Moral Community

Cohen uses the theory of moral community to argue against animal rights. He believes that the only thing that can possess rights are members of a moral community. A moral community is an entity that recognizes some of its actions that have a moral dimension. That will mitigate our actions by the effects. For example, if I cognize some of my actions are moral dimensions, some of what I might want to do will describe in terms of what effects if might have on other entity. We also need to understand that what it means to be a member of a moral community is to recognize that some of what we do have moral implication that will mitigate what I might choose to do. Such entities are morally self-legislative because they are morally autonomous. For instance, they are self-directed and independent. On the other hand, lion does not recognize that his action has a moral dimension. If he is hungry, he is going to eat something next to him or anything else. Yet we cannot act the way lion does because we are morally autonomous and live in moral community.

Cohen uses the theory of moral community to argue against sentience. According to Singer, he thinks that there is no morally relevant distinction between humans and non-human animals. If something suffers, it should take their suffering into account in terms of equal consideration of interests. Yet Cohen thinks that the idea of Singer is wrong. For instance, he believe that there is morally relevant distinction between humans and non-human animals. According to Cohen, humans act morally and they are a member of moral community. No animals are a member of a moral community because they cannot act in terms of their behavior. For example, lion will eat anything when he is hungry, and he will not have ability to think whether he should eat or not.