Compassion for Animals

actions.2 Both models maintain that compassion is made possible by the ability of the one who feels compassion (source) to identify with the plight of the individual for whom compassion is felt (target).3 They diverge in their analyses ofhow identification is achieved. One account, advanced separately by Lawrence A. Blum and Adrian M. S. Piper, contends that imaginative reconstruction of the other's subjective experiences is necessary for identification.4 The alternative, which I develop, denies that imagination is required for identification, but admits that it can playa facilitating role. That the source has a particular set of beliefs, including beliefs about the I target's vulnerability and its role in occasioning the target's plight, as well as beliefs about the source's My thesis is that it can be, and frequently is, rational similar vulnerability and consequent liability to for humans to feel compassion for nonhuman animals. misfortune, can suffice for identification.5 Compassion for animals can be explained by examining Examining compassion for nonhuman animals not several modes of connection between humans and other only reveals the limitations of the imagination-based animals. The connections encompass modes of account; it also underscores some advantages of the identification between humans and other animals, for belief-based model. The weaknesses of the BlumJPiper example: imaginative reconstructions of their subjective view are discussed in part II. The contention ofpart III is experiences, beliefs about humans and other animals, that the original version of the belief-based model can including beliefs about similarities between species, be amended to explain how human compassion for other other emotions toward animals, such as kinship feelings, animals is possible, appropriate, and rational. Part IV and outlooks or ways of life that reflect value judgments concludes by briefly sketching conditions under which about and attitudes toward nonhuman animals. To feel compassion is misnamed, misplaced, or irrational. compassion for animals is to be connected with them A preliminary comment. Both accounts presuppose in an especially complex way. The challenge of this a cognitively complex conception ofemotion, according essay is to comprehend this connection. Two competing accounts of compassion have emerged in recent philosophical literature. l Both rely on a core definition of compassion as an intense emotional response to the misfortune of another, which includes suffering with the other, and concern for the other's good. This concern is frequently expressed in benevolent other-regarding thoughts, desires, and