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Humans are far and away the most cruel species that has ever walked the face of the earth. No other species has the capacity to invent torture, using our analy

Humans are far and away the most cruel species that has ever walked the face of the earth. No other species has the capacity to invent torture, using our analytical abilities to keep the victim alive indefinitely while inflicting the most vicious agonies possible (e.g. torturing the child in front of the parent).

justinclift 2y ago
You've not seen cats toying with their prey?
- rectang 2y ago
  Bears with baby elks, cats with their prey, orcas playing catch with baby seals... none of them come close to what humans are capable of when they put their reasoning to work in service of inflicting agony. Have you ever visited a museum exhibit on torture? The engineering creativity that has gone into exploiting physiology and psychology to cause unendurable, unimaginable pain is astonishing. You'll want to look away. You'll want to forget, to believe once again that cats are worse... but cats are to a first order approximation indifferent to suffering, in contrast to humans hellbent on maximizing it. JumpCrisscross is taking a techno-optimist's perspective, but while I personally believe that humans should voluntarily seek to serve as "ethical guardians" and to minimize "sentient suffering", I don't trust them to do it. Not as individuals, since empathy is a weak force compared with first-person pain. Not as cogs within societies where inflicting pain is often a means to gaining and maintaining power.
labster 2y ago
I guess you are not a cat owner
danparsonson 2y ago
I would also like to Orcas with baby seals to your list. Sorry.
- rectang 2y ago
  I already brought up orcas and baby seals in a sibling comment[1], forty minutes before your response appeared. Have you grappled with my reasoning there? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43035760#43064754 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43035760#43064754
  - danparsonson 2y ago
    So you did, my mistake.
s1artibartfast 2y ago
Are you judging by the median or the extreme? I dont really see why the latter would be a reasonable way to asses species.
- rectang 2y ago
  I'm primarily responding with skepticism to JumpCriscross about humans minimizing "sentient suffering" — which would be measured by the aggregate of total suffering inflicted by all members of a species. The extremes contribute the most in the ledger of agonies, but I don't think they are the most relevant — rather I fault human nature for tending to produce extremes. Is it Vladimir Putin who is personally responsible for all the suffering inflicted by the Russian state, or can we say that the environment from which Putin emerged played a role? Thanks to their reasoning abilities, humans have enormous capability to inflict violence and suffering, which is not matched by a commensurate empathy which would dissuade violence.
  - s1artibartfast 2y ago
    I think there is a tremendous amount of empathy, if one isn't blinded to it. For every person that dies a violent death, there there are thousands engaging positively with friends, family, loved ones. If you care about sums, you must also acknowledge positive within the Russian state as well? On a given day, it also has lovers meeting, mothers nursing children, friendships. Surely, humanity doesn't have enough empathy to dissuade violence, but that is an argument about purity, not aggregates. The typical person spends an exceedingly small amount of time engaged in violence, and this is a testament to both our empathy, intelligence, and the social systems we have built.
    - rectang 2y ago
      All those Ukrainians basking in that tremendous Russian empathy… It only takes a moment for you or your loved ones to receive death or grievous injury, but not to worry because they’re “spending an exceedingly small amount of time engaged in violence”. Rape might be over in minutes! And besides, it only affects… how much of the population? Those who are most confident about human righteousness are the least qualified to minimize “sentient suffering”. It is often said that one’s foes “only understand violence”, and the essential truth in that assertion is that indirect empathy is utterly insufficient compared with direct, personal pain as a motivator for changing behavior.

justinclift 2y ago

You've not seen cats toying with their prey?

rectang 2y ago
Bears with baby elks, cats with their prey, orcas playing catch with baby seals... none of them come close to what humans are capable of when they put their reasoning to work in service of inflicting agony. Have you ever visited a museum exhibit on torture? The engineering creativity that has gone into exploiting physiology and psychology to cause unendurable, unimaginable pain is astonishing. You'll want to look away. You'll want to forget, to believe once again that cats are worse... but cats are to a first order approximation indifferent to suffering, in contrast to humans hellbent on maximizing it. JumpCrisscross is taking a techno-optimist's perspective, but while I personally believe that humans should voluntarily seek to serve as "ethical guardians" and to minimize "sentient suffering", I don't trust them to do it. Not as individuals, since empathy is a weak force compared with first-person pain. Not as cogs within societies where inflicting pain is often a means to gaining and maintaining power.

labster 2y ago

I guess you are not a cat owner

danparsonson 2y ago

I would also like to Orcas with baby seals to your list. Sorry.

rectang 2y ago
I already brought up orcas and baby seals in a sibling comment[1], forty minutes before your response appeared. Have you grappled with my reasoning there? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43035760#43064754 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43035760#43064754
- danparsonson 2y ago
  So you did, my mistake.

s1artibartfast 2y ago

Are you judging by the median or the extreme? I dont really see why the latter would be a reasonable way to asses species.

rectang 2y ago
I'm primarily responding with skepticism to JumpCriscross about humans minimizing "sentient suffering" — which would be measured by the aggregate of total suffering inflicted by all members of a species. The extremes contribute the most in the ledger of agonies, but I don't think they are the most relevant — rather I fault human nature for tending to produce extremes. Is it Vladimir Putin who is personally responsible for all the suffering inflicted by the Russian state, or can we say that the environment from which Putin emerged played a role? Thanks to their reasoning abilities, humans have enormous capability to inflict violence and suffering, which is not matched by a commensurate empathy which would dissuade violence.
- s1artibartfast 2y ago
  I think there is a tremendous amount of empathy, if one isn't blinded to it. For every person that dies a violent death, there there are thousands engaging positively with friends, family, loved ones. If you care about sums, you must also acknowledge positive within the Russian state as well? On a given day, it also has lovers meeting, mothers nursing children, friendships. Surely, humanity doesn't have enough empathy to dissuade violence, but that is an argument about purity, not aggregates. The typical person spends an exceedingly small amount of time engaged in violence, and this is a testament to both our empathy, intelligence, and the social systems we have built.
  - rectang 2y ago
    All those Ukrainians basking in that tremendous Russian empathy… It only takes a moment for you or your loved ones to receive death or grievous injury, but not to worry because they’re “spending an exceedingly small amount of time engaged in violence”. Rape might be over in minutes! And besides, it only affects… how much of the population? Those who are most confident about human righteousness are the least qualified to minimize “sentient suffering”. It is often said that one’s foes “only understand violence”, and the essential truth in that assertion is that indirect empathy is utterly insufficient compared with direct, personal pain as a motivator for changing behavior.