tronvillain

Well, I am not a member of either of the species in question, so the positions are not comparable. Still, are you saying that you see no morally relevant differences between grasshoppers and gorillas? You are completely indifferent between the death of a gorilla and the death of a grasshopper?

Malaclypse the Younger

Yes, Singer's argument is flawed, because it is not "different species" that is the criterion used to determine eatability.

The species-oriented moral criterion against cannibalism can (and does) exist without implying anything about the truth or falsity of morality of eating other species. That s->~e (if a being is of the same species as you, then you may not eat it) does not imply either the truth or falsity about ~s->e. To assume otherwise is the fallacy of the converse.

The rather obvious objective difference between humans and animals is one of quality and quantity of thought; we will arbitrarily label human-like quality and quantity of thought as "sapience". There are all sorts of fairly obvious objective ways to determine sapience, both syllogistically and evidentially. It is absurd to assert there there are no objective criteria which can reliably separate humans from animals.

And again, the objection that this criteria somehow "compels" us to permit the consumption of nonsapient members of our own species (children under one, the profoundly retarded, the irretreivably comatose, etc.) is simply absurd. There is no logical contradiction between the morality of noncannibalism and the morality of eating nonsapients, even though some members of our species are not sapient.

Moral statements cannot always be considered in isolation. While it is true that carnivorism (the moral permission of eating non-sapient animals) by itself does not prohibit cannibalism of nonsapient humans, to find that carnivorism compels acceptance would entail finding a logical contradiction between carnivorism and noncannibalism. But of course, these propositions are not logically contradictory; acceptance of both merely entails (~p & ~s)->e (it is acceptable to eat nonsapient members of different species).

The choice to make the objective criterion of sapience morally determinant is, of course, entirely arbitrary. But the subjectivists asserts that all choices of morally determinat criteria are arbitrary. The vegetarian's decision to make kingdom (vegetable vs. animal) morally determinant is arbitrary, and would be objected to by someone who made the objective criterion of prokaryoticism vs. eukaryoticism) arbitrarily morally determinant.

That spin feels contempt for those who make a different arbitrary choice of a morally determinant criterion is both unsurprising, and, to a subjectivist such as myself, an entirely legitimate position. It is a necessary part of moral subjectivism that when I makes a moral choice, I expose myself to the contempt of those who make an alternative choice, especially when my choice entails permitting myself actions that offend the moral sensibilities of others.

However, I can live with spin's contempt.

I will speak no more on this. If spin, punkersluta, or anyone else feels that my views are in error, the challenge still stands to debate one-on-one in FD&D with a resolution of your choice, where neither of our views will be drowned out in the free-for-all noise.

[ March 28, 2002: Message edited by: Malaclypse the Younger ]</p>

Tom Piper

tronvillain,

You have indicated that there is a morally relevant difference between grasshoppers and apes without specifying the morally relevant difference.

My racist says that there is a morally relevant difference between blacks and whites without specifying the morally relevant difference.

In what significant way are these two positions different, so far? Suppose for the sake of the argument, we make my racist Chinese.

Tom

tronvillain

While on the other hand you have repeatedly avoided specifying whether or not you are indifferent between the death of a gorilla and the death of a grasshopper. Are you or are you not?

Now, I consider the morally relevant differences to be physical characteristics and behavior, and as Melacylpse the Younger points out:
I suspect you have the same or similar considerations, and would not in fact be indifferent between the two cases as a result.

Malaclypse the Younger

Of course, it is entirely rational (in principle) to consider the death of a grasshoper equally reprehensible to the death of a gorilla, or indeed a human being. Weird, but rational, at least in principle.

tronvillain

Yes, I said as much before:

Tom Piper

tronvillain,

I don't see how my particular views are relevant to the argument? Will you explain to me how you think they are, if you think they are!

Tom

spin

emphryio,

If you want to make assertions about who I am, look at the other things I am involved in on the secular web and stop being myopic.

Make a reassessment and then cut the stupidity.

Corwin

Ok spin.... answer me this.

