This. This. THIS!:)

I couldn't agree more.

Nobody ever said sentient beings aren't animals. Indeed, I said that humans are just sentient animals, nothing more.

If you admit your point is fallacious, why make it? This is certainly not the first time someone has called you out on intentional use of fallacy.
Under the actual taxonomic definition of animal, then yes, all mammals are animals because mammal is a subtype of that kingdom (under the domain eukaryotes). Equally, by definition, humans are animals - they have a species, genus, family, order, class and phylum, all of which belong to animalia.

caveman - I understand the part about the importance of life, but not all life is equal - if you consider all life equal, then do you avoid stepping on an ant? Do you avoid using antibacerial soap?, would you allow an animal atatcking a person to continue doing so rather than stop it doing an and in doing so potentially injure or kill it?
The vast majority of people would not, therefore they are making a decision about which forms of life they find more important or more deserving of different treatment. There is nothing wrong with the fact that 99.9% of people WILL make decisions on which life they value more, at all, as long as all life still gets basic respect.

So, which would you put more value on? A fruit fly or an endangered shark?
When life is life. They are equally valuable? And yet one is an endangered species? Does that affect your judgment?

I do consider all life equal, and no, I have *never* killed any life intentionally in my life. Not stepped on any ants, not squashed any mosquitoes, etc, etc. I do avoid using antibacterial soap - and if they were two animals attacking, no, I would not stop them.

I do realise that in extreme situations my instincts would take over and I might very well do things not according to my opinions and beliefs - but nevertheless, this is what I believe.

No. And I wouldn't allow a human attacking another human either. Or Human attacking an animal.

I agree with what Eltu said pretty much. For me the only time I'd intervene between 2 animals fighting is if one was a pet and I loved it or if 2 humans were fighting and the person I considered to be in the right was losing. Apart from that, I prefer to let nature take it's course.

I don't know what to say, other than you missed the point :P

Life is awesome. Plain and simple.

It's like being a kid - just having a simple appreciation for all the plants and animals because they're fascinating, and we recognize life is something special.

So to answer your questions:

I would avoid stepping on all bugs. Bugs are cool! Especially ants. Individually they seem small, but together they can build huge ant mounds and dig elaborate caves. And sometimes you'll see them carrying leaves to their underground hideouts. Fascinating!

I use antibacterial soap. Mothers know best.

As for the wolf - let me answer your question with another question: Would a pack of wolves simply watch if I attacked one of their own?

So, there is judgement. I just don't think of it as, "this life is more significant than the other life." I just think of it as life, and life is cool. So although I might hurt it sometimes (what animal doesn't), for the most part I try my best to promote its wellbeing as a whole.

Again, I completely and fully agree with you, caveman.

Me too. :)

I think humans and animals can at the very least live in semi-harmony. We can give back to our animal friends in certain ways, yet keep them in check in others. Whether or not other animals are "sentient" or not, I don't believe that we should kill if it could be avoided. Other creatures are living on this planet, that gives them quite a bit in common with us in case we can't notice. What I mean by semi-harmony is that some aspects of our existence being harmful to other species is unavoidable. But hell, if I'm walking through campus, I can practically touch a squirrel or pidgeon without having them run in fear because we're so used to each other's existence. While these animals may be suffering from our presence, we have the power as a species to care and help these animals. If we want to leave any positive impact on this planet (we've seen through my other thread about humans that no one could really think of a positive aspect of humanity's existence to the rest of the biosphere), then this could be one.

This is probably closest to what I think - I recognise the fact that it isn't always practical to not harm any animal (and we need to eat...), but life should still be respected and even when an animal is to die, it should be allowed to do so without suffering.

Cavman, this is a beautiful post and this is also why it pains me to see people hurting each other for no reason. Life has been treated as cheap and disposable in our society and I think that it is very dangerous. We need to treat nature/animals with respect and care but we also need to treat each other better. All life is sacred, from the tiniest to the biggest and it needs to be protected.

i agree with you Man in Black. I see it all the time on campus as well. The geese, squrriels, and other animals get along just fine with everyone else. Sometimes it is necessary to have to kill an animal if it is threatening one's life or one's family but those are rare occasions. I believe that non-lethal means should be used to take care of animals who are threatening if possible.

As for as vermin (cockroaches, flies, etc) that cause disease to humans and other animals, it is justified to kill them since they can cause more harm. If they are out in their natural environment, that's fine but its when they get into houses, etc that I draw the line.

:hmm:

This is an interesting and deep topic.

My personal opinion is, that humans indeed are animals There is an interesting documentary by the way which is humorous and enlightening. It is not ver ynew, created by the BBC and called "The human animal". If you care to watch it, I hope you find it as fascinating as I did. It also describes pretty much what kind of animal we are - by looking at our physiology and behaviour - and our past. Basically it is a view of humans from a zoologists perspective.

And to be honest, not many things are unique to humans. Actually - try finding something that is and tell me. I mean something really unique - not something that humans just can do better than some other animal (like using tools).

