Ever heard of the riddle " What do you do or who do u save when you have three people and a dog to put on a lifeboat that can only take three people (the dog counts as one person) at once?" Well as a kid, that riddle meant nothing more to me than just a riddle and as such i relied on my common sense to provide me an answer. Nonetheless, if placed in such a situation,most of us wouldn't hesitate to leave the dog out of the life-boat so as to save the three humans.
Not until a few days ago, i would have still applied "common sense" and saved the three people but now i think i know better! The answer to this riddle entails more than just common sense, it is a moral question; one which treads on the fine line between inherent values of humans and non-human animals alike, one which addresses the concerns of doing whats better for the few or for the many and most importantly one which talks of the principles of morality.
As Regan points out in his theory on animal ethics from the book " The Animals Ethics Reader", the inherent value of humans and non-humans or humans and humans or better yet non-human and non-humans alike shouldn't be evaluated as to which is or more importance or what not only when and only when they are in direct conflict with each other-like in the life boat scenario. According to Regan, the life of a dog and that of a human should be considered of equal importance based on their inherent values except when, one has to be sacrificed for the other to live and for times like these, he beckons we call on the miniride or worst-off principles.
Usually i present answers or my thought on my blogs but this time i think i will do it differently, i think i will ask questions and hopefully, you guys answer them or at least voice your opinions on the matter. Taking the miniride and worst off principles, could there be a situation in which a human's life could be of less importance? Is there a possibility where a dog's life due to the miniride or the worst off principle could be important enough to replace that of a human on the life-boat?
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In a lifeboat situation where we must chose between inflicting harm on a severely cognitively impaired human and a rather clever dog, many critics have suggested that Regan's principles -- ones that disallow appeal to competing moral values and any heirarchies involving sentience -- might favor the dog.
i googled to find Ingrid Newkirk's infamous quote and i came across this instead so i thought u guys get the answer to the question in this blog from Regan himself..........................
"Regan when asked which he would save, a dog or a baby, if a boat capsized in the ocean: "If it were a retarded baby and a bright dog, I'd save the dog."
-Tom Regan, Q&A session following a speech, University of Wisconsin-Madison, October 27, 1989.
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