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  • Originally posted by Ronson View Post

    And one would think that a person would place more value on a person than on a pig, but some on the Left are in need of therapy.
    That view isn't all that uncommon.

    Ingrid Newkirk, President and co-founder of PETA, is quoted as saying in the August 1, 1986 edition of Washingtonian magazine: "A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They're all animals."

    Several years later she repeated this sentiment with a bit of elaboration in the June 22, 2003 edition of The Observer: "Animal liberationists do not separate out the human animal, so there is no rational basis for saying that a human being has special rights. A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They are all mammals."

    IIRC, PETA's other co-founder Alex Pacheco repeated the "A rat is a pig, is a dog, is a boy" chant during an interview published in Vogue back in 1989.

    I'm always still in trouble again

    "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
    "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
    "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

    Comment


    • Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
      That view isn't all that uncommon.

      Ingrid Newkirk, President and co-founder of PETA, is quoted as saying in the August 1, 1986 edition of Washingtonian magazine: "A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They're all animals."

      Several years later she repeated this sentiment with a bit of elaboration in the June 22, 2003 edition of The Observer: "Animal liberationists do not separate out the human animal, so there is no rational basis for saying that a human being has special rights. A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They are all mammals."

      IIRC, PETA's other co-founder Alex Pacheco repeated the "A rat is a pig, is a dog, is a boy" chant during an interview published in Vogue back in 1989.
      Disturbing, but apparently a slightly different rationale. PETA is claiming that all animal life is equal, which actually makes more sense than SL's claim that higher brain function has relatively more value. Using the latter reasoning, Ted Bundy or John Wayne Gacy are more valuable than any child growing up.

      In fact, PETA claiming that all life is equal is less evil than claiming any animal is more valuable than a human child.

      Comment


      • Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
        That view isn't all that uncommon.

        Ingrid Newkirk, President and co-founder of PETA, is quoted as saying in the August 1, 1986 edition of Washingtonian magazine: "A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They're all animals."

        Several years later she repeated this sentiment with a bit of elaboration in the June 22, 2003 edition of The Observer: "Animal liberationists do not separate out the human animal, so there is no rational basis for saying that a human being has special rights. A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They are all mammals."

        IIRC, PETA's other co-founder Alex Pacheco repeated the "A rat is a pig, is a dog, is a boy" chant during an interview published in Vogue back in 1989.
        If you're a naturalist and believe in human evolution, that conclusion would seem pretty logical.

        Comment


        • Originally posted by seer View Post
          We were speaking of a just born baby. So by your lights she has no value.
          Sure. And if, as per your hypothetical, I didn't value her either, then it wouldn't really matter to me that she has no value.

          But your counterfactual hypothetical doesn't really demonstrate anything, does it?

          Comment


          • Originally posted by Mountain Man View Post

            I'm curious how you are defining "value" in this statement.
            I don't think there is anything unusual about the way I'm using the word.

            It's not hard to find stories of people going to great lengths to keep old oak trees from being cut down.

            https://www.google.com/search?q=prot...hrome&ie=UTF-8

            It is hard to imagine anyone caring so much about a few acorns. I would conclude that they value the oak trees more than acorns.

            Comment


            • Originally posted by seanD View Post

              If you're a naturalist and believe in human evolution, that conclusion would seem pretty logical.
              Most naturalists who believe in human evolution that I can think of, still consider humans to be "special."

              I'm always still in trouble again

              "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
              "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
              "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

              Comment


              • Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
                Most naturalists who believe in human evolution that I can think of, still consider humans to be "special."
                Good. That should be the most rational position, to defend and value your own species. If for no other reason than empathy. We can have sympathy for animals, but we can have that and empathy with people.

                Comment


                • Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
                  Most naturalists who believe in human evolution that I can think of, still consider humans to be "special."
                  I would imagine because we all intuitively know that to be true. But that wouldn't be very logical from a naturalistic point of view.

                  Comment


                  • Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
                    Most naturalists who believe in human evolution that I can think of, still consider humans to be "special."
                    Humans have more cognitive ability.
                    "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                    "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                    "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by Gondwanaland View Post
                      Because a freaking unconscious person doesn't 'CURRENTLY" have the ability to understand and feel suffering and harm. Just as I wouldn't be okay with shooting an unconscious person in the head I'm similarly not okay with harming an unborn child of any species.
                      Some people would argue that the pain neurons in an unconscious person would still fire, and that killing them like this would perhaps essentially cause them to briefly wake up and feel the pain before dying. But I'm happy to consider the hypothetical where we suppose some method of inducing death that causes no pain or suffering. An overdose of anesthetic perhaps, that simply deepens an unconscious state and causes painless death.

                      I agree with your comments that we all have moral intuitions that causing somebody else suffering and pain who can experience those things is a moral wrong.

                      And I agree that in a situation where someone is temporarily unconscious, we agree that killing that person, even if it's done in a way that's painless, is a moral wrong. So I agree that it's clear that this shows we need to expand in some way on the first cause-no-pain ethic because that ethic alone doesn't cover such situations.

