Should Monkeys Be Considered Persons

1.Animals are not our (as humans) resources. (325.2.1) 2."Such beasts are not mere things to be used as cruelly as we like no matter how trivial the benefit we derive." (365.3.4) 3."Non-human mammals have essentially the same right not to be harmed or killed as we do." (344.1.3) 4."Mammals are not only sentient but have other mental capacities as well." (345.3.2) 5.All sentient beings have inherent value. (334.3.9) 6. "The basic moral rights of at least some non-human animals are in no way inferior to our own." (344.1.1) 7.Therefore, monkeys should be considered persons. Primarily, animals are not here for us, they are not our resources. Animals were not put on this earth to be eaten by humans, or to be worked on in cruel lab experiments for science, or exploited for sport or money for our own entertainment. Animals don"t exist for humans to benefit from them. The system that permits us to perceive animals as our inferiors, does not entitle us to really care about the harm done to the animal, including the pain or death that they suffered. (326.2.1-4) Sentient beings are those with "the ability to feel, perceive, or experience subjectively" according to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Such beings are entitled to equal rights. Rights are "valid claims, claims to certain goods and against certain beings, i.e., moral agents. Moral rights generate duties not only to refrain from inflicting harm upon beings with inherent value but also to come to their aid when they are threatened by other moral agents." (346.2.5-6) Inherent values are values that we all have as individuals, and that we are something more than measly vessels. It must be that all who have inherent value, must have it equally; gender, race/ethnicity, religion, place of birth, and so on should not matter. Also one"s talents and skills, intelligence, prosperity, personality, illness and/or disease, adored and admired, or despised, are beside the point. (333.4.5-7) All of those who have inherent value have an equal right to be treated with respect, to be treated in ways that does not make them feel reduced to inferiors, as if they merely existed as resources for others. One"s value as an individual is independent of their usefulness to another. To treat someone in a way that neglects to show respect of that individual"s independent value, is to act immorally and violate the individual"s right. To act morally is to be "concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character", according to Merriam-Webster dictionary. (333.4.8-10) This concludes that every interest matters and each interest must be counted as equivalent importance. Whether it is in the case of a human or an animal, everyone"s pain or frustration is significant, and is just as significant as any other being"s pain or frustration. This also concludes that animals are indeed sentient beings with other mental capacities in addition. These capacities contain emotion, memory, desire, the use of general concepts, deliberate acts, and self-awareness. Although animals may be deficient in many of the abilities that some humans acquire, such as reading and writing or performing higher mathematical equations, many humans cannot perform such abilities neither. It would be wrong to say that these human beings, that are similar to animals in the sense that they might not be able to read, write, or solve math problems, have less inherent value and less of a right to be treated equally and with respect compared to others who can perform such functions. Some people might say that only humans have inherent values, or that humans have more inherent value, because humans have reason, intelligence, and self-sufficiency. But again, there are individuals who lack such qualities, such as infant, young child, or mentally deranged person, and are nonetheless worthy of having value, even with their lack of usefulness to others. (335.1.1) It is our similarities as sentient beings, rather than our differences that counts. (334.3.1-5) Animals do without a doubt show similarities to human beings regarding fear, instinct, and conditioning. (342.3) And the most principle similarity is that sentient beings are each an experiencing subject of life. A subject of life is a "conscious creature having an individual welfare that has importance to us whatever our usefulness to others." (334.3.6) This means that subjects of life have wants and perforations, beliefs and feelings, recollections and expectations. We, as subjects of life, also experience pleasure, pain, satisfaction, and frustration. (334.3.7-8) This concludes that animals, including the ones that are eaten, hunted, and experimented upon, must be considered experiencing subjects of life with inherent values.