Morality is subjective

[SVPD]

Think of what characteristics of humans make them more morally valuable. Then subtract that from the equation. It should tell you why it is not a punishment.

The mere characteristic of being human makes one morally valuable. There is nothing to subtract.

[SVPD]

Edit: if it is ok to parade a dog around and own it because it is too stupid and cognitively unaware to know, then intelligence and level of sentience is obviously your criterion. Barring the existence of outside influences: family, friends, you really should should treat a human or the dog on the same level, isnce they are on the same mental level. There is no relevant difference. They both can feel, but neither have the higher level interests that separates them. Which is more valuable in moral status? A dog or a cat? Neither really, since they are on the same relative level of sentience.

No you should not. Your argument first of all, presumes there is only 1 criterion. Second it fails because ALL dogs are too stupid to know that they are paraded around, while only humans with very serious and rare problems are too stupid to know. you want to take certain members of one species which genreally IS sufficiently intelligent to know and treat themas if they belong to another species that does not. That is immoral. (see below for more).

Humans are not inherently more valuable for being human as cats are not more morally valuable than dogs simply because they are a different species. It would be a nonsense to say: Humans are more valuable than dogs. Why? What makes humans more valuable than dogs? The fact that humans are not dogs. Ok. What characteristic of dogs makes them morally inferior to humans? The fact that they are not humans... .... ....

Actually, being a human DOES intrinsically make one more valuable, and not just because they are not dogs. You strawman when you make that argument. It is the quality of being a member of a species that can develop a moral code. (again, see below)

It's completely foreseeable that there could be non-human aliens somewhere. The fact is they could be smarter than we are, or just the same level of intelligence. Would they be worth "less" because they are not human? That's awefully speciest.

No. Such a species would be capable of developing a moral code.

Look here:

As Mike has correctly pointed out:

The very concept of a human moral code requires the existence of human society because morality is a decision-making system for human social conduct, moron. To argue that the erasure of human society could possibly be a valid moral value is a self-defeating proposition since there would be no morality in the first place if we did not exist. This is no better than solipsist idiocy.

Therefore, any moral code would have to work against behaviors that would tend to cause the extinction of the species. In a primitive society where such a code would originate, the first rule would probably be "no unnecessary killing", since killing decreases population, which would be important in this very primitive society.

Now, since we want to prevent unnecessary killing, we should probably discourage behavior that would lead to unnecessary killing, or to unnecessary incapacitating injury due to fighting (an incapacitated person being of little use to survival). Amongst these we might include theft, rape, adultery, and physical mistreatment of others. People would be generally treated according to their own behavior under this code, since the effort of all is needed for survival.

As the society evolves into one where the dog-intelligence person can survive, the moral code remains. The threat of extinction appears remote, but it still exists; if people were able to simply behave in whatever fashion they wished towards others, hostilities between people would quickly rage out of control, supported by modern weapons.

Therefore, the moral code of "no unnecessary killing, and no activity that is likely to provoke others into doing so" remains in effect. The person with the intellect of the dog is protected by this moral code because he is a member of the society that lives by it.

No, there may not be anything that elevates the dog-person above an actual dog other than his species and membership in society, but that's irrelevant. The point of moral codes is to determine what behavior is acceptable and what is not. Mistreating this person is objectively harmful to him, and is therefore proscribed. If this person were NOT retarded, it would NOT be ok to mistreat him, and he might fight to defend himself. If he had family that cared, THEY might fight to defend him.

So: If you're going to argue that it's ok to mistreat this p[erson because they are doglike in intelligence and can't know that they are being so treated, you're basically saying it's ok because you can get away with it, and no one will do anything about it.

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

Think of what characteristics of humans make them more morally valuable. Then subtract that from the equation. It should tell you why it is not a punishment.

The mere characteristic of being human makes one morally valuable. There is nothing to subtract.

Why? There is no reason to believe so. If you are going to say humans are more morally valuable than another creature, you ought to be able to produce a reason that does not consist of using the species as the criterion. It's not universalizable, first of all, and it doesn't differentiate anything to substantiate the difference in moral worth.

Ergo, I repeat: what about humans makes them so? Apparently, you think an an anacephalic infant must be worth more than a normal chimpanzee too, no? Obvious, since one is human and the other isn't. Your only criterion is value is species membership.

No you should not. Your argument first of all, presumes there is only 1 criterion.

Foremost, on Utilitarian grounds, my criterion is able to cope with Weighing like interests. Yours is not. My criteria deals with sentience and self-awarenes, wicj are a prerequisit for ALL moral value. You cannot act immorally toward an inanimate, non-sentient object. If I kick a rock, it has no moral effect. Why? The rock is not sentient. Ergo, it is not capable of thinking, or feeling, or experiencing. There is no point in giving something moral value if it is not at least sentient. However, all mammals are sentient creatures, thus all have basic moral value. However, your proposing that Humans ought to be given "special" moral value. You claim it is due to their membership of Homo Sapien. That's unjustified, silly speciesm.

THe only real difference morally in humans and a dog is their level of intelligence and self-awareness. There must be a quantifiable, objective difference--"I am human" does not qualify.

Second it fails because ALL dogs are too stupid to know that they are paraded around, while only humans with very serious and rare problems are too stupid to know. you want to take certain members of one species which genreally IS sufficiently intelligent to know and treat themas if they belong to another species that does not. That is immoral. (see below for more).

Which is irrelevant. It does not matter if ALL dogs are that intelligent or if ALL humans were. Treat it on a case-by-case basis. It increases accuracy and prevents hasty generalizing. The characteristics are what make the individual morally valuable, not the meatsack. Humans are special because of their minds. That is what makes them different. Subtract the mind and you get a blubbering vagina. That valuable characateristic, once gone, also removes the value of the human if there are no intrinsic reasons to place value on it.

It's far from "immoral." Why? Because you treat other creatures that are of the same moral intelligence level the same. You unversalize it based on the characteristic. That's fair, balanced, and reasonable. Actually, what YOU are proposing is immoral. It's not objectively universalizable and is speceist.

Actually, being a human DOES intrinsically make one more valuable, and not just because they are not dogs. You strawman when you make that argument. It is the quality of being a member of a species that can develop a moral code. (again, see below)

False. You have failed to provide any real reason why. You just keep asserting it, but you have no actual ethical theory or principles to back you up. I do. You are confusing your elements. This quality of being able to develop a moral code is irrelevant to the way in which you treat others. The fact that a dog is not rational does not mean it is outside the moral community. It cannot make a decision--it is not an agent, but it IS a recepient of moral action. This also matters, but you are only looking agent-side.

You base your decisions of ethics on calculation of interests. As such, you weigh like interests. Organisms with vastly different mental capacities (as we are hypothetically babbling about), do not have completely similar intersts. Some intersect, but some do not. You treat them equally where equality is due. You do not generalize. That's speciest.

From a Utilitarian perspective, which Mr. Wong uses quite often (and which I hold), you do the greatest good for the greatest number. This means: "maximize the welfare preferences of the greatest number." To this effect, you measure and weigh the preferences of any participants in a calculation. Dogs and Humans have welfare preferences because we are both sentient. However, dogs do not have the self-awareness level that humans do. We do not treat all of their interests equal to ours because our interests, due to our self-awareness and high degree of sentience, gives us many more, and many more complex preferences. We often have more to lose. This is not the case whatsoever with dog-retard boy.

His interests are no more advanced than that of the dog, since we are saying he's literally of the same mental level. It is not immoral to treat him as you would any being with similar level of intersts. In fact, that is morally desirable and adheres to the principle of equality of interests. To treat him differently would be unethical. I don't give two shits what the majority of humans are like. It's irrelevant to the analysis of the morally relevant characteristics that make us value humans--our rational attributes.

If the dog were of a higher level of intelligence than humans, we would not be justified in treating him worse, regardless of his species. Whether or not he would be able to make up his own moral code is neither here nor there, since OUR moral code would not permit us to violate equality of interests. In Utility, all creatures that are similar in morally relevant criteria deserve EQUAL moral consideration. In utility, sentience and self-awareness are paramount.

Therefore, any moral code would have to work against behaviors that would tend to cause the extinction of the species. In a primitive society where such a code would originate, the first rule would probably be "no unnecessary killing", since killing decreases population, which would be important in this very primitive society.

Yes. I know what he said. However, if morality is to be objective and universalizable, it also has to extend BEYOND humanity to anything similar, like I mentioned in the principle of equality of interests. Localizing it to species is not proper ethics. Wong actually doesn't say what you think he says. I have seen him argue that any creature like a human ought to be treated the same. Obviously, we wouldn't go ZOMG HUMANS= TeH Bestors!

Wong is against people saying Humans are equal to other animals. This is true, and he has said this. Ask him. I have never heard him say they are better simply because they are human.

Furthermore, treating dog-intelligence humans different from normal humans would not "destroy humanity" or lead to extinction. That's a nonsense assertion to begin with. If someone is a dog-level intelligence, he would likely not contribute to the population to begin with. It's probably not even GOOD for the population for him to breed. Again, you are strawmanning my position and going off into wild hypothesis that are dealing with "killing." I hope you are not assuming my position means you can go off and do anything you want to the dog-boy. If so, that's completely false. I wouldn't kick a dog in the head any more than I would kick a dog-boy in the head.

As the society evolves into one where the dog-intelligence person can survive, the moral code remains. The threat of extinction appears remote, but it still exists; if people were able to simply behave in whatever fashion they wished towards others, hostilities between people would quickly rage out of control, supported by modern weapons.

Of course great suffering for everyone, not only humans, would occure if people were able to run around and act in any manner they wanted in accordance with whatever whim they wanted.

You are right, but that's also very irrelevant to whatever I said no one at all is saying "do anything you want to others." You are misunderstanding the modern concepts in ethics: personhood, moral agency, universalizability, the principle of equality of intersts, etc.

What you are doing is juxtaposing what I said and and "anything goes/all behaviors allowed FFA." In no way does that follow.

Therefore, the moral code of "no unnecessary killing, and no activity that is likely to provoke others into doing so" remains in effect. The person with the intellect of the dog is protected by this moral code because he is a member of the society that lives by it.

So what? No one is saying kill or hurt the dog, and no one is saying kill or hurt the dog-boy. You are making a huge leap in logic. No one is saying we should go "unnecessary killing" of dog-level humans.

No, there may not be anything that elevates the dog-person above an actual dog other than his species and membership in society, but that's irrelevant. The point of moral codes is to determine what behavior is acceptable and what is not. Mistreating this person is objectively harmful to him, and is therefore proscribed. If this person were NOT retarded, it would NOT be ok to mistreat him, and he might fight to defend himself. If he had family that cared, THEY might fight to defend him.

