Animal Liberation (book)

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Animal Liberation: A New Ethics for Our Treatment of Animals is a book by Australian philosopher Peter Singer.

The book was published by Random House in 1975 (ISBN 0-394-40096-8). In 1977, Avon Books published an edition (ISBN 0-380-01782-2). In 1991 and 2001, Harper Perennial published a 352-page paperback (ISBN 0-380-71333-0 and ISBN 0-06-001157-2).

Although Singer is not the first person to apply the concept of moral standing to animals (Singer himself says that he heard of the concept from a fellow student rather than coming up with it himself) the book is widely considered within the animal rights movement to be the founding philosophical statement of its ideas. Singer himself rejected the use of the theoretical framework of rights when it comes to animals: he argued that the interests of animals should be considered because of their ability to feel suffering and that the idea of rights was not necessary in order to consider them.

The central argument of the book is an expansion of the utilitarian idea that 'the greatest good for the greatest number' is the only measure of good or ethical behaviour. Singer argues that there is no reason not to apply this to animals. Although Jeremy Bentham applied utilitarianism in this way, utilitarians in general have not.