                      But I have a problem with the way you choose to expand on that ethic. Philosophers I've read have typically addressed this problem in three ways, with those three ways being combinable:
                      1. By noting that the family and friends of the person you are killing would experience emotional suffering as a result of you killing them, even if it were painless to the person being killed. An implication of endorsing only this view would be that it's okay to kill painlessly anyone who lacked friends or family who cared for them, which is something most people would object to.
                      2. By noting that the person you are killing had goals, and dreams for the future, which brought them happiness and meaning, and that by ending their life, even if it is painless, you are harming them by thwarting their goals and preventing them achieving everything they had hoped for with their life. So while you are not causing them literal pain, you are shattering their dreams and goals for their life.
                      3. By ascribing value to the person by virtue of them having a mind, regardless of whether that mind is currently active. You would be destroying an entity with cognitive functions, regardless of whether those functions are currently being used.

                      Personally, I agree with all 3 answers above.

                      You seem to have instead decided to go a different route to address this issue, and it's not a route I've ever see someone take before, and I think the reason for that is that it has some obvious problems. Your proposed solution seems to be to incorporate time, so that you have the ethic that killing a entity is wrong if they would currently feel pain from that action, or if, at any time in their likely future development as an entity, they would feel pain from such an action. (Please let me know if I'm misunderstand this, and if that's not your viewpoint or if your viewpoint is subtly different)

                      While an ethic deals with the issue of an unconscious person who would wake up sometime in the future, it doesn't seem to me to deal with the question of an inherently painless method of death. e.g. let us say an overdose of anesthetic or sleeping pills causes drowsiness and then painless death, regardless of what time in the life it is administered. I think you would still want to intuitively say such a killing was wrong, but your ethic above, at least in the way I have understood and phrased it, doesn't seem to lead to that judgement.

                      Another question I have with regard to this ethic is: Why hold it? It seems to be rather arbitrary - the average person would not at all necessarily agree that if causing pain is bad, then not causing pain but doing so in a way that would have been painful to the entity if done to it at some different point in its life, is bad. It seems like you are trying to invent a principle you can use to explain your moral intuitions - which is fine because that's how moral philosophy tends to get started - but you've invented a principle which is quite complicated, has some questionable implications, and tries to explain things that can be more easily explained by simpler moral principles.

                      How are you this bloody braindead?
                      Probably my philosophy degree. Also because I'm not telepathic so can't magically know what your personal viewpoint and reasoning is without asking you a series of questions to get you to elaborate on it.

                      Oh wait, are you that nutjob who is fine with infanticide?
                      The vast majority of human cultures in history practiced infanticide regularly out of necessity. Through most of human history human population were food-limited in their growth, with starvations being a regular occurrence. Lacking contraceptives and abortion technologies, infanticide was their only practical method of getting rid of newborn population that they were well-aware they lacked the resources to support.

                      Only in the last couple of hundred years has technology advanced sufficiently that food scarcity is no longer a problem in the developed world, and we also have contraceptive and abortion technologies. So from our position of privilege, our society, unlike virtually all others in history, is not forced to practice infanticide due to necessity.
                      "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                      "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                      "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                      Comment


                      • Originally posted by Stoic View Post
                        Sure. And if, as per your hypothetical, I didn't value her either, then it wouldn't really matter to me that she has no value.

                        But your counterfactual hypothetical doesn't really demonstrate anything, does it?
                        Yes, it shows, that by nature, humans have no value. So when the Nazis devalue, let's say Jews, they are not doing anything irrational, or really immoral.
                        Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                        Comment


                        • Originally posted by Starlight View Post

                          But I have a problem with the way you choose to expand on that ethic. .
                          Coming from someone who supports infanticide, I'm honored, as I wouldn't want someone like you to NOT have a problem with my ethics.

                          Comment


                          • Originally posted by Gondwanaland View Post
                            Coming from someone who supports infanticide
                            "Supports" is a rather strong word. You make it sound like I'm a cheerleader for it. Disinterested apathy isn't support. I lack any desire to have it occur.

                            I'm honored, as I wouldn't want someone like you to NOT have a problem with my ethics.
                            Showing your ethical system to be full of logical holes isn't just having a problem with it.
                            "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                            "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                            "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                            Comment


                            • Originally posted by seer View Post
                              Yes, it shows, that by nature, humans have no value.
                              My own position is that nothing has inherent value. Value is always value to someone.

                              There will always be people around who value other humans. That's just human nature.

                              So when the Nazis devalue, let's say Jews, they are not doing anything irrational, or really immoral.
                              Not in my opinion. It might not have been irrational, but it was immoral. (Unless by "really immoral" you mean "objectively immoral". As you are aware, I don't think anything is "objectively immoral".)

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by Stoic View Post
                                My own position is that nothing has inherent value. Value is always value to someone.

                                There will always be people around who value other humans. That's just human nature.


                                Not in my opinion. It might not have been irrational, but it was immoral. (Unless by "really immoral" you mean "objectively immoral". As you are aware, I don't think anything is "objectively immoral".)
                                So we are back to inherently valueless human beings, where the Nazis are morally justified if they say they are. Where ethics are defined by might...
                                Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                                Comment

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