Do Species Have Interests?

Original text Luciano Carlos Cunha · Volume VI, p. 38 of the PDF edition · English translation

The concept of interest often appears in debates about ethical issues. For example, we would say that it is in Maria's interest to avoid suffering, since suffering would harm her. Likewise, we would say that it is in Maria's interest to experience happiness, since happiness would benefit her. In more general terms, we can define the concept of interest as follows⁴⁹:

It is in A's interest to obtain X if X benefits A.

It is in A's interest to avoid X if X harms A.

The word interest is sometimes used as a synonym for desire. However, the definition above is not necessarily committed to that view. Although satisfying desires may be in someone's interest, the definition above does not imply that, for something to be in someone's interest, that someone must have a corresponding desire. For example, it could be said that if the life a baby would have ahead of it would be meaningful, it is in that baby's interest to go on living, even if it is unable to form a desire to go on living.

Thus, given this broad definition of the term interest, saying that “we should give moral consideration to sentient beings because they have interests” is the same as saying “we should give moral consideration to sentient beings because they can be harmed or benefited.”

However, some authors argue that certain nonsentient entities also have interests. For example, Lawrence Johnson⁵⁰ argued that species have interests. According to Johnson, there are four reasons for this:

(1) Species carry out complex activities that are not merely the aggregate of the activities of their members;

(2) Species are things with a past, a present, and an orientation toward the future;

(3) Species have unity and self-identity (that is, they are distinguishable from other things); and

(4) Species have a stronger interest in continuing to exist than their members do because, unlike their members, they do not have an inherent mortality.

These claims, especially the last one, could be used to try to justify the programs of killing animals carried out in the name of preserving species and biodiversity as a whole⁵¹. However, there are several possible responses to these four claims, which we will now examine⁵².

One response to the first claim consists in pointing out that it is possible to explain such complex activities without having to assume that they are more than the aggregate of their members' activities. Moreover, it is unclear why carrying out complex activities would be relevant to moral consideration, since it does not determine who can be harmed or benefited.

The second and third claims can be answered by pointing out that having a past, a present, and an orientation toward the future, as well as unity and self-identity, does not seem sufficient for having interests, since political parties and cities also have these characteristics, but that does not mean they have interests. We can speak metaphorically of the interests of the city or of the party, but what we are really talking about are the interests of the citizens and of the party members. The same holds for species. In the case of species of sentient beings, we can speak metaphorically of the interests of the species, but what we are really talking about are the interests of the sentient beings who are its members. This does not mean that species are someone, with a well-being.

As for the fourth claim, one could respond that what is relevant to the existence of an interest in continuing to exist is whether existing is a benefit, and that what is relevant to the strength of this interest is how much someone would be harmed by ceasing to exist. This seems to depend, for example, on how much this someone has lived so far (and how positive or

negative that life has been), and on how much they would have left to live (and how positive or negative that life will be), and not on whether or not their mortality is inherent⁵³.

For this reason, it does not seem to make sense to say that species have a stronger interest in continuing to exist than their members, since species do not even have an interest in continuing to exist. Given that they are incapable of valuing certain states over others (since there is no someone who is the species), it makes no sense to hold that, from the species' point of view, it is better to exist or to cease to exist (since there is no such point of view).

Species are abstract entities. They are categories constructed by humans to group living beings according to certain similarities. There is no someone who is the species, who could literally be harmed by ceasing to exist or benefited by continuing to exist. Those who can be benefited or harmed in these ways are its members, if they are sentient.