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> To presume that one (or ones species) is the most important thing in the world (or universe) is basically the definition of narcissism Humans are the most im

> To presume that one (or ones species) is the most important thing in the world (or universe) is basically the definition of narcissism Humans are the most important things in the world. Why? Because I am a human. My family are humans. To me, and likely most people, humans are most important. If I were an Otter and capable of self reflection I would likely think Otters were the most important things in the world. Now this absolutely does not mean I don't value Otters. In fact I do. Otters are awesome! Just because I feel humans are the most important thing doesn't preclude me from having compassion to help other creatures. It's simply an order in which you find things important. You've essentially manufactured a belief here (parent believes humans are most important therefore all others are in the way), projected it onto the parent and then became outraged by it.

unprepare 10y ago
I said nothing about what the parent believes, i said that there are religious groups that have an ideology i find narcissistic at best. besides that gp didnt say 'i prefer humans above other animals' dont change what they said to suit your needs; they said: >the whole point of existence is human flourishing and happiness. Thats a significantly stronger statement than you allude to
- BinaryIdiot 10y ago
  > I said nothing about what the parent believes, i said that there are religious groups that have an ideology i find narcissistic at best. So you brought up a point that is unrelated to parent's about what people who belong to a religion believe in? I...should that even be in this thread? I don't get it unless you're actually replying to the parent above you. > Thats a significantly stronger statement than you allude to It's not though. They didn't say to bulldoze all the things. Why wouldn't humans flourishing and having happiness be a goal to hit? I can't think of a single thing that we do, when we interact with nature, that doesn't affect the environment in at least some fashion. It's all about balances. If you can add a dam, reducing carbon emissions from other power sources, but it displaces animals within X square miles that needs to be understood. It may be very worth it. It may not it. What I got from your comment was that the parent poster was bad and that you think most people are bad because they find themselves most important.
  - unprepare 10y ago
    Im not sure if english is your first language, but my response makes perfect sense to who i replied to, and we are discussing a comment by the grand parent. > Why wouldn't humans flourishing and having happiness be a goal to hit? you are /immediately/ softening the language - how do you not see yourself doing this? now its gone from 'the whole point of existence' to 'should be a goal to hit' I'm not even going to read the rest, because youre flat out being dishonest here.
    - BinaryIdiot 10y ago
      > Im not sure if english is your first language, but my response makes perfect sense to who i replied to, and we are discussing a comment by the grand parent. I really don't enjoy the passive aggressive insults here. I provided criticism to your comment because, to me, it sounded wildly off base. If you want to ignore that then that's fine but don't say it makes "perfect sense" when obviously it didn't if we're not on the same page. > now its gone from 'the whole point of existence' to 'should be a goal to hit' I'm not even going to read the rest, because youre flat out being dishonest here. The initial language wasn't "hard" in the first place as I already explained. I told you it wasn't as huge as you made it out to be and your response is I'm making it soft...then I guess? In the context of your understanding of it I am but I still think you're making a giant crater out of a little ant hill here.
      - unprepare 10y ago
        >The initial language wasn't "hard" in the first place Right, literally claiming to know the meaning of existence - totally an interpretable statement. My qualm was never that someone would put humans needs before animals, but that that should be the only consideration made is extreme - that its the very nature of existence to do so is beyond extreme. Have a good one!
        ZoF 10y ago
        Your responses are all combative and (from my perspective) seemingly off base; meaning I have difficulty parsing your intended meaning from your statements. He/she's trying to have a discussion and you're trying to win an argument. >My qualm was never that someone would put humans needs before animals, but that that should be the only consideration made is extreme - that its the very nature of existence to do so is beyond extreme. If your initial comment had been solely about 'that religion that thinks the world is solely for us and us alone', that would make some kind of sense, but given the following statement(from the same comment) I didn't interpret it that way. >To presume that one (or ones species) is the most important thing in the world (or universe) is basically the definition of narcissism ^this is the sentence that people were responding to.^ On this point I also agree with other commenters; narcissism is excessive interest in oneself, not in one's species. I don't think it's narcissistic to say your species is more important than any other, especially given the dearth of evidence to back that assertion up(in this case). I think it's definitely interesting that we as a species have been so successful that members of this species are quite literally advocating for it's demise. We all have to build up our own framework of morality. If your framework says to save the animals at the expense of humanities advancement that's fine, but you won't have much company and from my perspective you're not a 'better person' for having done so. (I also don't think the people espousing this "humans are evil" narrative would _actually_ save more animals)
solipsism 10y ago
Replace "humans" with "white people" in your post, and you'll get a sense of how silly your beliefs seem to me. Not to say my beliefs are more right than yours -- to each his/her own.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- nixos 10y ago
  Would you kill two black men to save a white man. I wouldn't. Would you kill two otters to save a human? Yes. Absolutely. Would you kill two bacteria to save a human? Yes. Absolutely. I would kill a million bacteria to save a human. In fact, we do it all the time. It's about the lack of consciousness in bacteria, as I would never kill even one mentally deficient adult, even to save the life of a genius.
  - astrodust 10y ago
    "Two otters" is a non-issue. What about "all otters" to save a single human being?
    - squidfood 10y ago
      If the OP answers it is anecdotal of course, but I'll point out that there's a whole field of bio-economics that tries to find survey/public answers to these questions for the purpose of making policies. And the result is laws such as the Endangered Species Act which dictates how far society thinks you should go in this direction.
    - nixos 10y ago
      If we could do that without hurting a single other human? Absolutely. Actually, we did that a few years back with Smallpox. True, there's a debate if viruses are alive, but I have no doubt we'd do the same if it was a bacteria (and possible to obliterate).
      - 10y ago
cderwin 10y ago
> You've essentially manufactured a belief here (parent believes humans are most important therefore all others are in the way), projected it onto the parent and then became outraged by it. This is the definition of a "straw man".

