If Human Beings Are Only Animals, Why Do We Care About Morality? (quotes, religion)

[Mightyqueen801]

Some of the posts above make me think "If human beings are only animals", that's a compliment!

[ncole1]

Originally Posted by jeffbase40

Morality has no place if that is your belief. You can spend your life helping the poor with no gain or pleasure or live it up like Hugh Hefner. In the end, both people become worm food, wiped away in the dustbins of time. One could argue that would be foolishness to not spend every moment alive in extremely selfish pursuits since there is no life after death, right?

Only by pre-supposing that rationality requires you to elevate yourself to a status of importance above that of others, despite there being no justification for doing so.

Utilitarianism and social contract theory both posit that morality is based upon the idea that all persons are intrinsically equal in value, unlike "ethical egoism" (which is not normally what people mean when they speak of ethics).

[duke944]

Originally Posted by jeffbase40

Atheists want me to believe.... So the atheist tries to convince me that....

On the Contrary, atheists believe what they believe, and don't give a rat's ass if you agree with them. Why would they, are you going to send them money if they convince you? probably not, right? You have all the information that they do, agree or disagree - use your own brain and make your own conclusions.

[Matadora]

Originally Posted by granpa

Natural behavior? The world has too much natural behavior. What the world needs is civilization.

Those are not wild dog they are spotted hyena's. Although hyenas appear similar to dogs, they are actually more closely related to cats.

Now let's compare to human behavior.

Moderator cut: We deon't need to watch videos of animal abuse.

Humans are cruel for reasons that have nothing to do with survival.

Check out the Lions flexing their morality muscles to help save one of their buddies under attack from those hungry hyenas.


Lion Cornered by Hyenas Calls for Backup


Other animal species also exhibit morality.


Moral behavior in animals | Frans de Waal

[granpa]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_wild_dog

[Matadora]

Originally Posted by granpa

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_wild_dog

OK so what? They looked like spotted hyena's at first view.

They have the same hunting and feeding behaviors as the spotted hyena. From your wiki link:

The average chase typically only goes as far as 2 km, during which time the prey animal, if large, is repeatedly bitten on the legs, belly, and rump until it stops running, while smaller prey is simply pulled down and torn apart.

Let's not allow that to distract from the fact that other animal species demonstrate morality. Or distract from how evil and horrific the human species behaves against other humans and other animal and plant species. The difference between what we view as immoral from say a pack animal's feeding behavior for the purpose of survival vs. a human just brazenly abusing farm animals for no good reason...so that you can survive.

[granpa]

They didnt look like hyenas to me but I see no point in arguing about it.

Moderator cut: Watching animals tear up other animals adds nothing to the R&S forums.

[Matadora]

LOL no one is arguing.

Stop detracting from the fact that plenty of other animal species display morality and civility.

[LuminousTruth]

Arguing that animals also express sectarian selfishness, individual selfishness, individual aberrant behavior, etc. just like humans doesn't really help an argument that humans are not mammals and that not all mammals are animals.

[modernist1]

'Only animals' - the poor OP's confused. Do they really think that from a cosmic aspect humans are so goddamn special?. A bit of the old quaint desert trilogy subjectivity going on there.