--- John Thornton <jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> It doesn't prove animals suffer but it strongly
> suggests that higher mammal forms should.
> Dismissing animal suffering as unproven is like
> dismissing climate change as unproven 10 years
> ago. You're clinging to an overly pedantic
> standard of proof and don't seem to want to admit
> to that.
[WS:] I do think he is pedantic - he seems to argue that suffering comes from the psyche which is a Greek word for soul, not from the material body. Since animals by definition do not have a soul, only humans do - as x-tian theology can attest - ergo: animals cannot suffer, only humans can.
More seriously, I think this whole debate hinges on the implicit assumption that humans are exceptional i.e. have a special faculty that no other species does. I think that such belief is rubbish by Miles's own standards - there is no scientific proof of that, other than subjective perceptions.
If we drop this superstition of human "psyche" and assume that all responses, including all emotions and all cognitive functions, are nothing but electro-chemical reactions of the nervous system, the whole debate becomes a non-issue. As long as there is a neurological response to stimuli, there is some form cognition, emotions and suffering (or satisfaction,) almost by definition.
Wojtek
Wojtek
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