At the very end of his discussion concerning animal rights,
Tom Regan puts forth an interesting lifeboat scenario. There are four adult humans and a dog in a
lifeboat, but there is only room for four.
Regan argues that his rights view is consistent with our initial belief
that the dog should be thrown overboard.
He justifies this by arguing that death would cause more harm to any one
of the humans than it would to the dog.
The ease with which he seemed to draw this conclusion took me somewhat
by surprise, given that he had just went to great lengths to convince
the reader that all “subjects-of-a-life” have equal inherent value. He specifically emphasizes that
“subject-of-a-life” is a categorical
distinction, “admitting of no degrees” (p.22).
How is it that the harm caused by death is not measured by the loss of
one’s inherent value?
Please do
not misunderstand. Although I confess I
am a dog-lover, and it breaks my heart to even imagine this scenario, I am in
full agreement that the dog should be thrown overboard. I believe that human beings, due to the
nature of our consciousness, have a distinctly more profound capacity for
suffering, and for meaningful life in general.
To me, however, this suggests that inherent value does exist in varying degrees.
Although I would not know how to quantify it, I do place the value of a
human life above that of a dog.
