Monkeys learned to talk and mastered the computer. So, is the line between man and animal completely blurred? Archpriest Roman BRATCHIK, a systematic zoologist, reflects on what place man occupies in the system of animals and plants.

Main Difference
-- Father Roman, experiments with monkeys who were taught sign language refute the idea that humans differ from animals in having intelligence...
— A very long time ago I was struck by one experience. A monkey who had lived with people for a long time was shown photographs of dogs, people, monkeys and her own and asked to classify them. She considered herself a human being, not a monkey. Mowgli, apparently, would classify himself as a wolf (this is imprinting - the unconscious imprinting of an image that is internalized as a native one; normally this is the mother, but in an experiment it can be anything). But, speaking about the presence of intelligence in a monkey, we will run into a definition of intelligence that does not exist. If by intelligence we mean the ability to form concepts and perform certain operations with them - yes, at some level the monkey copes with this. Another question is how long chains of such operations can it build? A person can think through and accumulate material, writing it down, encoding it with a system of signs. The monkey does not have this, in the monkey community. It seems to me that there is a lower mind - the ability for abstract thinking - and there is a higher mind, inaccessible to a monkey.

- So how then does a person differ from a monkey?
- It is impossible to give a definition. Biology cannot even give a clear definition of how a dog differs from a cat. We will find a lot of intermediate forms. There are cats that are more like dogs and vice versa. There are certain types of animals that resemble both dogs and cats. We divide all the diversity of the animal world into some groups, but there is always something that doesn’t quite fit in, this is generally a headache for all taxonomists, but I was involved in taxonomy. Any definition is the setting of a boundary. And in empirical reality, the boundaries are always blurred to one degree or another. For example: a person has an internal environment, but where it begins and where it ends is unclear. When my mouth is closed, what is in my mouth is the internal environment, but if my mouth is open, where is the boundary? So now in science the boundary between man and ape is blurred.

The non-believer will simply lose this boundary. A believer will clearly determine that the presence of the spirit of God is the only thing that makes a person human. Outside of this, a person is simply a taxonomic unit in a system of living organisms, a little more complex. Because of this, it will always be possible for materialists to call some of the people not human. Tell me, if a person loses his mind as a result of some kind of trauma, has he ceased to be human? From our point of view, it has not stopped. And a non-believer can easily reach the point where he can kill such people. If a person is one whose IQ is not lower than such and such a value, then such a patient is, therefore, not a person. And then its destruction will be considered as a social good! In Orthodoxy, we can define a person without the danger of losing any representative of humanity, regardless of what physical disabilities he has, what his skin color is, his nationality, his education.

In Orthodox anthropology, there are two approaches to defining a person: trichotomous and dichotomous. According to the dichotomy, a person has body and soul, and according to the trichotomy, there is body, soul and spirit. The word “soul” is used here in different senses: the soul of the trichotomous system is the highest manifestation of the physical, the emotional, mental sphere. It is by the presence of this “corporal” soul that we come together with our smaller brothers. Perhaps the latest research on monkeys suggests that the mind, the rationale, also belongs to this bodily area. Animals do not have the spirit, which makes us godlike. Another thing is why the Lord breathed His spirit into man; could He have breathed it into an amoeba? What, a spirit cannot fit into one cell? Maybe. A person’s soul is given to him immediately after fertilization, and there is only one cell, and there is already a spirit in this cell. So, could an amoeba be the same cell? But this is not the case. The amoeba, apparently, does not have those abilities that could perceive the spirit. Man is the most complex known living organism; this is the fertile soil in which the grain of the spirit can germinate and bear fruit. What we do with this grain is another matter; these are our personal problems.

This fundamental difference in a person can be observed in the simplest situations. For example, a person has an aesthetic sense. It happens, of course, that birds also bring flowers to their females. But this is not yet the aesthetics that a person has, which evaluates the world around him, identifies harmony in it, and this harmony causes resonance, an amazing state of mind. What can resonate with harmony? Not flesh, at least. The presence of God in the beauty of the world is harmony, it takes your breath away, you see a sunrise or sunset: “Ah!” - that's all. Man is “ah!” before sunset. I don’t know if the smaller brothers have this “ah!” internally, in my opinion, no.

