Philosophy, as Aristotle said, originates in wonder. And nonhumananimals have long been a source of wonder to humans,especially in regard to the treatment they deserve. The upshot isthat Western philosophy has been concerned with the way inwhich we ought to treat nonhuman animals since its origins withthe pre-Socratic philosophers.Animal ethics is a highly challenging fi
eld, as well as one of theliveliest areas of debate in ethics in recent years. Not only has thisarea issued in a range of attention-grabbing controversies, but ithas also led to the exploration o f novel and imaginativeapproaches to worn-out issues.This book is roughly evenly divided between the presentationand discussion of a range of influential past approaches toanimal ethics, and an equally signi
ficant range of contemporaryapproaches. We need to understand the legacy of the past andthe resources that it offers us while also forging new views thatare appropriate to our increasingly developed understanding ofthe nature of nonhuman animals.