I don't particularly care how useful it is from an evolutionary standpoint - saying that you aren't bothered by it and then saying you're empathetic to the creature's suffering is a clear contradiction.
I've already addressed this several times. I am bothered by seeing it by way of instinct. I am not bothered by it on an intellectual level. I think I've clearly established that I value human capacity to rise above our instincts several times, so it should be clear that the point that matters is that I'm not bothered by it. The fact that I don't like to see it just means that I'm wired like any other normal person. The whole point is that it's
not a contradiction because I'm talking about two different thought processes.
Don't hide behind scientific literature, I want your personal thoughts. Why do you feel sorry for the animal. I didn't ask for a reason why empathy might be advantageous.
I already said it's because, likely as a product of natural selection, I'm hard-wired to feel empathy for suffering things. My reasons are
always couched in science and rationalism; saying "don't hide behind scientific literature" is like telling a musician to explain why Tchaikovsky is great without referencing emotion. Science is an integral part of how I come to my conclusions and how I decide I'm going to behave; if I went by raw emotion and instinct, I would be no better than an animal.
You wrote "and in this case, there is", hence the question.
The reason in this case is to get rid of rats. The employer in this thread seemed to have a rat problem. I also explained that there's really no way to trap and kill rats that isn't either unreasonably expensive and hard to set up or causes some degree of suffering. Cage traps don't work very well, sticky traps have the problems described in the first post, snap traps aren't an instant kill either and have the same problems, and poison pellets don't kill instantly, either. In the end, people use an effective but slow method because there is no effective but fast method that's reasonably priced and available.
You explained how empathy is evolutionarily advantageous, that doesn't necessarily mean it is purely instinctive. Empathy (at least towards animals) is a choice, and even if that means for self betterment, it's still a choice. It isn't just an automatic impulse, there is still a thought process required. People can choose not to feel empathy for an animal for a host of reasons, and it's usually the case why they do (or not) feel empathy to them.
One of the things that sets humans apart is the ability to control our emotions. Not just that, but we have the
will to control our emotions, we have the reason to. I think empathy is a raw instinctive response, but we can manipulate how we feel based on other knowledge, as well.
Being concerned about unnecessary cruelty to an animal isn't what I'd call a significant moral consideration, at least not the definition you are using. You are still attributing them at least some form of moral consideration for the very fact that you seem to be opposed to unnecessary cruelty and/or mistreatment.
I don't think I disagreed with that at any point. Rather, I think I said that I think most animals are somewhere between "property" and "low-awareness human" in how I think of them, though probably closer to the "property" side of that equation. It's possible I'm mistaken on that, there's an awful lot we don't know; I'm merely going off what I do know. That said, even knowing everything, there's only so much you can reasonably ask people to do if you're expecting results.
Heightened sense of awareness is what is required for learning specific things.
Almost all animals, and some things outside of kingdom Animalia, are capable of learning to some degree. Some animals are capable of more complex learning, but that itself isn't sufficient to consider them conscious.
A rat may not be able to do calculus, but it can learn through processes that was once thought only unique to humans. They might not be on the same level as humans beings, but there is still something there. What you call "tricks", I call proof of limited higher cognition. It also explains why you can train mammals and birds to do specific things, but for lizards it is significantly harder.
I like Tak's suggestion that it's more complexity, as it jives well with this. It's not as black and white as I might be making it out to be, it's more a continuum. I don't know specifically where rats might be on the continuum because I don't know enough about rats. They're clever, but I'm still not convinced they're anywhere near our level. Heck,
seagulls are pretty clever, too. You've gotta be pretty clever to survive in the wild.
What about the world around us? Only caring about ourselves and "damn the rest" isn't really what I'd consider ethical.
If there are other species on the same or a somewhat close level to use, they deserve different ethical considerations, but keep in mind that as awareness increases, so does
their ethical responsibility. If they want to be treated with the same considerations as we treat each other, they have to act ethically, as well. As far as I know, the only species that might understand ethics right now is dolphins, and it seems like a fair share of them don't really care from what I understand of dolphin attacks.
Considering we are the dominant species, we have certain responsibilities, and I think having concern for other life is one of them. Having ethical consideration needn't be selfish.
I think our responsibility ends at not causing undue harm to lesser species. I don't see any reason why we owe them anything more than that. That's certainly more consideration than they give us.
As for where I draw the line, I consider pain and suffering that the creature is capable of feeling. I would have to balance that with what is practical of course. This is why I'd be more upset if a human was tortured, for example. It's not as simple as what that quote of yours state, in fact it's a rather clinical and cold-hearted way to look at things. Yes, bacterium will move away from stimuli but it is incapable of feeling pain or suffering, it is not a good comparison to make when it comes to the treatment of animals.
