Introduction to Animal Ethics

Why do many of us who eat pigs condemn those who eat dogs? Is there any difference between lab mice and companion hamsters that justify the use of the former for drug tests? Our attitude toward animals is full of seeming inconsistencies and unexplained conventions. Animal ethics is the field that tries to make sense of human-animal relationships using insights from philosophical ethics, and this course is an introduction to the field.

This course has several distinctive characteristics from other animal ethics education materials. First, this course uses situations of animals in Japan as illustrative cases, which makes this course as a means to learn something about Japanese culture. Second, it also uses Manga to think about actual situations.

By listeningto the lectures and thinking through the issues presented, you will acquire the ability to think more clearly and systematically about human-animal relationships.

Topics include:

• Training of companion animals
• Neutering of companion animals
• Animal experimentation for cosmetics
• Eating farm animals
• Environmental enrichment in zoos