Human is?

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I pretty much agree with Preacherman's definition of human being. When it comes to animals, I adhere to the humans first rule. I'd risk my best dog to save a worthless human. I'd kill my best dog myself if it would insure the safety of a human of unknown worth. Although I can't come up with a circumstance where killing my dog would help, having a hierarchy established eliminates the need to think about when the time comes.

Is it harsh? Maybe, but I'm not suggesting it for anyone else.


David
 
I would not kill a person for killing my pet, whether or not it was done with intent. I don’t put animals on the same level as humans. Lord knows I’ve killed my fair share of feral dogs and raised my fair share of livestock to be eaten.

I would however, use every available resource to have the crumb bum arrested and or locked up in a happy hotel if the act was intentional.:fire:

The one exception to this would be, if a BG killed my lab mix with the intent of getting to me or any other human member of my family. This act would earn him a .45 cal enema.:what:
 
Regarding the line between human and "critter":

I've seen ferrets do things that are just...mind-boggling. Like *lie*. I kid you not, they're capable of lying. I saw one do something bad, and just as she was about to get caught, dart into bed with her sister and pretend to be asleep to come up with an "alibi" :eek:.

But the most incredible such was a video taken by a ladyfert's owner to prove what he was actually seeing her do of her own free will. This guy was breeding ferrets on an amateur basis on his farm, so this was an unusual case of a full-tilt pet female ferret fully bonded with her human owner, and with a new litter. This is NOT common. Female ferrets that are bred must be kept in outdoor light only, otherwise they'll cycle into season too soon and die. So this guy went to a lot of trouble to set up one room in his house as natural-light only, for the ferts (males too, to keep them in the same breeding cycle).

Anyways, what this guy filmed was the female ferret dragging him to her nest, and then taking his hand in her teeth (gently), moving it over the baby ferts and making up and down motions right over them. She would keep this up UNTIL he petted the babies and played with them.

First, she had communicated via gestures of her own invention. None of this was "taught", she was acting 100% of her own free will. Second, she knew that being petted was enjoyable, and wanted to make sure her babies got some. And you can also imagine the level of trust involved.

Mama only weighed about 1.5 pounds.

:eek:

Other stuff: ferrets are NOT ever "food possessive/aggressive". A friend once brought his new kitten over to visit and not only did my two male ferts gently play with it, they were perfectly content to let it eat out of their food dish (ferts eat high-grade kitten formula kibble) either alone or while they were eating too. But, I've also seen video of a couple of ferrets that realized that the family German Sheperd WAS "food aggressive" so they played this hilarious game where they'd approach the dog's dish from different directions, and each time the dog tried to drive one away, the other would make a dash for the doggydinner :). They didn't actually want to EAT the dog's food, just "count coup" by stealing pieces and stashing 'em away. And when they made a score, both would happily jump around, regardless of which one succeeded in making the grab, proving that this was a true "joint venture" ganging up on the doggy :D.

I've seen ferrets move objects up against barriers so they can jump over.

I've seen them use "controlled force" against a dog that was being very rude, but not quite "committing assault". Felix didn't like being woke up and nudged all over by a Jack Russell Terrier, so he reached out and bit the dog's lip, NOT hard enough to draw blood or even make the dog yelp, just enough to get it's attention - then he let go and gave the dog a cold stare until it went away.

All this, from critters that can comfortably sleep in a large pocket. :scrutiny:

Plus they're ridiculously affectionate, will try and make friends with just about anything this side of a lizard, I could go on for days.
 
One of the background tangents for this question is about non-functional people. If a kid is born severely retarded, then that's decades' worth of resources which would other wise go to other kids of that same couple. It could, for instance, mean the difference between affording education for the other kids and not. Some propose that "society" take care of unwanted or forever dependent kids. Others suggest the same but via private insurance purchased against such eventualities. My question, to the medical profession and to the amature ethicists here, at which point would you pull the plug on someone who can't ever be independent or even self-aware. Nazis did away with a lot of people based on very loose definition of "non-viable", whereas some folks in the current US would like to keep everyone alive, even if the "person" has no brain at all. Where's the line...or does the person who pays determine that line?
 
