動物解放與護生行動 : 從關懷生命協會的角度來探討=The Animal Liberation and the Action of Life Protection : Discussion from the Standpoint of the Life Conservationist Association
In 1993, when the Life Conservationist Association was founded, a life-based philosophy of Life Protection was also proposed. It becomes the guiding principles for theory building and points out the direction for actual practice. Yet, to keep away from narrowing the development of the Association as becoming a religious group, a non-religious assertion for animal protection has to be established. Therefore, the Association has translated and published Peter Singer's monument, Animal Liberation in 1996, in order to introduce ideas of animal protection in the West. This work has become a classic and it has provided powerful theoretical framework supporting the argument of animal protection. This paper attempts to make an argument from three claims: animal liberation, ethics of life protection and animal rights. Their foundation of morality and evidence of proof will be analyzed, in order to examine the debate formed during the cross-dialogues among them. The purpose is not to look at the development of animal protection of the Association, but to analyze the basis of argumentation and the practical orientation of the ethics of life protection, under the context and environment in Taiwan. From the comparison among different theories, this study learns that the Association has underestimated the significance of animal rights in the animal protection campaign, and this indicates that the theory specified in the objective of the Association to promote animal rights is perhaps not legitimate. Therefore, we propose that the ethics of life protection can be a potential way of establishing animal rights, and this may also become resources of theory for the action of life protection.
