Queen bans fox hunting!

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Yes please.

[GePap]

Well, screw you

[Sandman]

I used to be opposed to animal rights, but I'm now in favour.

Rights are just something humans invented, and we can extend them to some animals some of the time, if we feel like it. No reason is necessary.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker


That's completely disingenuous, and you know it (or if you don't, you haven't been reading my posts).

I could build a robot that writhed and howled in what looked like pain when you started breaking it. I could make it so fantastically complicated that it even looked like a person. It would not, however, actually be feeling pain; it would be triggering motors and speakers whenever certain electrical sensors were triggered. It's exactly the same way with foxes. With humans, however, our thoughts are so complex that they actually give rise to self-awareness. This is obvious, since you know you are self-aware, and that your brain is practically similar to other humans' brains, so other humans ought to be self-aware too. In addition, there are other people who have spoken of the concept of self-awareness without you telling them about it first, and the most reasonable conclusion is that they have actually experienced it, to know of it.*

There is no difference between the fox's pain and a plant growing towards the light. Neither involve consciousness, all are just fantastically complicated but NOT self-aware machines responding to stimuli.

(* Turing proposed the "polite convention" that anything that claims it is self-aware, is actually self-aware, since all evidence for sentience in another being, even another person, is by nature circumstantial.)

Plants do not have a nervous system -- thus, they are not capable of feeling any pain whatsoever.

All species of animals, on the other hand, have a nervous system with which to feel physical pain. I can't believe you can make an overdrawn argument to claim that animals cannot feel pain.

[Az]

Rights are just something humans invented, and we can extend them to some animals some of the time, if we feel like it. No reason is necessary.

IF we feel like it.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by General Ludd
Robots can't be trained, they are built and programmed to a specific task. They are machines.

Robots can be trained. You lose.

Moreover, animals are machines as much as robots. They are very, very complicated machines, but they behave mechanically.

What does it take to be self-aware? Answer my question. Tell me what it is that allows a human to "hear" and a dog not to.

EDIT: Or better yet, tell me how a dog doesn't hear.

Dogs hear in the same way that your computer microphone hears. They do not hear, in their mind (not their brain, their mind), the sound.

When you see something, you don't just register a bunch of intensities. There's a part of you, your consciousness, that actually sees the image, this thing that is aware. A religious person would call it the soul. It's impossible to describe beyond that, and if you truly don't know what I'm talking about, you must NOT be sentient. I really doubt that, though, and think you're either being obtuse or really are just stupid.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker

Originally posted by General Ludd
Robots can't be trained, they are built and programmed to a specific task. They are machines.

Robots can be trained. You lose.

Moreover, animals are machines as much as robots. They are very, very complicated machines, but they behave mechanically.

And you seperate humans from animals?

Dogs hear in the same way that your computer microphone hears. They do not hear, in their mind (not their brain, their mind), the sound.

When you see something, you don't just register a bunch of intensities. There's a part of you, your consciousness, that actually sees the image, this thing that is aware. A religious person would call it the soul. It's impossible to describe beyond that, and if you truly don't know what I'm talking about, you must NOT be sentient. I really doubt that, though, and think you're either being obtuse or really are just stupid.

So keep that in mind and explain to me the scenario I posted before.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by reds4ever
So it's okay to torture them?

Morally, yes. I think people who choose to do so for just so see them in pain (not for the fun of the hunt, but just to see them squirm) probably are psychopaths, but that's because there are strong emotional tendencies in humans to empathize with animals even though they are not actually self-aware, and to take pleasure in the violation of those tendencies means that you probably can't empathize at all. However, if there's any other reason, I'd lean towards it probably not being indicative of anything dangerous.

[Gibsie]

Originally posted by MrFun



Plants do not have a nervous system -- thus, they are not capable of feeling any pain whatsoever.

All species of animals, on the other hand, have a nervous system with which to feel physical pain. I can't believe you can make an overdrawn argument to claim that animals cannot feel pain.