Dandelion death
- Many are convinced that before the fall of man there was no death in the world at all: neither animals nor plants died (although plants were given for food from the very beginning).
- In my understanding, the death of a dandelion is death. And if so, then we will have to admit that the death of plants existed before the Fall. Or we should introduce two concepts of death. Just as we introduced two concepts of “man” - biological and theological. Scripture directly says about man that he was created immortal and after the Fall he passed from one state to another, from immortality to mortality. Nothing is said about animals.

The fact is that idle curiosity is alien to Orthodox theology. We have never attempted to find out in detail what happens in hell and what happens in heaven.

After creating the earth and sky, plants and animals, God created man and “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul” (Gen. 2:7).
Mosaic from the Cathedral in Montreal, Italy. XII century

Orthodoxy is essentially very practical, it shows the way, teaches us how to go, and gives us faith. And what will happen there next - go there and you will see. The Bible says a lot about the world of the soul, about love - we will find a colossal number of references and direct commandments of Christ about this. Evangelist John ends his sermon with only one thing: children, love one another. If you love, love will teach you everything, it will teach you how to walk, how to communicate with people, everything will happen. But about the creation of the world... This was told to the Jews, who had just spent several centuries in Egypt, and were probably infected with Egyptian ideas about the universe, which had to be immediately cut off. There was no task to give a consistent picture of the creation of the world. It is said that the sun was created on the fourth day, respectively, the solar god Ra finds himself in the background, animals that were also deified in Egypt, all these cats, birds, crocodiles and so on, it turns out, were also not created on the first day. It is emphasized that they are created, they are not gods, they are creations, above all is the uncreated God, who has the nature of being in himself. They often try to see a detailed scientific picture of the world in this stroke, but this is wrong.

Geese and cannonade
- Defending animal rights is now very fashionable. People don’t eat meat, don’t wear fur, protest against experiments on rats, and against testing cosmetics and medicines on animals. Should a Christian participate in this?
- If he sees that someone is senselessly abusing an animal, he must intervene. But we are not defending the rights of animals, we are defending the morality of the divine law. We are fighting the spread of anger and hatred. There is no point in torturing an animal for cosmetics - cosmetics are not vitally important. And if a vaccine is needed to prevent people from dying, I think it can be tested on animals. A person must determine this line within himself. It is impossible to give a list here: this is possible, but this is not. It seems to me that you just need to cultivate a sense of conscience in a person, and he himself will feel that line that it is better not to step over. I personally think that if St. Sergius could walk in leather shoes, then, therefore, this is no longer important.

— Is it necessary to save the endangered Amur tiger?
- Just not to the detriment of a person. If this enriches the gene pool of nature, which again man uses.

- But man does not use the tiger!
- But he doesn’t use a tiger. The gene pool is a kind of complex in which there should be a fairly large variety, some of which we use directly and some indirectly. Then, we never know what we will need tomorrow. But if it turned out that in order to preserve the Amur tiger, we need to leave twenty thousand people without food, without territory... If a tribe is dying and we need to kill the last representative of a species from the Red Book - say, a whale, then it is better to kill the whale than to kill people.

- Can hunting be an activity for a Christian, what do you think?
“I hunted myself, but I gave up even before I was baptized.” I once had a dream: I heard as if military cannonade was coming far, far away, beyond the horizon. And slowly this cannonade begins to approach me. I see a flock of geese flying and gunfire going around them. And so they fly on, and the cannonade follows them further, further, further. I woke up no longer a hunter. That is, if I needed to feed my family, there would be no problem. Such a hunt is simply an inevitable or difficult to avoid evil of our sinful world. But when they hunt for pleasure, it seems to me that this is wrong. Nowadays almost no one in Russia hunts for food; it’s more of an entertainment thing. Moreover, some hunters generally do not eat what they kill. They don’t like this food: why, because you can get good food. And this boar still needs to be cooked for several hours, just to chew it. I remember at the university someone brought us a piece of elk from a hunt. It was cooked, I think, for about six hours until it became edible.

