'Better' animals, dpm?  C'mon now, now, you'll have to do 'better' than that if you want to conclusively prove that Homo sapiens sapiens is more a more desirable, more competent, more intelligent, etc., etc. creature than, say, an eel or a cougar.

And to do that you'll have to define 'desirable,' 'competent,' and 'intelligent.' 

If you're talking about 'better' meaning educated, in the sense that your average dog can only learn so many commands, or that dolphins, although smart, can only do a few tricks that people teach them, then you'll have to define just exactly what you mean by that as compared to humans learning things.

I have two university degrees, can play the piano, and speak and understand some German.  So, does that mean than I'm a superior person to somebody who does not have as much education, is not a musician, and speaks only English?

Does it make me more intelligent just because I was able to learn a few things?  Does it make my cats less intelligent because they don't understand Prospero's motivations in Shakespeare's The Tempest, can't play the works of Chopin on the piano, or know what Wilkommen means? 

You'll have to compare what constitutes intelligence in various other animals with what we think of as intelligence in humans.  If you state categorically that humans are, for instance, more 'intelligent' than hedgehogs, you'll have to say why.

May 6, 2010 -- 7:57PM, d_p_m wrote:

Hmm... yes. You seem to have been going with a philosophical definition, while I was going with a legal one.

I think that since the legal one is more interested in taking those rights away, we should go with the philosophical one. 

That is just me though, maybe you like having your rights in the control of people thousands of miles away, that you never met. 

May 6, 2010 -- 8:07PM, d_p_m wrote:

May 6, 2010 -- 7:16PM, solfeggio wrote:

Animals will always be fair game for humans to use because humans believe that nonhumans are inferior to them.

Perhaps they are influenced by the fact that, by many ojective measures, animals are inferior to humans. Or more accurately, other animals. We're animals too, but we are, in some ways, better animals.

More brutal, yes.

Better at surviving, yes. 

Better in general, eh, not sure on that one. 

all

It's reality?  What's reality???  Not sure what you mean by that statement....

May 8, 2010 -- 2:35PM, bluehorserunning wrote:

It doesn't matter if you like it or not; it's reality. 

I reject your reality, and substitute my own. 

May 9, 2010 -- 12:45AM, bluehorserunning wrote:

All was arguing that zu (?) definition was better because it means that one can still 'have rights' in a philosophical sense, even if the government says that one does not.  My point was that it doesn't matter if it gives you comfort to think that you have a right, if nobody else agrees with you. 

That's what I mean by reality. 

I guess I'm atheistic/humanistic with regard to human rights.  ;)

I was arguing that it doesn't matter if a government or anyone else believes you have a right.  In reality, it doesn't.  Their disagreement has no bearing on whether or not you actually have a right.  Their agreement only matters on how you can express that right. 

Expression is not ownership.  In my opinion, that is reality. 

all

May 10, 2010 -- 4:26PM, solfeggio wrote:

all -

I agree.  There is no such thing as an intrinsic right.  It is only a concept in the human mind and therefore completely subjective.

However, both humans and nonhumans are said to have instrumental value.  That is, we have worth strictly in relation to how useful we are.  This is why a mink would have more value than a chicken, for instance, or a billionaire than a shop clerk.

It's ain't fair - but that's the way our society is structured.

 

 

That is external value. 

A mink is going to value themselves more than they value a chicken, and a shop clerk will value themselves more than a billionare.  Regardless of how our society tells them to act. 

all