On the original question, I think none of these questions can be answered. The reason for this is very fundamental. The reason is that there is an error in the way most humans see the world in terms of abstract symbolism. This concept certainly has its place, but it is often used in the wrong way. Let me explain: (Civilized) humans have a tendency to treat life as objects and to use symbolism. They say one tree, two trees,...etc. They say "a bird" or "a mammal" or "a human". Or even worse they say "a living being". They they try to apply equations to that, like "a mammal" > "a bird", or "a human" > "a tree". Or even "a human" > "a tree" + "a bird" + "a mammal". The fallacy here is that the basic assumption is not as easy as "a human" = "a human" or "a bird" = "a bird". There are many species and subspecies and they have a different role and place that also depends on place and on time of the year and on time in general. Also they are all individuals.
Some of the native people in the Amazon who still exist today were believed to be unable to count. They did not manage to tell the anthropologists the number of people in their tribe. But it was not because they were stupid - it was because to them, each person was different, they saw no sense in setting one of them equal to another one in every aspect.

So what does that mean for the original topic. Translated to civilized speech, the statement that follows is very lame: "It depends". It depends on who you are, who the other is, when you are, what the situation is. There is no ruleset, humans are not computers (even though they seem to begin to think of themselves that way). Humans do not go through a rulebook that can be written down and in that one can look up what decision to make. Such behaviour actually leads to destruction and devastation, because it never ever can account for all possibilities.

I may shoot a bird and kill it because I need to eat, but I may not shoot it when I have enough food or I may not shoot it for fun. I may kill an animal for food if there is a great herd of them, but I may not shoot it if there are only few and I have other means of surviving.

Each such decision has to be made with respect and consciousness if we want to maintain the idea that we are sentient and conscious beings.

Something else. Look at other animals for guidance. Look at how the wolf or the lion behaves. Of course he will kill an animal for food or fight off someone who threatens his offspring or occasionally step on an ant. But he would not kill just for the fun of it, he would not kill if he and the ones in his group has enough food, he would not eradicate other animals to make sure that there are enough game animals left for him to hunt. I recognize that humans do not need to follow all these rules, that they may choose to differ, that they may choose not to hunt because they have potatoes, but every such deviation should be valued. The "fruit of the tree of knowledge", the knowledge to decide if someone is allowed to live or to die is something that has to be taken with great respect. I find it not justified that humans think they can feel better because they protect a few animals and eat potatoes instead while at the same time eradicating whole species in order to continue a certain lifestyle (like spraying poison and deforesting landscapes in order to grow said potatoes)

In this thread, I think for me, cavemans posts are very good. I really like what he says.


This is completely not logical. You have a problem with inclusiveness here. If you want to use categories and symbolic thinking, then do it properly:
Clouds are water, Snow cones are water, that means Clouds and snow cones are made out of water.
Ice cubes are made of ice, ice is made of water, ice cones are made of ice, thus ice cones and ice cubes are both made out of water...

I admit that humans can cause such deviations, but my favoured solution would not be to "fix" the problem by shooting animals. That is a band aid. Same tactics as to put people in prison for doing drugs. In all these cases one should prioritize to look at the reason for all this, e.g. why are there too many animals of one kind in that place. Is the ecosystem damaged? Are keystone species missing?

I think it is a very good point here. Again, this is another example of the symbolic, digital black-and-white thinking I criticized before. "a human" = "sentient", "other animals" = "nonsentient". This is blatantly wrong. It is a matter of degree indeed and actually I would go even further and question that there is a black and white endpoint ot this, that humans are on one side and e.g. microbes on the other. What if all the forms of sentience are just different, what if you drop the supremist idea that one form of consciousness is better than another? What if the forest, the trees, the rivers, the dolphins that recognize themselves in the mirror, the octupus that uses tools, the monkey that passes on a culture to its descendants - what if all these beings have different ways of sentience - and civilized humans in their limited capacity to see this think that their own way of sentience is the only one? Is that then not speciest, supremist thinking?

Here I would argue that while all life is valueable, has an inherent value, it is not equal. It only is equal in that it equally deserves our respect and consideration, but life is not equal. In fact every single living being is different. The sheer vastness of differences and uniqueness on Earth is far far greater than all what humans have created. So would I step on an ant? Not deliberately, but also I would not make my life miserable by continously watching with each step if I break a twig or smash an ant. Would I kill a moth that is laying its eggs in my food? If I cannot remove it otherwise, yes I would, because it competes with me for food. Would I spray some poison that eradicates this species of moth so that no moth can ever eat my food again? No I would not, because my quarrel is with this one moth that is eating my food, not with the millions of other moths that may just eat very different things. Would I kill a wolf that is about to take a bite out of a human being? If there is no other way to scare him off, yes I would, because I protect my own kin. would I try to eradicate all wolves so that never again a wolf may harm a human being? Certainly not, that would be incredibly totalitarian.