Question by Oleg on the "Unaware"

Well it's a quality of life issue for the person. If you don't even know you exist, what does it matter if you stop exisiting?
I think it should be legal to end life/kill/terminate,(hatever term you like)
individuals who are unaware they exist.
No higher brain activity would be my basic marker.
That's if the family wishes it, not state mandated.

There would be be guidelines for those injured Vs. born damaged,how long before death allowed etc. done by a panel of doctors with no vested interest either way.

I hate to venture over here but from a practical, scientific and unemotional standpoint thats why I don't have any problem with abortion either.

BT
 
A human is what Preacher said. DNA proves it, yadda yadda. Human rights, such as that to keep and bear arms, were designed for humans. Do animals have rights? I haven't even ventured into this subject on my own yet, so I don't have a concrete position. Off-hand, I'd have to say yes. What are they? Hell, I dunno. :)

What is a person? Well, a person is defined by their personality. Animals do indeed have a personality. Just pick any two random cats and observe how differently they act. Jim's example is good.

On a personal note, I value all innocent life, and as such would be willing to defend my pets the same as my other human loved ones. If somebody comes into my house and is about to shoot my cat, I will shoot them first. Same as if they are about to shoot any other innocent human. They've proven themselves a threat to my physical well-being if they're willing to shoot my animals unprovoked, and as such should be ‘neutralized'. :D

Should we be able to pull the plug on somebody who isn't self-aware? Well, if they're truly not self-aware, does it matter? They're just a hunk of organic material going through some basic automated cycles. Do we even have the right to pull the plug on some innocent person without their consent though? Hmm... I dunno. If there is even a remote chance of recovery, then no. If it's biologically impossible to become a self-aware living thing at any point in time, yes. Same as my view on abortion I suppose. Until said fetus has any remote chance of surviving outside of the womb, it's a hunk of tissue that is the property of the mother.

Damn, I just opened up a can of worms, huh? :)

P.S. Views subject to change at any time. :p
 
I agree with Preacherman. As far as animals? I value my cats and cats / dogs I've had more highly than many humans I have encountered. Some clown in our area has poisoned 35 dogs (not 100 pct certain of the number). I have a few choice punishments in mind for this sob.

With regard to when to pull the plug on humans?

When I was in the boy scouts many years ago, we did a chirstmas party at a mental hospital. Talk about defective humans. Full grown adults with less IQ & common sense than I've seen in 18 month old babies. I'll never forget the retard who tried to bite my dad's hand. I've never seen a hand move so fast. These defective human are worthless, other than providing jobs for other humans.

Now, I fast forward about 6 years. Working at an amusement part, they had a program to put some of the less retarded to work. A couple were pretty bad. But one guy, I think he was 24 or 26, was oh so close to being able to function on his own. Just needed 1 or 2 more IQ points. He never could remember his locker combination / how to dial / use the combination to open it. I helped him when I was around. It was truly heartbreaking then and still is today, 25 years later. I still can see him. So close, yet so far.

Of course so call normal humans were stealing cash from the registers - I was amazed. Who really are the defective humans?

There is a time to pull the plug. Just do not give that power to Nurse Ratchet.
 
