Jonas Auer, Dominik Rieger
In this episode of our podcast series we were discussing the relationship between liberalism and animal ethics. Our guest was Prof. Dr. Markus Wild who is professor for theoretical philosophy in Basel. His focus is on animal ethics and he pioneered animal philosophy in the German speaking region. Our questions dealt with the relationship between liberalism and animal ethics, for example whether we should grant certain animals the right to be counted as consenting individuals and whether we can connect the concepts of Judith Shklar`s “liberalism of fear” and J.S. Mill`s “harm principle” to our relationship with animals.
Liberalism of fear: The notion of «liberalism of fear» was coined by Judith Shklar. It means the (negative) freedom of abuse of power, oppression, fear and authoritarian regimes. The notion was heavily influenced by the experiences of totalitarian rule during the 20th century.
Harm-principle: The so-called «harm principle» stems from John Stuart Mill and says that the freedom of individuals consists of acting deliberately unless the freedom of others is threatened by it. In other words the freedom of an individual ends where the freedom of another individual begins.