I was watching a show on conservation, extinctions, etc., and they raised an interesting point - do we, as a human race, put ourselves above every other organism on the planet, collectively? Is that how we look at things deep down in our guts - it’s us or them, and we have no intention of letting them win? We feel bad about killing off other species, but not bad enough to put their welfare above our own comforts.
They were discussing the issues of poaching and animal conservation in areas where poverty is rampant, which always seems to be where the most endangered species are, and the discussion moved to how can we try to make conserving animals/birds/amphibians/plants a priority over humans trying to keep themselves from starving. My gut reaction to this is that there are 6.5 billion humans, and a double handful of tigers - tigers are obviously a hell of a lot more important than humans. This seems to be self-evident to me, but I have a feeling I am fairly alone in this.
How many humans would you kill to save a tiger? Would you see every other mammal, plant, and insect on this planet die off before you would visit harsh consequences on humans - like, for example, an entire Indian village killed because they just won’t stop poaching tigers? They poach the tigers because they are poor and starving and the tigers are seen as problems, and the tigers are also sold for their parts. If you kill the village of humans, the tiger isn’t a problem any more, and their poverty and starvation isn’t a problem any more, either. I think we’ve proved pretty conclusively that humans can’t co-exist with anything except cats, rats, and cockroaches - we’re just killing, consuming machines, and damn but we’re good at it. Will we make some sacrifices before we kill and consume everything, or will we just see every other organism lost?
I try to stay away from speciesism (the whole, ‘‘humans are superior to other living creatures’’ thing.) I try to be mindful that I am, in fact, an animal. On one hand, we have a basic instinct to preserve our own species. On the other hand, we have an advanced consciousness that allows us to consider the moral implications of this.
Do I think human life is more valuable than other forms of life? Objectively? No way.
Subjectively? Absolutely.
I also tend to assess this overall general perspective according to capacity for suffering. I believe the advanced consciousness and extensive amount of uncommitted cerebral cortex in humans results in humans having a higher capacity for suffering. Which is not to say that animals do not suffer–clearly they can and do, and the unnecessary suffering of any living being should be avoided at all costs. But when making moral judgments I think capacity for suffering is an important factor (FWIW, I feel the same way about abortion–it’s not the most popular perspective in the world, even Mr. Olives thinks I’m kind of a nut.)
You’re talking about poaching in an impoverished area. And I have to say I truly believe that until world inequality among humans is addressed, animals and nature are going to be fighting a losing battle. People, out of instinct, will do whatever it takes to survive, same as any animal. You put the most intelligent and moral and rational person in a survival situation and moral qualms about injustice and unfairness go right out the window. This has been demonstrated countless times–one of the most powerful being examples from Elie Wiesel’s ‘‘Night’’–watching relatives fight violently with one another for a scrap of bread–wishing that his father would die so he would not be held back. The moral part of us feels guilt for this kind of thinking, but instinctually it makes us no different from any other animal.
I guess a person’s feelings about this would largely depend on their religious convictions and their perception of what it means to be a human. I think what it means to be a human is to be an animal with an unusually large amount of uncommitted cerebral cortex. But I also think we are animals that form a part of the universe and if we are to truly find long-term solutions to suffering we must learn to live in harmony with our environment rather than exploiting it.
I am with you featherlou. I desperately wish we could slow and largely halt of population growth. We just keep on increasing our footprint on this one dear planet. We keep expanding and the rate is frightening. I know the earth can support even more people that we have now for a while, but is this a good idea? If we started reducing our growth and eventually reversed it, would it not be far easier to solve poverty, end suffering and preserve the environment? Would this not be better for all the humans and most of the animals and plants?
We could make this planet a paradise for all; or we can continue down our current path that can only lead to destruction.
I know, “God said be fruitful and multiply”, well you know what, you did, so stop being so damn fruitful! Besides according the Bible and Torah, he said plenty else that we do not do. Why do we have to keep following this one?
Agreed. And the number of people on the planet will only continue to grow exponentially. We need to be more conscious of our reproductive decisions and mindful of the way we distribute resources.
HIV
Flu Pandemics
Bubonic Plague
E-Coli
Pirhana’s
The Birds (No species really became extinct in this case, but it sure scared the hell out of that little town)
I’d be quite willing for those who think it should be ‘us’ to volunteer themselves for the soylent green factories. Changing the OP’s question: How many tigers should die to save a single human being? All of them.
Unless you are willing to sacrifice your family members, or other people you care about vs. some unknown Indian village then why should they die for your warped priorities?
I think she means on a 1 to 1 basic as there are 6,500,000,000 humans to about 6500 tigers in the world. One Tiger would appear to be more valuable than 1 human. Of course I know I am enough of a hypocrite to recognize the fact that the Tiger is not more important than a member of my family or one of my friends.
I should clarify that I agree with What Exit?. We shouldn’t breed ourselves to the point that nothing other than us can survive. It is the reason I have against more immigration into Canada. I think that ~30 million people are more than enough here. But that doesn’t mean that a bear who wanders into downtown Calgary shouldn’t be shot if you don’t have time to dart it properly.
“Important” in what sense? I can’t say I’ve ever read a learned philosophical treatise written by a tiger. Tigers may be important if you have spare hoofed mammals to kill off or if you want to watch something lick its own ass, but beyond that, they’re pretty useless. They eat, they shit, they make more tigers, and that’s it.
I would kill every remaining tiger on the planet by clubbing them to death with a pillowcase full of batteries to save the life of one junkie with AIDS.
People like you trouble me. Where’s this arbitrary line of what we’re supposed to save and what we’re supposed to not care about? Do we need to save the life of every chicken? How about jellyfish? Let’s say it comes down to the lives of an African village versus one endangered stinkbug, who wins?
What is it about tigers that makes them more deserving of life? Cuteness? Majesty? That’s about the most shallow reason imaginable to save another living thing. Hey, I have an idea! Let’s kill all the ugly people, since they’re using up too many resources, and then the pretty people can just stare at each other all day and enjoy their aesthetic specialness!
Since you seem to want to know how others feel about these things, here’s my take: we run the show. Humanely killing an animal is not in itself a morally wrong act. That being said, I believe that the needless killing of animals ought to be avoided, being that it is by definition “needless”. Still, even the lowliest human deserves more consideration than the brightest dolphin.
I’m tired, and I’m going to bed. I’ll take this on again tomorrow.
Well that is the problem and the only solution is to either slow/reverse the population growth of humanity or lose most large wild animals.
BTW, you cannot be more important that all the other humans, I know for a fact, that my Daughter, Son and Wife, 2 Sisters and Brother and Parents are all more important than I am and I know I must be more important than you.
So get of my lawn and by lawn I mean verdant fields and thriving forests.
Think of it this way: If there were 6.5 billion tigers, and a dozen of us, I promise you the tigers wouldn’t fret over making an afternoon snack of us. They’d have wholly forgotten about us by their mid-evening tongue bath.
You know what people like you trouble me. A completely useless junkie, that is probably more likely to kill another human than a tiger is worth more than all the Tigers left on Earth and you think featherlou has a problem. You scare me in your callousness. You scare me in your easy cruelty to animals.
