The Objection That the Balance of the Situation of Animals in the Wild May Be Positive

Original text Luciano Carlos Cunha · Volume VII, p. 111 of the PDF edition · English translation

34.1. The claim that the overall balance may be positive

It is sometimes argued that the overall balance of the situation of animals in the wild may be positive¹⁶⁰. This is because, although the number of animals who die prematurely after lives full of suffering is vastly greater than the number of animals who have lives with a positive balance, the few survivors live for many years, and so the sum of their positive experiences could tip the scales toward the positive.

34.2. If the overall balance is positive, so what?

Suppose the aggregate overall balance were positive. There would still be an astronomical number of animals who individually have lives with negative balances. We would have strong reasons to help these animals. Interestingly, these reasons are equally strong in the case of animals who individually have lives with a positive balance but are facing a negative episode.

Just imagine human victims in their place and everything becomes very clear. The reasons to help humans starving in underdeveloped countries are not weakened just because there are well-off humans in first-world countries. The reasons to help someone who is in terrible suffering are not weakened just because their life may contain, overall, more positive than negative experiences. People think differently in the case of nonhuman animals only because of the prevalence of speciesism.

34.3. Which views could accept helping regardless of the overall balance?

The thesis that, even if the balance (individual or collective) is positive, the reasons for us to help animals are not weakened would be accepted by many views in ethics:

(1) It would be accepted by those who agree that preventing what is negative is more important, at least to some extent, than promoting what is positive.

(2) It would be accepted by those who accept that the happiness of others does not weaken the reasons for us to help those who are badly off, and that the fact that someone is well off at other times does not weaken the reasons to help them when they are badly off.

(3) Even those who believe that all that matters is the overall balance, and who consider promoting what is positive as important as preventing what is negative, would have reasons to prioritize eliminating what is negative. This is so because of the principle of diminishing marginal utility, according to which an extra unit of a resource produces greater increases in well-being the worse off the one who would receive it is. For example, if someone is starving and receives a kilogram of food, this produces a greater increase in their well-being than if we gave it to someone who is already well off. Thus, prioritizing improving the situation of those who are in a negative situation is more efficient for increasing the overall balance.

34.4. Decisions in which the only option is to change the situation as a whole

It could be objected that, unlike scenarios in which it is possible to choose to maintain a situation and merely reduce what is negative in it, there are scenarios in which we can only affect the situation as a whole. Below are some examples.

(1) The decision whether to maintain or destroy an ecosystem. (2) The decision whether or not to create new ecosystems. (3) The decision whether or not to recreate ecosystems that have already gone extinct.

What to do in decisions like these depends on the weight assigned to positive aspects relative to negative aspects. Two people could agree that a situation has a positive balance and still disagree about what should be done about it.

For example, let us imagine that, if we create a new ecosystem, the aggregate overall balance will be positive. However, let us also suppose that an enormous number of individuals with lives full of suffering would be born, though fewer than the number of individuals who would have positive lives. Someone who holds that promoting what is positive is as important as preventing what is negative would say that it is better to create such a situation. However, this is not the only possible position. Another person could agree that such a situation has a positive balance but hold that preventing what is negative is more important than promoting what is positive.

It could be objected that prioritizing preventing what is negative would have absurd implications, such as saying that no amount of what is positive, however great, could compensate for something negative, however small. However, this would be so only if preventing what is negative were considered a trump over promoting what is positive. But that is not the only possibility. Preventing what is negative could carry greater weight without being a trump (depending on how much greater its weight was, the greater the amount of positive aspects would have to be to compensate for a certain amount of negative aspects).

34.5. Conclusion

Even if the aggregate balance of the situation of animals in the wild were positive, this would not weaken the reasons to minimize/prevent its negative aspects, nor would it necessarily be decisive for decisions of the "maintain/eliminate" and "create/not create" type regarding a situation.

In the previous section we saw three examples of situations of this kind:

(1) The decision whether to maintain or destroy an ecosystem. (2) The decision whether or not to create new ecosystems. (3) The decision whether or not to recreate ecosystems that have already gone extinct.

What should the decision depend on in these contexts? The next three chapters address these questions.