Perhaps the best definition of human is one that includes how an alleged human treats and considers other critters that appear or are not at the same physical or mental level the alleged human considers himself to be.

grampster :scrutiny:
 
Nazis did away with a lot of people based on very loose definition of "non-viable"
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I think you are missing the point. It wasn't just disabled persons. The Nazis chose to adopt a definition of "human" that would accomodate their belief system and practices, essentially making them morally unaccountable for their actions. Jews and Slavs were on the extermination list, thus they were defined as "sub-human". This had the effect of making mass murder more palatable for those Nazis who were squeamish about pulling the trigger. Afterall, murdering an innocent person can be difficult for someone with any modicum of moral fiber and the Nazis could not take the chance that some of their soldiers might have moral objections to mass murder. However, if you simply define someone as non-human, then it is not murder. It may be distasteful to machinegun thousands of sub-humans, but it is certainly not murder and once that moral hurdle is overcome, it becomes no more difficult than killing thousands of cattle that have mad cow disease. You feel sorry for them but you tell yourself it is necessary for the preservation fo your country, your fellow "man", your children. It also set the stage for societal acceptance of the overt mistreatment of Jews in the early 30's.

Defining your targeted enemy as less than worthy is the first step towards genocide and/or enslavement. On an individual basis, it is the precurser to murder in every case. The Japanese did it to the Chinese and Koreans, the American Southerners did it to the blacks, the Serbs to Muslims, and yes, we are doing it today here in the U.S. Man has always justified murder and always will. In the final analysis, one can justify anything as long as there is no objective standard by which we judge and are judged.
 
"Man is the only animal who laughs--or needs to."

To paraphrase PJ O'Rourke: With rights come responsibilities, animals have rights when they start taking out the trash.

GinSlinger
 
I've had this discussion before and have never found a clear answer.

There is no measure that holds up across the board: For example, if one chooses the simple DNA model, then you have to grant "humanity" to sociopaths, the brain dead, etc; who are totally without empathy or any of the other emotional, spiritual or intellectual components we think of as making up a "human."

Conversely, if we look to the emotional or intellectual components, then we'd have to grant humanity to some of the higher animals - surely, dogs are "self-aware" and display love, empathy, compassion, etc, and are at least as intelligent as a young child (anyone want to deny "humanity" to children?)

You can fall back on the spiritual definition, but that is the hardest to defend of all! It's wholly dependent on your religion or personal philosophy and can not be argued from an objective viewpoint.

I don't think there is a pat answer, but we must struggle with all of this anyway. Humans have rights and law codifies those rights, so humanity must be defined in some fashion.

Keith
 
This should help clarify! ;)

I think these are very intertwined with what's "Humanity"?

If we cut up beasts simply because they cannot prevent us and because
we are backing our own side in the struggle for existence, it is only
logical to cut up imbeciles, criminals, enemies, or capitalists for the
same reasons.
--C. S. Lewis (novelist and essayist)

People often say that humans have always eaten animals, as if this is a
justification for continuing the practice. According to this logic, we
should not try to prevent people from murdering other people, since this
has also been done since the earliest of times.
--Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904- )

All beings seek for happiness; so let your compassion extend itself to all.
--Mahavamsa (Buddhist)

When a man has pity on all living creatures then only is he noble.
--Buddha (563? - 483? B.C.)

Not to hurt our humble brethren (the animals) is our first duty to them,
but to stop there is not enough. We have a higher mission--to be of
service to them whenever they require it... If you have men who will
exclude any of God's creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity,
you will have men who will deal likewise with their fellow men.
--Saint Francis of Assisi (mystic and preacher)

Compassion for animals is intimately connected with goodness of character;
and it may be confidently asserted that he who is cruel to animals cannot
be a good man.
--Arthur Schopenhauer (philosopher)

"As long as people will shed the blood of innocent creatures there can be
no peace, no liberty, no harmony between people. Slaughter and justice
cannot dwell together."
--Isaac Bashevis Singer

"Until he extends the circle of compassion to all living things, man will
not himself find peace."
--Albert Schweitzer

The relationship between cruelty to animals and cruelty to humans
Out of 135 criminals, including robbers and rapists, 118 admitted that
when they were children they burned, hanged and stabbed domestic animals.
--Ogonyok(1979) (Soviet anti-cruelty magazine)