Note that some people cannot cut off the head of a fish that is flailing. It’s one thing when we override this normal reaction in order to feed someone. But it’s another thing when we turn it into the norm or even pleasure. It seems to me that this is a kind of bitterness. Because for a Christian, murder is unnatural.

What about the problem of stray dogs? They are dangerous, but the trapping service simply kills them - should the Christian conscience put up with this?
- It's like war. Stray dogs can be a direct threat, and there are cases where these dogs form into packs, where they are even more dangerous. The wolf does not attack a person, but dogs do attack, so they have to be destroyed. But at the same time, I feel sorry for them, of course, because in this situation it is our fault - we are the ones who multiplied them. Here is a feeling of universal human guilt, this is our universal human oversight that we abandoned these dogs, and now we are forced to kill them. Now it’s good, there is sterilization of animals. And before, they usually drowned puppies. We had a poodle. She had the first litter of about ten puppies, the second litter was also about that, and I drowned the puppies if I couldn’t give them away. At the same time, the very fact of killing puppies resonated with illness in my soul. And then we were just baptized. And I got to Father John (Krestyankin), I had a lot of questions, and then I said, father, I’m ashamed, I have such a question. He says: well, what? I say: yes, this is the situation, the dog is giving birth, I don’t want to kill these puppies, you know. I can sink, but it's hard. He says: if you don’t want to kill, everything will work out. As a result, the dog gave birth to only two live puppies and several stillborn ones. I didn't have to kill anyone.

Interviewed by Marina KOFTAN

Friends, I invite you to discuss an interesting ethical problem.

ANIMAL RIGHTS AND PETS

One aspect of my theory of animal rights, described in the book "Introduction to Animal Rights: Your Child or the Dog?" (Introduction to Animal Rights: Your Baby or the Dog?) and elsewhere, the concern that some animal advocates have is that if we take a rights-based position, then we should stop raising pets. I'm not just talking about animals used for food, experimentation, clothing, etc., but also our animal companions.

If you take a welfarist approach, which holds that using non-human animals is morally acceptable as long as you treat them “humanely,” and which sees the goal as better regulation of animal use, then I can certainly understand that you will reject my views. But if, like me, you see the fundamental problem with animal exploitation as being used regardless of “humaneness” and your goal is to abolish that exploitation, then I am not clear why such a position would be difficult for you.

The logic is simple. We treat animals as our property, as resources that we can use for our own purposes. We breed them by the billions for one single purpose: to use and kill them. We have bred these animals to depend on us for their survival.

The central position of my legal theory is that we have no justification for treating animals as property any more than we have any justification for treating other people as slaves. We have ended human slavery in most of the world; likewise, we must abolish animal slavery.

But what does this mean in the context of non-human animals? Should we "free" animals and let them roam the streets freely? No, of course not. It would be as irresponsible as allowing small children to roam around. Of course, we must take care of those animals that have already appeared in this world because of us, but we must stop breeding new ones. We have no justification for using non-human animals - no matter how “humanely” we treat them.

I have heard two objections to this opinion.

First, there is a fear that we will lose "diversity" if we don't have these domesticated animals.

Even if continued domestication were necessary for biological diversity, this would not mean that it was morally acceptable. However, we do not need to deal with this problem. There is nothing “natural” about pets. They are creatures created by us through selection and restriction of freedom. Where they have non-domesticated relatives living in the wild, we should certainly try to protect these animals primarily for their own sake and secondarily for the sake of biodiversity. But our protection of currently existing domesticated animals is not necessary for any kind of biological diversity.

Second, and more often, animal advocates have difficulty with my views on domestication because they rely on the fact that many of us live with non-human animals and treat them as members of our families. They claim that such relationships must certainly be morally acceptable.

When it comes to companion animals, some of us treat them like family members and some of us don't. But no matter how we treat our dogs, cats and other animals, they are property in the eyes of the law. If you consider your dog part of the family and treat him well, the law will protect your decision in the same way that the law will protect your decision to change the oil in your car every thousand miles - the dog and car are your property, and if you wish to add more value to your property , the law will protect your decision. But if you decide to place less value on your property and, for example, decide to have a guard dog that you keep on a chain in the yard and which you provide with minimal food, water and shelter - and no communication or affection - the law will protect this decision.