You are misunderstanding the point. You are right insofar as the point of moral codes is to determine what is acceptable behavior. Woo hoo! that's vague man. You are under the false impression that:

A. You are not mistreating the dog-boy

B. You are doing whatever you want to the dog-boy, regardless and heedless of ethics.

Both of these assumptions are false. Foremost, the dogboy would no longer be a person. Personhood is a moral concept tied to the rational attributes of sentience and sapience in modern Ethics. Basic moral value begins at basic sentience, becaues that is the beginning of preferences. You cannot being to satisfy/maximise preferences and weigh them according to the principle of equality of like interests untill they HAVE interests. Refer to the rock example.

With certain levels of intelligence come more profound, greater quantity of preferences (more to lose/gain from a decision). I suggest you read up on your ethics. Mr. Wong is correct, but he's not saying what you think he's saying. He's not saying humans are more valuable because "they are humans." Search the forum and you will find he has actually not said that in past discussions on this issue. We were talking about what makes humans valuable several months ago, and we used the cow-man example upon which I believe Wong mentioned that it is the mental characteristic that makes them valuable. For example:

If you were to replace the brain of a human and put it into the body of a cow, and put the cowbrain into the human, and get everything to work, the human body with the cow brain would not be more morally valuable than the cowbody with the human brain. It is not the meatsack, but the mind. The human mind has what we see as being "a person." If those characteristics do not exist, then poof, there goes the moral value separating the cow and the human.

So: If you're going to argue that it's ok to mistreat this p[erson because they are doglike in intelligence and can't know that they are being so treated, you're basically saying it's ok because you can get away with it, and no one will do anything about it.

ANd you accuse me of strawman? Please. No one said mistreat any person. This is a complete distortion. I am saying, quite correctly and in line with the concept of ethical personhood, that you treat peolple according to their personhood. If you have a human that has none of the requisite elements of personhood, he therefore does not deserve the title or the moral worth. This does not mean you do "anything you want" to it by any means. You aren't allowed to mistreat dogs either. It would be just as bad to kick a dog in the head, torture it as it would be to do it to an isolated, dog-man.



You must obviously feel that even PVS individuals, who are alive, technically, are still more valuable than dogs. Obviously, since sentience level, functionality, and sapience don't matter. It's merely being a member of human membership.

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

Edit: You have to think outside of the human box. Humans are not the only morally relevant beings. Sure, they are the ones we give most credit to in weighing intersts; this can be justified, as Mr. Wong has before. However, this doesn't mean what you think it means.

No one is advocating a wild free for all where anyone can do anything, which will lead to the collapse of the human species. In fact, that would be decidedly anti-utilitarian.

In practical, everyday reasoning, there is no problem. However, in theoretical situations, if you have a competing species, Utilitarianism would apply to them too, not jus to Humans. It would not be morally appropriate to automatically elevant humans above the hypothetical aliens. For Human interests, it would not be appropriate to always find in favour of humans, regardless of the level of damage done to the interests of similar non-humans.

People should be treated according to their sentient/sapient natures, and equality should be given where equality is due. If aliens are the same as humans, they ought to be treated with equal consideration of their intersets. Period. 1 human's interests, for example, don't automaticaly = infinite number of species X's. In the case of the dogs vs the humans and the dog vs the dog-human, you wouldn't "mistreat" the dog as you wouldn't and shouldn't mistreat the human with the dog-like sentience (which is an unrealistic scenario anyway).


The average bonobo Chimpanzee has the intellectual capacity of a 2-3 year old, or so I have read. If this is true, then it would have more moral value than a PVS adult human or a human so severely retarded as to be of a less sentient state. Why? Because that is how you weigh like interests. In the case of the PVS individual, even thought it is "human", it is not a human person any longer. The Chimpanzee has more to live for and more to experience.

Tell me: do you think anacephalic infants, because they are human biologically (with HUMAN DNA!!!), are seriously more valuable than your average tree monkey? Hopefully not.

[Surlethe]

Does a dog deserve to be owned by humans and made to serve them?

Yes. It's an animal that cannot develop a moral code in order to assist it's species in survival.

Let's, for a moment, presume the existence of a dog which possesses the intelligence of an average human. Do you, then, still assign that dog a moral status inferior to an average human being, simply because an overwhelming majority of its species are much stupider?

Just because something isn't deserved doesn't mean it's unethical; for instance, you probably don't deserve to be given $500 out of the blue, but such a gift wouldn't be unethical.

I did not think it necessary to qualify it as "undeserved and detrimental" since I referred to punishment, but apparently I do.

Why is treatment of a person as a dog necessarily punishment?

You're moving the goalposts.

Do you even know what that means? I'm questioning your premise, rather than redefining my own claim in the face of evidence.

If treating a person like a dog was not necessarily punishment we would be discussing whether it's ethical to do so.

This doesn't say anything: in case you haven't been paying attention, we are, in fact, discussing whether or not it's ethical to treat a human as a dog.

Dogs are not treated as well as the average person. Neither are criminals. In the case of criminals, it is because they have comitted crimes.

You have given no reason why such treatment would cease to be punishment when applied to a retarded person.

You've given no evidence such treatment is always retribution for perceived crimes in the first place.

Thank you for entirely missing my point; I'm pointing out that it's not pragmatic to lump everybody with the average, because whether or not you want to believe it, there will exist deviations from the mean. By your logic, lumping an entire group with the average is all right to save time and effort from determining who ought to be treated in what way; and, since it's a well-known fact African-Americans are, on average, much more likely to be jailed than whites, it certainly saves you time and effort to simply prejudge a black man rather than going to the trouble of inventing multiple rule sets based on criminality, or lack thereof.

Except that in your analogy it does NOT save any time and effort; I could make a strong case that it COSTS time and effort. It takes a great deal of time and effort to subjugate millions of people in that respect, especially when they take exception to doing so.

We're not talking about subjugating them, as your strawman so conveniently claims; we are talking about judging them, and it certainly does not cost time and effort to judge an entire race guilty, rather than judging each individual person.

You are attempting to equate putting aside extreme outliers which are so rare and so far from the averager as to merit individual consideration with treating millions of people who differ from the EXACT average as if they were all exactly the same.

But they're both equally pragmatic; and thus, your attempt to justify blanket generalizations in defense of pragmatism falls flat on its face.

If a human has the sapience of a dog, then what sets him apart from a dog? Merely his appearance and physical constitution. You're basing your entire moral code on superficial qualities in order to "pragmatically" -- i.e., without giving thought -- determine moral status.

I do not see that these qualities are superficial. the gentic makeup of a being is not superficial at all; it determines what that being will be.

So? A fetus possesses human genetics; does this mean you give a fetus the same moral status as a grown adult?

What sets him apart is the fact that he is not a dog. Mike has pretty firmly established that a moral code must as a prerequisite ensure the survival of the species for it to be relevant. If we exclude members of the species from consideration as members, the concept of "species" ceases to have meaning.

Nice red herring. Nobody is questioning the fact our retarded dog-intelligence man possesses characteristics of the species H. sapiens; the issue is whether or not the man deserves a moral status equal to more sapient individuals.

That's not a red herring at all. The moral code starts from the survival of the species. This person is a member of that species regardless of sapience. You need to prove that lack of sapience in the individual excludes him from the protection of the moral code.

Simply because the moral code starts from the survival of the species doesn't mean that it necessarily applies equally to all members of the species; for instance, why should a person who contributes nothing to the species be given equal moral value to a person who helps it to survive?

So far I see you presenting me with a lot of assumptions that you expect me to take at face value when answering your questions. I'm doing my best to answer your questions, but you keep refusing to validate these assumptions.

Go ahead and point out the assumptions, then.

Whether or not it's actually "art" is immaterial; the key point here is that you disagree that he ought to be a spectacle simply because he shares superficial features with other humans. Am I correct in this assertion?

Quit moving the goalposts. You claimed he could be considered a work of art; I showed how that is not the case. Now you're changing the key point to something else.

The key point was never that it was a "work of art"; the key point has always been that you feel, simply because he shares the human form, he shouldn't be paraded in front of people for their enjoyment, regardless of his lack of intelligence.

furthermore, you have yet to establish why it would be ethical to parade a person in front of people for their visual enjoyment.

I need to see some answers and defense of your position before I give you anything else.

This person doesn't realize he's being paraded, remember? He's got the intelligence of a rock, even though he's a stunning specimen of the human form.

[SVPD]

Let's, for a moment, presume the existence of a dog which possesses the intelligence of an average human. Do you, then, still assign that dog a moral status inferior to an average human being, simply because an overwhelming majority of its species are much stupider?

Let's not assume that. There's no reason to think such a thing would actually occur; it's a fictitious construct with no intent other than to create a contradiction in my argument. We could create an infinite number of such constructs; I see no reason to debate what would apply to them.

Do you even know what that means? I'm questioning your premise, rather than redefining my own claim in the face of evidence.

You are trying to create an infinite "why" loop, where no matter what premise I use, you will ask "why." Treating a person with severe retardation like a dog is punishment because it would be punishment when applied to the vast majority of people who are NOT so retarded. You need to show that something changes to make this behavior ethical when applied to the retarded person. Here's a hint: That would be something OTHER than "he's retarded". So far you're just saying "It's ethical to treat retarded people like dogs because they're retarded."

This doesn't say anything: in case you haven't been paying attention, we are, in fact, discussing whether or not it's ethical to treat a human as a dog.

In other words, you accept my argument that such treatment can be construed as punishment (or something equally unpleasent.). Why is it necessary to discuss it AT ALL if it could not be construed as unpleasent, and therefore have a possibility of being unethical?

You've given no evidence such treatment is always retribution for perceived crimes in the first place.

Tell me, why does anyone inflict retribution for anything OTHER than "perceived crime?".

[We're not talking about subjugating them, as your strawman so conveniently claims; we are talking about judging them, and it certainly does not cost time and effort to judge an entire race guilty, rather than judging each individual person.

Horseshit. You're changing horses in midstream now:

It's equally pragmatic to declare all humans with dark skin as vile criminals each worthy to be punished on sight; after all, the majority of prisoners in our jails are black.

Those are YOUR WORDS, you lying sack of shit.

That's no strawman on my part, that's you lying about what you posted so you can claim I made a strawman.

But they're both equally pragmatic; and thus, your attempt to justify blanket generalizations in defense of pragmatism falls flat on its face.

Except they are NOT equally pragmatic, which I demonstrated, and which you just tried to lie your way out of... so my assertion stands and you're revealed as just another poser who thinks he's playing logic professor on the internet.

