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Toddlers are unable to conceptualize so it is okay to kill them, right? They have no rights, correct?
Toddlers are human, and humans have rights. Their level of physical maturity does not change their Identity. Rights are designed and formulated by humans in agreement with other humans in order to facilitate coexistence and cooperation. Rights are derived from Man, By Man, For Man.
Toddlers are human, and humans have rights. Their level of physical maturity does not change their Identity. Rights are designed and formulated by humans in agreement with other humans in order to facilitate coexistence and cooperation. Rights are derived from Man, By Man, For Man.
You just said only beings that are rational get rights. You are contradicting yourself. If you are saying that because some humans are rational, all humans get rights is speciesist and illogical. It would make just as much sense for me to say some animals are rational and therefore all animals get rights.
Read the article in the link; it pretty much says everything I could possibly say about the subject.
I did read it. The author didn't actually give justification for why it is that rights only belong to creatures capable of reason and choice. He asserted it, many times, but never explained the justification for it.
Toddlers are human, and humans have rights. Their level of physical maturity does not change their Identity. Rights are designed and formulated by humans in agreement with other humans in order to facilitate coexistence and cooperation. Rights are derived from Man, By Man, For Man.
Not to mention toddlers have the inherent potential for conceptualization. They will eventually be able to conceptualize. Something animals will never be able to do, not even on the crudest of levels.
I did read it. The author didn't actually give justification for why it is that rights only belong to creatures capable of reason and choice. He asserted it, many times, but never explained the justification for it.
Do you have any justification for it?
Either you didn't read it or didn't understand it because he did prove it.
Either you didn't read it or didn't understand it because he did prove it.
I think you're trolling us. Either way, you've expressed your position, and you are unwilling to actually engage in any real debate about it. Pointing to an article is not sufficient to keep taking up space in the thread. If you wish to discuss the justification for the view that reasoning is part and parcel to rights, then I'd welcome it. Just pointing to an article and saying "He explained it" doesn't work, though.
The only difference is the ability to use language. Our phenomenal consciousness, which determines the level of experience we undergo, and consequently, our capacity to suffer, is simply a difference in degree.
Animals have first-order consciousness, which is what matters. In other words, they can experience the "ouch" as real pain. They can't think "Wow, that really hurt," but the experience of the ouch itself is enough to make their suffering real -- and something we should seek to avoid.
Your position really is quite crazy to me. You're essentially claiming that, because animals can't undergo propositional cognition, their experiences do not matter. That seems simply false on the face of it. Suffering is bad whether the creature can think "man, that's bad!" or not.
Only men have rights. Plants do not have rights. Animals do not have rights. Rights are a function of being human and intelligent and are designed to accommodate our social nature and our need to cooperate, since our physical skills are insufficient to guarantee our survival.
Animals are savage beasts that exist by tearing each other apart in a violent and primitive struggle to stay in existence. They don't use rights because they are not rational and cannot conceptualize. They simply eat whatever living thing is nearby, convenient, and will provide sufficient nutrients.
Man is able to use Reason to dominate animals and make them useful to our well-being. And that is a good thing and a behavior that needs to be expanded, cultivated, and improved.
Which is of course what has happened and will happen, regardless of irrational people who, because they hate other people for one reason or another, try to inflict their irrational over-identification with lower animals on others.
The only difference is the ability to use language. Our phenomenal consciousness, which determines the level of experience we undergo, and consequently, our capacity to suffer, is simply a difference in degree.
Wrong. It's not the only difference. Language is just the end result of conceptualizing. The set of concrete symbols we give our concepts. But it comes after, at least until we start making abstractions from abstractions. And both language and conceptualizing on any level is impossible to animals.
Not to mention toddlers have the inherent potential for conceptualization. They will eventually be able to conceptualize. Something animals will never be able to do, not even on the crudest of levels.
Correct, and rational.
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