The question for this week asks you to identify the values at stake in both sides of the feral cat controversy and then to explain how this is an ethical dilemma.
While this dilemma is hardly black-and-white, it is possible to identify two pretty clear-cut sides. The first includes environmental advocates, ecological scientists, and bird lovers who believe that outdoor cats kill many native wild birds and thus cause a great deal of harm to ecosystems. This group values ecological integrity, native wildlife, and the overall good of the environment.
On the other side are people who value individual cats. They do not think that primary moral good lies in a collective, such as an ecosystem or even a species. Instead, the main good for this group is individual life.
The interesting thing about this debate, or controversy, is that people on both sides consider themselves animal lovers and nature lovers. Their different positions on outdoor cats come in art from their different beliefs about the damage that cats do to bird populations and the effectiveness of lethal and non-lethal management strategies for outdoor cats. Thus the conflict between values is also a conflict about information or data.
The same is true for many issues in social ethics. Often people share some core values -- they value democracy, or freedom of religion, or children, for example -- but they disagree about the best way to support and protect what they value.
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