Mercy – A Central Virtue in Animal Ethics

In ethical debates regarding modern technologies in livestock production, virtue ethics plays a subordinate role. Leon Borgdorf addresses this issue by providing a virtue ethical framework centered on mercy. First, he defines mercy as a virtue, which applies when the moral agent can harm someone vulnerable and refrains from doing so. Second, he links mercy to empathic concern, which he argues to be crucial for virtue because it informs moral agents about pain in others and inhibits them from harming others. Drawing on an existing argument from military ethics about the viciousness of unlearning empathy in the case of soldiers learning to kill, he problematizes animal slaughter. Third, he argues that a virtuous society promotes eudaimonia in its citizens and therefore should not require them to become merciless. He concludes that societies should not endorse practices that cultivate mercilessness, but encourage practices that increase mercy towards others, including farmed animals.