Christian Research Journal Reads Episode 156: Merely Human: The Problem of Recognizing Chimpanzees as Persons

This is Episode 156 of Christian Research Journal Reads. This is an audio version of the CHRISTIAN RESEARCH JOURNAL article, “Merely Human: The Problem of Recognizing Chimpanzees as Persons” by Jay Watts. https://www.equip.org/articles/merely-human-the-problem-of-recognizing-chimpanzees-as-persons/

This article first appeared in the Christian Research Journal, volume 42, number 2 (2019).It was also accompanied by Postmodern Realities Episode: 163 Merely Human: The Problem of Recognizing Chimpanzees as Persons.

This podcast presents audio versions of Christian Research Journal articles. As the flagship publication of the Christian Research Institute, the Journal seeks to equip followers of Christ to think and to live Christianly—to exercise truth and experience life. Truth, especially essential Christian doctrine, forms the basis for how we live our lives in Christ. As the apostle Paul instructed Timothy in 1 Tim. 4:16, “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.”The Christian Research Journal enjoyed a print incarnation of almost 45 years. Now exclusively an online publication, the Journal consists of thousands of free articles. We hope that through these audio articles you are not only equipped to proclaim and defend your faith but that as a disciple you also draw closer to Christ in your walk with Him.  You can find the written version of each article that is an episode of Christian Research Journal Reads at the website of the Christian Research Institute, equip.org. All Christian Research Journal articles at equip.org are completely free and do not require a subscription and are not under a paywall.All episodes are available at the following podcast platforms with more being added daily! You can help spread the word about this podcast by giving us a rating and review from the other channels we are listed on and telling others!You can view off our Website at the at this link and off our Journal main page. 



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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
This is episode one hundred and fifty six of the
Christian Research Journal Reads podcast. Merely Human The Problem of
Recognizing Chimpanzees as Persons by Jay Watts. This article first
appeared in the print edition of the Christian Research Journal,

(00:26):
Volume forty two, number two, in twenty nineteen. The Christian
Research Journal Reads Podcast presents audio versions of Christian Research
Journal articles. To read the full article and its documentation,
please go to equip dot org. That's e qu ip

(00:50):
dot o.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
RG Merely Human The Problem of Recognizing Chimpanzees as Persons.
This article is by Jay Watts and is read by
an automated voice. In an effort to protect two chimpanzees
living in terrible conditions, Jepsibo, the director of the Animal
Studies Program at New York University, offered a New York

(01:14):
Times editorial calling for chimpanzees to be recognized as persons
under the law. SICCO and his colleagues at the Non
Human Rights Project NHRP also filed an amicus brief with
the State of New York Court of Appeals arguing that
Kiko and Tawny are persons and entitled to habeas corpus.
In order to force their respective custodians two different individuals

(01:38):
to defend what NHRP characterizes as unlawful imprisonment before a judge.
The main thrust of the argument lies in the following claims. One,
species membership is a scientific classification to arbitrarily determined to
ground a substantial concept like moral personhood. Two. The capacities
appealed to as morally setting human beings apart from other animals,

(02:01):
like sentience, intention, desire, and autonomy, all exist in chimpanzees
as well, though in lesser degrees than most humans. They
possess those capacities comparably to a human infant or a
cognitively impaired human being. If those humans qualify as persons,
so do any animals that share similar capacities. Just as

(02:23):
third parties can petition courts on behalf of infants and
the cognitively impaired, courts should offer the same legal status
to Kiko and Tommy. Finally, three, the most relevant capacity
for settling the personhood claims of non humans and humans
alike is autonomy. If a being has desires, in the
will to pursue those desires, such as the basic desire

(02:46):
not to be imprisoned, and isolated from other members of
their species, then violating their autonomy as an act of injustice.
The animal rights position easily draws on public sympathy chimpanzees, guerrillas, dolphins,
and elephants to demonstrate remarkable capacities to feel and communicate.
In his New York Times editorial, Sepo states, the simple

(03:08):
truth is that Kiko and Tommy are not mere things.
This seems self evident to anyone that loves and appreciates animals,
and as outspokenly liberal talk show hosts Samantha Bee recently said,
the fact that animals are awesome is about the only
point on which all Americans can agree. If the law
offers two categories persons or things, as Sebo states, and

(03:31):
being identified as if thing opens animals to abuse as property,
then it seems reasonable to desire to change their definition
under the law. However reasonable it may seem that would
be a mistake animal welfare versus animal rights. The representatives
of NHRP argue from the position of real and substantial rights.