So? A fetus possesses human genetics; does this mean you give a fetus the same moral status as a grown adult?

A fetus is incapable of surviving outside the body of the mother, dumbass. It posesses the genetics of a human because it is part of a whole human. What's your next stupid analogy going to be? That a sliced-off finger is somehow the same morally as a grown person?

Simply because the moral code starts from the survival of the species doesn't mean that it necessarily applies equally to all members of the species; for instance, why should a person who contributes nothing to the species be given equal moral value to a person who helps it to survive?

Because that's the point of having moral codes, you fucking nitwit! Moral codes alleviate the need for each individual to defend himself through force, by guaranteeing that society will exercise force on his behalf. The moral code becomes useless if you start assigning arbitrary values to members of society that are not based on their adherence to said code; anyone can contrive an excuse to do whatever they want just by inventing a reason why there is an execption!

Go ahead and point out the assumptions, then.

I have.



I need to see proof on your part that it is ethical to treat people in an inferior fashion because their intelligence is inferior.

I need to see proof on your part that being a member of the species homo sapien is insufficient to qualify one to be considered a full member of that species, when intelligence is seriously impaired.

This person doesn't realize he's being paraded, remember? He's got the intelligence of a rock, even though he's a stunning specimen of the human form.

No fucking kidding! You really like circular argument, don't you?

"This person is very attractive but dumb as a rock, so it's ok to parade him in front of people for their visual enjoyment because he doesn't realize it because hes dumb as a rock"

WHY is that OK?

[SVPD]

Edit: You have to think outside of the human box. Humans are not the only morally relevant beings. Sure, they are the ones we give most credit to in weighing intersts; this can be justified, as Mr. Wong has before. However, this doesn't mean what you think it means.

I see no reason to think any other species is morally relevant.

No one is advocating a wild free for all where anyone can do anything, which will lead to the collapse of the human species. In fact, that would be decidedly anti-utilitarian.

No kidding.

In practical, everyday reasoning, there is no problem. However, in theoretical situations, if you have a competing species, Utilitarianism would apply to them too, not jus to Humans. It would not be morally appropriate to automatically elevant humans above the hypothetical aliens. For Human interests, it would not be appropriate to always find in favour of humans, regardless of the level of damage done to the interests of similar non-humans.

We can invent an infinite number of hypotheticals. Who cares about hypothetical species? Any of these hypothetical aliens would be exhibiting characteristics that indicate they are human-like in ability to evolve a moral code. No existing species has done that.

People should be treated according to their sentient/sapient natures, and equality should be given where equality is due. If aliens are the same as humans, they ought to be treated with equal consideration of their intersets. Period. 1 human's interests, for example, don't automaticaly = infinite number of species X's. In the case of the dogs vs the humans and the dog vs the dog-human, you wouldn't "mistreat" the dog as you wouldn't and shouldn't mistreat the human with the dog-like sentience (which is an unrealistic scenario anyway).

In the absence of actual aliens, this is pointless nonsense.

The average bonobo Chimpanzee has the intellectual capacity of a 2-3 year old, or so I have read. If this is true, then it would have more moral value than a PVS adult human or a human so severely retarded as to be of a less sentient state. Why? Because that is how you weigh like interests. In the case of the PVS individual, even thought it is "human", it is not a human person any longer. The Chimpanzee has more to live for and more to experience.

No, that's not how you weigh it. The humans are members of the human species that evolved the moral code; therefore all humans enjoy the protection of it regardless of individual properties. Chimpanzees cannot do so. If or when they can, the issue can be revisited.

You keep asserting that the mental capacity of the individual determines worth; I've seen no proof of that, just assertion.

Tell me: do you think anacephalic infants, because they are human biologically (with HUMAN DNA!!!), are seriously more valuable than your average tree monkey? Hopefully not.

Yes, actually I do. Why should I give a rat's ass about the tree monkey?

[Zero]

SVPD: What about species such as Bonobo chimpansees, and dolphins, who's intelligence and sentience/sapience is disputed by some? Do they deserve no more or less moral consideration? Is a dog on the same level as some random bacteria on your moral scale, since no animals but humans matter?

[Darth Wong]

The humans are members of the human species that evolved the moral code; therefore all humans enjoy the protection of it regardless of individual properties.

That does not follow. Human civilization developed the moral code, so it exists for the benefit of human civilization, not necessarily the benefit of each and every individual human.

[SVPD]

You must obviously feel that even PVS individuals, who are alive, technically, are still more valuable than dogs. Obviously, since sentience level, functionality, and sapience don't matter. It's merely being a member of human membership.

I was going to respond to this entire post, but this sums it up very succinctly.

You present the ASSUMPTION that it's ethical to assign treatment based on individual intelligence as fact. I see no reason to accept it as fact. You claim that to do otherwise is "speciesist", but I see no reason that "speciesism" ( a nonsense word anyhow) is necessarily bad. The mere application of the "-ist" suffix in an attempt to equate it to racism will not cut it.

Yes, it's a matter of human membership. Your entire position rests on this silly idea of "speciesism".

It is membership in the human species that gives most humans the mental capacity we enjoy. Our genetic characteristics are responsible for the development of our nervous system and brain.

A human that does not develop those characteristics has suffered some sort of accident.

Therefore, when you treat that person differently, you do so based on events beyond his control that altered the characteristics he should have had. That is blatantly unfair, for the same reason that imprisoning a person when an accident they could not have forseen or prevented injures or kills another.

The dog, or any other species, when they develop normally (i.e. no accident invloved) is unintelligent in comparison to humans. Therefore, it is fair to treat it in accordance with the intelligence it has. It is not the victim of any accident.

You are trying to pretend that the genetic characterisitcs of humans or other animals are separate matters from intelligence, when in fact those genetic characteristics dictate that intelligence just as they do the physical appearance.

Tell me, if a human being were to be injured as an adult in such a way that their intelligence were reduced to that of a dog, would it be ethical to start treating them like one?

If a child which was otherwise normal suffered partial strangulation in the birth process, such that it suffered such servre oxygen loss as to render the brain incapable of developing beyond the capacity of a dog, due to carelessness by the doctor, is it ok to reat that person as a dog?

[SVPD]

SVPD: What about species such as Bonobo chimpansees, and dolphins, who's intelligence and sentience/sapience is disputed by some? Do they deserve no more or less moral consideration? Is a dog on the same level as some random bacteria on your moral scale, since no animals but humans matter?

Some animals matter more than others. The dog's intelligence as a species vastly exceeds that of the bacteria.

Remember, I'm asserting that its the species average that matters; humans matter most because the human average is so much higher. The dogs is vastly higher than the bacterium's.

In the case of "disputed" species, I do not know enough about the dispute, or the range of possible intelligences in the dispuite to give you a good answer.

[SVPD]

That does not follow. Human civilization developed the moral code, so it exists for the benefit of human civilization, not necessarily the benefit of each and every individual human.

How can we assign a criteria that would exclude certain humans from the protection of the moral code without it ceasing to be a moral code?

[Surlethe]

Let's, for a moment, presume the existence of a dog which possesses the intelligence of an average human. Do you, then, still assign that dog a moral status inferior to an average human being, simply because an overwhelming majority of its species are much stupider?

Let's not assume that. There's no reason to think such a thing would actually occur; it's a fictitious construct with no intent other than to create a contradiction in my argument. We could create an infinite number of such constructs; I see no reason to debate what would apply to them.

Answer the fucking question, you slippery little monkey. Just because it won't ever happen doesn't mean it's not a valid ethical dilemma; by your logic, since the chances of me ever being with a person with the intellect of a dog for more than several minutes are close to nonexistent, I shouldn't even be debating this with you.

Do you even know what that means? I'm questioning your premise, rather than redefining my own claim in the face of evidence.

You are trying to create an infinite "why" loop, where no matter what premise I use, you will ask "why."

Heaven forbid you actually justify your premises.

Treating a person with severe retardation like a dog is punishment because it would be punishment when applied to the vast majority of people who are NOT so retarded.

If I keep you in a kennel, put a collar around your neck, and take you out with a leash, what am I punishing you for?

You need to show that something changes to make this behavior ethical when applied to the retarded person. Here's a hint: That would be something OTHER than "he's retarded". So far you're just saying "It's ethical to treat retarded people like dogs because they're retarded."

Damn, you don't even understand the claim, do you? It's not the case that it is not ethical to treat retarded people like dogs even though they have the same intellect as dogs, you subliterate protozoan. The thing that changes is that the intelligence drops; if you're too stupid to realize that, then I'm surprised you are even capable of writing.

This doesn't say anything: in case you haven't been paying attention, we are, in fact, discussing whether or not it's ethical to treat a human as a dog.

In other words, you accept my argument that such treatment can be construed as punishment (or something equally unpleasent.). Why is it necessary to discuss it AT ALL if it could not be construed as unpleasent, and therefore have a possibility of being unethical?

For fuck's sake, do you have any idea what logic is? The fact your implication leads to a true result doesn't say anything about the premises, you stupid little asshole.

You've given no evidence such treatment is always retribution for perceived crimes in the first place.

Tell me, why does anyone inflict retribution for anything OTHER than "perceived crime?".

What are you, illiterate? Read the statement: you've given no evidence such treatment is always retribution for perceived crimes in the first place.

[We're not talking about subjugating them, as your strawman so conveniently claims; we are talking about judging them, and it certainly does not cost time and effort to judge an entire race guilty, rather than judging each individual person.

Horseshit. You're changing horses in midstream now:

It's equally pragmatic to declare all humans with dark skin as vile criminals each worthy to be punished on sight; after all, the majority of prisoners in our jails are black.

Those are YOUR WORDS, you lying sack of shit.

That's no strawman on my part, that's you lying about what you posted so you can claim I made a strawman.

I don't take kindly to accusations of lying, you illiterate subchordate. If you weren't a retarded shitmonkey, you would understand the very words you emphasized in my quote constitute a judgment, you idiot.

But they're both equally pragmatic; and thus, your attempt to justify blanket generalizations in defense of pragmatism falls flat on its face.

Except they are NOT equally pragmatic, which I demonstrated, and which you just tried to lie your way out of... so my assertion stands and you're revealed as just another poser who thinks he's playing logic professor on the internet.

The judgment is equally pragmatic, because you don't have to waste time in either case deciding about outliers, a fact you'd recognize if you had the reading skills of a turnip.

So? A fetus possesses human genetics; does this mean you give a fetus the same moral status as a grown adult?

