Is there a moral requirement to assist wild animals suffering due to natural causes? According to the laissez-faire intuition, although we may have special duties to assist wild animals, there are no general requirements to care for them. If this view is right, then our positive duties toward wild animals can be only special, grounded in special circumstances. In this article I present the contribution argument which employs the thought that the receipt of benefits from wild animals is one such kind of special circumstance. If this argument is correct, then the circle of moral agents required to assist some wild animals is significantly widened.

是否有道德上的要求来协助因自然原因而遭受折磨的野生动物？根据自由放任的直觉，尽管我们可能负有协助野生动物的特殊职责，但对它们的照护没有一般性要求。如果这种观点是正确的，那么我们对野生动物的积极责任只能是特殊的，要在特殊情况下立足。在本文中，我提出了贡献论证，该论证采用了这样一种思想，即从野生动物获得利益就是这种特殊情况之一。如果这个论点是正确的，那么帮助某些野生动物所需的道德主体的圈子就会大大扩大。