(03:52):
They believe there is an objectively unjust way to treat
some beings, and animals fall within the category of beings
who ought to enjoy equality the end of the law,
similar to the manor. Christopher Catcher, a philosopher at Loyola Merrymount,
argues his inclusive view of human rights in favor of
the pro life position to include all human life, even

(04:13):
embryonic human life in the family of valuable human beings.
NHRP sees a wider view of personhood as more strongly
securing equality under the law from animals. These aren't merely
conferred rights in a legal sense. The animals in question,
it is argued, possessed capacities indicative of a person that
must be recognized under the law in a just society.

(04:36):
Wesley J. Smith, a fellow with the Discovery Institute, draws
important distinctions between animal rights and animal welfare efforts in
his book A Rat Is a Pig as a Dog
Is a Boy. Animal welfare efforts begin with the understanding
that there are obvious differences between the most intelligent animals
and human beings. Human beings are exceptional. These distinctions and

(04:59):
are exceptional status among animals, place a unique moral burden
on humans to treat one another with respect while minimizing
the suffering we cause in other species that lack our
more advanced rational and moral capacities. Efforts toward animal welfare
include the pursuit of humane animal husbandry practices, the breeding
and caring for farm animals, the control of animal testing

(05:22):
procedures to guarantee they are done out of necessity and
as humanly as possible, and the overall pursuit of a
culture committed to responsible behavior toward animals. Smith provides evidence
that these goals are not shared by animal rights activists.
That movement does not see humans as possessing a unique
moral nature among the animal kingdom that ethically obligates human

(05:44):
beings to consider the needs of other animals in a
manner those animals could never match. In response, the leaders
of this movement morally equate human beings and animals the
concepts of responsible animal husbandry, responsible pet ownership, and humane
animal research art. In their view, oxymoronic animals are to

(06:05):
be treated as art equals. Owning them is the equivalent
of human slavery person or thing under the law. Returning
to Sebo's legal person or thing distinction, Chimpanzees, he argues,
are emotionally complex beings that demonstrate the capacity to communicate, plan,
pursue goals, and sustain strong community bonds. They clearly are

(06:27):
not things. Cibo and his colleagues demand the law must
correct the manner in which it defines them to avoid
unjustly treating a person as a thing. According to a
judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the
Ninth Circuit, it is not that simple. Nerudo verse. Slater
is a case involving a lawsuit filed by PTA people

(06:48):
for the ethical treatment of animals as a next friend
to an Indonesian machaic, a kind of monkey PTA named
Nerudo that inadvertently took selfies. The professional photograph whose camera
Narudo played with later published the pictures. Pieda argued that
Nearudo was the actual artist and owner of those photos,

(07:08):
ensued on his behalf. Judge N. Randy Smith dismissed the
claims as frivolous and provided a warning that taking the
legal step of identifying animals as persons under the law
would open our entire legal system to incalculable abuse. Wesley
Smith expands on this warning, arguing that every animal becomes
a possible litigant. The sheer number of cases that could

(07:31):
be brought forth by any in all persons is seeking
to use animals to further their own pet agendas could
cripple the legal system. Because of this threat, Wesley Smith
routinely calls for immediate action to define personhood clearly under
the law to be reserved and limited to human beings.
The possibility that a single judge could seek to establish

(07:52):
bizarre precedent threatens to flood our courts with animal litigation.
Smith believes the only reason that legislation has yet to
be addressed is that people foolishly fail to take the
animal rights movement seriously on a common sense level. The
moral similarities between humans and non humans clearly are being exaggerated.

(08:12):
Christian philosopher J. P. Moreland once said that our intuitions
aren't infallible, but they are where we begin our reasoning.
We perceive the world to be a certain way and
act accordingly. Human beings can be bound legally to behave
in a certain manner and punish should they fail to comply.
We obviously can't say the same about chimpanzees. Catcher asks,

(08:35):
are we now to police the behavior of animals? Are
we to break up their fights and punish them for
killing each other within their species? Are we to behave
consistently with the view that chimpanzees are our moral equals,
holding them accountable for their decisions. The obvious answer is no,
we do not and should not, precisely because we understand
that there are substantial differences in the moral nature of

(08:57):
human beings and chimpanzees. Judge N. The R. Smith addresses
the challenge raised comparing non human species with infant humans
and the cognitively impaired in his concurring Naruto decision. Animal
next friend standing is materially different from a competent person
representing an incompetent person. We have millennia of experience understanding

(09:19):
the interests and desires of humankind. This is not necessarily
true for animals. Next friend standing for animals is left
at the mercy of the institutional actor to advance its
own interests, which it imputes to the animal or object
with no accountability emphasis and original. We have lifetimes of
shared community and communication, offering insight into the desires of

