To each their own. My children seem just as inspired by today’s documentaries as I was by zoos, and my daughter has decided she wants to be a Veterinarian.
She seems quite aware that zoos are prisons for animals, and although she did like them when she was too young to understand all of the ramifications, today she is not interested in visiting our local zoo at all.
What you are repeating here is that zoos are a kind of propaganda for protecting nature, not that zoos protect nature.
Therefore, zoos are not an intrinsic good, they are one possible strategy for motivating people to actually protect nature.
Saying that zoos are good in this fashion is like saying that advertising is good because it may motivate people to do good. That’s fine, but it doesn’t make advertising an intrinsic good.
An intrinsic good is something internal to the thing itself. What you are actually arguing is that zoos are an extrinsic good, that the goodness of the zoo happens somewhere else, in the actual nature, and somewhen else, when the kids grow up.
She seems quite aware that zoos are prisons for animals, and although she did like them when she was too young to understand all of the ramifications, today she is not interested in visiting our local zoo at all.
What you are repeating here is that zoos are a kind of propaganda for protecting nature, not that zoos protect nature.
Therefore, zoos are not an intrinsic good, they are one possible strategy for motivating people to actually protect nature.
Saying that zoos are good in this fashion is like saying that advertising is good because it may motivate people to do good. That’s fine, but it doesn’t make advertising an intrinsic good.
An intrinsic good is something internal to the thing itself. What you are actually arguing is that zoos are an extrinsic good, that the goodness of the zoo happens somewhere else, in the actual nature, and somewhen else, when the kids grow up.