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Complications in Theological Thinking about Other Species: A Reply to David Jones
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 February 2024
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This discussion concerns some difficulties which occur when we try to think about other, non-human animals. It takes the form of a reply to an article which appeared in this journal in December of 1992. The article, written by David Jones and entitled “Do Whales Have Souls?”, was a free-ranging attempt to ask theologically and philosophically inspired questions about whales and other life. This reply points out difficulties inherent in any thinking about other animals, and in particular those risks which such thinking faces if it relies on primary categories of Catholic theology. Failure to see the limitations of such categories can perpetuate the dismissal of other animals’ possibilities which has been characteristic of the Christian tradition.
Jones’ article contains the first mention of whales appearing in this journal, and it aims to be speculative and provocative. While at first we may smile at the range of the questions and the tendency to poetic observation in the article, the general subject matter—the existence of another group of species characterized by large brains, the occurrence of complex inter-individual communication, and both family structure and enduring social networks of distinct individuals—invites speculation of a very pointed sort. This reply argues that two sets of complications arise when Jones tries to think about whales. The first concerns the inherent limitations of familiar theological categories if we use them when trying to assess the significance of other living creatures, and the second concerns the viability of the familiar category of “species” when seeking to understand other animals’ value.
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- Copyright © 1995 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers
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1 I use the term “whales” in the most inclusive sense, such that it includes the many, many varieties of dolphins and porpoises, as well as the so–called great whales. The scientific name for this group of animals is “celacea” and thus the term “cetacean” is commonly used. There are just under one hundred known species in this group, and others continue to be identified.
2 The numbers in the parentheses are references to the page numbers of the article in Volume 73, No. 866, of this journal (December 1992).
3 Jones' thinking about “whales” includes a level of generality in the conceptualization which risks a betrayal of the enterprise itself. Jones uses the extremely general concept of “whales”, rather than refer to a particular species of whale or dolphin; this ordinary language term is itself a coarse level of discrimination, making reference to a large group of species which has immense internal variation. Such a high level of generalization, itself heavily reliant on an essentialist notion of the animals within the category, cannot help but miss some of the finer points of each member's significance.
4 Some of the complications in using rationality as pan of essentialist thinking can be seen in the following: Richard Sorabji's argument that the concept of reason itself has varied (Animals Minds and Human Morals: The Origins of the Western Debate (London: Duckworth, 1993)Google Scholar; Genevieve Lloyd's account of how it has been subject to genderized differences (The Man of Reason: ‘Male’ and ‘Female’ in Western Philosophy, 2nd edn (London: Roulledge, 1993)Google Scholar; and reformed episiemology's challenge to classical foundationalism as a theory of rationality (see Plantinga, Alvin, and Wolterstorff, Nicholas (editors). Reason and Rationality: Reason and Belief in God (London and Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1983)Google Scholar.
5 Interestingly, some modem philosophers have recently picked up the challenge. One groundbreaking advance in ethical awareness based on decades of etiological studies on primates appears in what is known as the “Great Ape Project” whereby philosophers and scientists are working on bringing a group of non–human species including chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans into the circle of recognized legal and ethical rights. See The Great Ape Protect: Equality Beyond Humanity, ed, by Paola Cavalieri and Peter Singer (London: Fourth Estate, 1993)Google Scholar.
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