That's fine if that's where you draw the line, I'm just saying I draw it elsewhere. As for bacteria feeling pain, I guess that depends on how you define pain.
Unethical? No. Selfish? Maybe.
Selfish means to hold one's self-interest as the standard for making decisions. I don't see anywhere where I said that I only valued myself. Quite the opposite, I value other people quite highly and often go out of my way to help them. Heck, I have a link to a charity org in my signature. I don't see how that really benefits me in any way at all. Maybe "human-centric" or "sentient-centric," but certainly not selfish.
We don't need laws to tell us it's wrong to torture or abuse animals, but I still think there should be a deterrent. If not for that then something to show that such a thing is unacceptable in a civilised society.
The point I was making (including with the examples I brought up) was that my personal ethics don't really have anything to do with what the laws are. My posts here are trying to explain why I feel the way I do. What the law says doesn't really enter into that, but since you brought it up, I explained why I think the laws are the way they are. As for their necessity, I don't know. I don't see any problems with having them, at least, provided they don't go too far.
Fair enough. Then we are on a similar page here; I just think that you're not giving them enough credit, and I find it sorta disturbing you would liken the processes of an animal (that's quite capable of feeling pain and mental distress) to that of a simple computer. We could just as easily expand on this notion and say everything we do is based on instinct, we are nothing but a super advanced computer. A quantum computer. In fact our entire reality might be a simulation in a quantum computer!
Yeah, I touched on that in a different post. It's a difficult line to draw, of course, but I do feel there are significant and important differences that separate us and that these differences are more than enough to warrant different treatment. As for the computer comparison, I mentioned earlier that it wasn't the greatest. It's hard to come up with a good analogy for this, really. Like I said, they're somewhere on the continuum.
What about the level of pain and suffering inflicted? Is it only the reason that is important to you? What if the reason was for sadistic entertainment?
We're smart people. I could go on for several pages about what constitutes a good reason and what doesn't, but I've already blabbered enough. Suffice it to say I don't think "entertainment" is a sufficient reason to cause harm to an animal.
Oh, he had a "reason". It was a pest, and it wasn't a human and hence its pain didn't matter one bit. So "sufficient reason" doesn't necessarily justify the act.
I mentioned two things here. First, there needs to be a reason. All right, so the cats are pests. How do you deal with them? Second: not causing unnecessary harm. As I said, there were better ways to deal with the situation. If it was me, I'd trap the thing and bring it to the humane society and let them deal with it. If that's not an option, there are other solutions which don't require that degree of harm, which I don't think there's any excuse for.
Then you should be well aware that they aren't objects and that it's unethical to do whatever you wished to them.
I don't believe I ever stated it was tolerable to do "whatever you wish" to them. What I have said is that I wouldn't feel too bad about causing them harm in the course of some reasonable action.
And depending on how often you interacted with them, you would have noticed (especially the higher mammals) that they have little personality quirks. Something you will brush off as "instinct", I suspect.
Yeah, pretty much. Variation in behavior is nothing particularly unexpected but not really indicative of anything other than slightly different wiring.
Such as?
Then what does? I would have thought thinking about your own thinking process is a pretty darn good guide to how much awareness one has. If that isn't at least a decent yardstick then I don't know what is.
I'm not a neuroscientist or even a biologist, so any opinion I could offer wouldn't be worth its weight in mouse hair. That was just my initial reaction based on how much I know of mice, which admittedly, is rather little. That said, if it is the case that they're more intelligent than I give them credit for, it would explain why they're so darn successful at getting into things and breeding like crazy.
I think the literature I linked in this thread shows that it is extremely likely. A lot of these "tricks" are due to the animal's intelligence. Not having a reasonable level of awareness would make such an intelligence significantly harder to not only show, but to use.
I don't know about that. I'm still not convinced they're sufficiently aware, but I think maybe I'll change my answer to "
INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR MEANINGFUL ANSWER." That said, my position hasn't changed, though perhaps my prioritization will have a bit. I still think there's only so much you can ask people to do, and like I said, the available options for dealing with rodent infestation are limited. Perhaps someone should
build a better mouse trap?
Man, I need to stop with the references.
That isn't the viewpoint that's in debate here, though. I don't think you will find much people will disagree with you on that, however I will say that having concerns for humans and animals are not mutually exclusive. Just because humans are of higher priority does not mean we should ignore animal welfare.
That's fair. I think the question, though, is what is reasonable to ask and what is not. And that's a tough question. I still think my "don't cause harm for no good reason" schtick is about right.