form the basis of several parts of Buddhist doctrine, both lay and monastic. With regard to their fundamental role in Buddhist ethics, they have been compared with the ten commandments in Abrahamic religions or the ethical codes of Confucianism. The precepts have been connected with utilitarianist, deontological and virtue approaches to ethics, though by 2017, such categorization by western terminology had mostly been abandoned by scholars. The precepts have been compared with human rights because of their universal nature, and some scholars argue they can complement the concept of human rights.
Sentience is the simplest or most primitive form of cognition, consisting of a conscious awareness of stimuli without association or interpretation. The word was first coined by philosophers in the 1630s for the concept of an ability to feel, derived from Latin sentiens (feeling), to distinguish it from the ability to think (reason).
This index of ethics articles puts articles relevant to well-known ethical debates and decisions in one place - including practical problems long known in philosophy, and the more abstract subjects in law, politics, and some professions and sciences. It lists also those core concepts essential to understanding ethics as applied in various religions, some movements derived from religions, and religions discussed as if they were a theory of ethics making no special claim to divine status.
Ethics involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior. A central aspect of ethics is "the good life", the life worth living or life that is simply satisfying, which is held by many philosophers to be more important than traditional moral conduct.
Conversations regarding the ethics of eating meat are focused on whether or not it is moral to eat non-human animals. Ultimately, this is a debate that has been ongoing for millennia, and it remains one of the most prominent topics in food ethics.
Buddhist ethics are traditionally based on the enlightened perspective of the Buddha. In Buddhism, ethics or morality are understood by the term Śīla or sīla (Pāli). Śīla is one of three sections of the Noble Eightfold Path. It is a code of conduct that embraces a commitment to harmony and self-restraint, primarily motivated by nonviolence or freedom from causing harm. It has been variously described as virtue, moral discipline and precept.
Animal rights is the philosophy according to which many or all sentient animals have moral worth independent of their utility to humans, and that their most basic interests—such as avoiding suffering—should be afforded the same consideration as similar interests of human beings. Broadly speaking, and particularly in popular discourse, the term "animal rights" is often used synonymously with "animal protection" or "animal liberation". More narrowly, "animal rights" refers to the idea that many animals have fundamental rights to be treated with respect as individuals—rights to life, liberty, and freedom from torture that may not be overridden by considerations of aggregate welfare.
Mary Anne Warren was an American writer and philosophy professor, noted for her writings on the issue of abortion and animal rights.
In Jainism, ahiṃsā is a fundamental principle forming the cornerstone of its ethics and doctrine. The term ahiṃsā means nonviolence, non-injury, and absence of desire to harm any life forms. Veganism, vegetarianism and other nonviolent practices and rituals of Jains flow from the principle of ahimsa. There are five specific transgressions of Ahimsa principle in Jain scriptures – binding of animals, beating, mutilating limbs, overloading, withholding food and drink. Any other interpretation is subject to individual choices and not authorized by scriptures.
Animal ethics is a branch of ethics which examines human-animal relationships, the moral consideration of animals and how nonhuman animals ought to be treated. The subject matter includes animal rights, animal welfare, animal law, speciesism, animal cognition, wildlife conservation, wild animal suffering, the moral status of nonhuman animals, the concept of nonhuman personhood, human exceptionalism, the history of animal use, and theories of justice. Several different theoretical approaches have been proposed to examine this field, in accordance with the different theories currently defended in moral and political philosophy. There is no theory which is completely accepted due to the differing understandings of what is meant by the term ethics; however, there are theories that are more widely accepted by society such as animal rights and utilitarianism.
Contemporary debates about animal welfare and animal rights can be traced back to ancient history. Records from as early as the 6th century before the common era (BCE) include discussions of animal ethics in Jain and Greek texts. The relations between humans and nonnhumans are also discussed in the books of Exodus and Genesis, Jewish writings from the 6th or 5th century BCE.
Lewis Gompertz was an English writer and inventor, and early animal rights and veganism advocate. He was a founding member of the English Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals; later the RSPCA, and the Animals' Friend Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
Biocentrism, in a political and ecological sense, as well as literally, is an ethical point of view that extends inherent value to all living things. It is an understanding of how the earth works, particularly as it relates to its biosphere or biodiversity. It stands in contrast to anthropocentrism, which centers on the value of humans. The related ecocentrism extends inherent value to the whole of nature.
Sentiocentrism, sentio-centrism, or sentientism is an ethical view that places sentient individuals at the center of moral concern. Both humans and other sentient individuals have rights and/or interests that must be considered.
Wild animal suffering is the suffering experienced by non-human animals living outside of direct human control, due to harms such as disease, injury, parasitism, starvation and malnutrition, dehydration, weather conditions, natural disasters, and killings by other animals, as well as psychological stress. Some estimates indicate that these individual animals make up the vast majority of animals in existence. An extensive amount of natural suffering has been described as an unavoidable consequence of Darwinian evolution and the pervasiveness of reproductive strategies which favor producing large numbers of offspring, with a low amount of parental care and of which only a small number survive to adulthood, the rest dying in painful ways, has led some to argue that suffering dominates happiness in nature.
The welfare of farmed insects concerns treatment of insects raised for animal feed, as food or pet food, and other purposes such as honey and silk.
The predation problem or predation argument refers to the consideration of the harms experienced by animals due to predation as a moral problem, that humans may or may not have an obligation to work towards preventing. Discourse on this topic has, by and large, been held within the disciplines of animal and environmental ethics. The issue has particularly been discussed in relation to animal rights and wild animal suffering. Some critics have considered an obligation to prevent predation as untenable or absurd and have used the position as a reductio ad absurdum to reject the concept of animal rights altogether. Others have criticized any obligation implied by the animal rights position as environmentally harmful.
The ethics of uncertain sentience refers to questions surrounding the treatment of and moral obligations towards individuals whose sentience—the capacity to subjectively sense and feel—and resulting ability to experience pain is uncertain; the topic has been particularly discussed within the field of animal ethics, with the precautionary principle frequently invoked in response.
Moral Inquiries on the Situation of Man and of Brutes is an 1824 book by Lewis Gompertz, an early animal rights advocate and vegan. In the book, Gompertz lays out a moral framework for the treatment of and obligations towards humans and other animals, arguing against the consumption of meat, milk, eggs, silk and leather, denouncing vivisection and arguing for aiding animals suffering in the wild.
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