"Though a small proportion manage to lead successful lives, [Animal Rights] theorists cannot restrict their concern to successful r-strategists. Any sentient being is morally significant from an [Animal Rights] perspective, and thus all sentient individuals born into r-strategist species must be taken into account when determining whether r-strategists are flourishing. And the facts about r-strategists’ life histories suggest that they aren’t [...] most r-strategists die very painful deaths, e.g., starvation, exposure, and being eaten by predators [...] most of them die minutes, days, or weeks after birth, and thus do not have the opportunity to experience the enjoyment associated with reaching a stage in life where one has learned to competently manage and be comfortable in one’s environment [...] these facts suggest that, at best, most r-strategists fail to live flourishing lives. At worst, they suggest that most r-strategists experience more suffering than enjoyment in their lives: that they do not even have lives worth living. Furthermore, since one of the defining characteristics of r-strategist species is that they produce far greater numbers of offspring than K-strategist species, it seems that we’re left with an even more depressing conclusion: at best, most wild animals born into the world fail to flourish, and at worst, most do not have lives worth living."
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Kyle Johannsen, "Animal Rights and the Problem of r-Strategists", Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, Vol. 20, Iss. 2 (Apr. 2017), p. 338
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Animal_rights
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Animal rights
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