Assigning a value: Embryo, baby, adult, moron, genius, animal?

D

Dinosaur

Rational Skeptic
Valued Senior Member
The never ending abortion debate and the more recent controversy about cloning got me to thinking about the value of a human life and other ethical issues.

Why do most people (including myself) believe that a human has more right to life than any animal? Is my & others belief in a right to life an unprovable axiom? Is the life of a moron as valuable as the life of a genius? Is the life of a non productive person as valuable as the life of a wage earner who supports himself and a family? Does an embryo have as much right to life as a viable baby or adult? Does a baby have more or less right to life than an adult?

In comparing myself to animals, I realize that I am far more aware of being alive than they are. Since my teenage years I have had thoughts of what I intended or hoped to do in the future. I was aware of being alive, of enjoying various activities, of interacting with other people, of having ambitions. I think I am more conscious and self aware than animals. This suggests to me that I have more right to life than animals because I am more aware than they are, because I can see farther into the future than they and make plans (at least have hopes) for the future. If I consider my life more valuable than that of an animal, I believe I must similarly value another human life over that of animals.

The above leads me to believe that a baby has less right to life than an adult. The baby has hardly any awareness of the future, has no long ranges plans/hopes for the future. Similarly for the moron versus the genius. I would not advocate killing babies or morons, but suppose I was faced with a choice of saving a baby or an adult (a moron or a genius) from drowning or a fire. I can imagine the thoughts of an adult faced with death, and would not want to allow a person to experience such thoughts. The baby might suffer pain, but would not have regrets about the loss of futures hopes. Similarly, I would choose to save the highly intelligent person rather than the moron. For different reasons, I would choose to save a productive wage earner instead of a person dependent on others. The productive person is obviously more valuable, without considering the anguish of facing impending doom.

From the above, you can surmise that I do not assign much value to an embryo or a fetus.

BTW: I am assuming that I have no personal interest in the people involved. I would certainly value my own baby over any adult stranger. I would save my dog before I would save some people.
 
Well the problem with assigning value to life is that it's really all subjective. There is no objective value to anyone's life, only value in certain contexts, and toward certain goals.

In general we don't kill people because we know that it's detrimental to the species, society, and certainly our personal well being if we create a world where people can simply go about killing each other at random. Most people would chose to kill a moron before a genius, because people of skill are much more valuable toward the goal of production, enlightenment, science, or what have you, whereas a moron generally is good for pulling a lever or pushing a button.

As for killing animals, well if we were truly to believe that all life is sacred, then we simply wouldn't be killing them (or plants for that matter) unfortunately this view runs quite contrary to the reality of our existence which dictates that we must kill to survive. We need food and building materials, so we make up little philosophies about how animals are here for us to do with as we please, this of course is just self serving BS. I myself am not a vegetarian, though I can see where they are coming from, it's an appeal to the philosophy that all life is sacred.

I myself don't hold such things to be true, and gladly eat meat, though if they come up with something just as good that they can grow in a vat or something and not have to kill animals for, I'll make the switch.

Anyway, what was my point? Oh, yes, the value of a life is an arbitrary thing which we assign (or society and tradition can assign for us, if we are the suggestible type. . . and really who isn't?), and for the goal of keeping people from killing each other that works pretty well, for the goal of surviving by eating other plants and animals, it also works pretty well, but it's still just an illusion. Killing is not objectively wrong, only wrong for goals or values that we hold.
 
Intersting thought . . . .

I've often thought about what exactly seperates us from animals. The most common, and I would say the factor that I would agree with is our ability to reason.

That being said, and I don't mean to say this is a joking manor, but someone who is mentally retarted doesn't have the ability or capacity to reason. Neither does a baby, but a baby has the eventual capacity to reason.

Just something to think about.


-Orristur
 
In the drowning/fire example when presented with the choise to save the adult or the baby, i would save the baby. Babys are smaller and weigh less, and i am not strong. The kind of adult i could save would likey be some kind of dwarf.

I could probably come up with an explaination for why letting that get in the way of my choise isnt amoral... but i dont think I will.
 
SpyMoose: You do what you can. Given the choice between a baby and a 300 NFL Lineman in white water, I would try to save the baby. The bad choice to to save nobody when you could have saved one.
 
I would have tried to save them both!

Hehe, sorry having flashbacks from Trigun. A similar situation arises in which a butterfly is trapped in a spider web, and the spider is getting ever closer to it. Vash tries to carefully unstick the butterfly and set it free, but Knives just snatches the spider off of the web and squishes it. Vash's philosophy is that he wanted to save them both, but Knives asserts that you have to kill spiders to save the butterflies, you can't save both.
 
@ Dinosaur (my answer excludes the baby/abortion/animal-issue)
Putting it a mechanical way (correct me if I’m wrong) I see you trying to assign human life to a kind of scale, say like a thermometer. The “fever” marker would then be the point where the border between worthlessness and worthiness starts. Fine up to here. The problem is that it is very difficult to put people down to such a scale. A moron to you, once you get to know him better, may change into the “best friend” area (by let’s say, saving your life, bringing you the news that you have won the lottery, by becoming the enemy of your enemy…). :eek:

[Question in-between: Why should a productive person more valuable than a person dependent on others? You mean this in a material sense, correct? What if the productive person harbors thoughts about how best to torch your house? Nobody can look into people’s heads…]

