Home / B. Harm, death and welfare / Part DIR
"Without farming, these animals wouldn't even exist."
bringing someone into existence gives no right to kill them. Parents give life to their children and gain no right over their lives because of it. Henry Salt called this argument, in 1914, "the logic of the larder": the idea that whoever loves animals most would be whoever breeds the most of them to eat. And it protects no animal that already exists; it only justifies breeding others to kill.
Short answer
Giving someone life doesn't give the right to take it: parents give life to their children and gain no right over their lives. Someone who doesn't exist loses nothing by not existing; someone who exists loses everything by being killed. And the sentence protects no cow that exists today: it only justifies breeding others to kill. No one would say breeding dogs for meat is a favor to dogs.
For children
Your parents gave you life. Does that mean they can do whatever they want with you, even hurt you? Of course not! Giving someone life doesn't give the right to take it. It's the same with animals: making a calf be born doesn't give anyone the right to kill it later.
"If someone had a child only to sell it later, would having given it life justify the sale?"
Como pode aparecer
"If no one ate them, there'd be no cows."
"We're giving them life."
"Vegans want chickens to go extinct."
"Thanks to barbecues, billions of cattle exist."
"Would you rather they'd never been born?"
"Replaceable animals are not harmed if they are killed and replaced."
"One dies, another is born: it evens out."
"What would we do with the animals if everyone went vegan?" (which is J5)
The strongest version
"If no one ate meat, there'd be no cows. We're giving them life."
Strongest version (steelman):
- P1Existing with a life worth living is better, for a being, than not existing.
- P2Farmed animals only exist because they are bred for consumption.
- P3If consumption ended, these animals would not exist.
- CSo consumption benefits the animals by bringing them into existence.
The strong version has a well-known philosophical formulation, the replaceability argument: if each animal killed is replaced by another with an equally good life, the total amount of well-being in the world does not decrease.
The argument is valid. Its soundness fails at P1, which treats non-existence as a loss for someone who doesn't exist, and in the conclusion, which moves from "brought into life" to "may kill".
Full answer
- a
Reconstruction and diagnosis
The argument treats existence as a gift that gives rights to the giver:
Step What the argument assumes The problem Not existing would be bad for the animal Someone who doesn't exist can be harmed There is no one to be harmed by non-existence Giving life is a benefit The benefit creates a credit Benefits create no right over the life of whoever received them So killing is allowed The credit licenses the harm No human relationship works like that - b
Where the argument breaks
1. Bringing into existence gives no right to kill.
Parents, dog breeders and sanctuaries bring animals and people into existence, and no one considers that this licenses them to kill.
2. Someone who doesn't exist isn't harmed.
There is no cow who fails to exist and misses life. Whoever loses something is the cow who exists and is killed. The argument compares a real being with an imaginary one.
3. Henry Salt answered this in 1914.
In the essay The Logic of the Larder, Salt observed that, by this reasoning, the true lover of animals would be the one whose larder was fullest of them. He called the idea the very negation of reverence for life.
4. The life given is rarely good.
About three quarters of farmed animals live in intensive systems (B2). For them, "we gave them life" means "we gave them a life of confinement".
5. Extinction is not a harm to the animals.
The end of farming would reduce the number of animals born to die; it wouldn't kill the ones that exist. Domesticated species could go on existing in smaller numbers, and many were shaped by breeding to serve production, with health problems they wouldn't have on their own.
6. Killing someone who exists isn't the same as not breeding someone.
When an animal is killed, there is an individual who loses their life. When an animal is not bred, no one loses anything: there are only possibilities. That's why one death is not "cancelled out" by another birth. If it were, parents could kill a child as long as they had another in its place.
- c
Data and sources
Source What it says Note Salt, *The Humanities of Diet* (1914), essay "The Logic of the Larder" Criticizes the idea that breeding animals to eat would benefit them Published by the Vegetarian Society Singer, *Practical Ethics* (1979) Discusses the replaceability of beings without a sense of themselves over time Cambridge University Press; basis of the strongest counter-reply Our World in Data, *How many animals are factory-farmed?* About 74% of farmed land animals live in intensive systems Shows that the life given is rarely good Questão de Ética, vol. III, ch. 8 Discusses the claim that animals are replaceable Basis of the last point Questão de Ética, vol. IV, ch. 7 Answers the argument that raising animals is justified because it makes them exist Same topic, applied to farming - d
The strongest counter-reply: replaceability
The most serious version says that, for beings without a sense of themselves over time, what matters is the total amount of good experiences in the world. If an animal with a good life is killed and replaced by another with an equally good life, the total doesn't change. Peter Singer discussed this idea, though with many caveats.
- e
Why the counter-reply doesn't reach the conclusion
It proves too much.
It requires good lives.
Replaceability only works if each animal has a life worth living, which doesn't describe most animal farming.
It treats individuals as containers.
Each animal stops being someone and becomes a place where well-being is stored. That is exactly what an ethics of individuals rejects.
Singer himself doesn't use it to defend today's consumption.
He considers it inapplicable to factory farming.
Reasoning errors
Logical
Is the form valid?
Non sequitur
Comparison with someone who doesn't exist
Epistemological
Does the evidence support it?
Idealizing the life given
Moral
Is the criterion coherent?
A credit over another's life
Biases
Extrapolations
The principle being tested is: "whoever brings a being into existence may kill it later".
If it applied to…ChildrenTap to see
Parents could dispose of their children's lives
No one accepts this
If it applied to…Bred dogsTap to see
Breeders could slaughter them for meat
Almost no one accepts this
If it applied to…Beings created in the labTap to see
They could be killed by whoever created them
Contradicts all research ethics
Contradictions
Giving life has never licensed anyone to take it.
Even if it "gave life" to more dogs.
The concern for existence appears only for farmed species.
What the argument gets right
What is true
There's a real philosophical question here: the ethics of bringing beings into existence is hard, and whether it's good for there to be more good lives in the world divides serious philosophers. It's also true that the end of animal farming would change the relationship between humans and domesticated species, and that this calls for careful thought.
But
But none of this turns birth into permission to kill. If the animal exists, it is already someone, and what matters is what is done to it, not the fact that it was brought into the world for that purpose.
Connections
Usually comes before
Usually comes after
Go deeper in Questão de Ética
Chapters from the open-access collection A Journey Through Animal Ethics that discuss this argument in more detail:
- Discussing the Claim That Animals Are Replaceable Vol. III, ch. 8
- Is Raising Animals for Consumption Justified Because It… Vol. IV, ch. 7
References
Philosophy
- *The Humanities of Diet*, essay "The Logic of the Larder".
- Practical Ethics.
Data and psychology
- How many animals are factory-farmed? *Our World in Data*.
- Rationalizing meat consumption. The 4Ns. *Appetite*, 91.