Ignoring animal rights
Scotty Anderson (June 8) claims that his conservative principles have stood the test of time. In some instances, however, they persist only because conservatives refuse to acknowledge clear evidence against their views.
Anderson’s view on animal rights is a good example. He ignores recent studies about the cognitive and emotional abilities of higher animals. I define a person as a being with a significant mental life, and courts in South America have now ruled that two apes have moral and legal rights.
In 2014, a court in Argentina ruled that Sandra, an orangutan in the Buenos Aires Zoo, was a non-human person. In 2016, a Brazilian court found that a chimpanzee named Cecila was a non-human person who had been illegally imprisoned.
In 2018, Steven Wise filed a writ of habeas corpus on behalf of Happy, an Asian elephant, in a New York court. Happy had passed the “mirror self-recognition” test, and Wise argued that “the zoo’s imprisonment of Happy deprives her of her ability to exercise her freedom to choose where to go and what to do.”
Just recently, elephants have been found to communicate “by name” over long distances (see bit.ly/3VhY9s5). Elephants are also known to grieve the loss of their children and relatives.
In March 2012, after the death of Lawrence Anthony, South African conservationist and elephant “whisperer,” two herds of elephants, which Anthony had studied and loved, walked 12 hours to attend his funeral.
Dozens of unemployed Asian logging elephants now have second careers as painters. Most of the paintings are abstract, but trainers have taught them to depict natural scenes as well. Most amazingly, some have done self-portraits, indicating that they are conscious of themselves as unique individuals.
I have written more on this topic at bit.ly/3S6gTKf.
Nick Gier
Moscow
