Interests and Rights: The Case Against Animals

by R.G. Frey

Genres: Philosophy

188 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1980

About the author

Raymond Gillespie Frey (1941-2012) was Professor of Philosophy at Bowling Green State University, specializing in moral, political and legal philosophy, and author or editor of a number of books, including Interests and Rights: The Case Against Animals (1980), Euthanasia and Physician-Assisted Suicide (1998, with Gerald Dworkin and Sissela Bok), and The Oxford Handbook of Animal Ethics (2011, with Tom Beauchamp).

David DeGrazia wrote in 1991 that Frey was one of five authors – along with Peter Singer, Tom Regan, Mary Midgley, and Steve Sapontzis – who had made significant philosophical contributions to the work of placing animals within ethical theory.

Frey obtained his B.A. in philosophy in 1966 from The College of William and Mary, his M.A. in 1968 from the University of Virginia, and his D.Phil. in 1974 from the University of Oxford – where his supervisor was R. M. Hare – for a thesis on "Rules and Consequences as Grounds for Moral Judgment."

Reviews

[Heather Browning · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although I disagree with Frey's central argument - that animals do not have 'interests', I very much enjoyed reading his book. He makes a clear and non-emotive case against moral consideration of animals, one of the most convincing. Essentially Frey argues that because animals lack language, they are incapable of the beliefs and desires necessary to have interests. I don't think he is right about the necessity of language for these psychological states, but he argues well. He also touches on issues about the intelligibility of 'rights' discourse in general, with which I agree.