Bears and whales

[Mare Tranquillity]

Re: The Most Important Thing on Earth is Life;

A little off the subject, but this is an interesting story abut dolphins:

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Dolphins-Identify-Themselves-with-Names-23078.shtml

Maybe not so off the subject. If dolphins have names for each other, and may even "gossip", certainly they must have self awareness. I've been told that dogs have no self awareness, but mine knows her name. How do we know that polar bears don't have self awareness?

We are often too quick to judge others. Our anthropocentric viewpoint blinds us to the intrisic value of all life.

 

[Dr.Who]

Re: The Most Important Thing on Earth is Life;

Care to demonstrate the truth of your statement? We all could assume the same about you, can you prove self-awareness to our satisfaction? Dolphins have learned quite a few words of English and have demonstrated the ability to do abstract thinking and communicate abstract ideas to each other, people have learned zero words of the dolphin language--who's the more intelligent, self-aware being?

I think a number of animals have self-awareness. They might be the more stupid animals or the more intelligent even. I am not doubting that intelligence can help one to become self aware I just don't think there is an absolute correlation between intelligence and self awareness. After all some of our politicians are not too bright and they seem to possess nothing more than self awareness. Serioiusly, discussions of self-awareness are interesting but it is not the criteria we should use to determine value. There are some pretty tasty animals I value alot but I don't care if a duck was self aware or not once it is on my table.

 

[Mare Tranquillity]

Re: The Most Important Thing on Earth is Life;

I think a number of animals have self-awareness. They might be the more stupid animals or the more intelligent even. I am not doubting that intelligence can help one to become self aware I just don't think there is an absolute correlation between intelligence and self awareness. After all some of our politicians are not too bright and they seem to possess nothing more than self awareness. Serioiusly, discussions of self-awareness are interesting but it is not the criteria we should use to determine value. There are some pretty tasty animals I value alot but I don't care if a duck was self aware or not once it is on my table.

You should be happy to know that Jeffery Dahmer agreed with you. If intelligence and self-awareness are not criteria for deciding upon whom you dine, then what are the criteria? If it's only taste perhaps we could reduce the excess population through a Soylent Green process.

Seriously though, how should we assign value to other lifeforms? Only on the basis of their utilitarian value to us or is it possible that they might have intrinsic value? Justice Willian O. Douglas once wrote a treatise SHOULD TREES HAVE STANDING in which he argued that someone should have legal standing to speak for the interests of trees--living beings, by definition, have interests.

 

[Bunz]

My Umma....

Seriously though, how should we assign value to other lifeforms? Only on the basis of their utilitarian value to us or is it possible that they might have intrinsic value? Justice Willian O. Douglas once wrote a treatise SHOULD TREES HAVE STANDING in which he argued that someone should have legal standing to speak for the interests of trees--living beings, by definition, have interests.

I wish my great Umma was still alive to answer this, because it would cause one to really sit back and evaluate human and well all of life's existence on Earth. So I am going to clump together many teachings she shared with me when I was younger, and do my best to pass along the wisdom she had learned from her relatives who were only a generation or two from first contanct. But I digress....
Humans, like everything else has some value and some place in the world. Since the creation of Earth, everything has been shaped, and placed and created by everything else. So it behests us to treat the world around us with respect and thought with all we do and change and ultimately consume. Because as we did to other things, they will do to us. The force of nature is infinately times more powerful than man could hope to be.

 

[Dr.Who]

Re: The Most Important Thing on Earth is Life;

You should be happy to know that Jeffery Dahmer agreed with you. If intelligence and self-awareness are not criteria for deciding upon whom you dine, then what are the criteria? If it's only taste perhaps we could reduce the excess population through a Soylent Green process.

Seriously though, how should we assign value to other lifeforms? Only on the basis of their utilitarian value to us or is it possible that they might have intrinsic value? Justice Willian O. Douglas once wrote a treatise SHOULD TREES HAVE STANDING in which he argued that someone should have legal standing to speak for the interests of trees--living beings, by definition, have interests.

