Considering Victims' Minds in the Evaluation of Harmful Agents' Moral Standing

Abstract

An agent's moral standing is considered as depending on the agent's mind and their harmfulness toward a victim, but a victim's mind and species may also matter. To examine whether a victim's species (i.e., human or another) and a victim's mind are considered in the judgment of a harmful agent's moral standing, the present study modulated the mental capacities of an imaginary species. Only humans' suffering was considered when the other species' mental capacities were presumed to be low (Study 1), but humans' and the other species' suffering were equally considered when the other species had mental capacities that were presumed to be equivalent to those of humans (Study 2). The results suggest that our judgments of the moral standing of an agent 1) depend not only on the agent's mind but also on the victim's mind and 2) are not human species-oriented but human mind-oriented.