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Old 03-16-2010, 11:50 AM   #2 (permalink)
The Rev
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The real difficulty is, you can't ask the animal. You can make educated guesses, such as "no, animals would probably prefer to continue living, rather than get eaten" or "well cared for pets don't seem to mind being well cared for" but that's the best you can do. Since animals can't enter into agreements, the concept of morality goes out the window (morality being a set of behavior limitations that a given group of humans generally agree on). So you have to base your "right or wrong?" assessments on something else, like compassion, or utility.

Compassion is my compass where animals are concerned, and therefore I don't eat them and I oppose causing them to suffer. However, keeping a dog as a pet doesn't strike me as wrong, so long as you care for him and don't cause him to suffer.



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