(in Polish) Animal Ethics FIL-ENG-SM>mono05
Animal ethics is a relatively new field of research, one could say it's celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, as the foundational book was published in 1975. To mark this anniversary, I'm offering this course to students.
The course aims to introduce students to issues related to animal ethics. This course is introductory in nature. During the course, we will examine various human-animal relationships and analyze the moral obligations humans have toward animals. We will consider whether animals have moral status, and if so, what it is. We will examine contemporary discussions on moral diet and explore the philosophical assumptions present in contemporary animal legislation. The topics have been selected to provide an introduction to animal ethics (professional terminology, key issues, disputes, and positions will be presented), while the applied ethics aspect of the course emphasizes issues faced by most participants in public life.
During the course, we will not adopt a specific philosophical position, but will attempt to examine various positions to understand them, discerning their strengths and weaknesses from the perspective of other positions. We will also examine how animal ethics has changed over the past 50 years and how it affected EU legal regulations.
Students will be required to read a philosophical text for each class except the first. This should take 90 minutes or more if you are not fluent in English. Most of the texts on specific topics represent new and recent important voices in the ethical debate, and many texts are interconnected to illustrate the dynamics of philosophical debates. The classes are a starting point for exploring specific issues in greater depth, with the instructor readily available for consultations. Master's-level students are thus prepared to engage in discussions within the international academic community on this topic.
We will work on the following topics:
1. Introduction to animal ethics. History of animal ethics. Animal rights vs animal welfare. Areas of relation between humans and animal
2. Moral status of animals: Thomas Aquinas, Bentham and Schopenhauer
3. Aniaml welfare from impartial perspective: Peter Singer
4. A critique of animal ethics: R. Scruton, R. Griffiths
5. Christian approach to animals: A. Linzey, C. Camosy
6. Using animals in laboratories: P. Singer, Tom Regan
7. Factory farms as moral catarophe P. Singer
8. Moral diet: arguments for veganism and against moral omnivorism,maximizing expected choiceworthiness and eating animals
9. Moral diet: reductarianism, beefarianism
10. Moral diet: pescarianism, new omnivorism,
11. Humans vs wild animals: ethics of hunting, wild animals and toursim
12. Weighting the value of live, animals and humans
13. Suffering of wild of animals as a moral porblem. The state of nature is not that good?
14. EU newest regulations with regards to pets and farm animals
15. EU newest regulations with regads to labolatory animals. Ethical comitees for animal experimentation
Readings are rquired for every class but the first one!
(in Polish) Liczba godzin zajęć porwadzonych on-line
Course coordinators
Learning outcomes
Student knows the current state of research in animal ethics
Assessment criteria
Continuous assesment + final exam
Continuous assessment - student activity is assessed during each class.
Pass for individual classes is granted to a student who has confirmed the achievement of all the learning outcomes for these classes, has prepared substantively (including, for example, mastering the text that needed to be read or familiarized himself with a specific argumentation, etc.) and has demonstrated substantive activity during classes.
A very good grade (5.0)for individual classes is awarded to a student who confirmed the achievement of all the learning outcomes for these classes, prepared very well substantively (mastered the text that needed to be read) and demonstrated substantive activity during the classes.
A satisfactory grade (3.0) for individual classes is awarded to a student who confirmed at least one of the assigned learning outcomes, prepared substantively for the classes and marked his/her presence with at least one substantive statement.
A good grade (4.0) is awarded to a student who has done more than the minimum required for a satisfactory grade, but less than the minimum required for a very good grade.
A student who does not meet the conditions to receive a satisfactory grade receives an unsatisfactory grade (2.0) in the course.
An unsatisfactory grade should be corrected during consultations. The method of improvement is determined individually.
The final grade of the continuous is the average of partial grades, assuming that:
1. all learning outcomes have been confirmed
2. all partial grades are positive
3. the number of unexcused absences does not exceed 1
And it is calculated according to the following formula:
Very good (5.0) - average above 4.51
Good plus (4.5) - average between 4.15 and 4.50
Good (4.0) - average between 3.91 and 4.14
Satisfactory plus (3.5) - average between 3.51 and 3.90
Satisfactory (3.0): average 3.50 and lower
All partial grades are included in the average grade, including corrected ones, e.g. when an unsatisfactory grade is improved to a very good one, both 2 and 5 are included in the average grade.
In case of additional absences it is possible to offset them during consulation, the conditions will be determined individually.
Final exam will take place during examination session. A student that recieve 4.0 or higher from continuous assement does not need to take final exam in case the grade is satisfactory.
Bibliography
Readings corresponding particular classes
2. St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologie, Q 64 A1, Q65 A3; Artur Schopenhauer „On the basis of morality”(fragments), J. Bentham, Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation(fragments)
3. Peter Singer, Animal Liberation Now, Chapter I
4. R. Scruton, Animals rights and wrongs, R. Griffiths, A critique of animal righs
5. A Linzey, Theo-rights, C. Camosy, For love of animals, ch 1-3
6. P. Singer, Animal liberation now, ch. 2 (fragments)
7. P. Singer, Animal liberation now, ch 3 (fragments)
8. P. Singer, why vegan? (fragments), Animal liberation now 187-194
9.B. Kateman (ed.), The reducarian solution, New York 2017, (fragments) + K. Saja, The moral foodprint of animal products, Agriculture and human values, 30 (2013), s. 193-202.
10. M. Elder, The moral poverty of pescetarianism, J. Milbum, Ch. Bobler, New Omnivorism: a nowel approach to food and animal ethics
11. T. Hsiao, A Moral Defencse of Trophy Hunting, Sport, Ethics and Philosophy, vol 14 (2020), p. 26-34; S. P. Morris, A Moral Defense of Tophy Hunting and Why It Fails, Sport, Ethics and Philosophy, vol. 15 (2021), s. 386-399.
12.W. MacAskill, What we ove the future(fragments); J. Broome, Weighting lives (fragments)
13. B. Tomasik, The importance of wild animal suffering, Relations: Beyond Anthropocentrism, vol. 3 no 2, 2015, s. 133-152; Bruers, S., Davis, A. J., Hojjat, S., Koskensilta, A., Lepeltier, T., & Pearce, D. (2024). Nature without Suffering: Herbivorisation of Predator Species for the Compassionate Stewardship of Earth’s Ecosystems. Journal of Applied Animal Ethics Research, 6(2) 2024, 175-204
14 & 15 EU newest regulations (as for january 2026)
Some of the readings are availble for user of UPJPII Library and I recommend students to use this tool kindly provided by our university
Notes
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Term 2025/2026-Z:
Note: for passing this course, you receive 2 ECTS, which means between 50 and 60 didactic hours of the student's work. This includes 30 hours of working in contact with the teacher during classes and up to 30 hours of independent work (reading texts). On average, 4 didactic hours should be devoted each week. Please take this into account when planning your work this semester, because if you do not devote enough time to these classes, you will neither receive the grade you would otherwise be able to obtain, nor will you be satisfied with your participation in the course. |
Additional information
Additional information (registration calendar, class conductors, localization and schedules of classes), might be available in the USOSweb system: