I mean, I think they may agree that we are the most powerful species on Earth (debatable, if you account for the impacts of bacteria, viruses, trees, etc.), but that's distinct from agreeing that our lives are the most valuable.
I think most humans would begrudgingly agree that white men, americans, europeans, etc. are the most powerful group on Earth. I don't think they'd agree that their lives are the most valuable.
I know. I looked to see which way the rest of the world could see us as being some synonym of important, powerful is the likely one.
The way that "important" was likely meant in this context was "valuable", which I then addressed in my comment.
Again, even the power is debatable. Single celled organisms and plants have a far greater impact on the world than we do.
Valuable is not really up for debate. A nonhuman animal would not say that the life of a human is more valuable than their own any more than a disempowered person would say that the life of a powerful person is more valuable than their own.
>Humans are roughly interchangeable with each other, so in a wide view they can be roughly equally important.
What? Some are surgeons are working for MSF saving lives with their bare hands on a daily basis, others are sex traffickers. Some are Einstein others are flat earthers. Their positive and negative impact on the world around them, their capabilities vary greatly.
Depending on how loosely you define interchangeable, you can include nonhuman animals as being interchangeable with humans.
> But we're capable of so many things nothing else is.
Can we hibernate? Can we lay eggs? Can we grow to the size of a blue whale? Can we survive naked in the vacuum of space? Do we possess biological immortality? Have we persisted for hundreds of millions of years through multiple extinction events? Etc etc. The natural world is filled with species who hold countless capabilities beyond our own.
Do you think there might be a bias at work when we decide that the traits unique to humans are those that are more "important"?
> Valuable is not really up for debate. A nonhuman animal would not say that the life of a human is more valuable than their own any more than a disempowered person would say that the life of a powerful person is more valuable than their own.
There are plenty of people I would say are more important/valuable than me. And I can imagine species that would be more important/valuable than humans; they just don't seem to exist here and now. But the boundaries within humanity are a lot narrower and I wouldn't be confident enough to label any humans as less important/valuable than me the way I would talk about a random non-endangered rodent.
> Do you think there might be a bias at work when we decide that the traits unique to humans are those that are more "important"?
Well I think "hibernate" and "eggs" are dumb metrics. But we can replicate most feats with some prep time, even if you use a big list of unique abilities that humans need technology for.
Even taking bias into account, I think the bias would have to be ridiculously large to overcome the strength of the answer.
> There are plenty of people I would say are more important/valuable than me.
So by this thinking humans are not interchangeable?
> And I can imagine species that would be more important/valuable than humans; they just don't seem to exist here and now.
Really? You think the single celled organisms and plants responsible for producing oxygen, those responsible for decay, even those present within the digestive tracks of all animals, are not more important/valuable than humans?
>But the boundaries within humanity are a lot narrower and I wouldn't be confident enough to label any humans as less important/valuable than me the way I would talk about a random non-endangered rodent.
Sorry I'm confused, your first quote says there are plenty of people you'd say are more impotant/valuable than you. How do you square that statement with this one? What is the range of variation within human capability that is allowed for equal consideration, but which excludes nonhuman animals? What are the boundaries of that variation defined by if not, honestly, by ex post facto rationalization?
> Well I think "hibernate" and "eggs" are dumb metrics.
Why are they any more objectively dumb than any other capability?
> But we can replicate most feats with some prep time, even if you use a big list of unique abilities that humans need technology for.
Huh? At this point in time humans are incapable of any of the things I listed. You'll need to show proof that we are capable of these things even with all of our technological ability. As of right now it's just kind of handwaving "with the power of technology, at some indeterminate point in the future, anything is possible!" when facts don't bear that out, as we have yet to have any immortal humans, and may never have them.
> Even taking bias into account, I think the bias would have to be ridiculously large to overcome the strength of the answer.
Sorry, I don't understand what you mean by the strength of the answer. I do think it's self evident that the bias is ridiculously large though.
