On Jul 28, 1:26 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rudy Canoza wrote:
> > On Jul 27, 4:13 pm, Rupert > wrote:
> >> On Jul 27, 5:42 pm, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
>
> >>> rupie, you lisping fruit: you assert that (non-human)
> >>> animals are due equal moral consideration (compared
> >>> with humans). You haven't established that. Get busy,
> >>> you lisping utilitarian fruit.
> >> Why don't you have a go at writing some sort of reply to the file
> >> called "animal rights talk.doc" he
>
> > Why don't YOU have a go at justifying your most basic assertion?
>
> He is a follower of David DeGrazia, whose approach is to argue that
> opponents of "equal consideration" are the ones with the burden. I
> attempted to read his book "Taking Animals Seriously" at Rupert's
> suggestion.

That's true, and I'm certainly happy to talk over Chapter 3 of "Taking
Animals Seriously" with Ball if he wants to. However, I did actually
refer him to a lecture I gave, for payment, recently, in defence of my
position. That was what I was hoping he might engage with. Rather odd
that he missed that.

> I ended up taking animals seriously but not DeGrazia. The
> book is the the most tangled bunch of hogwash I have ever had the
> misfortune to encounter. The entire book is a circular effort to define
> "Equal Consideration" in such a way that it shifts the burden to
> opponents to disprove it. Rupert will never justify his position, he
> knows intuitively that he can't, that's why he is attracted to DeGrazia.
> Strange that it never occurs to him that the assertion is flawed.
>

I'm sorry you didn't like DeGrazia. I think he's quite a clear and
insightful writer, myself. It would be nice if you could actually
engage with what he wrote and try to offer some cogent criticisms.

> In attacking the essay moralstat99 he latches onto one word that he
> thinks is poorly defined

It's the crucial concept on which the whole argument rests, and
nothing resembling an adequate explanation of the concept is given. He
doesn't even make a start. Until he makes a start, we've got nothing.
He himself would acknowledge this point, I'm quite sure. He would
acknowledge that by itself the essay is not a satisfactory rebuttal of
the argument from marginal cases, that further clarification of the
crucial concept of "capability" is required.

> and disregards the whole essay on that basis.

No, I think parts of the essay are quite interesting, and I'm
particularly interested in the discussion of moral methodology.
Furthermore, I am interested in the attempted rebuttal of the argument
from marginal cases and will follow it up further, looking at the
thesis to which he refers. But the section which attempts to rebut the
argument from marginal cases is what you've been focussing on, and
it's quite short, and it crucially rests on the notion of
"capability", which is introduced in one very short paragraph, which
is not an adequate explanation. This section of the essay is a non-
starter until we've got an explanation of the crucial notion of
"capability".

> DeGrazia's book is loaded with poorly defined concepts,

No. This is pretty rich when you are so excited about an essay which
does not make the least attempt at defining the crucial notion of
"capability".

> as he admits
> himself,

No, he does not.

> yet Rupert eats in up like salted popcorn.

It's not just me who thinks DeGrazia has something interesting to say.
He's a well-respected bioethicist. There are quite a lot of
professional academics who think this is good philosophy. I'm sure
they've made just as much of a good faith effort to think about the
matter critically as you have, and I see no reason to think that their
critical faculties are any less than yours. They might be wrong, but
are you really in a position to say that quite so confidently?
Shouldn't be somewhat more open to the possibility that it might be
you who's underestimating the quality of DeGrazia's work? Surely it's
at least a possibility? Or are you infallible, are you?