The reality is that in the United States, most cats and dogs do not die of old age in the arms of the people who love them. Most have a home for a relatively short period of time before they are given up to another owner, taken to a shelter, thrown out, or taken to a veterinarian to be killed.

If we call the owner a “guardian,” as some animal activists insist, the essence remains the same. This name is meaningless. Those of us who live with companion animals are owners in the eyes of the law and have the legal right to treat our animals as we see fit, with few restrictions. Anti-cruelty laws do not apply to the vast majority of cases of cruelty to animals.

But, these animal rights activists respond, we could, at least in theory, have different and morally acceptable relationships with non-human animals. What if we abolished the property status of animals and demanded the same treatment for cats and dogs as we demand for human children? What if people who lived with dogs could no longer use them as tools (like guard dogs, show cats and dogs, etc.), but had to treat them as family members? What if people couldn't kill companion animals, except in cases in which at least some of us would consider assisted suicide in a human context (like when the person is terminally ill and in agony, etc.) acceptable. Would it then be acceptable to continue breeding non-human animals to be our companions?

Leaving aside the fact that developing common standards for what would constitute treating animals as "members of families" and resolving all the issues involved would be impossible in practice, this position denies that domestication itself raises a serious moral issue. regardless of *how* the animals involved are treated.

It depends on us what time pets eat, and whether they eat at all, whether they have water, where and when they can go to the toilet, what time they sleep, whether they have the opportunity to move enough, and so on. Unlike human children, who, except in special cases, will become independent and functioning members of our society, domestic animals are neither part of the animal kingdom nor a complete part of our world. They remain forever in a hell of vulnerability and depend on us for everything they need. We have bred them to be pliable and helpful, with characteristics that are harmful to them, but pleasant to us. We can make them happy in some way, but our relationship will never be “natural” or “normal.” They have no place in our world, no matter how well we treat them.

This applies to all pets to a greater or lesser extent. They are indefinitely dependent on us. We control their lives forever. They are real "slave animals". We may be generous “hosts,” but we are really not much more than that. And this can't be right.

My partner and I live with five rescued dogs. All five would have died if we had not sheltered them. We love them very much and try our best to give them the best care and care. (And before anyone asks: we're all vegan!) You probably won't find two people on this planet who enjoy life with dogs more than we do.

But if there were only two dogs left in the universe and we had to decide whether to breed them so we could continue to live with dogs, and even if we could guarantee that all dogs would have the same loving home that we have , we would not hesitate to put an end to the institution of pet ownership. We see the dogs that live with us as refugees of sorts, and while we are happy to care for them, it is clear that people should not continue to breed these creatures into a world for which they are simply not suited.

Some animal rights activists think that "animal rights" means that non-human animals have some kind of right to reproduction, so sterilizing animals is wrong. If this observation is correct, then we would find ourselves morally obligated to allow all domesticated species to continue to reproduce indefinitely. We cannot limit this “right to reproduction” to just cats and dogs. Moreover, there is no point in saying that we were immoral by domesticating non-human animals, but now we must allow them to reproduce. We made a moral mistake by domesticating animals; what's the point in keeping it now?

To sum up, I can understand welfarists, for whom the primary moral issue is treatment rather than use, thinking that the domestication and continued use of animals is acceptable as long as we treat them “humanely.” But I cannot understand why those who consider themselves abolitionists think that the continued domestication of any animals can be justified as long as we treat those animals well - just as I cannot understand how those those who consider themselves abolitionists may not be vegans.

The subtitle of my book is your child or your dog? - this is a reference to a child and a dog in a burning house (or on a lifeboat, or somewhere else); it is intended to focus our attention on the fact that we seek to resolve moral conflicts between humans and other animals. But we *create* these conflicts by dragging an animal into a burning house, that is, by breeding them as resources for our use. And then we wonder how to resolve the conflict we created! This is nonsense.

If we took animals seriously, we would stop treating them as resources, as property. But this would mean the end of breeding animals for food, clothing, vivisection or any other purpose, including companionship.

