Is human life much more valuable than other animals` life?

[I Ratant]

I think pretty much any non-human animal that is capable of bonding would save an animal of a different species that it had a bond with over a member of its own species who was a stranger. That is, assuming sufficient know-how and understanding of the situation to make that choice.

.
There's 4 dogs down the street.. A beautiful blue-eyed Husky, and 3 ankle biters.
The Husky loves to see me... the biters just bark.. one of them has all the aspects of a serious biter if it got loose.
The Husky will jump on the biters when they interfere with my petting it!

 

[RenaissanceBiker]

Extremely enlightening thread. I wish the opt outs were easy to recognize in the real world. Even then my instincts would save their sorry asses before an fn pet. JREF, I swear.

Except for Kentucky fans, I can't stand them.

I was going to say, "Welcome to the forum" but apparently you're quite the lurker.

 

[Emily's Cat]

One thing that I would like to point out is the difference in perspective, and the strength of dogma at play.

For those people who accept some degree of variable moral obligation depending on relationship, and who allow for the potential existence of pets within those spheres of value, there is an acknowledgement that each person's value assessment will differ.

For those that reject any non-human animal from the equation, there seems to be a nearly universal assumption of the right to pass moral judgment on the others, and to demean the value equations of others.

In other words: those of you who think that pets don't matter sure are dogmatic about assuming that your view is the only "right" view, and seem to have no compunction about implying that there's something wrong with those of us who allow that others might have a different value set.

 

[Cain]

A pet only matters if some human has given it a name. I'm not dogmatic about it, as I believe any name will do (i.e., it does not have to be a proper Christian name).

 

[Jekyll's Guest]

One thing that I would like to point out is the difference in perspective, and the strength of dogma at play.

For those people who accept some degree of variable moral obligation depending on relationship, and who allow for the potential existence of pets within those spheres of value, there is an acknowledgement that each person's value assessment will differ.

For those that reject any non-human animal from the equation, there seems to be a nearly universal assumption of the right to pass moral judgment on the others, and to demean the value equations of others.

In other words: those of you who think that pets don't matter sure are dogmatic about assuming that your view is the only "right" view, and seem to have no compunction about implying that there's something wrong with those of us who allow that others might have a different value set.

 

[Darth Rotor]

Is human life much more valuable than other animals` life?

Yes.

It must be so. No other animal came up with bacon.
(I'll give the bees credit on the honey, however ...)

QED

 

[PhilosophicalCaveman]

Perhaps value is subjective. To me there are two types of 'value'; a symbolic value and a physical value. I'm not sure I'm explaining my thought process properly in words, but think about it as money, we give it value though the object (stone/dollar bills) itself can be considered valueless or useless. An example of the other can be water, it is valuable because of its usefulness not its perceived use.
To assess the question it might be best to look at the latter, are we useful to the Earth? Do we contribute to the overall structure of life? As a species are we more useful than animals. I think if we group ourselves against other animals (though we are animals ourselves) then that answer will be that the other animals are more useful to life on Earth. If you place a human life against a random dog then more detail will be needed. That one human might be able to contribute more than a dog might.

 

[dudalb]

To the original question:
Yes.
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