Buy new:
-
Ships from: Amazon Sold by: TigerUSA-Book&Media
Save with Used - Very Good
-
Ships from: ThriftBooks-Phoenix Sold by: ThriftBooks-Phoenix
Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.
Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.
Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.
Animal Liberation: The Definitive Classic of the Animal Movement Paperback – Illustrated, February 24, 2009
Purchase options and add-ons
“A most important book that will change the way many of us look at animals—and, ultimately, at ourselves.” — Chicago Tribune
Since its original publication in 1975, this groundbreaking work has awakened millions of people to the existence of "speciesism"—our systematic disregard of nonhuman animals—inspiring a worldwide movement to transform our attitudes to animals and eliminate the cruelty we inflict on them.
In Animal Liberation, author Peter Singer exposes the chilling realities of today's "factory farms" and product-testing procedures—destroying the spurious justifications behind them, and offering alternatives to what has become a profound environmental and social as well as moral issue. An important and persuasive appeal to conscience, fairness, decency, and justice, it is essential reading for the supporter and the skeptic alike.
- Print length368 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- Publication dateFebruary 24, 2009
- Dimensions5.31 x 0.83 x 8 inches
- ISBN-100061711306
- ISBN-13978-0061711305
Discover the latest buzz-worthy books, from mysteries and romance to humor and nonfiction. Explore more
Explore your book, then jump right back to where you left off with Page Flip.
View high quality images that let you zoom in to take a closer look.
Enjoy features only possible in digital – start reading right away, carry your library with you, adjust the font, create shareable notes and highlights, and more.
Discover additional details about the events, people, and places in your book, with Wikipedia integration.
What do customers buy after viewing this item?
Customers also bought or read
- Ethics in the Real World: 90 Essays on Things That Matter – A Fully Updated and Expanded Edition
PaperbackDelivery Sunday - Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows: An Introduction to Carnism, 10th Anniversary Edition
PaperbackDelivery Sunday - The Most Good You Can Do: How Effective Altruism Is Changing Ideas About Living Ethically
PaperbackDelivery Tue, Dec 2 - The PETA Practical Guide to Animal Rights: Simple Acts of Kindness to Help Animals in Trouble
PaperbackDelivery Sunday - Voices for Animal Liberation: Inspirational Accounts by Animal Rights Activists
PaperbackDelivery Monday - Fellow Creatures: Our Obligations to the Other Animals (Uehiro Series in Practical Ethics)
HardcoverDelivery Mon, Dec 1 - 10th Anniversary Edition The Life You Can Save: How To Do Your Part To End World Poverty
PaperbackDelivery Sat, Nov 29 - Out of Sight: An Undercover Investigator's Fight for Animal Rights and Her Own Survival
HardcoverDelivery Sunday - Free the Animals: The Amazing, True Story of the Animal Liberation Front in North America (30th Anniversary Edition)
Paperback$3.99 delivery Wed, Nov 19
Editorial Reviews
Review
"A most important and responsible work. Everyone ought to read it, and ponder deeply whether we do not need to change our view of the world and our responsibility toward its creatures." - Richard Adams, author of Watership Down
“A most important book that will change the way many of us look at animals—and, ultimately, at ourselves.” - Chicago Tribune
“Singer’s documentation is unrhetorical and unemotional, his arguments tight and formidable, for he bases his case on neither personal nor religious nor highly abstract philosophical principles, but on moral positions most of us already accept.” - New York Times Book Review
"This book is a must . . . not just for every animal lover but forevery civilized reader." - Cleveland Amory
From the Back Cover
Since its original publication in 1975, this groundbreaking work has awakened millions of people to the existence of "speciesism"—our systematic disregard of nonhuman animals—inspiring a worldwide movement to transform our attitudes to animals and eliminate the cruelty we inflict on them.
In Animal Liberation, author Peter Singer exposes the chilling realities of today's "factory farms" and product-testing procedures—destroying the spurious justifications behind them, and offering alternatives to what has become a profound environmental and social as well as moral issue. An important and persuasive appeal to conscience, fairness, decency, and justice, it is essential reading for the supporter and the skeptic alike.
About the Author
Peter Singer is widely acknowledged as the father of the animal rights movement and one of the most renowned writers on contemporary ethics. He is co-founder of The Life You Can Save, an organization that aims to help those living in extreme poverty; and Animals Australia, that country's largest and most effective animal organization. His many other books include Why Vegan?, The Life You Can Save, Writings on an Ethical Life, Rethinking Life and Death, and Practical Ethics. Since 1999, Singer has served as Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University’s Center for Human Values. He lives in Princeton, New Jersey.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Animal Liberation
The Definitive Classic of the Animal MovementBy Peter SingerHarperCollins Publishers, Inc.
Copyright © 2009 Peter SingerAll right reserved.