The international animal protection organization World Animal Protection compiled. Countries ranked from A to G, Where A- the highest possible score. The map allows you to view a detailed comparison of selected countries to understand why a particular country ended up in its assigned place. This rating will consider exactly those countries that received the highest scores ( A And B). Russia earned a rating in the ranking of countries in terms of attitude towards animals F, losing to countries such as China, Nigeria, Ukraine, Ethiopia, etc.

10

In 2010, all anti-cruelty laws were repealed or replaced. They have been replaced by a positive approach, the idea of ​​which is to use laws that dictate how animals should be treated. The government body directly responsible for ensuring the proper treatment of animals is the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Environment (AFCD). In Hong Kong, a person who, to quote the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, is subject to a fine of 200,000 local dollars (approximately $25,000 US) and a three-year prison sentence: “severely hits, kicks, runs over, tortures, teases, scares , does not prevent or causes unnecessary suffering to the animal while being its owner.” The remaining articles of the law also regulate in detail the rights of animals to a decent life.

9

According to the World Animal Protection rating, Chile received a grade of B. Laws that would protect animals in Chile are hardly effective or even valid, but they continue to be improved. The current policy of the country in this matter is usually to consider physical harm caused to an animal, such as damage to someone's property.

8

The Netherlands can boast absolute absence of stray animals. To achieve this, they did not destroy animals. This result can be a good example for all humanity, and if desired, it can be achieved. Also, in 2015 it was introduced a complete ban on the use of wild animals in circuses. The use of wild animals remains permitted only in zoos.

7

The main provision of pet protection laws in Sweden is the statement - the animal should feel good. So every dog ​​living in Sweden must be registered. This work is performed by veterinarians by tattooing a registration number on the animal's ear or inserting a chip under its skin. Swedes don't even understand how a dog can be homeless. If she is on the street without her owner, it means she is lost. Most often, dogs get lost during hunts, but such “losses” are quickly found and returned to their owners.

6

In Denmark, great importance is paid to the environmental and ethical components of animal husbandry, and livestock breeding in particular. Denmark is the cleanest country in the world regarding bovine diseases. Vaccination of livestock is prohibited here, and antibiotics are used only with permission from the state veterinary service and only in cases of urgent need. Danish animals officially have status of the healthiest animals, since Denmark is officially free from such serious diseases as tuberculosis, brucellosis and leukemia. Denmark is one of the few countries that has an official classification as a country with a negative risk for the disease “mad cow disease”.

5

Just like Switzerland, Sweden and Austria, Germany banned battery systems for keeping brood hens(a system characterized by extremely inhumane conditions for keeping animals - cramped cages that exclude the possibility of any movement; lack of access to sunlight throughout the life of chickens, and so on). The EU as a whole has promised to phase out the battery system for keeping chickens in 2012. Moreover, in the EU Cats are not allowed to declaw. Killing or causing serious pain to animals (or prolonged or repeated exposure to suffering) is punishable in Germany imprisonment for up to three years or a fine.

4

New Zealand officially recognizes animals as sentient beings. The country passed a bill in favor of animal welfare (Animal Welfare Bill). From now on, punishment awaits those who cruelly treat animals; research and experiments on animals are prohibited. Any hunting or trapping of wild animals will become illegal.

3

Austria has the toughest law to protect animals. Keeping chickens in cramped cages, cutting off dogs' tails and ears, and tying livestock with tight ropes would be considered crimes. Also, according to the law, it is categorically It is prohibited to use lions and other wild animals in circuses, you cannot keep a dog on a chain, a choke collar, or use a so-called “invisible fence” in the yard, which shocks the animal if it crosses a certain line. In addition, it is prohibited to keep puppies and kittens in stuffy display windows of pet stores. Violators of the law face fine of €2,000 to €15,000. The authorities reserve the right to seize an animal from its owner.

2

A country with very strict laws against animal cruelty. Unlike similar laws in other countries, the Animal Welfare Act allows authorities to intervene when animal cruelty is suspected. Punishments for violations of the law are provided in the form fine up to £25,000 and a year's imprisonment. Some articles prohibit, for example, giving animals as prizes, buying an animal for a person under 16 years old, cutting tails, and dog fighting is also illegal. A number of articles describe in detail the conditions for keeping animals.

