humans making animals smarter
- Thread starter rainforests1
- Start date
Blobbenstein
.......
FortyTwo
Custom Title
Well, it depends. Maybe future generations will have to deal with increasing evidence that animals deserve consideration too, and then veg*anism will be taken more seriously.
On the other hand, they could still ignore them, and end up just causing more jarring psychological torment with their usual activities.
On the other hand, they could still ignore them, and end up just causing more jarring psychological torment with their usual activities.
Blobbenstein
.......
It could be an environmental and development effect, if the animals face greater problems that they have to figure out, then maybe it causes their brains to get bigger.
Taxi driver's brains(part of them anyway) get larger when they learn street layouts:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-16086233
Taxi driver's brains(part of them anyway) get larger when they learn street layouts:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-16086233
Just because humans use their more evolved brain for doing evil doesn't mean other species would do the same. I don't see any harm this can do.
ledboots
Peace
Clueless Git
Plant powered
That's not what I was talking about. I'm saying that it is not necessarily a good thing for the animals who are getting "smarter." For one thing, at least some of the species who are cited as becoming "smarter" are ones that humans think of as pests or vermin. The more adept that such species are in interfering with human lifestyles, the more ruthless humans will be in killing them. And, the more intelligent a species is, the more they suffer at the hands of humans. Intelligence creates whole new levels of suffering that can be inflicted on a being. (Just think of the difference between a fish kept in an aquarium and a whale or dolphin kept in an aquarium. Which do you think suffers more?)
On a more general note, I am always bothered by the concept that it is a positive when another species becomes more like us (and intelligence is something that humans see as a basic human characteristic). There's no reason that animals need to be more like us; they are fine as they are. We also measure "intelligence" on purely human terms. I don't know that we are even capable of recognizing or understanding other kinds of intelligence.
FortyTwo
Custom Title
Yeah, our concept of intelligence is pretty human-centric. We take the products of our own evolution and try to hold other species up to that standard, as if where we are now in our development is some kind of "end goal" for a system that is inherently accidental and without any objective whatsoever.
Which animal has suffered the most from humans? Chickens. They're not considered to be one of the smartest. Any person can pick and choose examples, but there's no correlation at all between intelligence and how much an animal suffers.
As a species, sure, chickens are currently probably one of the species at the top of the list of species upon whom we are inflicting suffering, because of the methodology of factory farming we use.
But again, you are either ignoring or failing to understand my point. If chickens were more "intelligent" than they are currently, they would suffer even more under the same conditions to which they are currently exposed. A shark, confined to an aquarium, suffers from that confinement, the chemicals in the water, etc. A dolphin, similarly confined, suffers everything the shark does, and then has an entirely additional level of suffering layered on top - the lack of emotional connection and communication with others of his species, the memory of being torn from family members, the sheer overwhelming boredom of not having enough to exercise his mind, year after year, etc.
When I think of any species that lives the most miserable existence possible, I think of chickens. We couldn't make them suffer more if we wanted to. Animal rights groups don't talk about dolphins or primates very often as far as the horrible treatment goes. How much suffering do they go through compared to other animals that are considered less intelligent? Many other animals are taken from their family as well. It shouldn't be a big issue considering it happens often.
Oh, yes we could. You are underestimating humans' capacity for cruelty. For example, we could repeatedly pluck them while alive, as we do with some ducks, and that's not a matter of even trying for cruelty, that's simply motivate by profit.
?!?!?!?!?! Firstly, that's simply not true. The treatment of dolphins and primates has actually been at the forefront of much of the AW/AR movement. Secondly, even if animal rights groups didn't talk about it, it wouldn't mean that it doesn't exist.
By this standard of yours, the treatment of chickens in factory farm operations shouldn't be a big issue either.
Clueless Git
Plant powered
I slightly disagree on a slightly mathematical basis ..
It is observable in the human animal that lesser intelligent specimens experience suffering far more easily, and deeply, than more intelligent specimens do.
F'rinstance; Take a toy off of a child (less intelligent than an adult) and the child can hit 100% of it's capacity to suffer instantly.
(Only an absolute cnut would justify causing a child to hit 100% of its capacity to suffer on the basis that the same action would not even register on their own capacity to suffer scale?)
Same with animals I think ...
The lower the intelligence then the more easily 100% capacity to suffer is reached.
100% is 100% and only an absolute cnut would think that hitting 100% capacity to suffer feels any different to a child/animal/facebooker/whatever than hitting 100% of their own capacity to suffer feels like to them.
You've just made an interesting argument, namely that taking a toy away from a child causes that child to suffer as much as if you were to torture him to death.
I think that qualifies as a cnut argument, to use your own adjective.
Clueless Git
Plant powered
I think the cnut rating of that one will vary dependant on the raters experience with small children.
I do think the 100% capacity rating would last longer in your 'tortured to death' scenario, mind.
I was sitting here, trying to imagine the nature of someone's experience with small children that would lead them to equate a child's "suffering" at having a toy taken away with the suffering of that child while being torture, but then my mind started hurting from being over-boggled, so I stopped.
Clueless Git
Plant powered
That could be usefull.
It is a good example of that 'proportionality' thing I was thinking about.
