Ethics and Education (1912)

AUTHOR: Moore, J. Howard

PUBLICATION: Ethics and Education. London: G. Bell & Sons, 1912.
https://archive.org/details/cu31924031243318
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=coo1.ark:/13960/t8z89sz6t&view=1up&seq=7

KEYWORDS: animals, animal welfare, capitalism, education, evolution, food, labor rights

SUMMARY (Ridvan Askin, edited Deborah Madsen):

In this book for teachers, Moore promotes veganism as part of his plea for humane education based on an ethics of trans-species altruism and universal interconnectedness. In the Preface, Moore clarifies that this is a text “primarily for teachers” (v). It is intended “to meet the demand for information on the relation of ethics to the general educational process” (v). As with all of Moore's work, it is based on “the evolutional point of view” (v). “Nearly all the woes of the world,” Moore contends, “arise either from ignorance of the ways we should go or from hereditary waywardnesses which we bring into the world with us” (vi). It is the task of education and schools “to correct these inherent defects” (vi). He also announces the publication of a related textbook, High School Ethics (the first volume of which was indeed published the same year).

In twenty short chapters, Moore explains evolutionary theory and its relation to education and teaching, school and educational reform, the importance of ethics, the teaching of morals, the implementation of a proper curriculum in ethics that reflects the knowledge of evolution, and he offers suggestions for a respective methodology and course design. It is within this larger framework geared towards the teaching of ethics at schools that Moore elaborates on ethical veganism. He is adamant that ethics, which he understands as going beyond purely human affairs, should be at the heart of education, that “[t]he teaching of the correct relations of human beings to each other and of human beings to the other inhabitants of the planet should have a prominent place in every course of instruction designed for human young” (5-6).

Ethical education is so important because it is the only available tool to counter humans' hereditary defects in morality (bellicosity, selfishness, etc.). “Eugenics,” Moore is hopeful, will make it possible one day that “[i]nstead of correcting the defects of heredity, we will prevent them” (42, 41). While that is not the case, he contends, a truly “[u]niversal ethics” is needed to acknowledge “universal kinship”: “No one but an inferior,” he writes, “can any longer maintain that kindness, justice, sympathy, love, honesty, humanity, and charity are not as good for dogs, horses, and fishes as they are for men; or that cruelty, hatred, and inhumanity are not the same damning things wherever they fall on living souls” (42-43). Moore promotes what he calls “Universal Mutualism” (59), the application of the golden rule to all sentient beings. If applied comprehensively, “[i]n time to come, when the human mind has become broader, and knowledge more general, and the imagination is trained systematically in all the schools of mankind, men will look back on us to-day as a lot of brilliant knaves. We are able to do so much, and to feel and realize so little. From an extra-terrestrial point of view human conduct is literally demoniacal” (72). This is obvious in the capitalist's exploitation of workers as much as in the exploitative relation to nonhuman animals: “The great mass of mankind, “ Moore writes, “are restricted to the privileges and pleasures of domestic animals, in order that a few of their fellows may roll in gold. We are a race of cannibals. We eat each other.” Similarly, “[t]he attitude assumed by human beings toward non-human beings is essentially that of savages. It is utterly atrocious. 'Civilised' men are the only beings on the earth, or, let us hope, in the universe, who find relaxation in killing and terrifying” (73). For Moore,

it is impossible to understand the things men do – many of them are so horrible and idiotic – unless we take into account the fact that this agricultural and town-building being whom we see when we look in a mirror was once a literal beast of the field, clothed in natural hair, without mercy, modesty, matrimony, or religion, living on roots, fruits, honey, and birds' eggs, and contending doubtfully with other animals about him for life (107).

The teaching of ethics must proceed on this basis. The “[h]unting and fishing” of other animals “for nutritive purposes” is “a superfluous instinct which has persisted in our nature from savage times. They are the most inexcusable of all known crimes” (108). If done for mere pastime, they are true abominations “beyond characterization” (108). But Moore is hopeful:

The practice men have of suppressing other animals for furs, feathers, and food is a survival from the more primitive past. We can hardly conceive of such a practice originating to-day, with our improved notions of art, our widened sympathies, and our better knowledge of foods, and especially since the discovery of evolution and all that it implies. The practice is under a pretty heavy fire at present, and it is destined to encounter still greater difficulties in times to come, as the humane instincts mount higher and reason grows more influential in the psychologies of men (112).

Further drawing on evolutionary theory, Moore also notes that “[i]t was probably after the invention of fire that man acquired the practice of using the flesh of other animals as food. Man originally lived on fruits, nuts, leaves, and birds' eggs, as the monkey does. This is indicated by the architecture of his mouth and digestive organs and by the child's natural preference for fruits and nuts” (124). Moore is convinced that both capitalism and human “Anthropocentricism” (141) will be overcome as

[t]he next hundred years will witness the greatest improvement in moral practice and understanding this world has ever seen. Nothing to compare with it has ever taken place in the evolution of ethics. The twentieth century is going to be a humanitarian century. The twenty-first century will dawn on a very different condition of things from that which we see around us to-day. Men are going to be Brothers, as certainly as the stars rise in the east. The marching and counter-marching going on in the industrial world to-day will end in a new order of society based on Mutualism, in which there will be not only division of labour but division of the products of labour as well. And along|with the recognition of human brotherhood will come, is bound to come, the corollary recognition of the brotherhood of all those that feel (147).

The remainder of the book contains concrete suggestions for “a course of study in ethical culture for elementary and high schools” along these lines as well as the appropriate methods of teaching (151).

Last updated on December 6th, 2024

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