Abstract

I agreed to review this book based on the title alone (coupled with a cover picture of a adult pig and several piglets outdoors in the grass). My decision was justified, since it offers a coherent, detailed response to an important problem in animal ethics and animal welfare: the question of humane (or “animal friendly”) animal husbandry, especially in the meat industry, in which animals are raised with the end of being killed long before the end of their natural lifespan.Humane animal husbandry is based on two distinct assumptions. The first is that animals’ welfare matters, so that they should have pleasant lives and avoid unnecessary suffering. The second is that killing animals for food is morally justified. This is commonly justified, in both popular and philosophical discourse, with the claim that “the animals are granted pleasant lives, usually in connection with the claim that they would not exist at all if it were not for the purpose of our consumption. By consuming and farmin