From: tms@cs.umd.edu (Tom Swiss (not Swift, not Suiss, Swiss!))
Newsgroups: rec.food.veg
Subject: Re: Medicine & the Mall
Date: 14 Dec 92 17:11:12 GMT
Organization: The Reality Liberation Front (pixels to the people!)

young@serum.kodak.com writes:
))
))     The strongest justifications I find for assuming that other humans
))have an internal experience similar to mine are in behavior and physiology.
))The same justifications apply, in differing degrees, to other animals.
)
)	At what point in the evolutionary scale does it become unjustifiable?
)	Please post for us the criteria you use to make such judgements and
)	the exact procedure you use to determine whether a non-human species
)	is to be classified ethically important or ethically irrelevant.

     I don't see a sharp line; it's not a simple dichotomy. More of a
continuum. 

     There's a sort of hierarchy, even among the "ethical importance"
of other humans. My parents get more consideration that mere
acquaintances.  Acquaintances get more consideration than stangers.

     The same with animals. Dogs get more consideration than frogs.
Frogs get more consideration than flies. But even flies get some small
consideration; I don't rip their wings off for fun, and I shoo them
out the window rather than smashing them when I can.

))     Consider the following twist on what you wrote:
))
))	Making assumptions about other white men may be justifiable:
))      after all, as white men, it is not unreasonable to assume that
))      there is some similarity in response between ourselves and others
))      of our gender and race.  It is the extension of this to other
))	races and to women that results in conclusions which have no
))	justification.
)
)	Your example is a strawman.  

     It's the exact same form as your argument. Your original
arguement had "species" where I have "white man"; I've just
substituted another class of genetic similarity. I think you have
a more well-defined argument in their somewhere, but I can't
quite see it.

)	The issue is whether we, as humans,
)	can make justifiable conclusions regarding non-human species based
) 	on the criterion of similarity of physiological structure.

     "Justifiable" is pretty fuzzy. We ultimately have no way
other knowing what subjective experience other animals have, if
any, any more than we can know the subjective experience of other
humans.  Is the inside of your head anything like mine? Do you
even have an internal experience of existence? What conclusions
can we justifiably draw about each other, based on similarity of
physiological structure and behavior? What "justification" do I
have for assuming that you have some sort of internal experience,
that there is indeed something going on in your head that's somewhat
similar to what goes on in mine?

===============================================================================
Tom Swiss/tms@cs.umd.edu  |  "Born to die"   |   Keep your laws off my brain!
     "What's so funny 'bout peace, love and understanding?" - Nick Lowe 
                     Keep your values off my family.
      "There are some microorganisms that exhibit characteristics of
       both plants and animals.  When exposed to light, they undergo
       photosynthesis and when the lights go out, they turn into
       animals.  But then again, don't we all?"
Newsgroups: rec.food.veg