Re: Libertarian views on dog breeding

mireh wrote:

I know this is going to be a very minor subject, but normal people's
everyday life is full of things like this, isn't it?

I would be very interested in opinions on the following subject: dog
breeders reponsibility towards the dogs they breed. There seems to be a
growing line of thought nowadays in certain circles of the dog fancy
(breeders, people that does rescue, etc.) that says the breeder of a
dog is forever responsible for the welfare of any dog he/she has bred,
even if the dog was sold as a puppy long ago. Personally I think there
is no doubt you are responsible for the welfare of any dogs that you
own, but dogs you sold???  I believe breeders should try to sell the
puppies to good responsible owners, but other than that, I do not think
it is reasonable to expect breeders do anything else. Rescueing and
taking back dogs you bred years ago would be a compassionate and
charitable thing to do, but as such, voluntary and never mandatory!


Breeders are responsible for the dog's existence in the first place, so it might reasonably be argued that they have some ongoing responsibility. But I agree that a breeder does not have an indefinite unlimited responsibility.


Some dog breeders are including in their puppy sales contracts things
like this: be notified in the event that the owners change their
residence / the dog may not be given away or sold to a third party, but
must be returned to breeder / defines the conditions under which the
puppy must be kept / etc.

What do you think of this?


Breeders have a right to include whatever conditions they want; no one is forcing the seller to accept them. Some conditions seem reasonable since a dog is not just an inanimate piece of property, but a living being with some degree of sentience.

As far as the "libertarian view," on the subject, libertarianism is a political theory, not a complete moral theory. My own view is that animals with some degree of sentience are entitled to some degree of moral consideration. As Robert Nozick (arguably one of the most influential libertarian philosophers of the 20th century)put it:

"Animals count for something. Some higher animals, at least, ought to be given some weight in people's deliberations about what we do. It is difficult to prove this (It is also difficult to prove that people count for something!). If only the experiences of pleasure, pain, happiness, and so on (and the capacity for these experiences) are morally relevant, then animals must be counted in moral calculations to the extent they *do* have these capacities and experiences."
--Robert Nozick, _Anarchy, State, and Utopia_ (New York: Basic Books, 1974)

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