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From: steiny@scc.UUCP (Don Steiny)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: animal vs human rights, morality
Message-ID: <351@scc.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 31-Jan-85 14:50:35 EST
Article-I.D.: scc.351
Posted: Thu Jan 31 14:50:35 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 1-Feb-85 21:34:48 EST
References: <233@usl.UUCP>
Organization: Personetics, Inc. - Santa Cruz, Calif.
Lines: 46

**
	NOTE:  This has been moved back to net.abortion to spare
others.
> 
> It seems to me that questions such as abortion and animal rights can easily be
> settled  once  a  moral  framework   is defined.  Once a 'moral meterstick' is
> determined, such issues need merely be measured against them.  Of  course  the
> hard part is agreeing on such a structure.
> 
	It is impossible.  The "moral matchsticks" for Buddhism, Christianity,
and Islam are different.   I DON'T agree that intelligence has anything
to do with it.

> The only arguable difference between our species and the other animals on  the
> planet  is that of intelligence, 
>
	??  - What about dangerousness?  A  powerful rifle can make
short work of any animal on earth.
> 
> So, as you can see, I don't at all believe that our  intelligence  inherrently
> gives us a moral edge over the other creatures of the earth.  
> 
> 				    Joseph Arceneaux

	Of course not, the only morality  anyone has ever heard of
that places intelligence as morally superior is the one you invented
for this article.

	If animals, fetuses, or whatever want rights, they have to ask
for them.   The human race did not wake up one day and say "by gosh,
we just all collectively realized that blacks, women, or whowever,
has been being denied equal rights and we will change it today!"
Entire inner cities  were burned to the ground before the country
woke up to the conditions in the getthos.  The women's movement
is still fighting for equal rights for women.  

	There is no big platter of "rights" somewhere that are
ordained for all living creatures.  
-- 
scc!steiny
Don Steiny - Personetics @ (408) 425-0382
109 Torrey Pine Terr.
Santa Cruz, Calif. 95060
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