Kant, Mill, and Animal Agriculture

The ethical methodologies of Immanuel Kant and John Stuart Mill are typically perceived as in utter opposition to one another, on account of how they evaluate consequences. Kant’s ethics are rooted in a hypothetical consideration of an action’s successful universal applicability, without any situational considerations. In contrast, Mill’s moral judgment is based in a cost-benefit analysis of the potential situational consequences that may arise from a particular action. While this difference may often promote unique moral evaluations, their ethical methodologies likely lead to a similar conclusion about the ethical response to animal agriculture. I contend that, while Kant and Mill would evaluate animal agriculture with different considerations and calculations, they would both argue that consuming flesh is wholly unethical, given the modern empirical research about its unavoidable, disastrous consequences. In this paper, I will explain each philosopher’s ethical framework. I will then enumerate some of the direct and inevitable consequences of animal husbandry and justify their consideration in each moral system. Finally, I will conclude by arguing that sustainable eating must preclude animal consumption.

Situationalism and Consequentialism in Kant and Mill

In his introduction to Utilitarianism, John Stuart Mill claims that while Immanuel Kant attempts to develop an ethical calculus that does not measure an action’s worth by its consequences, Kant is ultimately a consequentialist. Mill writes that Kant fails to identify “any contradiction, any logical (not to say physical) impossibility,” in an action’s universal adoption (8). Instead, Kant only clarifies between actions whose universal adoption “would be such as no one would choose to incur,” and ones that wouldn’t have such an effect (8). Separating acts into these two categories still requires considering their consequences, which is why Mill implicitly calls Kant a consequentialist—a title Kant would have never given himself. I believe, however, that Mill’s reading of Kant is incorrect. Situational contexts and consequences are at the core of Mill’s ethics and wholly irellevant to Kant’s. Because Mill is clearly consequentialist, I will demonstrate how Mill and Kant’s philosophies are incompatible, to refute Mill’s claim that Kant is also consequentialist. I will further demonstrate that, given Kant’s complete exclusion of situational contexts and consequences, it would be wholly inaccurate to call him a consequentialist, on account of the following justifications: Firstly, because Kant values ethical certainty, he cannot consider a given action’s consequences, since it is impossible to fully determine them. Secondly, because happiness is indeterminate, with unknown causes, an ethical calculus based in promoting happiness cannot yield moral certainty. Finally, because Kant strives for ethical calculus which precludes the situational corruption of actors, it must be determined a priori and in the abstract, for clear and precise behavioral guidance in all situations, which is impossible when considering situational contexts and consequences.