Could Questions of Desert Justify Speciesism?

Original text Luciano Carlos Cunha · Volume II, p. 25 of the PDF edition · English translation

6.1. The principle of equal consideration

The principle of equal consideration³⁰ holds that harms and benefits of similar magnitude should receive equal weight. According to this principle, assigning different weight to harms and benefits of similar magnitude depending on the race, gender, or species of those affected by our decisions is unjustifiable, since in that case one is considering the good of each individual affected by one's decision in a biased way. The principle of equal consideration therefore implies that we are unjust toward nonhuman animals not only when we disregard them entirely, but also when we assign less weight to their good compared with the good of humans.

6.2. Questions of desert

It could be objected that the greater harm should not always receive greater weight. For example, if someone deserves³¹ the harm they suffer, it seems justified to prioritize helping other individuals who do not deserve the harm they suffer, even if they are suffering to a lesser extent. In light of this, one might think the following: if the factor of desert can justify an exception to the principle of equal consideration, why couldn't the species to which those affected by the decision belong?

6.3. The idea of desert depends on equal consideration

One possible reply would be to say that the idea of desert is not an exception to the principle of equal consideration: on the contrary, it depends on it in order to make sense. This is so because a non-arbitrary criterion for knowing when someone deserves a harm is whether that someone has previously violated the principle of equal consideration. For example, imagine that individuals A and B are injured, but that A is more seriously injured. Suppose, however, that A was injured while trying to murder B, who is innocent. Imagine that the reason A tried to kill B is the color of B's skin.

In this case, it seems justified to prioritize helping B, even though B is less injured than A, because A did something to deserve the harm he suffers. And the reason it makes sense to say that A deserves the harm he suffers is that his act first violated the principle of equal consideration by using race as a criterion for moral consideration. Race is irrelevant as a criterion for moral consideration because it determines neither who can be harmed and benefited nor the magnitude of the harms and/or benefits. However, the same can be said of the criteria of species, degree of intelligence, size, and so on.

6.4. Two dimensions of roles in morality

There are two dimensions of "roles" in morality: there are the individuals who will decide how to act and the individuals who will be affected by their decisions. It only makes sense to hold someone responsible for their decisions if that someone has cognitive capacities developed enough to understand what they are doing. On the other hand, for someone to be affected by a decision, it is enough that they can be harmed and benefited.

The criterion of desert refers to individuals who can be held responsible (even though it has implications for the appropriate way to treat these individuals when they are in the position of being affected by other people's decisions). It is because someone who can be held responsible behaved in a certain way that it makes sense to say they did something to deserve a harm or a benefit. There is nothing analogous in the case of the species to which someone belongs, since being born a member of this or that species is not a matter of merit or demerit.