Duty and the Beast
Should We Eat Meat in the Name of Animal Rights?

The moral status of animals is a subject of controversy both within and beyond academic philosophy, especially regarding the question of whether and when it is ethical to eat meat. A commitment to animal rights and related notions of animal protection is often thought to entail a plant-based diet, but recent philosophical work challenges this view by arguing that, even if animals warrant a high degree of moral standing, we are permitted - or even obliged - to eat meat. Andy Lamey provides critical analysis of past and present dialogues surrounding animal rights, discussing topics including plant agriculture, animal cognition, and in vitro meat. He documents the trend toward a new kind of omnivorism that justifies meat-eating within a framework of animal protection, and evaluates for the first time which forms of this new omnivorism can be ethically justified, providing crucial guidance for philosophers as well as researchers in culture and agriculture.

Introduction: the new animal debate; 1. The case for animal protection; 2. A view to a kill; 3. Burger veganism; 4. The dinner of double effect; 5. Killing them softly; 6. What is it like to be a chicken?; 7. The logic of the larder; 8. Thinking like a plant; 9. Long live the new flesh.

Andy Lamey is Assistant Teaching Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of California, San Diego. He is the author of Frontier Justice: The Global Refugee Crisis and What to Do about It (2011).