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Originally Posted by tore
At some point, I think most of us have more concern for humans than other species animals simply because they are humans. This is what I think is wired as in it's been a general adaptive trait in our evolutionary history.
Culture can of course turn everything upside down and play havoc with what I just wrote, for example by the way it defines the "us" and "them" as you point out. This is something I of course am well aware of but chose to disregard as I don't think it falsifies my original assumption that we in general tend to elevate humans over other animals when it comes to moral considerations. I think holocaust and so on are examples that took place despite this capacity.
I'm talking about general trends here - averages - which I tend to assume is a given! Certainly there are cultures who treat certain people "worse" than animals and cultures that eat other humans, though I'm not sure in the latter if the role of humans in the diet is normally explained by them being regarded as food. There may be other cultural reasons why people want to be cannibals.
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I pretty much agree with your whole post, Tore. I think, though, that I feel people have a greater ability than you think to see other humans as useful, exploitable beings rather than as beings with inherent worth.
I've read that tribal humans (during our hunter-gatherer phase) would meet a person from another tribe, sit down and figure out if they were distant relatives, and, if not, try to kill (and eat) each other. I think humans generally care most strongly about close family...and sometimes even that breaks down.
People like to eat. Sometimes that just seems to be more important to them than almost all other concerns. The Neandertals' bones have a lot of cut marks in them...suggesting humans ate them, regardless of how similar they were to our human ancestors. I often think that if people could bring back the dinosaurs, people would just eat them, too.
Sometimes I feel we humans can be very selfish and self-centered and that bothers me when the result of our self-centered actions is to cause others to suffer.
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Originally Posted by Freebase Dali
I'd say that at the heart of matters I adhere to variants of relativism with personal caveats. But for practicality, I'm far more flexible.
Ultimately, I don't think anything is sacred at all, but there are many reasons why one should believe the opposite. Civilization depends on it. But stripping away all the societal obligations, the illusion of unity for anything other than survival, the technology, the politics, the religion, the morality, the ideals and the "intelligence" to understand it all.. we're just animals like the rest of nature's beasts. But since we are who we are, my accepted man-made morality includes only the simple rule of regarding other human life like you would your own.
If I were an animal out in nature with no better sense, I'd generally be doing the same.
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Everything you said, Freebase, is almost exactly what I would say about myself. I also don't think anything, ultimately, is sacred, but I have many reasons for my self-created morality. I do feel very much that I'm just an animal like the rest of nature's beasts. And I do try to treat other human life as I would my own. Thanks for answering!