The entity of animals and our obligations to them

Abstract

The article analyzes two basic matters in the recent development of the zooethics. First, whether traditional reasons for the coincidence between the limits of moral community and the limits of human species are valid. Second, the question of what kind of obligations we would have with animals in case of we would recognize moral entity to them. The author defends the importance of the animal intereses in our moral decisions, but he critics that we decide either putting animal intereses on the same level with human intereses or maintaining that animal intereses entail animals have individual rights.