If there's no effective difference between animals and humans.... are you by any chance out enjoying yourself in the barnyard? After all.... human... animal... they're both 'conscious' in your opinion.... so there should be nothing wrong with a wooly or furry girlfriend, right?

spin

spin:
--------
This {killing 1,000 sentient beings for the protection and benefit of 10,000 sentient beings} would deliberate contravention of the first part of the statement.

You are not protecting the ones you want to hack up. You start with the maximum and when an entity contravenes the second part applies. As what you are advocating contravenes then it is stopped.
--------

PB:
--------
I'm struggling to connect this statement to your moral theory. The last three sentences of yours that I quoted are not very clear. The only conclusion that seems to make sense to me is, as another poster has suggested, that your theory advocates no "look ahead." We ought to do whatever will benefit the most sentient beings right now, with no regard to the number of sentient lives our actions will benefit or destroy in the future. Can you clarify?
--------

For some reason you seem to think that it's alright to take &lt;grin&gt;non-consenting&lt;/&gt; baboons and subject them to all sorts of torture, while never ever ever thinking of the fact that baboons, not being humans, are not as suitable to the tortures and their results as humans would be. You seem prepared to accept the vast amount of waste of research on our baboons because of cowardice regarding what one should be using. You are already favouring the human against other species and not protecting and benefiting all species.

We are not dealing with 1000 baboons to save 10000 humans. Duh. We are dealing with the predominantly irrelevant testing of baboons which is unsupportable in the moral position I have given.

spin:
--------
Humans have become a plague on this planet, going from occupying a minimal part to having stolen the habitat from so many species which have now been driven into extinction. Why not use humans instead of baboons, PB? They would be more relevant to the experiments.
--------

PB:
--------
Are you asking me why I wouldn't personally use humans instead of baboons or why someone who adhered to your moral standard would not use humans instead of baboons? I personally would not use humans because, first, I value human more than baboon life and, second, I adhere to a moral system that grants higher consideration to humans than to baboons. Assuming that research would, indeed, be more efficient (in terms of sentient beings saved/sentient beings killed) if it used human subjects, a person who adhered to your moral theory would prefer to use humans, unless there is some aspect of your theory that I have missed.

Now, having established that,would you have an ethical problem with a system in which an annual lottery was held to determine which citizens were to be used for medical testing? Why or why not?
--------

What would happen of course is that researchers would have to rethink what monstrosities they could perform, as they wouldn't be able to get away with your lottery idea.

PB:
--------
I asked for clarification about the concept of consent which, although not explicitly included in your moral theory as you have presented it, seems to factor in your moral deliberation. You replied:

spin:
--------
I suppose one can consent to give up one's existence. But then it's only applicable to consenting adults anyway, so we don't need to change the system to allow one consenting human to *uck another consenting human.
--------

PB:
--------
What on earth does this have to do with the question I asked?
--------

This was a gratuitous addition. Use your head a little. A bit of word association football, with the added basic relevance to the discussion. If the animal texted could give consent or withhold it, do you have any doubt in the world that the animal would not give consent to be a guinea pig for something that has nothing to do with it?

PB:
--------
You objected to a scenario in which a number of sentient beings were sacrificed in order to preserve the lives of a rather larger number of sentient beings on the grounds that the sacrificial "victims" were not consenting. I asked you to describe how consent factors into your moral system, as it clearly is not implied by the two sentences I am quoting at the top of each post. Can you please clarify this point?
--------

You seem to think that benefiting and protecting principally works for humans above the rest, so you are attempting to co-opt my statement with obviously tendentious reasoning, ie attempting to turn it against the purpose it was stated for (rights for all sentient beings). Consent per se is not a part of the simple statement, but choosing crappy moral dilemmas which favour human beings at the expense of other animals is merely species bias. You are prepared to put humans above other animals and repropose my morality at me. Fine. When you don't have the starting understanding, you can distort anything to say what you would like, while missing the content.

You have proposed using animals for experiments regarding humans. You realise that the results of such experiments are not particularly reflective of humans. Human guinea pigs would be much more relevant. You are prepared to sacrifice the other animals, who would not consent to such maltreatment, because of cowardice, both on your part and that of the scientists. Neither are prepared to use human subjects for obvious reasons. If forced to use human subjects, experiments would have to change radically, so that the tortures performed on the animals would not be done on humans, but other means found to get the data.