> You think the single celled organisms and plants responsible for producing oxygen, those responsible for decay, even those present within the digestive tracks of all animals, are not more important/valuable than humans?
Weren't we talking about most important animal?
But when it comes to most important, things a million different species can do are much less important.
Let alone the fact that we can produce oxygen and decay organic matter.
As for everything else, I don't feel like you're even trying to understand my argument. But if you're that confused it's only going to be a waste of time for me to go on.
You’re right. I slipped into talking about species on the whole, my bad.
That said, I think it’s really important to clarify what we mean by important. Do we mean powerful, impactful? Or do we mean the lives of the individuals of that species are more valuable?
Back to powerful/impactful, if we’re talking about purely animals, then I’d look to pollinators. Would you argue that humans are more important to the functioning of the world than pollinators?
> But when it comes to most important, things a million different species can do are much less important.
Again, what do we mean by important? Power?
> Let alone the fact that we can produce oxygen and decay organic matter.
If we were to rely purely on humanity’s ability to produce oxygen and decay organic matter, the majority of life on Earth, humans included, would quickly die and then pile up, undecaying. There’s no comparison between our ability and the ability of the species that are specialized for this. It’s like comparing Einstein’s and a crow’s ability to flesh out physics. Sure, the crow might be able to solve some physics-based puzzles, but it’s on a very basic level.
> As for everything else, I don't feel like you're even trying to understand my argument. But if you're that confused it's only going to be a waste of time for me to go on.
I admittedly made some assumptions about your argument, and have been arguing against those assumptions. This is because I’m genuinely unclear on your argument. If you can clarify a couple things:
1) What exactly do we mean by important?
2) What are the boundaries of ability by which we can define humans as interchangeable, but humans and nonhuman animals as not, that are not rationalized after the fact?
If we establish these things I think we can make some progress instead of talking past each other.
> If we were to rely purely on humanity’s ability to produce oxygen and decay organic matter
But again this is about a single species. If you remove one random type of algae or plant it's not going to make a huge difference.
> 1) What exactly do we mean by important?
The impact they have, the breadth of skills, the monuments and constructs and art, the potential for what they can do in the future. Including spreading life through the solar system eventually, or things like that. I might be missing some parts, it's late.
> 2) What are the boundaries of ability by which we can define humans as interchangeable, but humans and nonhuman animals as not, that are not rationalized after the fact?
I don't want to double down on this too hard. I just think most humans are in a pretty narrow band and this band is pretty far away from any other species.
> But again this is about a single species. If you remove one random type of algae or plant it's not going to make a huge difference.
Prochlorococcus single-handedly produces 20% of all oxygen on Earth.[1]
> The impact they have, the breadth of skills, the monuments and constructs and art, the potential for what they can do in the future. Including spreading life through the solar system eventually, or things like that. I might be missing some parts, it's late.
No, I mean what do you mean by important, fundamentally. Is this a judgement of the objective value of the lives of the individuals of that species? Is it just an assessment of their power? Is it putting arbitrary characteristics that species happens to posses on a pedestal while simultaneously and just as arbitrarily devaluing the unique characteristics of all other species?
Are we starting from the bias that humans are more "important" (again, still unclear what that actually means) than all others, then working backwards and highlighting all the human characteristics as being evidence of that importance after the fact?
If a species with giant claws ruled the world, do you think they might wax poetic about the great importance of giant claws, and how this is the one true metric by which the value of a life can be measured?
Are giant claws, ability to produce art, or any other specific characteristic or capability in any way relevant to the question of whether or not a life has value?
> I don't want to double down on this too hard. I just think most humans are in a pretty narrow band and this band is pretty far away from any other species.
Well we're going to have to define the boundaries of this band, otherwise it doesn't seem to be based on anything concrete and seems more like circular reasoning that the boundaries of this band are those that exist within humans and therefore those humans are important because they exist within the boundaries of that band.
