Re: OT: Spiked Article/Atheists and EcoChristians

On Jan 1, 6:37 pm, Lynn Allen <l...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 2008-01-01 13:36:44 -0800, Larisa <purple_bov...@xxxxxxxxx> said:

That's nothing special in the animal
world. Groups of monkeys or apes have similar moral standards

Sorry, Larisa, this is an egregious misuse of the word "moral."
Morality is defined as:

"of, pertaining to, or concerned with the principles or rules of right
conduct or the distinction between right and wrong; ethical. "

Animals are not capable of formulating rules of right and wrong
conduct. All they are capable of is behavior prompted by biology,
instinct and in some cases, training.

Same for us. Except that we call it "right and wrong". But our
behavior is still prompted by biology, instinct, and in some cases,
training.

Even the higher primates make decisions based on self-interest, or the
interests of their own genetic line or group. A mother animal may
sacrifice herself for her own young, because the genetic imperative
demands the survival of her DNA in her offspring. However, unless
she's of a species that practices group raising of the young, I
guarantee you no lower mammal will sacrifice itself for an unrelated
animal. This is not a moral choice, it's pure biology.

Are you really so sure of that? There were many cases of dogs
rescuing their owners and risking (and sometimes, losing) their lives
doing so - and that's not just an unrelated animal, that's a whole
different species. And if you read the studies on apes and other
primates, you'll find that they do, in fact, adopt unrelated children
and sacrifice themselves for unrelated animals.

Okay, the occasional dog may put its life on the line for a human, but
that human has become a pack member-substitute for the dog, and so
instinct will make the action possible.

You realize, of course, that a dog putting its life on the line for an
unrelated animal negates your whole argument - if it's instinct for a
dog, it's instinct for humans as well.

Humans, on the other hand, are able to make a moral choice to risk
their own lives for unrelated people, and sometimes, foolishly, even
for other species.

Just like a dog risking its life for a member of a different
species.

They formulate, discuss, and pass on to their
posterity the rules they find appropriate, even if those rules vary by
culture. No animal can teach its young that stealing is wrong, or that
eating other members of your species is immoral.

Animals do, in fact, teach their young to behave in ways appropriate
for survival of the species. Watch a mother cat with her kittens
sometime.

As for eating other members of their species - that taboo, just like
the incest taboo, is biological. Both taboos go against the survival
of the species. We call it "immoral" - an animal would not call it
anything at all - but it's the same thing.

Note that all sorts of interesting diseases arise with cannibalism.
Prion diseases, for instance. They were first noticed in cultures
that practice cannibalism, and later arose when we made cows practice
cannibalism (interestingly, this "immorality" of eating other members
of one's species does not seem to bother us so much when we make cows
eat cows). Cannibalism significantly reduces a group's chances of
survival - hence the instinctive taboo.

It's not that animals have different morality, they have NO morality.
They have behavior, which often has complex roots, but is never
governed by reasoned rules of conduct.

Neither is ours. We are able to explain it better, but the
explanations come after the fact. We find incest disgusting - this is
biologically ingrained within us. Then, because we have pattern-
seeking brains, we come up with all sorts of explanations for why
incest is morally wrong. But the instinctive disgust comes first.

Name one moral rule that does not promote the survival of the species
as a whole.

LM
.

Relevant Pages

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