A fetus is incapable of surviving outside the body of the mother, dumbass. It posesses the genetics of a human because it is part of a whole human. What's your next stupid analogy going to be? That a sliced-off finger is somehow the same morally as a grown person?

Oh my gosh; I can't believe you just claimed this. I think I'm going to sig this. You actually think a fetus' genetic makeup us human because it's gestating? What are you going to claim next, that an infant is human because it can't survive without immediate care from its mother and father? You think Terri Schiavo was morally equivalent to yourself? Then we shouldn't have unplugged her!

Simply because the moral code starts from the survival of the species doesn't mean that it necessarily applies equally to all members of the species; for instance, why should a person who contributes nothing to the species be given equal moral value to a person who helps it to survive?

Because that's the point of having moral codes, you fucking nitwit! Moral codes alleviate the need for each individual to defend himself through force, by guaranteeing that society will exercise force on his behalf. The moral code becomes useless if you start assigning arbitrary values to members of society that are not based on their adherence to said code; anyone can contrive an excuse to do whatever they want just by inventing a reason why there is an execption!

Damn, you are stupid, aren't you? Are you trying to defend this man with the mind of a dog because you have the same intelligence? The reason a person who contributes nothing to the species won't have the same moral value as a person who does help it survive is because groups where people who don't contribute are not valued (like this board, for instance) prune them off and allocate resources far more efficiently than groups where people who don't contribute are valued.

Go ahead and point out the assumptions, then.

I have.



I need to see proof on your part that it is ethical to treat people in an inferior fashion because their intelligence is inferior.

I need to see proof on your part that being a member of the species homo sapien is insufficient to qualify one to be considered a full member of that species, when intelligence is seriously impaired.

If you strawman me one more time, I'm going to tear your testicles out of you through your abdomen, fucktard. I have never claimed lack of sapience removes one from the species H. sapiens,, you son of a bitch.

This person doesn't realize he's being paraded, remember? He's got the intelligence of a rock, even though he's a stunning specimen of the human form.

No fucking kidding! You really like circular argument, don't you?

"This person is very attractive but dumb as a rock, so it's ok to parade him in front of people for their visual enjoyment because he doesn't realize it because hes dumb as a rock"

WHY is that OK?

Here's the guy you've been defending:



Aside from your stupid "genetics" argument, he fits precisely the conditions laid out. Incidentally, the same logic applies to Terri Schiavo, as I pointed out earlier.

[SVPD]

Answer the fucking question, you slippery little monkey. Just because it won't ever happen doesn't mean it's not a valid ethical dilemma; by your logic, since the chances of me ever being with a person with the intellect of a dog for more than several minutes are close to nonexistent, I shouldn't even be debating this with you.

Fuck off. I don't see any reason to answer the question. People with seriously impeded intelligence similar to that of a canine exist, your dog-genius does not. If you want to end the debate now, then say so.

Heaven forbid you actually justify your premises.

Pot, meet Kettle.

If I keep you in a kennel, put a collar around your neck, and take you out with a leash, what am I punishing you for?

Nothing that I know of, hence the reason it's unethical. Do you think it's ethical to inflict actions that are considered punishment on any arbitrary person for no reason whatsoever?

If I hauled your ass to my station, booked you, and took you to the county jail for no reason, what would you consider that?

Damn, you don't even understand the claim, do you? It's not the case that it is not ethical to treat retarded people like dogs even though they have the same intellect as dogs, you subliterate protozoan. The thing that changes is that the intelligence drops; if you're too stupid to realize that, then I'm surprised you are even capable of writing.

I understand that just perfectly. You have failed to justify that intelligence dropping justifies a change in treatment.

Apparently, since you do understand what I'm writing, I'm also not "subliterate"

For fuck's sake, do you have any idea what logic is? The fact your implication leads to a true result doesn't say anything about the premises, you stupid little asshole.

You're talking about TREATING a human being IN A WAY other than the default, dipshit. The burden of proof is on you to show why we should depart from the default treatment of humans.

What are you, illiterate? Read the statement: you've given no evidence such treatment is always retribution for perceived crimes in the first place.

IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE you idiot! It only has to be generally used as punishment for real or perceived crimes.

By your standard of "always" prison is not punishment for crime because people have been imprisoned as POWs!

We're not talking about subjugating them, as your strawman so conveniently claims; we are talking about judging them, and it certainly does not cost time and effort to judge an entire race guilty, rather than judging each individual person.

Horseshit. You're changing horses in midstream now:

It's equally pragmatic to declare all humans with dark skin as vile criminals each worthy to be punished on sight; after all, the majority of prisoners in our jails are black.

Those are YOUR WORDS, you lying sack of shit.

That's no strawman on my part, that's you lying about what you posted so you can claim I made a strawman.

I don't take kindly to accusations of lying, you illiterate subchordate. If you weren't a retarded shitmonkey, you would understand the very words you emphasized in my quote constitute a judgment, you idiot.

1. I don't give a flaying fuck what you take kindly to. You a lying sack of shit.
2. "punished" is a verb, specifically in the past tense. It implies action, not mere thought.

pun·ish·ment ( P ) Pronunciation Key (pnsh-mnt)
n.

The act or an instance of punishing.
The condition of being punished.
A penalty imposed for wrongdoing: “The severity of the punishment must... be in keeping with the kind of obligation which has been violated” (Simone Weil).
Rough handling; mistreatment: These old skis have taken a lot of punishment over the years.

3. Judgement is merely thought or determination

judg·ment also judge·ment ( P ) Pronunciation Key (jjmnt)
n.
The act or process of judging; the formation of an opinion after consideration or deliberation.

The mental ability to perceive and distinguish relationships; discernment: Fatigue may affect a pilot's judgment of distances.
The capacity to form an opinion by distinguishing and evaluating: His judgment of fine music is impeccable.
The capacity to assess situations or circumstances and draw sound conclusions; good sense: She showed good judgment in saving her money. See Synonyms at reason.
An opinion or estimate formed after consideration or deliberation, especially a formal or authoritative decision: awaited the judgment of the umpire.
Law.
A determination of a court of law; a judicial decision.
A court act creating or affirming an obligation, such as a debt.
A writ in witness of such an act.
An assertion of something believed.
A misfortune believed to be sent by God as punishment for sin.
Judgment The Last Judgment.

4. Now you're just playing semantic games and attempting to ignore the dictionary definitions of words to get out of the lie, you lying fuck.

The judgment is equally pragmatic, because you don't have to waste time in either case deciding about outliers, a fact you'd recognize if you had the reading skills of a turnip.

Mere departures from the average are not "outliers" you nincompoop. It has to be far from ost other data points. Blacks who are noncriminal productive members of society are not "far from the norm". furthermore, the fact that there are more imprisoned black criminals than white does not mean the average black is a criminal.

Now you're just spouting racism to avoid admitting that your example was fucked up.

out·li·er ( P ) Pronunciation Key (outlr)
n.
One whose domicile lies at an appreciable distance from his or her place of business.
A value far from most others in a set of data: “Outliers make statistical analyses difficult” (Harvey Motulsky).
Geology. A portion of stratified rock separated from a main formation by erosion.

Oh my gosh; I can't believe you just claimed this. I think I'm going to sig this. You actually think a fetus' genetic makeup us human because it's gestating? What are you going to claim next, that an infant is human because it can't survive without immediate care from its mother and father? You think Terri Schiavo was morally equivalent to yourself? Then we shouldn't have unplugged her!

Holy fucking strawman. The fetus cannot survive AT ALL if it is removed from the environment of the mother. That essentially makes it part of the mother's body; hence the woman has the right to an abortion via control ove her own body.

Are you seriously trying to argue that human fetuses DO NOT have human genetic makeup?

Damn, you are stupid, aren't you? Are you trying to defend this man with the mind of a dog because you have the same intelligence? The reason a person who contributes nothing to the species won't have the same moral value as a person who does help it survive is because groups where people who don't contribute are not valued (like this board, for instance) prune them off and allocate resources far more efficiently than groups where people who don't contribute are valued.

Hey fuckhead, in such an ancient society, the moral code WOULD permit getting rid of the non-contributor. I never claimed otherwise; if I gave that impression or did so accidentally, I retract it right now. The moral code prohibits getting rid of them NOW that society is at the point where that individuals contribution is unnecessary for the continuity of the species and society.

In another post I pointed out that he first tenet of such a survival oriented moral code would be "no unnecessary killing" to prevent the deaths of productive members of the group. the second tenet would be "no mistreatment of others" in order to prevent fighting that would also kill or incapacitate productive members.

When modern times arrive, the moral code survives. It's no longer necessary to stop the killing of productive members of society for survival, but it's also still not desirable to allow them to be killed arbitrarily. Therefore we still have the basic moral code of "no unnecessary killing" and "no unnecessary mistreatment of others".

It's no longer necessary to kill the non-contributing retard because society has ample reasources and population, and there's no reason to mistreat him either. It's therefore immoral to do either.

If you strawman me one more time, I'm going to tear your testicles out of you through your abdomen, fucktard. I have never claimed lack of sapience removes one from the species H. sapiens,, you son of a bitch.

Don't play semnatic nitpick games and don't waste my time with threats of physical harm that are A) irrelevant B) immature, and indictive of a need to be an internet badass and C) you couldn't back up face to face in your wildest dreams.

you've been claiming we can treat the person who is mentally equivalent to a dog as if they were a dog. That's de facto removing them from the species. You're lying again and using semantics to make another bullshit strawman claim.

Fuck off, you wannabe logician

Here's the guy you've been defending:

<snip image for brevity>

Aside from your stupid "genetics" argument, he fits precisely the conditions laid out. Incidentally, the same logic applies to Terri Schiavo, as I pointed out earlier.[/quote]

So you lied again in order to create this contradiction. The conditions laid out were:

Let's consider a hypothetical situation. There is a man who has the intellectual capacity of a rock, but he's one of the prettiest guys you'll ever lay eyes on. Currently, every day, he's paraded out in front of a gallery of people so they can look at his body -- i.e., they treat him like a rock. Is this treatment justified?

You claimed "a man". That's not a man, it's a rock sculpture of a man. You're a lying fuck. An image of something is not the same as the thing itself.

And as I already pointed out, if an actual person had the intellectual capacity of that statue, their heartbeat and breathing would cease.

You don't care about honest debate at all; you care only about playing semantic games in an attempt to appear as if you're actually intelligent.

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

I see no reason to think any other species is morally relevant.

Because you don't know how to apply ethics consistently and universally. Need more training, you do.

No one is advocating a wild free for all where anyone can do anything, which will lead to the collapse of the human species. In fact, that would be decidedly anti-utilitarian.

