Consequences Matter: Compassion in Conservation Means Caring for Individuals, Populations and Species
Human activity affecting the welfare of wild vertebrates, widely accepted to be sentient, and therefore deserving of moral concern, is widespread. A variety of motives lead to the killing of individual wild animals. These include to provide food, to protect stock and other human interests, and also for sport. The acceptability of such killing is […]
Ethology applied to animal ethics
According to modern animal welfare legislation, animals should be protected from suffering and lasting harm not for the benefit of us humans as in earlier anthropocentric conceptions, but in their own interest. The driving force behind animal protection is our empathy with animals which triggers feelings of compassion. Empathy with animals most likely is a […]
Behavioural reactions of elephants towards a dying and deceased matriarch
The extent to which elephants hold behavioural traits in common with human beings is relevant to the ethics of how we treat them. Observations show that elephants, like humans, are concerned with distressed or deceased individuals, and render assistance to the ailing and show a special interest in dead bodies of their own kind. This […]
THE COMPASSIONATE TREATMENT OF ANIMALS A Contemporary Buddhist Approach in Eastern Tibet
The compassionate treatment of animals has been the focal point of speeches and writings by one of the most influential Buddhist cleric-scholars on the Tibetan plateau today, Khenpo Tsultrim Lodro of Larung Buddhist Academy. This essay surveys the Khenpo’s broad-based advocacy for animal welfare and details his discrete appeals to nomads in eastern Tibet to […]