unprepare 10y ago

I said nothing about what the parent believes, i said that there are religious groups that have an ideology i find narcissistic at best. besides that gp didnt say 'i prefer humans above other animals' dont change what they said to suit your needs; they said: >the whole point of existence is human flourishing and happiness. Thats a significantly stronger statement than you allude to

BinaryIdiot 10y ago
> I said nothing about what the parent believes, i said that there are religious groups that have an ideology i find narcissistic at best. So you brought up a point that is unrelated to parent's about what people who belong to a religion believe in? I...should that even be in this thread? I don't get it unless you're actually replying to the parent above you. > Thats a significantly stronger statement than you allude to It's not though. They didn't say to bulldoze all the things. Why wouldn't humans flourishing and having happiness be a goal to hit? I can't think of a single thing that we do, when we interact with nature, that doesn't affect the environment in at least some fashion. It's all about balances. If you can add a dam, reducing carbon emissions from other power sources, but it displaces animals within X square miles that needs to be understood. It may be very worth it. It may not it. What I got from your comment was that the parent poster was bad and that you think most people are bad because they find themselves most important.
- unprepare 10y ago
  Im not sure if english is your first language, but my response makes perfect sense to who i replied to, and we are discussing a comment by the grand parent. > Why wouldn't humans flourishing and having happiness be a goal to hit? you are /immediately/ softening the language - how do you not see yourself doing this? now its gone from 'the whole point of existence' to 'should be a goal to hit' I'm not even going to read the rest, because youre flat out being dishonest here.
  - BinaryIdiot 10y ago
    > Im not sure if english is your first language, but my response makes perfect sense to who i replied to, and we are discussing a comment by the grand parent. I really don't enjoy the passive aggressive insults here. I provided criticism to your comment because, to me, it sounded wildly off base. If you want to ignore that then that's fine but don't say it makes "perfect sense" when obviously it didn't if we're not on the same page. > now its gone from 'the whole point of existence' to 'should be a goal to hit' I'm not even going to read the rest, because youre flat out being dishonest here. The initial language wasn't "hard" in the first place as I already explained. I told you it wasn't as huge as you made it out to be and your response is I'm making it soft...then I guess? In the context of your understanding of it I am but I still think you're making a giant crater out of a little ant hill here.
    - unprepare 10y ago
      >The initial language wasn't "hard" in the first place Right, literally claiming to know the meaning of existence - totally an interpretable statement. My qualm was never that someone would put humans needs before animals, but that that should be the only consideration made is extreme - that its the very nature of existence to do so is beyond extreme. Have a good one!
      - ZoF 10y ago
        Your responses are all combative and (from my perspective) seemingly off base; meaning I have difficulty parsing your intended meaning from your statements. He/she's trying to have a discussion and you're trying to win an argument. >My qualm was never that someone would put humans needs before animals, but that that should be the only consideration made is extreme - that its the very nature of existence to do so is beyond extreme. If your initial comment had been solely about 'that religion that thinks the world is solely for us and us alone', that would make some kind of sense, but given the following statement(from the same comment) I didn't interpret it that way. >To presume that one (or ones species) is the most important thing in the world (or universe) is basically the definition of narcissism ^this is the sentence that people were responding to.^ On this point I also agree with other commenters; narcissism is excessive interest in oneself, not in one's species. I don't think it's narcissistic to say your species is more important than any other, especially given the dearth of evidence to back that assertion up(in this case). I think it's definitely interesting that we as a species have been so successful that members of this species are quite literally advocating for it's demise. We all have to build up our own framework of morality. If your framework says to save the animals at the expense of humanities advancement that's fine, but you won't have much company and from my perspective you're not a 'better person' for having done so. (I also don't think the people espousing this "humans are evil" narrative would _actually_ save more animals)

solipsism 10y ago

Replace "humans" with "white people" in your post, and you'll get a sense of how silly your beliefs seem to me. Not to say my beliefs are more right than yours -- to each his/her own.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
nixos 10y ago
Would you kill two black men to save a white man. I wouldn't. Would you kill two otters to save a human? Yes. Absolutely. Would you kill two bacteria to save a human? Yes. Absolutely. I would kill a million bacteria to save a human. In fact, we do it all the time. It's about the lack of consciousness in bacteria, as I would never kill even one mentally deficient adult, even to save the life of a genius.
- astrodust 10y ago
  "Two otters" is a non-issue. What about "all otters" to save a single human being?
  - squidfood 10y ago
    If the OP answers it is anecdotal of course, but I'll point out that there's a whole field of bio-economics that tries to find survey/public answers to these questions for the purpose of making policies. And the result is laws such as the Endangered Species Act which dictates how far society thinks you should go in this direction.
  - nixos 10y ago
    If we could do that without hurting a single other human? Absolutely. Actually, we did that a few years back with Smallpox. True, there's a debate if viruses are alive, but I have no doubt we'd do the same if it was a bacteria (and possible to obliterate).
    - 10y ago

cderwin 10y ago

> You've essentially manufactured a belief here (parent believes humans are most important therefore all others are in the way), projected it onto the parent and then became outraged by it. This is the definition of a "straw man".