No kidding.

Then don't bring up stupid irrelevant material.

We can invent an infinite number of hypotheticals. Who cares about hypothetical species? Any of these hypothetical aliens would be exhibiting characteristics that indicate they are human-like in ability to evolve a moral code. No existing species has done that.

They don't have to exist; they need only exist for the purpouse of the hypothetical. This entire scenario is hypothetical, so don't go pretending you don't like hypotheticals. There are no dog humans. Don't pick and choose.

In the absence of actual aliens, this is pointless nonsense.

Completely false. It is actually quite useful in proving the point. It doesn't matter if it DOES exist. If it did, it shows the extension of ethics for anyone who is logically consistent in ethics.

No, that's not how you weigh it. The humans are members of the human species that evolved the moral code; therefore all humans enjoy the protection of it regardless of individual properties. Chimpanzees cannot do so. If or when they can, the issue can be revisited.

That's not how you weigh it. I'm sorry I thought you were intelligent enough to apply ethical theory and principle. Oops. Guess ya can't.

You keep asserting that the mental capacity of the individual determines worth; I've seen no proof of that, just assertion.

It does. That mental capacity is intrinsically linked to their ability to feel, to think abstractly, and to be self-aware: everything that really makes an important difference between humans and dogs.

Tell me: do you think anacephalic infants, because they are human biologically (with HUMAN DNA!!!), are seriously more valuable than your average tree monkey? Hopefully not.

Yes, actually I do. Why should I give a rat's ass about the tree monkey

You have just proved my point. You haven't the foggiest idea what you're talking about. You don't even know what the above is, most likely. If you do, and you still say so, then you are acting like more of a fool. Perhaps you also think a hydatidiform mole is worth more than a chimp too. After all, it has human DNA, thus is technically part of the species.

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

Nothing that I know of, hence the reason it's unethical. Do you think it's ethical to inflict actions that are considered punishment on any arbitrary person for no reason whatsoever?

If I hauled your ass to my station, booked you, and took you to the county jail for no reason, what would you consider that?

This is a false analogy. He's not advocating doing anything to anyone for "no reason." However, your analogy is trying to tie his position to this very thing. You are essentially saying: treating the dog-human like his cognitive abilities represents is "for no reason." Hence, you can do whatever you want to him (a normal human) for no reason.

Check that premise. You will quickly find Surlethe never said "for no reason."

I understand that just perfectly. You have failed to justify that intelligence dropping justifies a change in treatment.

Apparently, since you do understand what I'm writing, I'm also not "subliterate"

Of course we have. It deals with sentience and sapience and their contribution to being able to experience, feel, and have preferences. A cockroach will never have a right to life because he cannot cognitively have that preference. He's not intelligent enought to have such preferences that reach into the future. It doesn't even know it exists! Most humans, however, do, and they do have the preference for continued life. Therefore, to maximize welfare preferences, we respect their "right" to life.

You're talking about TREATING a human being IN A WAY other than the default, dipshit. The burden of proof is on you to show why we should depart from the default treatment of humans.

Easy. If it is just like a dog, then it has the same set of welfare interests. You treat a dog like a dog because, when weighing interests, it does not have the level that humans do. You treat each organism according to its interests in comparison with your own. Since our interests vastly outweigh the dog (in most cases), we find in our favour. If they do not, you cannot. Not even all human interests count the same, so it's not true that you treat all humans the same.

You wouldn't be ethically expected to treat an anecephalic infant the same as a normal one, and even though those darn hydatiform moles are technically human DNA creatures, they do not attain moral personhood.

Please explain what moral personhood is. Oh, and you might want to google it. It doesn't = human being.

IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE you idiot! It only has to be generally used as punishment for real or perceived crimes.

By your standard of "always" prison is not punishment for crime because people have been imprisoned as POWs!

Ok. Let's apply your generalization love-affair. Most people think being whipped is a punishment. However, masochists love it! Ergo, whipping a masochist is a punishment, since it is a punishment for everyone else!

Oh wait...but..if they...enjoy it...and it fits their nature...it's...not..a...punishment! WOA! That totally blows your world-view of generalities.

Holy fucking strawman. The fetus cannot survive AT ALL if it is removed from the environment of the mother. That essentially makes it part of the mother's body; hence the woman has the right to an abortion via control ove her own body.

Are you seriously trying to argue that human fetuses DO NOT have human genetic makeup?

No he isn't. Your absurd argument though is that, since it is human, it deserves personhood rights and protections. Obviously, since no other elements you are listing and you are arguing against the only real, concrete reasoning behind attaching moral personhood to beings.

It doesn't matter that it cannot "survive" out of the womb. In fact, many can. And it occures earlier all the time. A fetus is another "human being" and according to you, has moral value because of that. You said it. Same thing applies to braindead terry schivo.

It's no longer necessary to kill the non-contributing retard because society has ample reasources and population, and there's no reason to mistreat him either. It's therefore immoral to do either.

Why would you kill the retarded kid anyway? That does not follow from anything either of us are arguing, yet you keep bringing it up as if it does. That's absurdly dishonest. If it's a dog, I guess you feel it's ok to do anything you feel like to it since it's not a moral "person." Hope you don't got pets.

you've been claiming we can treat the person who is mentally equivalent to a dog as if they were a dog. That's de facto removing them from the species. You're lying again and using semantics to make another bullshit strawman claim.

Nah. A quick DNA test would quickly show they are still part of the same species. You are merely removing personhood, which is a concept you obviously skipped in ethics school.

You claimed "a man". That's not a man, it's a rock sculpture of a man. You're a lying fuck. An image of something is not the same as the thing itself.

If you have a man that has the same cognitive capacity of a rock, there really is not morally significant difference.

[SVPD]

[Because you don't know how to apply ethics consistently and universally. Need more training, you do.

No, I just don't apply them in the way you think they ought to be applied. I disagree with what you are defining as "ethics".

If you'd like to agree to disagree at this point, I'm willing to leave it at that.

Then don't bring up stupid irrelevant material.

I'm not. You're dismissing it as stupid and irrelevant because it does not fit into your paradigm. You haven't given me any good reason to accept your paradigm as valid.

They don't have to exist; they need only exist for the purpouse of the hypothetical. This entire scenario is hypothetical, so don't go pretending you don't like hypotheticals. There are no dog humans. Don't pick and choose.

There are no humans that literally have a dog's mind. I was interpreting it as being a human so severly impaired as to be at a dog's level. (humans so severely impaired do exist) If you want to discuss some fictitious human with the actual mind of a dog, no, I'm not interested in discussing that either.

Completely false. It is actually quite useful in proving the point. It doesn't matter if it DOES exist. If it did, it shows the extension of ethics for anyone who is logically consistent in ethics.

Not really, since if the aliens did exist, they would, as species be able to understand our moral code, and we theirs, and thereby come to mutual understanding.

Let me clarify something: You are correct that mere genetic difference in and of itself is not that importan. For example, if dogs were able to think and communicate and otherwise function on the same level as humans, they'd be essentially human for moral purposes. So would the hypothetical aliens.

However, the genetic material of the dog does not give it human ability, even by accident.

The human with doglike capacity is the victim of some accident of nature or human action, and therefore does not have the intelligence that his genetic makeup should give him. he therefore is not the same morally as the dog, who is not the victim of accident.

That's not how you weigh it. I'm sorry I thought you were intelligent enough to apply ethical theory and principle. Oops. Guess ya can't.

Yes, i can. Just not in the way that agrees with yours. Do you want to agree to disagree at this point?

It does. That mental capacity is intrinsically linked to their ability to feel, to think abstractly, and to be self-aware: everything that really makes an important difference between humans and dogs.

The difference in olfactory capacity is not an important difference?

The fact that an individual specimen of humans does not posess these traits does not hange the fact that they are human. It is only through accident that they lack these traits. The dog lacks them as a matter of course. It is unethical to treat someone as nonhuman due to circumstances beyond their control.

You have just proved my point. You haven't the foggiest idea what you're talking about. You don't even know what the above is, most likely. If you do, and you still say so, then you are acting like more of a fool. Perhaps you also think a hydatidiform mole is worth more than a chimp too. After all, it has human DNA, thus is technically part of the species.

First of all, "part of the species" means a whole being capable of sustaining life processes through internal biological function; not as a result of the biological function of another's body (note: not the BEHAVIOR of others). A mole, a severed finger, or any other portion of a human body incapable of sustaining biological function is not part of the species; it's a piece of a member of the species.

Second, you have yet to answer WHY I should subscribe to the idea that differences in intellectual capacity between individuals are more important than thos e that describe the species as a whole. You have just claimed it's "speciesist" which is circular. Of course it is. So what?

Again, I ask: Is it ok to treat a person reduced to doglike intelligence via industrial accident as if they were a dog?

Is it ok to treat in infant reduced to such a level because of birth accident due to medical negligence in such a fashion?

[SVPD]

This is a false analogy. He's not advocating doing anything to anyone for "no reason." However, your analogy is trying to tie his position to this very thing. You are essentially saying: treating the dog-human like his cognitive abilities represents is "for no reason." Hence, you can do whatever you want to him (a normal human) for no reason.

That is not a false analogy at all. He asked:

If I keep you in a kennel, put a collar around your neck, and take you out with a leash, what am I punishing you for?

referring to me specifically, not the dog-person.

Check that premise. You will quickly find Surlethe never said "for no reason."

No. You need to go back and read the whole thing before you try and play logic professor. My comment regarding jailing him arbitrarily was in response to his comment about putting a leash on ME, not on dog-man. He asked if putting a leash on me was punishing me. I asked him the same question bck, although I changed it to jailing him.

Of course we have. It deals with sentience and sapience and their contribution to being able to experience, feel, and have preferences. A cockroach will never have a right to life because he cannot cognitively have that preference. He's not intelligent enought to have such preferences that reach into the future. It doesn't even know it exists! Most humans, however, do, and they do have the preference for continued life. Therefore, to maximize welfare preferences, we respect their "right" to life.

Yes, humans do. If an individual human does not, it is the result of accident.

Easy. If it is just like a dog, then it has the same set of welfare interests. You treat a dog like a dog because, when weighing interests, it does not have the level that humans do. You treat each organism according to its interests in comparison with your own. Since our interests vastly outweigh the dog (in most cases), we find in our favour. If they do not, you cannot. Not even all human interests count the same, so it's not true that you treat all humans the same.

The human IS NOT jsut like the dog. You keep tryingt to represent that as fact, and it is false. The dog is that way because that is the norm for dogs, the human is that way by accident.

All human interests DO count the same. You keep asserting that as fact; You have provided no justification for it that is not circular.