Cruelty has cursed the human family for countless ages. It is almost
impossible for one to be cruel to animals and kind to humans. If
children are permitted to be cruel to their pets and other animals,
they easily learn to get the same pleasure from the misery of
fellow-humans. Such tendencies can easily lead to crime.
--Fred A.McGrand (1895- )

Ask the experimenters why they experiment on animals, and the answer
is: "Because the animals are like us." Ask the experimenters why it is
morally OK to experiment on animals, and the answer is: "Because the
animals are not like us." Animal experimentation rests on a logical
contradiction.
--Professor Charles R.Magel (1920- )

Results from animal tests are not transferable between species, and
therefore cannot guarantee product safety for humans...In reality these
tests do not provide protection for consumers from unsafe products, but
rather they are used to protect corporations from legal liability.
--Herbert Gundersheimer, M.D., member, PCRM (Physicians Committee for
Responsible Medicine), Baltimore, Maryland, 1988

It is strange to hear people talk of Humanitarianism, who are members of
societies for the prevention of cruelty to children and animals, and who
claim to be God-loving men and women, but who, nevertheless, encourage by their patronage the killing of animals merely to gratify the cravings of
appetite.
--Otoman Zar-Adusht Ha'nish (1844-1936)

Nothing more strongly arouses our disgust than cannibalism, yet we make
the same impression on Buddhists and vegetarians, for we feed on babies,
though not our own.
--Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)

Suppose that tomorrow a group of beings from another planet were to land
on Earth, beings who considered themselves as superior to you as you feel
yourself to be to other animals. Would they have the right to treat you as
you treat the animals you breed, keep and kill for food?
--John Harris (1946- )

"A man can live and be healthy without killing animals for food;
therefore, if he eats meat, he participates in taking animal life merely
for the sake of his appetite. And to act so is immoral."
--Leo Tolstoy

For as long as men massacre animals, they will kill each other. Indeed,
he who sows the seed of murder and pain cannot reap joy and love.
--Pythagoras (6th century BC)

I have from an early age abjured the use of meat, and the time will come
when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look
upon the murder of men.
--Leonardo Da Vinci (1452-1519)

Can one regard a fellow creature as a property item, an investment, a
piece of meat, an "it," without degenerating into cruelty towards that
creature?
--Karen Davis, PhD
 
brookstexas,

Nice quotes. I've never been able to understand why "all living things" doesn't include plants. I suppose they just don't want to acknowledge that their beliefs actually require them to starve to death.

Plants have a right to life, too:rolleyes:
 
doesn't include plants
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Give them time. Haven't you heard the latest from the PETA types? They now believe that fish feel pain and thus suffer when hooked by fishermen. Trees will soon follow.

Kind of ironic when the only thing many human/animal rights groups consider "not human" is an unborn human fetus.
 
I guess this moves the question from "What IS human life?" to "What is the VALUE of human life?". The two are rather different...

To define human life is not difficult, scientifically. The definition I posted early in this thread is one that, in various slightly-differently-stated forms, is used by many scientists. However, defining the nature of human life in medical or scientific terms is not enough. For example, try getting a doctor or psychologist to define a concept like "love". They can go into the physiological and psychological effects of being in love, but they can't define the concept itself, as it can't be scientifically measured. Heck, they can't even define something like electricity! We use it every day, and can generate it, measure it, regulate it, etc., but there is still no clear scientific definition of what electricity actually IS.

When one tries to assign value to something, one hits a major problem - value can only be expressed in terms of something else. The value of a ham sandwich is directly related to a number of factors: what it cost in terms of its component parts, related costs such as salaries, rent of premises, kitchen equipment, etc. used to prepare it, and profit margin. All of these come together when the seller sets a price for the finished product. However, we now hit supply-and-demand laws... what if the street vendor a couple of yards away, lacking many of the overhead costs, can produce a similar ham sandwich for half the price? Which is more "valuable" to the consumer? He now measures the price of the sandwich in terms of health risk (the street vendor is somewhat more at risk), quality, size, etc., and then relates these to the value (to him) of the money in his wallet. If he's pretty wealthy, he doesn't have to worry about the cost, so he can buy the most expensive sandwich without worrying: but if he's counting pennies, obviously he goes for the cheaper alternative.

