Topics Animals

Question Can a non-human animal be cruel? Is it cruel of a hawk to kill a squirrel? Or of a cat to bat around a mouse before killing it?

Accepted:
April 25, 2007

Comments

I think it is reasonable to suppose that in order to have the character defect of being cruel (and thus, in order to act not just as a cruel thing would act, but actually to act cruelly) the being in question has to be able to do something like deliberate about the moral or ethical value of different courses of action. A hawk might be able to do something like deciding whether to attack this squirrel, but I strongly doubt that hawks can consider whether or not attacking squirrels is for the best.

Now, if you tortured a mouse, I would fault you as cruel, because I regard you as capable of deliberating about whether torturing mice is for the best. But when your cat does it, the cat acts in the way a cruel thing acts--you, for example, if you did that--but the cat does not act cruelly and is not cruel, in my view.

Question Can a non-human animal be cruel? Is it cruel of a hawk to kill a squirrel? Or of a cat to bat around a mouse before killing it? Accepted:April 25, 2007

Question Can a non-human animal be cruel? Is it cruel of a hawk to kill a squirrel? Or of a cat to bat around a mouse before killing it?

Accepted:
April 25, 2007