You wouldn't be ethically expected to treat an anecephalic infant the same as a normal one, and even though those darn hydatiform moles are technically human DNA creatures, they do not attain moral personhood.

Please explain what moral personhood is. Oh, and you might want to google it. It doesn't = human being.

I don't care what google says it is. As far as I am concerned it is a human being until and unless I'm given a good reason otherwise that doesn't involve unsupported circular assumption, which is all you've provided.

You have not yet said WHY mental capacity dictates worth, except to say that it gives self awareness et al that allow one to experience life. No kidding. All that says is that mental capacity has certain subfunctions that make it up. WHY does life have to be experienced to be worth preserving, when it is possible to do so without endangering other life?

Ok. Let's apply your generalization love-affair. Most people think being whipped is a punishment. However, masochists love it! Ergo, whipping a masochist is a punishment, since it is a punishment for everyone else!

Voluntary assent to something renders it no longer punishment.

Oh wait...but..if they...enjoy it...and it fits their nature...it's...not..a...punishment! WOA! That totally blows your world-view of generalities.

Not really, since you tried to ignore voluntary assent. Keep playing word games.

No he isn't. Your absurd argument though is that, since it is human, it deserves personhood rights and protections. Obviously, since no other elements you are listing and you are arguing against the only real, concrete reasoning behind attaching moral personhood to beings.

It doesn't matter that it cannot "survive" out of the womb. In fact, many can. And it occures earlier all the time. A fetus is another "human being" and according to you, has moral value because of that. You said it. Same thing applies to braindead terry schivo.

I did not say that. I said it DOES matter that it can't survive outside the mother, and explained why. All you're saying here is "your position is wrong because I say so". I said a fetus isn't a human (yet) because it can't survive. That's a criteria for humanhood. I'm pointing out a criterion for humanhood, and you're claiming it's not one because I stated another one! You're claiming I'm not lisiting other elements as an argument that the element I'm lisiting is not an element!

Why would you kill the retarded kid anyway? That does not follow from anything either of us are arguing, yet you keep bringing it up as if it does. That's absurdly dishonest. If it's a dog, I guess you feel it's ok to do anything you feel like to it since it's not a moral "person." Hope you don't got pets.

I have a golden retriever.

As for the "killing" you keep pretending that I haven't also said "no mistreating others" as part of the moral code, which would be necessary to prevent unnecessary fighting which would lead to unnecessary killing. I'm not claiming that either of you advocated killing the retarded kid; I'm showing that the moral code continues to exist, and protects him.

Nah. A quick DNA test would quickly show they are still part of the same species. You are merely removing personhood, which is a concept you obviously skipped in ethics school.

Fuck ethics school. That's a blatant appeal to authority. I see no reason to apply "personhood" a certain way because some school says so.

You apparently also aren;t familiar with the term "de facto" which means "in fact", and is also used to mean "for all intents and purposes". I said it would DE FACTO remove him from the species, not change his DNA, you strawmanning fucktard.

If you have a man that has the same cognitive capacity of a rock, there really is not morally significant difference.

As I pointed out, a man with that capacity would be dead and no longer of moral concern.

Furthermore, that does not change the fact that claiming "a statue of a man is " a man" is lying.

[b00tleg]

Is Morality Subjective?


http://www.doceo.co.uk/background/morality.htm

What is this paper doing here? My son was set this essay title at university, where he is reading philosophy. I made some suggestions and then it occurred to me that not only was it a silly question, but also therefore an unanswerable one. I began to reflect on similar questions I had myself had to answer, and also on how I had not been able to answer them in my own way because of the assumptions built into them and the marking scheme.

I learned my lesson early. In my GCE "O" level (now GCSE) English Literature exam I was asked a question about Wordsworth's "Ode on Intimations of Immortality..." (I can't remember the precise question.) I had recently been reading Aldous Huxley's "The Doors of Perception", and concluded that his account of the consequences of chronic hypoglycaemia—as I now know it to be—accounted well for Wordsworth's "There was a time/when every meadow, grove and stream/to me did seem/apparelled in celestial light" (The quotation is from memory and probably not correct). I used this argument in my answer. I failed.

I now know why. It was not because my argument was naïve, reductionist and positivistic (as it was, but what do you expect from an arrogantly precocious 15-year-old?) but because it could not be accommodated within the marking scheme. I was thinking "outside the box".

Ever since, I have thought about how I might tackle such questions if I couldn't give a damn about what a "marker" (or a marking scheme) thought of the answer—this was an exercise in doing it.

If you are in the position of setting and marking such essays, please get back to me and let me know the mark you would give this, and perhaps your comments. I'll publish the results (unless you request otherwise).


At one level, this is a silly question. Rather like, "Have you stopped beating your wife?" it begs the question. It assumes that the "subjectivity-objectivity" construct is a valid one to apply to the notion of "morality". Our human, social world is full of such socially-constructed entities. Every abstraction from experience is at a similar epistemological level: "justice", "politics" and even "taste" have the same status, but no-one makes much of a fuss of their "subjectivity" or "objectivity" (apart perhaps from the old tag "de gustibus non disputandum est"). One might legitimately ask why this question is asked about morality. One could go further and suggest that it is simply a device invented by philosophers to justify their existence in an age which has rendered largely irrelevant their speculative reasoning.


Having said that, what follows is a serious attempt to answer the question:


First, it is necessary to define the terms as they will be used in this essay. Both "morality" and "subjectivity" (not to mention "is"), are endlessly contentious ideas, so any definition has to be pragmatic and stipulative.


"Morality" will be taken to mean, "a set of implicit or explicit rules governing the relations of humans with their environment". The term "environment" has been chosen to cover everything which surrounds a human actor over which he (or of course, she) may have some influence, but not necessarily control. It is everything his action or inaction may affect, and of course includes other people.


"Subjective" or "subjectivity", will mean, "originating from ideas in people's heads, as opposed to material which exists independently of human perception"; the latter part of the definition may stand as "objectivity". The issues of solipsism and Bishop Berkeley-type sophistry will be ignored for present purposes. As we shall see, the issue of whether the "ideas in people's heads" are individual or communal is fraught but important.


"Is" cannot be ignored, though. It implies equivalence, or at least the "possession" of a "quality". If the latter, the issue is whether the quality is a defining or accidental quality. If the quality is deemed accidental, the question is trivial: the answer is clearly "yes", because empirically people interpret morality differently. If the quality is defining, on the other hand, the question is more interesting: that is the sense in which it will be taken in this essay.



It is next worth asking what the consequences are of answering "yes" or "no" to the question. If the answer is "yes", morality becomes a matter of taste; there is no firm place on which to stand in order to debate it. If the answer is "no", there is still an open question as to what its objective sources are.



Finally, there is the question of just how this question might be answered. It is posed within the discourse of "philosophy", which is the epitome of what Oakeshott (19??) called a "conversation acrosss the ages". But can it be answered within that discourse? Following Gödel (see Hofstadter, 1980), the axioms of even the most formal and abstract systems of thought, i.e. mathematics, cannot be proven from within the system. It may therefore be necessary to appeal to pragmatic and experimental disciplines to essay an answer; rational cerebration is not enough.



Indeed, the traditional modus operandi of academic philosophy is to critique the arguments of prior thinkers on the topic. This generally implies acceptance of their underlying assumptions—or at least taking them seriously enough to argue with them. Thus, debating the validity or utility of Plato's doctrine of ideal forms accepts the limitations of his discourse, which lacked the notion of the scientific method, not to mention specific psychological data on the formation of schemata.



(I might here embark on a [philosophical?] digression about the arbitrariness of traditional academic disciplines and what they accept as legitimate methods, but I shall forebear in the interests of the present argument.)



The status of the concept
What is "morality"? I have defined it above for the purposes of this discussion, but what kind of concept is it? It is clearly not a "scientific" concept. Its existence cannot be demonstrated by experiment, and indeed it is problematic to conceive of the kind of evidence which would count in demonstrating even its existence—never mind its nature. Nevertheless it is a compelling notion.



Is it an "emergent" property? Relatively recently, scientific investigation has moved away from naïve reductionism which maintains that phenomena are "nothing but" their observable components, to a recognition of the properties of their organisation. One consequence of this shift has been the increasing acknowledgement of the differing "ranges of convenience" of forms of discourse. While sub-atomic physics, for example, may be the most basic of scientific disciplines, it has nothing at all to say about sound or turbulence in fluids, which occur at a quite different level.



The discourses of the philosophers (with, as ever, the conspicuous exception of Nietzsche) for the discussion of morality have been metaphysical (broadly the objectivists from Aristotle onwards) or linguistic (more recent subjectivists). The limits of language in this case are however, as the later Wittgenstein suggests, analogous to the limitations of technology in relation to physics: they constrain our attempt to get at the (hypothesised) underlying "truth", rather than reveal it.



This discussion takes us in the direction of Moore's dictum that one cannot derive and "ought" from an "is", which is itself a development from Hume's "naturalistic fallacy". Surely all this amounts to is the contention that the sources of morality need to be sought outside the purely philosophical discourse?



There are currently several candidates. That attracting much interest at the moment is the argument from evolutionary psychology, expressed most clearly by Wright (1994). Originating from the arguments of Leto and Cosmides (19??) as a refinement of those of E O Wilson (19??), this maintains that moral imperatives have their root in traits which were formerly functional for the survival of gene pools under conditions of natural selection. Thus, most clearly, bonds of familial obligation are submitted to have their basis in efforts to ensure the survival of a group with which an individual shares a large proportion of genes. The same mechanism would account for hostility towards outsiders and strangers. They thus develop a biologically based view of "human nature", which provides the parameters of any further discussion of the nature of morality.



Wright (2000) has extended this argument by appeal to game theory, as developed principally by von Neumann and Morgenstern (1944). Game theory identifies the distinction between "zero-sum" and "non-zero-sum" games (of which the most famous example is the "Prisoner's Dilemma"—see Axelrod, 1990). In zero-sum games such as football, one side can only win at the expense of the other. In non-zero-sum games, both can win, one can win at the expense of the other, or both can lose. A major determinant of strategy in such situations is the value of "w", which refers to the probability of the recurrence of the situation. Axelrod conducted a series of computer-based simulations of the game, inviting a range of social and "hard" scientists and philosophers to submit candidates for the optimum strategy. It turned out to be "TIT for TAT", a strategy which accurately accounts not only for human and mammalian behaviour, but also that of bacterial colonies.



Wright goes on to argue convincingly that trade, which embodies such non-zero-sum principles, is the major civilising influence in the history of humankind. Trade is based on a sophisticated understanding of the limits of trust, and it can readily be argued that the facilitation of trust is at the core of "morality".