(09:42):
our fellow humans. We know their thoughts because they are
our thoughts. We can extend to other humans our basic
understandings of human nature, desires to thrive, flourish, be free, and,
most importantly, to be alive. We have no such insight
into the mind of other animals. All claims to know
their minds are speculative and vulnerable to the manipulations of

(10:05):
people with agendas unrelated to the welfare of particular animals.
Our species distinctions entirely arbitrary. Sibo argues that taxonomical classifications
are too arbitrary, and as evidence, he offers that science
authors such as Jared Diamond believe that chimpanzees and bonobo's
ought to be reclassified into the genus Homo, the human genus,

(10:29):
rather than the genus pan in order to communicate their
biological proximity to humans. Taxonomical classifications are not static in change,
as our understanding of other animals continues to grow, but
those changes are intended to establish classifications that reflect objective features.
It is true that Homo sapien sapiens as a classification

(10:50):
was created to represent humanity, but created classifications provide a
system to understand actual distinctions observed in different creatures. Admitting
chimpanzees and bonobos are more like humans than they are
like other animals doesn't make the argument that chimpanzees are
morally equal to humans In fact, it demands an explanation

(11:10):
as to why animals so similar to us in many respects,
are so dramatically different from us, both in rational and
moral capacities. Human dignity is better than autonomy. Sigo's arguments
focus strongly on autonomy, to which he appeals in order
to ground personhood. He believes species, membership and natural kinds
are simply illusory and unreliable. Autonomy is a superior standard.

(11:35):
Christopher Catcher responded to similar arguments put forth by Harvard
professor Stephen Pinker. In Pinker's article Dignity is Stupid. Catcher
countered that in every way human dignity is vulnerable to
the charge of arbitrariness, but autonomy is equally as vulnerable.
All criteria disqualifying human dignity, such as dignity is relative, ambiguous,

(11:58):
or fungible, can be reduced and increased, or it can
be harmful, can be leveled equally at autonomy. He writes,
the concept of dignity does a better job than autonomy
in describing and accounting for the intrinsic value of every
human being. We are valuable not simply because of our choices,

(12:19):
and still less do we have value only while we
are exercising our autonomy. We have value when we are
not choosing nor cannot choose. Grounding our value personhood and
dignity outside of our mere humanity in functional capacities leaves
all of the things we intuitively grasp as most important
to our self understanding as human beings anchored in foundations

(12:41):
that are apisotic and degreed by nature. We are set apart.
We craft laws and defend Smith's idea of human exceptionalism
based on strong intuitions common to the human experience. Our
shared experience of human thoughts, desires, and will provides insight
into humans nature, and we see moral capacities and responsibilities

(13:03):
in humanity that are absent in even the animals most
closely genetically related to us. This offers sufficient justification to
treat humans differently than animals under the law. In addition
to that knowledge from common experience sufficient for public discourse,
Christian anthropology grounds those differences. Christians have the best explanation

(13:24):
for clear intuitions that we are different from all other animals,
as well as the strong sense that humans bear responsibility
to protect our environment while refraining from unnecessarily causing suffering
in other species. We are the imago day, set apart
by God and intended to take care of his creation
out of our deep gratitude for the world He gave us.

(13:45):
It isn't necessary to pretend animals and humans are morally
equal in order to justify protecting them from cruelty. We
are commanded to reflect the character of God and the
world around us. His justice, his mercy, his love, and
his wisdom are to radiate through us. It pleased Him
to fill this world with wondrous and various creatures. We

(14:07):
are to be like him and be good stewards of
his creation. Christians are not a verse in principle to
the concept of non human persons. We traditionally attribute personhood
to the Trinity and to angels, clearly non human beings.
We simply recognize that a danger lies with attempts to
elevate animals to our moral equals, in spite of the
glaring evidence that could never operate as such. These efforts

(14:31):
ultimately reduce us all to an undifferentiated mess. Animal rights
activists will seek out the most basic presence of autonomy
and the broadest sense of what it means to pursue desires.
The argument's transition from chimpanzees ought to be treated as
special within the animal kingdom because of their shared capacities
with humans to humans and chimpanzees are no different from pigs,

(14:54):
or mice or parakeets. Efforts to blur specific lines usually
end up blurring all lines. According to Wesley Smith, that
is exactly the point.

Speaker 3 (15:05):
Thank you for listening to another episode from the Christian
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Research Journal articles. If you go to equip dot org,
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(15:29):
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(15:52):
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At equip dot org, you will also find a lot
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(16:13):
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Speaker 1 (16:15):
That's e q u I P dot O r G