Animal Ethics new section about animal suffering in nature

20 Oct 2016

Animal Ethics is pleased to announce a new section on its website dedicated to the situation of animals in the wild. This is a very important issue that affects an enormous number of animals but has been underaddressed and underresearched until recent times. Fortunately, though, the tide is changing, as more people are realizing that animals in nature need our help just as those exploited by humans do.

With this new section we intend to contribute to this change of attitude. The section is divided in three parts, which you can visit here:

This section contains a collection of papers exploring the various aspects of animals living in the wild. You will find papers explaining the reasons for the prevalence of animal suffering and premature death in nature. These include disease, malnutrition and thirst, hostile weather conditions, physical injuries, psychological stress, antagonism between animals (which includes parasitic and predation relations) and natural disasters.

The section also includes papers which, by considering both population dynamics and the evolutionary reasons underlying them, clarify the indicators used to evaluate whether suffering prevails over happiness in nature. These papers also explain the arguments why animals in the wild can be harmed in the same ways as domesticated animals and humans, and why we should care about this.

More practical papers detail different ways we can help those animals in need in nature. The topics they address include rescuing trapped animals, vaccinating and healing sick and injured animals, sheltering orphan wild animals, providing food and water to hungry and thirsty animals, and aiding animals affected by fires and natural disasters.

Furthermore, this new section also examines what courses of action we can follow in order to learn more about the issue of animals suffering in nature and raise concern about it, so, in the future, more significant actions are carried out to intervene in favor of these animals.

The papers include long lists of scientific references as well as many real world examples documented with videos or addressed in the media. We intend for this section to be a helpful resource for those wishing to do research about animal suffering in nature. More significantly, we hope it can help raise concern about this important topic and provide a useful tool for antispeciesist activists wanting to help all sentient animals.