If that is the case, is morality based in biology? If it is, then is it not objective? Yes, but...



This argument simply suggests that a morality, one possible morality, may be founded on biology and systems theory. This morality merely suggests loyalty to one's relatives and discrimination against outsiders, tempered by the need to preserve co-operation with those with whom you may have to deal again. Anything goes, for example, in one-off encounters with strangers, including murder. While this may be a pessimistically reasonable account of how some people live, moral codes in sophisticated societies go a lot further, and not merely because of the greater compexity of the society.



Wright (2000) argues that "civilisation" effectively expands the unit of interaction further. From individuals and families the calculus of fair trade extends to tribes, and to states, and ultimately to global communities. While his historical and pragmatic case is persuasive, it remains contingent. Huntington's (1996) vision, on the other hand, postulates a bifurcation (or trifurcation) of the content of moral systems between clashing civilisations.



This twist in the argument introduces a further complication. The idea of a morality itself may be objective, but it is a (relatively) empty box. Particular moralities are a different matter. Western liberals are appalled by Sharia law, and the treatment of animals in the Far East. Some Muslims in the UK are offended by the directionless self-indulgence of the native population; and even within Islam there is considerable divergence about the rights of women.



The content of any given moral code, therefore, cannot be claimed to be universal or objective. Does that mean that is "subjective"?



This introduces an alternative perspective, derived from anthropology and sociology, which regards that which is labelled as "moral" as being in conformity with the rules of a game (with a slightly different usage from von Neumann and Morgenstern) which is the defining characteristic of a "culture".



In their seminal text, Berger and Luckmann (1967) develop the idea of the "social construction of reality". They postulate a process in which ideas are "externalised"—their consequences assume a social reality through institutions or customs; they are "reified" or "objectified" through the accretion of power to those institutions or customs; and then subsequently "internalised", becoming the taken-for-granted parameters of action for subsequent generations (even, in the current climate of rapid change, within the same generation).



This model suggests that moral systems acquire an apparently objective status through "custom and practice". The argument may be extended to maintain that adherence to a particular moral system becomes a defining characteristic of particular social groups: the virtue (itself of course a concept within moral discourse) of the system becomes its contribution to social cohesion within a community. The origin of the morality is largely irrelevant: it may be the product of submission to a revealed truth of unassailable authority (which is what "Islam" means), or a complex negotiation of political interest (implied by Bentham's "hedonic calculus", for example). At some stage it passes a critical point, indicated largely by its instantiation in educational values and law including the regulation of trade, and nowadays in the very programming of communication and data management, which transmutes it from individual or community preference to what Gramsci termed "ideological hegemony". At this point it acquires the defining feature of a moral code, that people within the community can unselfconsciously refer to what "should", "ought to" or "must" be the case.



It may not be objective, but it might as well be.



References
Axelrod, 1990

Berger and Luckmann (1967)

Huntington's (1996)

Oakeshott (19??)

Hofstadter, 19??

Leto and Cosmides (19??)

E O Wilson (19??)

von Neumann and Morgenstern (1944)

Wright (1994)

Wright (2000)

[SirNitram]

[Because you don't know how to apply ethics consistently and universally. Need more training, you do.

No, I just don't apply them in the way you think they ought to be applied. I disagree with what you are defining as "ethics".

If you'd like to agree to disagree at this point, I'm willing to leave it at that.

Here's a hilarious statement indeed. 'I don't have to be consistant because I don't agree with you'. Oh, and it even has the trite, pussified, 'Let's agree to disagree!' bullshit attempt to run away.

[Surlethe]

Fuck off. I don't see any reason to answer the question. People with seriously impeded intelligence similar to that of a canine exist, your dog-genius does not. If you want to end the debate now, then say so.

Blow me, dipshit. If you're too fucking stupid to understand the purpose of a thought exercise, I'm impressed you're even capable of breathing.

Heaven forbid you actually justify your premises.

Pot, meet Kettle.

Apparently, you're afraid of some sort of infinite "why" loop, which would, of course, imply circular logic of some sort; and that, in turn was an evasion after being called out for throwing around fallacy names without understanding them. In short, you're being a dishonest bullfucker.

If I keep you in a kennel, put a collar around your neck, and take you out with a leash, what am I punishing you for?

Nothing that I know of, hence the reason it's unethical. Do you think it's ethical to inflict actions that are considered punishment on any arbitrary person for no reason whatsoever?

If I hauled your ass to my station, booked you, and took you to the county jail for no reason, what would you consider that?

Wrongful imprisonment, genius, not punishment. You haven't given me a reason treatment like that is always punishment even to ordinary humans.

Damn, you don't even understand the claim, do you? It's not the case that it is not ethical to treat retarded people like dogs even though they have the same intellect as dogs, you subliterate protozoan. The thing that changes is that the intelligence drops; if you're too stupid to realize that, then I'm surprised you are even capable of writing.

I understand that just perfectly. You have failed to justify that intelligence dropping justifies a change in treatment.

Apparently, since you do understand what I'm writing, I'm also not "subliterate"

You have created a distinction between a dog and a man with the mind of a dog based on nothing more than superficial characteristics, and you have attempted to establish those characteristics as morally meaningful though a series of sweeping generalizations and fallacious appeals.

For fuck's sake, do you have any idea what logic is? The fact your implication leads to a true result doesn't say anything about the premises, you stupid little asshole.

You're talking about TREATING a human being IN A WAY other than the default, dipshit. The burden of proof is on you to show why we should depart from the default treatment of humans.

Because the man is not a default human, motherfucker. You have given absolutely no reason beyond superficial characteristics to extend different moral statuses to a dog and a human with a dog's mind.

What are you, illiterate? Read the statement: you've given no evidence such treatment is always retribution for perceived crimes in the first place.

IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE you idiot! It only has to be generally used as punishment for real or perceived crimes.

You can take your sweeping generalization and shove it up your shit-encrusted ass right alongside your head, troll; do you not understand why it's fallacious to take a general rule and declare that a specific circumstance follows that rule?

By your standard of "always" prison is not punishment for crime because people have been imprisoned as POWs!

Of course it's not always punishment for a crime, precisely because people have been imprisoned as POWs, genius.

1. I don't give a flaying fuck what you take kindly to. You a lying sack of shit.

2. "punished" is a verb, specifically in the past tense. It implies action, not mere thought.

<snip irrelevant bullshit>

4. Now you're just playing semantic games and attempting to ignore the dictionary definitions of words to get out of the lie, you lying fuck.

Crawl back under your bridge, you spastic little troll. Your semantics whoring isn't fooling anybody; the words you emphasized are "each worthy to be punished on sight". Do you not fucking understand how that is a judgment instead of an action? How hard is it to realize that declaring something worthy of an action is a a judgment? By the very definition you quoted: "The act or process of judging; the formation of an opinion after consideration or deliberation." You're so dishonest, you post definitions without reading them first!

The judgment is equally pragmatic, because you don't have to waste time in either case deciding about outliers, a fact you'd recognize if you had the reading skills of a turnip.

Mere departures from the average are not "outliers" you nincompoop. It has to be far from ost other data points. Blacks who are noncriminal productive members of society are not "far from the norm". furthermore, the fact that there are more imprisoned black criminals than white does not mean the average black is a criminal.

Now you're just spouting racism to avoid admitting that your example was fucked up.

This is a valid point about the stated premise of my analogy, but my conclusion regarding pragmatism still stands: racism, or any other system which relies on generalizations, quite alleviates the need to waste time and effort on determining who ought to be treated in what way.

Oh my gosh; I can't believe you just claimed this. I think I'm going to sig this. You actually think a fetus' genetic makeup us human because it's gestating? What are you going to claim next, that an infant is human because it can't survive without immediate care from its mother and father? You think Terri Schiavo was morally equivalent to yourself? Then we shouldn't have unplugged her!

Holy fucking strawman. The fetus cannot survive AT ALL if it is removed from the environment of the mother. That essentially makes it part of the mother's body; hence the woman has the right to an abortion via control ove her own body.

Are you seriously trying to argue that human fetuses DO NOT have human genetic makeup?

Only you would think so, you retarded ass. You claimed a fetus possesses genetic material because it resides in the mother's body, implying that it doesn't have any in its own right, to try to weasel your way out of having to explain why, in your moral system, a fetus doesn't posses the same basic rights as an adult.

Damn, you are stupid, aren't you? Are you trying to defend this man with the mind of a dog because you have the same intelligence? The reason a person who contributes nothing to the species won't have the same moral value as a person who does help it survive is because groups where people who don't contribute are not valued (like this board, for instance) prune them off and allocate resources far more efficiently than groups where people who don't contribute are valued.

<snip for space>

It's no longer necessary to kill the non-contributing retard because society has ample reasources and population, and there's no reason to mistreat him either. It's therefore immoral to do either.

What makes you think that because there's no reason to do something, it's immoral? That's the fundamental assumption of your little exposition, and it has no basis. Furthermore, you're ignoring the point that moral codes will value people who don't contribute less than people who do.

If you strawman me one more time, I'm going to tear your testicles out of you through your abdomen, fucktard. I have never claimed lack of sapience removes one from the species H. sapiens,, you son of a bitch.

Don't play semnatic nitpick games and don't waste my time with threats of physical harm that are A) irrelevant B) immature, and indictive of a need to be an internet badass and C) you couldn't back up face to face in your wildest dreams.

Apparently, you don't understand hyperbole when you see it.

you've been claiming we can treat the person who is mentally equivalent to a dog as if they were a dog. That's de facto removing them from the species. You're lying again and using semantics to make another bullshit strawman claim.

Fuck off, you wannabe logician

You're a waste of air, you imbecile. You have yet to establish why assigning different moral values to individuals somehow removes them from the species; according to your logic, criminals are de facto inhuman.

Here's the guy you've been defending:

<snip image for brevity>

Aside from your stupid "genetics" argument, he fits precisely the conditions laid out. Incidentally, the same logic applies to Terri Schiavo, as I pointed out earlier.

So you lied again in order to create this contradiction. The conditions laid out were:

Let's consider a hypothetical situation. There is a man who has the intellectual capacity of a rock, but he's one of the prettiest guys you'll ever lay eyes on. Currently, every day, he's paraded out in front of a gallery of people so they can look at his body -- i.e., they treat him like a rock. Is this treatment justified?

You claimed "a man". That's not a man, it's a rock sculpture of a man. You're a lying fuck. An image of something is not the same as the thing itself.