ISBN: 9780061711305
Chapter One
All Animals Are Equal . . .
or why the ethical principle on which human
equality rests requires us to extend equal
consideration to animals too
"Animal Liberation" may sound more like a parody of other liberation movements than a serious objective. The idea of "The Rights of Animals" actually was once used to parody the case for women's rights. When Mary Wollstonecraft, a forerunner of today's feminists, published her Vindication of the Rights of Woman in 1792, her views were widely regarded as absurd, and before long an anonymous publication appeared entitled A Vindication of the Rights of Brutes. The author of this satirical work (now known to have been Thomas Taylor, a distinguished Cambridge philosopher) tried to refute Mary Wollstonecraft's arguments by showing that they could be carried one stage further. If the argument for equality was sound when applied to women, why should it not be applied to dogs, cats, and horses? The reasoning seemed to hold for these "brutes" too; yet to hold that brutes had rights was manifestly absurd. Therefore the reasoning by which this conclusion had been reached must be unsound, and if unsound when applied to brutes, it must also be unsound when applied to women, since the very same arguments had been used in each case.
In order to explain the basis of the case for the equality of animals, it will be helpful to start with an examination of the case for the equality of women. Let us assume that we wish to defend the case for women's rights against the attack by Thomas Taylor. How should we reply?
One way in which we might reply is by saying that the case for equality between men and women cannot validly be extended to nonhuman animals. Women have a right to vote, for instance, because they are just as capable of making rational decisions about the future as men are; dogs, on the other hand, are incapable of understanding the significance of voting, so they cannot have the right to vote. There are many other obvious ways in which men and women resemble each other closely, while humans and animals differ greatly. So, it might be said, men and women are similar beings and should have similar rights, while humans and nonhumans are different and should not have equal rights.
The reasoning behind this reply to Taylor's analogy is correct up to a point, but it does not go far enough. There are obviously important differences between humans and other animals, and these differences must give rise to some differences in the rights that each have. Recognizing this evident fact, however, is no barrier to the case for extending the basic principle of equality to nonhuman animals. The differences that exist between men and women are equally undeniable, and the supporters of Women's Liberation are aware that these differences may give rise to different rights. Many feminists hold that women have the right to an abortion on request. It does not follow that since these same feminists are campaigning for equality between men and women they must support the right of men to have abortions too. Since a man cannot have an abortion, it is meaningless to talk of his right to have one. Since dogs can't vote, it is meaningless to talk of their right to vote. There is no reason why either Women's Liberation or Animal Liberation should get involved in such nonsense. The extension of the basic principle of equality from one group to another does not imply that we must treat both groups in exactly the same way, or grant exactly the same rights to both groups. Whether we should do so will depend on the nature of the members of the two groups. The basic principle of equality does not require equal or identical treatment; it requires equal consideration. Equal consideration for different beings may lead to different treatment and different rights.
So there is a different way of replying to Taylor's attempt to parody the case for women's rights, a way that does not deny the obvious differences between human beings and nonhumans but goes more deeply into the question of equality and concludes by finding nothing absurd in the idea that the basic principle of equality applies to so-called brutes. At this point such a conclusion may appear odd; but if we examine more deeply the basis on which our opposition to discrimination on grounds of race or sex ultimately rests, we will see that we would be on shaky ground if we were to demand equality for blacks, women, and other groups of oppressed humans while denying equal consideration to nonhumans. To make this clear we need to see, first, exactly why racism and sexism are wrong. When we say that all human beings, whatever their race, creed, or sex, are equal, what is it that we are asserting? Those who wish to defend hierarchical, inegalitarian societies have often pointed out that by whatever test we choose it simply is not true that all humans are equal. Like it or not we must face the fact that humans come in different shapes and sizes; they come with different moral capacities, different intellectual abilities, different amounts of benevolent feeling and sensitivity to the needs of others, different abilities to communicate effectively, and different capacities to experience pleasure and pain. In short, if the demand for equality were based on the actual equality of all human beings, we would have to stop demanding equality.
Still, one might cling to the view that the demand for equality among human beings is based on the actual equality of the different races and sexes. Although, it may be said, humans differ as individuals, there are no differences between the races and sexes as such. From the mere fact that a person is black or a woman we cannot infer anything about that person's intellectual or moral capacities.
Continues...
Excerpted from Animal Liberationby Peter Singer Copyright © 2009 by Peter Singer. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Product details
- Publisher : Harper Perennial Modern Classics
- Publication date : February 24, 2009
- Edition : Updated ed.
- Language : English
- Print length : 368 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0061711306
- ISBN-13 : 978-0061711305
- Item Weight : 2.31 pounds
- Dimensions : 5.31 x 0.83 x 8 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #452,621 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #3 in Animal Rights (Books)
- #94 in Philosophy of Ethics & Morality
- #2,969 in Sociology Reference
About the author

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read book recommendations and more.

























![Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat [Second Edition]: Why It's So Hard to Think Straight About Animals](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51vlPyBfQVL._UX300undefined_.jpg)