Coming back to the thermometer issue: for the same person, you would end up with lots of thermometers all showing different values, because people tend to see each other differently. But even if all that were asked their opinion on a given person’s moron-ness agreed to one value, there would still be several thermometers needed – one for the material aspect (is he productive?), one for the reproductive (is he able to quantitatively contribute to humanity?), one for environment maybe (does he not waste resources?) and so on. I think this is where commandments (or their equivalents) come in. They give you exactly that fever-mark: killing another person. Stealing. Lying. Whoever crosses this mark is subject to punishment. In many cultures, those “marks” are on the thermometer of morale and ethics. In some the thermometer of materialism is more important. :rolleyes:

That was the mechanical part. Now the real-life part: you can theorize as much as you want; once confronted with a situation where you HAVE to act, you will be surprised to note that all your nice theories had vanished the moment you DID step into the water to rescue a moron. Maybe it happened to you already, it has to me. You might think AFTER the fact that it would have been better to not rescue this specific person, but while you are IN such a situation, it is only instinct that leads you. Rightly so.
 
dino

The above leads me to believe that a baby has less right to life than an adult. The baby has hardly any awareness of the future, has no long ranges plans/hopes for the future.

so what? the potential remains.

Similarly for the moron versus the genius.

a genius can be useless and impractical. a moron could find himself in a situation where he saves hundreds

I think I am more conscious and self aware than animals. This suggests to me that I have more right to life than animals because I am more aware than they are, because I can see farther into the future than they and make plans (at least have hopes) for the future.

i have no doubt these animals will fight hard for their survival. an animal's instinct to live is probably stronger than a human
 
Interesting attitudes here.

If forced to choose between saving one life or another, flip a coin. Do not analyze the situation because the moron might be more valuable than the genius, the productive person might be evil, while the indigent is a nice guy.

Do not make life and death choices based on reason or logic. They might not apply and you could make a mistake. If you flip a coin, who can blame you for the choice you made?

Does anybody here believe that all humans are equally valuable? On a case by cse basis, I am sure that family, friends, et cetera are valued more than strangers, but what about those who are not family or friends?

Spookz: I never said anything about an instinct to survive. The following might be true, but is not pertient.
i have no doubt these animals will fight hard for their survival. an animal's instinct to live is probably stronger than a human
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Compared to animals, I said a human has long range plans, ambitions, more awareness of the meaning of death. An intelligent human is driven by more than instincts. I would not know how to measure the instinct to survive, and have no opinion about whose is stronger. Do you have some basis for your opinion?

BTW: On what basis do you think a human has more right to life than an animal? Perhaps you do not think a human has more right to life than an animal.
 
Originally posted by Dinosaur
Do not make life and death choices based on reason or logic.
Click to expand...

Haha, hands down that has to be the worst piece of advice I have ever heard. It's right up there with "use your tongue to stop a fan". haha.

Originally posted by spookz
a genius can be useless and impractical. a moron could find himself in a situation where he saves hundreds
Click to expand...

Or similarly a moron could end up leading a nation, while a genius sits back and just kind of surtfs the Sciforums now and again.
 
dino

If forced to choose between saving one life or another, flip a coin. Do not analyze the situation because the moron might be more valuable than the genius, the productive person might be evil, while the indigent is a nice guy.

most people will make subjective choices. for instance if the wanna be saviour is a male, he probably will pick the young attractive female. family/culture/ethnicity/race/nationality/sex are all criteria for the choices we make. ideally however ("all men are created equal" and all that) why be like a frikkin animal?

Do not make life and death choices based on reason or logic. They might not apply and you could make a mistake. If you flip a coin, who can blame you for the choice you made?

i think you more or less mentioned this. besides what does blame have to do with any of this

Does anybody here believe that all humans are equally valuable? On a case by cse basis, I am sure that family, friends, et cetera are valued more than strangers, but what about those who are not family or friends?

this really should not be an issue. even tho i will pick friends and family over strangers for saving, i am not about to diminish the excluded people's humanity, potential or otherwise. ie it is possible that the stranger could eventually be your best friend/lover/spouse so ahh......

Compared to animals, I said a human has long range plans, ambitions, more awareness of the meaning of death. An intelligent human is driven by more than instincts. I would not know how to measure the instinct to survive, and have no opinion about whose is stronger. Do you have some basis for your opinion?

ahh cmon, all this talk about the id, the dark side of the human, a thin veneer of civ hiding the beast in man........ how well do you have shit under control? what happens when you are cornered, do you come out fighting like a rat?
also evolution happens. we happened to evolve from apes, whats to stop another homo something emerging from some obscure ape species?

awareness of the meaning of death? you mean the many hypotheses humans have put forth to explain death?

BTW: On what basis do you think a human has more right to life than an animal? Perhaps you do not think a human has more right to life than an animal.

on an intellectual and spiritual level, i equate the two cos humans are animals. on a practical level i will give preference to me and my kind (perhaps spot too)
 
Mystech

Haha, hands down that has to be the worst piece of advice I have ever heard. It's right up there with "use your tongue to stop a fan". haha.

who is giving this advice? explain why you think it should not be so

Or similarly a moron could end up leading a nation, while a genius sits back and just kind of surtfs the Sciforums now and again.

you talking shit about my president? you talking about yourself in sciforums?

;)
 
A heated argument, I see!

What is the value of a human?

What is value?

I don't think anything has a general value - it wouldn't make sence to think of things that way. When we are talking about this kind of value it is entirely subjective.

People who go on about animal rights do so because they have compassion for those creatures. I don't think there are any activists against the cruel extermination of wasps or ants! These creatures are not cute. They only protest because of an emotion.

They are protesting because they feel upset when they think about animal experiments and the likes.

In reality I don't think it matters at all whether or not someone is tortured somewhere else in the world. All that is important is that I am not tortured. I therefore will cooporate with those around me (society) and support laws to ensure we do not get hurt or hurt each other.

How can human life have value? In terms of what?

In terms relative to the individual (you).
 
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