My bad; I was somewhat imprecise in my language. However, it possesses all the superficial characteristics of a human; why shouldn't it be considered as one? And what about Terri Schiavo? Are you going to inveigh her termination, as your moral code dictates you should?

And as I already pointed out, if an actual person had the intellectual capacity of that statue, their heartbeat and breathing would cease.

You don't care about honest debate at all; you care only about playing semantic games in an attempt to appear as if you're actually intelligent.

You can suck my cock, you strawmanning, generalizing, illiterate semantics whore. You have no valid arguments which can demonstrate superficial characteristics are valid in moral comparisons, and you continue to dishonestly distort my statements and evade my points.

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

Ok. Let's see if we can fix this communication problem you seem to be having.

Quote:
Nah. A quick DNA test would quickly show they are still part of the same species. You are merely removing personhood, which is a concept you obviously skipped in ethics school.


Fuck ethics school. That's a blatant appeal to authority. I see no reason to apply "personhood" a certain way because some school says so.

You apparently also aren;t familiar with the term "de facto" which means "in fact", and is also used to mean "for all intents and purposes". I said it would DE FACTO remove him from the species, not change his DNA, you strawmanning fucktard.

This isn't an appeal to anyone's authority. It's trying to get you to go look up the concepts relevant to this ethical discussion. In any debate, you ought to at least have a passing familiarity with the ethical terminology. In any discipline, there exists jargon you need to know to converse intelligently in that field. In ethics, you need to know personhood and the various definitions of it.

I said apparently you missed that concept in school. This isn't an appeal to authority. It's stating "you don't know the definition and concepts." It is obvious you do not, since you are totally glossing over the entire concept and definition of personhood, which does not mean "human." I use a thought experiment to clairify this, but you ignore it because you dislike "hypotheticals." You don't understand the point and purpouse of hypothetical situations which is clear from your treatment of Surlethe's.

You are also wrong in that it doesn't even defacto remove him from the species. It merely removes him from personhod. Now, if you understood the concept behind personhood, you would understand the difference between them.

I have a golden retriever.

As for the "killing" you keep pretending that I haven't also said "no mistreating others" as part of the moral code, which would be necessary to prevent unnecessary fighting which would lead to unnecessary killing. I'm not claiming that either of you advocated killing the retarded kid; I'm showing that the moral code continues to exist, and protects him.

Sure you have mentioned no "mistreating others." That also doesn't follow as much as your "killing wildly" comment follows. THere is no "mistreatment" either. To understand why, you would have to understand the concept of Utility and "equality of interests." I already explained that most Humans are senstient creatures, but they have a high degree of sentience to the point of Self-Awareness. This means they have very advanced (and a large quantity) of preferences. Ok?

Your average dog has far more limited preferences and interests. However, there are some areas in which Humans and Dogs have similar welfare interests. There are some areas in which they are different. Many of the differences in interests and preferences stem from the intelligence/sentience levels of the two organisms. Some would exist even if the dog were on the same intelligence as the man.

Any ethical theory must have at least two criteria:

1. Objecive goals
2. Universalizability

In the dogboy/normal human scenario, the latter is the critical criterion at hand. In order to be consistent and meet universalizability, all relevant moral criteria that govern personhood or the weighing of intersts must be applied to all beings that fit those criteria. This means that dogs and cats and other animals are on the same relative level of intrinsic moral value. Humans, though, due to their vast sentience, have greater moral value (again, because they have more interests, higher quality, more to lose).

However,

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

Damn. Browser quit on me.

Continue:

You don't want to generalize, because that would defeat the entire purpouse of personhood. Not all members of a species will make the cut and attain personhood rights. Rights are arbitrary things we give or hand out when they reach certain levels of cognitive ability. For example: why do you think Humans have a right to life?

Humans have a right to life because they have an INTEREST in continued living. Unlike some other animals, the high degree of sentience of Humans allows them to comprehend they exist independent of others; that they are individual units that exist over time (past, present, future). They can look foreward to the future, make plans, have foreward moving interests. Simply, they got an "interest" in continued life. Other animals that do not exhibit these characterists would have no continued desire for life, make future plans. (This depends on their proximity to the human level of cognitive development).

This is why a rat does not have a right to life. They do, however, have basic moral, just like cats. They have an aversion to pain and basic welfare intersts, regardless of their more temporal, immediate interests.
It really makes no sense to say that something has a right to life if it cannot even desire that life or continued life. We don't give a shit about the plant because it has no interests it formulates; it has no desire for continued life. You cannot violate the "life interest" of a plant because it has none!

Let's compare this to humans. Humans often do have a continued life interest. They are self-aware, rational beings. This cognitive level is one major reason why they have a "right" to life. Same thing with property. WE have a "right" to property because we have a desire or a "preference" or an "interest" to own property. We have a right to free speech for the same reason. It would never make sense to say a dog has a right to free speech, a right to life, or a right to anything other than what is directly related to its specific type of interest sets.

Now, let's apply this to Surlethe's rockman example. The statue has no interests. It has not that capacity. It's like the plant, just not alive at all. On the otherhand, the "rockman", although human, has no capacity either. It makes no sense to give someone who has the mental capacity of a rock a right to anything. It has no personhood, as neither do dead people or people who are PVS or braindead.

Now, let's look at the dogboy once more. Personhood is a concept that gives certain core rights and privlidges to the being who has them. Again, beings have rights insofar as they have the capacity to have that preference/interest/desire in the first place. The dog has no right to life or a right to property or free speech as far as I am aware. Someone please correct me, but I have never seen any legitimate ethical claim to a beagle's those, because I have been taught they don't possess that level of cognitive ability. It does, however, have interests: it can feel pain, experience pleasure. It is sentient. Many animals can, although they do not have personhood rights, desire and have an interest for pleasure and evade pain. It would therefore make sense to give them some rights interests for that. It's more immediate.

Humans, on the other hand, due to their capacities, do quality for personhood and the core rights (most of which are enumerated in the UN declaration of HUMAN rights. Most of these rights are not given to other animals because those animals are not sufficiently like humans in mentality and cognitive development to even warrant respect of that interest. (Remember the plant and the rock). If, however, a dog WERE as intelligent and cognitively developed as a human, it would ALSO qualify for many of the same "human" rights, which are more accurately classified as "personhood" rights in modern ethics.

It also goes the other away. Since personhood is based on rational attributes, if a human is of the same mental capacity of a dog, it cannot formulate many of the interstests of other humans. It can some, yes. Therefore, it still deserves some. However, in areas in which its doglike cognition only allows for it to have similar interests to the dog, it should have those same interests respected.

It is not mistreatment, since to mistreat, you would have to do something against the interests of the organism. It's not mistreatment to fulfil the preferences and interests that come with the cognitive level. Most retarded people have the same welfare interests as other humans, so most of them qualify as persons. However, in many areas, a dog-human would not. That's an extreme level of retardation.

Cesteris Paribus, and without extrinsic factors to influence the moral calculus, you treat individuals EQUALLY where equality is due. Now, as I PM'ed you, even if there were a dog-equivalent human, as rare as that is, the human would STILL be treated as a human would in several areas. Nutrionally, for example. (This is unrelated to personhood rights). You cannot treat a human body like you can a dog. You are not supposed to feed humans dogfood due to the nutrion factor. Even without personhood, humans who are dumb as dogs still have welfare needs like other humans. They will never BE dogs. They only have some like interests and rights.

All human interests DO count the same. You keep asserting that as fact; You have provided no justification for it that is not circular.

They don't all count the same. The terry example is one example. Those that are incapable of said interests do not have to have that hypothetical, but nonexistent preference/welfare interest respected.

I have given a very non-circular, reasonable justificaiton.

1. Humans have X mental characteristics that give Y interests

2. Dogs have X.1 mental characteristics that give them Z interests

3. Sometimes their interests will coincide

4. Sometimes they will not

5. When discussing Utility, you weigh the moral Interests available

5. To respect universalizability and the principle of equality of interests, where various creatures have similar interests due to similar cognitive characteristics, you treat them with the same respect for those interests

It's not really that hard or unreasonable as you are making it sound. There was some obvious hyperbole going on earlier. You would not put a human in a kennel outside, because humans have no fur. Obviously, they have, in that regard, different welfare interests. However, many other interests would be the same (right to life, free speech, property rights etc).

I don't care what google says it is. As far as I am concerned it is a human being until and unless I'm given a good reason otherwise that doesn't involve unsupported circular assumption, which is all you've provided.

You have not yet said WHY mental capacity dictates worth, except to say that it gives self awareness et al that allow one to experience life. No kidding. All that says is that mental capacity has certain subfunctions that make it up. WHY does life have to be experienced to be worth preserving, when it is possible to do so without endangering other life?

Ok. So your telling me that you don't care what google says an anacephalic infant or a hydatiform mole is? Correct? All that matters to YOU is that it is human. Ok.

An anecephalic infant is one that's born without the majority of its brain. It cannot think. It can't do anything but stay alive like a terry schivo automaton. It's totally useless.

A hydatiform mole is a partially formed, parasitic human fetus. It is "superficially human" and has living material and human DNA. Therefore, it has personhood rights according to you becaues it is technically human. I even gave you the option of looking these terms up, since you are not familar with them in this debate. YOu basically told me to fuck off and you didn't "want" to look them up.

This is a hydatiform fetus



You don't care though. It's still technically a human fetus! Sentience doesn't matter!

As I pointed out, a man with that capacity would be dead and no longer of moral concern.

Furthermore, that does not change the fact that claiming "a statue of a man is " a man" is lying.

Sure he counts. He's sitll human! Dead people should count in your moral calculus too. They are human! You specifically said: membership in homo sapiens is what matters for personhood. Go check above and then backpeddal.

Sorry chump. I tried to give you a chance.

[SVPD]

<snip whining bitching lying and semantic game playing snip>

Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. You got caught in 3 lies, and you just keep making up bullshit and playing semantic games to get out of it. You don't believe in honest debate. You want to simply ask questions and have someone answer them while treating your own position as fact needing no defense. When you're ready to give up the double standard, let me know.

[Edi]

<snip whining bitching lying and semantic game playing snip>

Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. You got caught in 3 lies, and you just keep making up bullshit and playing semantic games to get out of it. You don't believe in honest debate. You want to simply ask questions and have someone answer them while treating your own position as fact needing no defense. When you're ready to give up the double standard, let me know.

You're so full of shit that it's oozing out of your ears, and you seem incapable of ever admitting a mistake on anything. You're fooling nobody but yourself with these proclamations of victory and how you're so hard done by and oppressed. Newsflash: Trolls like you are oppressed here on principle.

Edi