1

This legal paradise for animals on earth, judging by the laws that protect our smaller brothers. Human rights activists recognize Switzerland as the best in the world, thanks to the Swiss Animal Welfare Law of 2008, one of the strictest in the world. According to this law, for example, dog owners cannot cut their pets' tails, use sandpaper on the bottom of bird cages, or remove puppies from a bitch before they reach two months of age. Birds, fish and, say, yaks are considered social animals and by law should have the right to company. Horses must not be tangled and must be kept close to other horses so that they can see, hear and smell them.

I have a bruise on my right shoulder. It doesn't hurt much, but the bruise is noticeable. It's from the butt. Maybe I'm not holding him to my shoulder well?

I was hunting over the weekend. I walked with a 16-caliber Merkel double-barreled shotgun through fields and forest edges in search of hazel grouse. My grandfather used this gun to hunt hazel grouse back in the 40s, then my father in the 60s and 70s. Now I'm walking. True, they were luckier - I came across hazel grouse, but the shot flew past the target. But I'm happy with any result. Whether I hit or miss is not very important to me. The main thing is me and my gun in the forest. The gun is my toolkit for direct interaction with nature. It gives me power, perhaps unfair, but power. Among the birch trees, bushes, tall wet grass in which my hazel grouse hides, it turns me into a local resident. Whoever is stronger, more cunning, more dexterous is right. It's terribly politically incorrect, isn't it? Yeah. Like everything in nature. Predators, hurricanes, floods - all this is wild injustice. And me with a 16-gauge Merkel shotgun in the forest is also an injustice. Such an obvious manifestation of the injustice of the pre-politically correct era.

Not long ago I spoke with human rights activist Sergei Adamovich Kovalev. He turned out to be a real, even, I would say, an ardent defender of hunting. A person who has been defending human rights for many years does not simply deny such protection to animals. He says that “animals have no rights”: “Right is a category that relates exclusively to humans. After all, equal distribution of rights is assumed, that is, equality. The right is the same for everyone. A fly, a louse, a worm, a hare and a person cannot have equal rights.” And I agree with Sergei Adamovich. The word “right” itself cannot be related to the animal world. Including because the right always has another side - an obligation. What are the responsibilities of animals? Multiply. There is each other. And everything else, understandable, physiological. It has nothing to do, as officials like to say, with the “legal field.”

So there is a very serious problem in terminology. Returning to the bureaucratic language, “substitution of concepts”: animals have neither rights nor responsibilities, but people have rights and responsibilities in relation to animals. And these human rights and obligations, of course, must be regulated by law. As part of my legal rights in relation to the animal world, I went hunting. And a little earlier I bought a leg of wild boar, baked it in the oven with pleasure (in fact, my wife baked it) and ate it with even greater pleasure (in fact, not only me - I shared it with the guests).

There is an example in the history of mankind when “animal rights” were recognized as one of the priority areas of government policy. And this example is disgusting. On November 24, 1933, a set of animal protection laws was issued in Germany. Hitler then commented on the new Reich policy: “In the new Reich, cruelty to animals will be prohibited.” In 1934, a new law appeared that completely banned hunting. The state tried to alleviate the plight of animals everywhere and protect “animal rights” even in the kitchen: in 1937, a method of preparing lobster was legalized that excluded boiling it alive. This example is horrifying precisely because the Nazi regime tried to give animals rights that only humans had previously enjoyed, and therefore, in fact, turned people into animals. What happened next is known to everyone.

I am a law-abiding person. And only in this sense do I define my rights and responsibilities. For me, if you can eat wild boar, I’ll eat it; if you can eat hazel grouse, I’ll eat hazel grouse. If hunting is banned, that means I will remain hungry. In the meantime, hunting is the last legal refuge of politically incorrect conservative scoundrels. That is, mine too. But there is a feeling that we don’t have long left. Political correctness will defeat us. And entitled wild boars, hazel grouse and lobsters will run away from my table. Considering the previous paragraph, it will be a terrible time.