About five of us have made such an argument to Kuciwalker, and he's not accepted it so far, so I doubt he's going to accept it now, as sensible as it might seem to us.

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker

Do you understand the meaning of sentience and self-awareness? It has NOTHING to do with intelligence (well, they may be correlated in reality, but there is no necessarry connection). Sentience is the feeling of touching something, the fact that you see the signals from the nerves in your eye. It's consciousness. It's what religious people call the soul. Animals are no more sentient than rocks or robots.

I don't know how you would formulate a test of sentience on your hypothesis. Take dolphins for example, they are self-aware, they recognise themselves in the mirror, recognise abstract concepts and understand languages of sorts. You're claim to accept other humans as sentient is based on similarity of brain structure, dolphins have similar but slightly less developed structures. Are they sentient? Are they close to sentient? How far do they have to go to pass your sentience test? Will they ever?

If human brains themselves are your only reliable test what about prehistoric-humans from 5,000-500,000 years ago or upto 5 million years ago. At what degradation of the human brain capacity would sentience no longer exist? Did evolution cause a gradual culmination into current sentience or a sudden switch with sentient humans mixed with non-sentient ones at some point. Could we indeed still be in that era with non-sentients being the deceptive norm. Theories abound that there are only 27 real people in this world afterall.

Edit - poor grammar

[Kuciwalker]

I've seen too many people just being complete morons in this thread, so I'm just going to quote a few of my posts, add a few things, and stop responding until someone comes up with something I didn't refute a page or two ago. Just give me a minute.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Immortal Wombat

Darwin claimed it actually, in The Descent of Man, and a quick google search brings up the Professor of Biology at Colorado University.
The trouble is that even if a fox were to claim it was self-aware, you wouldn't understand it, because it doesn't speak. Incidentally, according to your definition, a child up to the age of about 15 months is a valid target for hunting/torturing/aborting.

Ah, I missed this, but I explained earlier why babies can be called self-aware - because they have practically similar brains to our own, which we know are self-aware, therefore it is a reasonable conclusion that they ARE self-aware (by the fundamental assumption that like causes produce like effects).

[GePap]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Robots can be trained. You lose.

People can be trained. So what?

Moreover, animals are machines as much as robots. They are very, very complicated machines, but they behave mechanically.

HUman beings are machines if this is your line of arguement as well. Jesus....

Dogs hear in the same way that your computer microphone hears. They do not hear, in their mind (not their brain, their mind), the sound.

Are you a neuroscientist? Have you done MRI's on dogs brains while they are undergoing auditory stimulation? Or have you seen studies thusly? Cause if you haven't, yet another BAM.

When you see something, you don't just register a bunch of intensities. There's a part of you, your consciousness, that actually sees the image, this thing that is aware. A religious person would call it the soul. It's impossible to describe beyond that, and if you truly don't know what I'm talking about, you must NOT be sentient. I really doubt that, though, and think you're either being obtuse or really are just stupid.

Do you have any neurological evidence to back these statements whatsoever, evidence that wouldat least counter the observable every day evidence anyone with an animal, or who has ever seen an animal react has? Cause again, if you don't.....

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
I've seen too many people just being complete morons in this thread, so I'm just going to quote a few of my posts, add a few things, and stop responding until someone comes up with something I didn't refute a page or two ago. Just give me a minute.

Well, today was my first time reading this thread -- first time opening it, in other words.

I could not be arsed to read the six pages to see if I missed anything already mentioned, before posting my thoughts.

What are the stages of the cross that I have to go through, to plead for your forgiveness?

[GePap]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
I've seen too many people just being complete morons in this thread, so I'm just going to quote a few of my posts, add a few things, and stop responding until someone comes up with something I didn't refute a page or two ago. Just give me a minute.

No one can refute your bams anymore than somoene can refure Ben when he goes on about gays, or creation. You are making arguments barely held up by even the most cursory logic, and fully without any actual physical, biological, neurological or zoological evidence.