So, value is expressed as a function of production, and as a function of consumption. How do we relate these concepts to the life of a human being? Any child (healthy or not) is going to cost at least X thousand dollars to raise to adulthood. Food, clothing, shelter, education, sports and recreation, etc., all add up to a stupendous sum over the twenty-odd years that that child will be financially dependent on its parents. If huge medical bills are added to the equation, that cost may run into millions of dollars.

However, can the child's life be measured only from such a utilitarian standpoint - what it will cost? What about the intrinsic value of a human life? Is there such a thing as intrinsic value?

Obviously, being a Christian, I maintain that there is, indeed, intrinsic value in a human life, since that life is created by God in His image and likeness, and is destined to return to God. Others, who do not share this viewpoint, will doubtless disagree strongly with me. However, there is also a concept of "intrinsic value" in the world, which might be useful for a-religious discussion of this concept.

If one looks at a beautiful wilderness area (e.g. Yosemite, the Grand Canyon, etc.), one has to ask: is its beauty of importance only because it can be exploited for the purposes of tourism? In other words, if one could not bring tourists into Yellowstone Park, would it lose its value as a natural wonder, and be better used for high-rise housing development? Should the Grand Canyon be filled in, so as to make better farmland or urban areas, if its tourist potential could not be realized? Most people will immediately reject such ideas, insisting that the areas have a value in themselves, whether or not they are visited by others. In the same light: we have the mask of Tutankhamen in a museum in Egypt. Its weight in gold can be measured: the purity of that gold can be tested and quantified: and given the daily price of gold, we can thus fix a monetary value for that mask. However, is that figure (based solely on its metal content) really a true reflection of its intrinsic value? If we had the same weight of gold bars, next to the Tutankhamen mask, would we say that the value of both items was identical? I think not... I think we'd immediately say that the beauty, historical significance and archaeological rarity of the Tutankhamen mask makes it many, many times more valuable than its gold content alone would signify.

To apply this to a human life: how can we determine its intrinsic worth, when we can't see inside it? There are innumerable confirmed stories of people in long-term comas, who heard doctors and family members discussing their cases (even talking about switching off their life support systems), but could not respond or join in the discussions, or even give an indication that they were aware of their surroundings. There are many handicapped children and adults who cannot communicate, and seem almost catatonic: but how do we know what is going on in their minds? (I would say "souls", but some don't believe in them, so let's stay with the mind for now). If we can't accurately determine what the intrinsic value of that life is to the person living it, how can we presume to make a value judgement about it on their behalf?

Isn't there an intrinsic element here just like the mask of Tutankhamen? If I'm a grave-robber, I'd steal the mask, melt it down, sell the gold, and be happy. If I'm an archaeologist, I would have a completely different perspective - because I would understand value from the statue's point of view (if I can stretch a point to illustrate). I would realize that this mask is "speaking" to us of a long-forgotten dynasty, a long-lost history, and that this was far more important than the intrinsic value of the metal it was made of. In the same way, a handicapped person, no matter how badly handicapped, cannot speak for themselves, but we can't judge the value of their lives, because we can't see inside their heads to judge for ourselves.

I don't know if I've made my points clearly here... if not, sing out, and I'll try to do better!
 
I believe in an intrinsic value of human life. I also believe that an individual, by his actions, can reduce the intrinsic value of his life to zero or even a negative value.

As a nurse, I see an ethical dilemma at times with medical treatment: are we prolonging life or prolonging suffering? With many terminal illnesses and especially with the natural process of dying due to old age, we are prolonging suffering, often at the behest of well meaning but ultimately selfish family members. By prolonging suffering, I mean medical treatment that does not give any quality of life, does not give any hope of recovery or even temporary improvement, but rather has the extension of life as its only rationale.
 
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