MANGALUS Questions for the Third Exam

Mangalus
Mangalus:
1. Why would it be ethical, or unethical to kill dogs? What moral considerations should be made with reference to treating animals?

2. After careful considerations of the various ethical theories/views we discussed, what “personal moral system or code” can you come up with and which you can adopt? Be sure to talk about the values, precepts/ideas, and other elements that should comprise this “personal moral system or code”. Include your conception of freedom and accountability in this given moral system and your view of what it means to be a moral individual.

I think it was the man with a clean-shaven face and a very aquiline nose who first said that Man, being a rational thinking being and highly capable of intellectually superior volition, is an end unto himself. I think he had very curly hair and his name was Immanuel Kant.

Immanuel Kant figured a lot in the making of Aso sa Plato (that forlorn and dejected waste of time). Upon his work, the backbone of the premise of the long, pompous and self-important documentary was loosely based. He made the following arguments that the makers of the film used (and disused and most probably twisted) to explain that eating dogs is morally permissible.

Permissible, was Immanuel Kant’s general notion in the consumption of animals for the benefit of man – in the pursuit of his duties to himself and to the people around him. He argued that inasmuch that it does not brutalize man (with all the blood and the gore) it was morally permissible. He makes it clear that Man did have duties to animals indirectly, duties that are not towards them, but insofar as the treatment of them that can affect Man’s duties to persons.

Persons were the second major consideration of Immanuel Kant’s argument on the morality (or lack thereof) of the consumption of animals for the benefit of Man. Kant posed the fundamental issue of the rationality of dogs, of their capacity for higher order thinking and their ability to question their own volition.

Aso sa Plato began with a question. Aso sa Plato also ended with a question. But this time around, this is the extended edition. Enjoy.

To what end?

Close associates would often brand me as an atheistic existentialist. They say that "I believe that man is essentially alone, that life is meaningless and that every man is born into absurdity and futility. Every effort to improve the condition of all humanity is senseless. No one can help me save me from myself, not even God. I am the master of my own life and I make my own fate."

Or so I would like them to believe.

To what end?

If I am to answer this question, and the answer I feel is inadequate, then to what end must I answer this question at all?

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to my brand of (im)morality.