In your second paragraph you discuss "other life forms". I assume you mean non humans. In you first paragraph you discuss what dahmer would do to humans. I don't think it helps to mix the facts up like this.

All humans have value by virtue of the fact that they are human and alive. This includes smart people and dumb people. It does not matter if they are self aware or not.

All animals and plants and other terrestrial life has value by how utilitarian they are for the continuation if the planet and the human race.

And are you really introducing the argument that trees (and anything living) should have a spokesmen to stand up for their interests? This is really silly.

 

[PLC1]

Re: The Most Important Thing on Earth is Life;

In your second paragraph you discuss "other life forms". I assume you mean non humans. In you first paragraph you discuss what dahmer would do to humans. I don't think it helps to mix the facts up like this.

All humans have value by virtue of the fact that they are human and alive. This includes smart people and dumb people. It does not matter if they are self aware or not.

All animals and plants and other terrestrial life has value by how utilitarian they are for the continuation if the planet and the human race.

And are you really introducing the argument that trees (and anything living) should have a spokesmen to stand up for their interests? This is really silly.

You have done an excellent job of articulating the anthropocentric viewpoint as mentioned above. The problem is that every living thing is connected in one way or another to all other living things, including humans.

 

[Dr.Who]

Re: The Most Important Thing on Earth is Life;

You have done an excellent job of articulating the anthropocentric viewpoint as mentioned above. The problem is that every living thing is connected in one way or another to all other living things, including humans.

That is because as far as it goes the anthropocentric view is the most correct one. It is of course my opinion, but God is the true center of the universe and God created man in his own image. It is humanity that was created to bring glory to God and God who gives all values worth. This does not diminishs the connectedness of all creation. Man is the steward and conservator of the earth until it's end.

On the other hand if there is no God to make one value more worthy than another then I would just say that each species has every right to determine that it is the best one.

 

[PLC1]

Re: The Most Important Thing on Earth is Life;

That is because as far as it goes the anthropocentric view is the most correct one. It is of course my opinion, but God is the true center of the universe and God created man in his own image. It is humanity that was created to bring glory to God and God who gives all values worth. This does not diminishs the connectedness of all creation. Man is the steward and conservator of the earth until it's end.

On the other hand if there is no God to make one value more worthy than another then I would just say that each species has every right to determine that it is the best one.

Of course, if we believe that god made mankind to look like himself, then that makes humans the be all and end all of creation.

How do we know that god is finished? The process of evolution, which was, of course, started by god, is still going on.

And, mankind can't survive alone on this planet. All creation is important.

 

[Mare Tranquillity]

Re: The Most Important Thing on Earth is Life;

In your second paragraph you discuss "other life forms". I assume you mean non humans. In you first paragraph you discuss what dahmer would do to humans. I don't think it helps to mix the facts up like this.

My comment about Dahmer was a direct response to your valuing animals by taste-bud quotient. My second paragraph was a SECOND PARAGRAPH because I was speaking about a somewhat different subject--that's why we have paragraphs. I mentioned Dahmer because you and he have the same way of valuing lifeforms: by taste. His taste just ran to long pig.

All humans have value by virtue of the fact that they are human and alive. This includes smart people and dumb people. It does not matter if they are self aware or not.

Why do humans have intrinsic value? Why would a Hitler be more valuable than another Blue whale or Dodo? You've repeated a very common and popular idea without providing anything to back it up.

All animals and plants and other terrestrial life has value by how utilitarian they are for the continuation if the planet and the human race.

Why don't they have intrinsic value? Can you demonstrate that humans have intrinsic value and animals or plants do not?

And are you really introducing the argument that trees (and anything living) should have a spokesmen to stand up for their interests? This is really silly.

Absolutely, without plants and animals humans would not exist, I know of nothing to suggest that they are inherently "less than" we are, do you? Life is life, what makes one life sacred and another profane?

Most humans are so deeply embedded in the anthropocentric paradigm that they cannot even conceive of other lifeforms having intrinsic value. This should present some interesting issues when we meet off-world lifeforms that are so different that they are hard to catagorize.