They now prefer to be called Simian-Americans.
Whatever the moral or ethical value of a human, for the Zoo I’m sure it was cost effective to shoot the gorilla rather than risk losing a lawsuit in the event it tears the kid’s face off.
I tire of the anti-Simianism in this thread. :mad:
There’s certainly a debate to be had, here. But this ain’t it. Off to IMHO.
Also, lay off the personal remarks.
I completely agree that a gorilla’s life is and should be worth less than that of a human. If you have to choose between the two, the moral imperative is to choose the human. As OP observes, there is never going to be a completely satisfactory answer as to what level of sentience deserves to be treated as “human-like,” although we can say with great certainty that a gorilla’s sentience is extremely close to our own and therefore deserves greater respect than say, a cow.
HOWEVER, having said that, I also understand the frustration and outrage going on here. The killing WAS unnecessary, in the sense that some little shithead put himself in a dangerous position and thereby prompted the killing of the gorilla. I absolutely believe the intruder bears responsibility for the gorilla’s death and they should face criminal sanctions.
Hear hear!
My bets?
- Sociopaths, and
- People who have chosen not have children, and therefore will hate other people’s children as if the child’s existence challenges the childless person’s life choices.
I’m sure a minority of the people calling for the child’s life to be sacrificed are parents.
I like Max the Immortal’s comments about speaking about “priority” rather than “value.” Value seems a little out of place when talking about life,
Why does it have to be either/or? It’s possible to agree that it was necessary to shoot the gorilla to save the child while still being angry about the circumstances that gave rise to the necessity.
It’s good that the child survived.
It’s infuriating that the gorilla had to be shot in order to save the child.
Being angry about this situation doesn’t mean that we don’t care about the child or that we value animals more than humans.
I think the family should be billed for the cost of the rescue and the replacement for the gorilla.
I agree with this. But would add that if an adult human were dragging around an infant chimpanzee or infant gorilla without regard to its well being. The adult human would not be shot. He would likely be arrested for animal cruelty, but not shot.
That’s true, but it’s something built into our laws, and those laws don’t make distinctions based on the species of non-human either. So it’s fair to say the law places more value (not necessarily monetary) on human life than any non-human as a victim. But in the real life case that distinction is not there, when a human life is perceived to be in imminent danger the species of the perpetrator doesn’t matter.
This. They didn’t (and shoudln’t have) react any differently than if it had been an adult man threatening a child.
It wasn’t a question of relative value; it was a question of stopping the threat.
I’d argue that if there was an adult person in there molesting gorillas somehow, then the cops would be right to shoot him as well. Similarly, I don’t see any problem whatsoever with authorities shooting people who’d hunt chimps for bushmeat.
Is it indecent?
Someone’s else baby in the gorilla pit: “They shouldn’t have resorted to such violence! Have they no shame?!”
My baby in the gorilla pit: “I don’t care if you had to kill all the animals in the animal kingdom. Somebody should have saved my baby!!”
No - I suspect it’s modest.
I think this is one of the more insightful comments here.
Our original sense of morality didn’t derive from pure abstract concepts. Our moral instincts evolved pragmatically as part of the sophisticated mental package that’s required for cooperating with other humans in a complex society. We must police the cheats that would try to take more than they contribute, and we can’t have stealing and murder within the group, so we labeled undesirable social behaviors as bad, and sought to display our own virtue as * good* cooperative group members.
Of course, our morality has developed a whole lot since it first arose, we have well reasoned cultural ideals, it’s no longer just a purely pragmatic social tool. But, given its functional origins, it’s not a surprise that it “breaks” sometimes, and that we really have no consistent answer to why we’ll pay $5 for a cup of coffee, but we won’t contribute $5 to saving the life of somebody on the other side of the world.
And conversely, when the perpetrator is human, they tend to be punished as well, the severity of which is based upon the species of the victim. However when you have non-human attacks on other non-humans we typically don’t get involved at all, and let nature take its course.
Very well stated. There is building scientific evidence that species with advanced social structures (like elephants and dogs) have some level of understanding of the concepts of right and wrong and fairness. It’s not the same a morality but it’s the foundation for that intellectual ability. Just as how you described it with humans, it appears that the conceptual understanding of fairness develops from social structures that require individuals to cooperate in hunting, food gathering or caring for young.
I suspect that at least some of the decision had to do with the fact that people write letters to their Congressmen and the newspapers and gorillas don’t. But I support the decision of the zoo.
And I agree that the parents should be billed. If they can’t afford it, they should be forced to put on gorilla suits and sub for the gorilla until a new one is found. if you are incapable of keeping track of n kids in public, don’t bring n kids. These kids are probably some fun in restaurants.
Addressing the OP’s question, another thing I’ve run into in online discussions about topics like this is that religious people feel very strongly that God put animals on the earth for our use. They’ll even cite passages from the bible as evidence. And also there is the whole “God made man in his image” idea… the corollary being that God did NOT make animals in his image, therefore the logic goes that humans are closer to God than animals are.
I’ve run into this with people when I try to explain how we should respect animals and not abuse them. It’s a very tiresome argument so I stopped engaging in it. But it’s one of the answers the OP was looking for.
That’s a matter of law as well, the Law of the Jungle. Best not to get involved, humans have no special status under those laws.