The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat

Edited by Ben Bramble and Bob Fischer

Inspired by The New York Times's essay contest on the ethics of eating meat and edited by two of the contest's top six contestants
Features twelve new essays by leading moral philosophers
One of very few volumes devoted exclusively to the ethics of eating meat
Includes essays that attempt to defend meat consumption

The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat

Edited by Ben Bramble and Bob Fischer

Description

A new collection offering provocative and often counterintuitive conclusions on the ethics of meat eating

In a world of industralized farming and feed lots, is eating meat ever a morally responsible choice? Is eating organic or free range sufficient to change the moral equation? Is there a moral cost in not eating meat? As billions of animals continue to be raised and killed by human beings for human consumption, affecting the significance and urgency in answering these questions grow.

This volume collects twelve new essays by leading moral philosophers who address the difficult questions surrounding meat eating by examining various implications and consequences of our food choices. Some argue for the moral permissibility of eating meat by suggesting views such as farm animals would not exist and flourish otherwise, and the painless death that awaits is no loss to them. Others consider more specific examples like whether buying french fries at McDonalds is just as problematic as ordering a Big Mac due to the action's indirect support of a major purveyor of meat. The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat is a stimulating contribution to the ongoing debate on meat consumption and actively challenges readers to reevlaute their stand on food and animal ethics.

The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat

Edited by Ben Bramble and Bob Fischer

Introduction
Part I: Defending Meat
Christopher Belshaw Donald Bruckner, "Strict Vegetarianism is Immoral"
J. Baird Callicott, "The Environmental Omnivore's Dilemma"
Part II: Challenging Meat
Julia Driver,"Individual Consumption and Moral Complicity"
Mark Budolfson, "Is it Wrong to Eat Meat from Factory Farms? If So, Why?"
Clayton Littlejohn, "Potency and Permissibility"
Tristram McPherson, "A Moorean Defense of the Omnivore"
Ben Bramble, "The Case Against Meat"
Part III: Future Directions
Lori Gruen and Robert Jones, "Veganism as an Aspiration"
Neil Levy, "Vegetarianism: Towards Ideological Impurity"
Bob Fischer, "Against Blaming the Blameworthy"
Alexandra Plakias, Beetles, Bicycles, and Breath Mints: How 'Omni' Should Omnivores Be?
Index

The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat

Edited by Ben Bramble and Bob Fischer

Author Information

Ben Bramble received his PhD in philosophy from the University of Sydney in 2014. He is a postdoctoral fellow in philosophy at Lund University, Sweden. His main research interests are in moral and political philosophy.

Bob Fischer earned his PhD in philosophy from the University of Illinois at Chicago; he is now an assistant professor of philosophy at Texas State University. He works on issues in animal ethics, modal epistemology, moral psychology, and philosophical methodology.

Contributors:

Chris Belshaw
Ben Bramble
Donald Bruckner
Mark Budolfson
J. Baird Callicott
Julia Driver
Bob Fischer
Lori Gruen
Robert C. Jones
Neil Levy
Clayton Littlejohn
Tristram McPherson
Alexandra Plakias

The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat

Edited by Ben Bramble and Bob Fischer

Reviews and Awards

"Forty years after Animal Liberation, one might think that everything worth saying about the ethics of going vegetarian or vegan has already been said. The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat shows that there are still meaty new arguments to be made, and fruitful discussion to be had."-Peter Singer, Princeton University, author of Animal Liberation

"While eating animals is an act most consumers assume to be relatively uncomplicated, an intense discussion about its moral implications has long raged on the periphery of culinary discourse. The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat not only brilliantly captures the deepest nuances of this debate, but, through consistently deft prose, it brings the issue to the core of our ongoing discussion about what to eat. The essays in this volume do what the best moral philosophy does: It destabilizes ideas-important, defining, crucial ideas-that we have once assumed to be permanently settled. Concerned consumers-be they vegan, vegetarian, 'unreflective carnivore,' hunter, forager, roadkill devotee, and so on-will leave these essays without having experienced something of a tectonic shift in the way they think about animal products. Few books have so directly influenced the way I think about eating animals."-James McWilliams, Professor of History at Texas State University, author of The Modern Savage

"The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat is a valuable addition to the literature and a very good book. It contains twelve new essays and a short introduction from the editors...There are sharp, riveting asides about anti-natalism, bug-eating, comparative accounts of harm, duties to pets and prey animals, and so on...These are gripping, pressing issues. It is wonderful that there is a state-of-the-art collection that touches on them. Anyone interested in the topic should read it cover-to-cover." -- Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews Online

"...Scholars will appreciate the extensive notes. The book builds on and pays homage to influential works on the topic..." - CHOICE

The Moral Complexities of Eating Meat

Edited by Ben Bramble and Bob Fischer

From Our Blog

Does the meat industry harm animals?

Should we eat animals? Vegetarians often say 'No, because the meat industry harms animals greatly.' They point to the appalling conditions in which animals are raised in factory farms, and the manner in which they are killed. Meat-eaters often reply that this objection is ill-founded because animals owe their very existence to the meat industry.

Posted on November 22, 2015

Read the blog post