A response to the problem of animal suffering

The problem of animal suffering is described as the contradicting evidence between an omnipresent, omnipotent, benevolent God and the indiscriminate suffering of non-human animals

Under suffering there are two categories: suffering caused by humans and suffering caused by natural disasters (starvation, floods, earthquakes, wind storms, even tripping and falling)

The first category of suffering can be easily written off as the result of free will. And for those wanting to continue the debate on whether or not we have free will I suggest going to a different post because whether or not we have free will, this is the justification we have for human caused suffering regardless.

The second category for suffering is suffering via natural disasters. And there are multiple approaches to this argument. That I will try to tackle.

1: Animals are a force of nature. According to Genesis 2:15 we must care for animals as God intended but they do not get the same moral consideration as humans do. Why is that? Because animals will always act in accordance with their nature. What does that mean? This means that animals act according to their instincts, drives, and biological programming rather than through conscious reasoning or moral considerations. A dog will always want a bone. A monkey will always throw poo. Since they act according to their nature we can throw animal attacks in the category of natural disasters for human suffering as well.

2: Animals suffering is real but not inherently evil: this is sort of a meta argument, attacking the foundation of the definition of evil. If evil is equivalent to unnecessary suffering, then how is it evil for me to skip a meal to get more work done at work/home. How is it evil to suffer through lifting weights at the gym to get stronger. Suffering as a definition of evil is inadequate. I suppose one could argue that my desire to benefit would require suffering and therefore be defined as necessary suffering and is therefore not evil. But I still find this definition to come short of what people categorize as evil. Can something still be evil even if it is necessary? I would say yes. Either way, animals experience pain unnecessarily, like a tree falling on a deer causing it to die a slow painful death. Despite that being considered evil or not, on a meta level, this suffering is unnecessary. It doesn’t accomplish anything. Referring to my argument before; animals are a force of nature they act according to their nature. Just like the Earth does when a tectonic shift occurs causing whole city’s to fall to water.

Furthermore proverbs 12:10 the righteous as a symptom of being righteous would care for the needs of animals. To me, this sounds like it is a secondary consideration as oppose to a righteous person obviously caring for other humans. This implies that people should care for animals not for the animals sake, but for their own. Animal suffering is not inherently evil because their value is only as much as humans can get from them. Despite their practical value, their moral value is nonexistent. If a man comes across a lonely and suffering deer under a fallen tree, is he obligated to care for it? Morally, yes, as long as it doesn’t result in the suffering of a human. Now say a man comes across a suffering dear under a fallen tree and a predator is about to eat it? Is it wrong to save the dear? Is it wrong to allow the predator to eat? If you stop the dear from being eaten the predator could likely die from starvation. If the predator eats the deer, that suffering could have been avoided. It was completely unnecessary because you could have stopped it. Some might say the right answer would have been the lesser of the two evils. Scare away the predator and rescue the dear. The predator might have a chance to eat again but the dear suffering can be prevented. I might rebut that with perhaps intervening is wrong because you are engaging with the natural order of the ecosystem. Something humans have already been doing a long time now, but does that make it any less wrong?

In conclusion, animals get only as much moral consideration as the human would for causing the suffering especially if it’s unnecessary. Animals are a force of nature and are not capable of doing evil, and they are on Earth to be cared for and reaped from; a symbiotic relationship. Therefore, God is not allowing an evil to take place because evil is not occurring in these situations unless the suffering is inflicted or ignored by man.