ABSTRACT
This chapter discovers that debates about whether animals really do have any moral rights depend in part upon the more fundamental question of whether animals are the kind of beings that could possibly possess any moral rights at all. James Rachels, a contemporary moral philosopher, asserts that nonhuman animals do have a moral right to life. Human beings do have a moral right to liberty. While moral rights are natural in the sense that their existence is independent of either human opinions or social institutions, legal rights are artificial creations of human lawmaking activities. The chapter realizes that moral philosophers disagree about both the practical import of rights and the moral theory presupposed by assertions and denials of rights. It considers both whether conclusions regarding alleged moral rights apply equally to legal rights and whether the strategy of the animal rights movement ought to be adopted by environmentalists.
