ANIMAL RIGHTS: Technical Terms

1. Dominion having control over or responsibility for the earth. 2. Stewardship human responsibility to look after the world and everything in it; looking after something for the next generation. 3. Sanctity of life the belief that all life is God-given, sacred, and to be treated with reverence; only God has the right to end life. 4. Sacred holy, special, precious, divine, worthy of respect and honour. 5. Reverence to treat with respect/honour/love 6. Relative value whether something is of less importance and should be treated differently as a result, linked to human life versus animal life. 7. Ahimsa the Hindu/Buddhist word for non-violence; the idea that no harm should be done to any living thing; respect for life. 8. Reincarnation the cyclic return of a soul to live another life in a new body.

9. Karma the belief that current and future lives are determined by behaviour in this and in previous lives. 10. Soul the spiritual part of a human being that is believed to continue to be immortal, exist after death. *Buddhists do not believe in the soul, but in an impermanent life force which is reborn at a different level of life (see karma). 11. Unethical something regarded as morally wrong. 12. Extinction when all members of a species have died out and that species will never exist on Earth again. 13. Factory farming when animals are used for meat or dairy products, but are kept indoors in small spaces. 14. Free-range farming a method of raising animals so that they can roam freely and live a more natural life. 15. Vegetarianism the belief held by people who do not eat meat. 16. Vegan a person who will not use any animal product whatsoever. 17. Animal experimentation to perform scientific research using animals. This may be to test household products, cosmetics, or for medical research. 18. Vivisection the practice of operating on living animals in order to gain knowledge of pathological or physiological processes.

19. Genetic modification Taking the DNA of an animal, changing it, and creating new forms of the species. 20. Cloning When scientists make an exact replica of something by inserting its DNA into an embryo and then replanting it.