Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons' • Hacker News Board

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#41

Post by netcan » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:42 AM UTC

itistoday wrote: post #8

grellas wrote: post #2

Marino and Reiss will present their findings at a conference in San Diego, California, next month, concluding that the new evidence about dolphin intelligence makes it morally repugnant to mistreat them. It is morally repugnant to mistreat animals regardless of the intelligence of the animal and being a scientist has nothing to do with making such a judgment, since it is not a scientific judgment but an ethical one.…

The article is not discussing the ethical question of "mistreatment", but rather that of legal rights. This is an important distinction. Anyone can advocate for dolphin rights, but, as scientists who have done research on dolphins, they are in a position to make ethical arguments against keeping dolphins in a zoo for public entertainment. The rationale behind these arguments are grounded firmly in science. You have t…

Scientists are in a position to tell us about various traits that dolphins possess, like a sense of self.

By saying that this gives this puts them in a position to make moral judgements you are implying that these traits (basically, intelligence or some flavour of it) are the basis for granting a moral consideration. That is one giant implication to just rely on without even mentioning. That is something these scientists are not in a special position to comment on.

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#42

Post by randallsquared » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:43 AM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #29

JulianMorrison wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely the opposite - disabled people are a perfect illustration of why humans are definitely "people". We work around our difficulties. Can't hear? Use sign language. Can't speak? Write it down. Human minds in dolphin bodies would quickly work out similar hacks. The fact that dolphins don't is what makes it hard to qualify them as people.

> I would want evidence of bidirectional conversation before calling them "people". There are plenty of people that are not capable of that in any way that most people would recognize. The dog analogy comes to mind: Dogs are smarter than people because they understand us but we do not understand them. edit: We seem to place the onus of proving your intelligence and your ability to communicate on others before giving…

David Brin starts off one of his articles talking about this: http://www.crackaddict.com/~nalgas/David_Brin-Dogma_of_Other...

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#43

Post by netcan » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:47 AM UTC

Locke1689 wrote: post #11

grellas wrote: post #2

Marino and Reiss will present their findings at a conference in San Diego, California, next month, concluding that the new evidence about dolphin intelligence makes it morally repugnant to mistreat them. It is morally repugnant to mistreat animals regardless of the intelligence of the animal and being a scientist has nothing to do with making such a judgment, since it is not a scientific judgment but an ethical one.…

We make moral judgements to the contrary every day. Our implicit acceptance that humans are "worth more" than other animals acknowledges both an innate desire to defend one's own species over all others, but also that a heirarchy of superiority. For example, you would object to a massacre of puppies but would not over a massacre of bacteria. The question lies in how you decide superiority. Thr religious tend to belie…

I think you are going backwards & trying to find rational justification for how you feel or act already.

Why is average intelligence for the species you basic qualifier? Why not intelligence of the individual?

I think we are fundamentally speciest and there is no way around it.

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#44

Post by elblanco » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:48 AM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #29

JulianMorrison wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely the opposite - disabled people are a perfect illustration of why humans are definitely "people". We work around our difficulties. Can't hear? Use sign language. Can't speak? Write it down. Human minds in dolphin bodies would quickly work out similar hacks. The fact that dolphins don't is what makes it hard to qualify them as people.

> I would want evidence of bidirectional conversation before calling them "people". There are plenty of people that are not capable of that in any way that most people would recognize. The dog analogy comes to mind: Dogs are smarter than people because they understand us but we do not understand them. edit: We seem to place the onus of proving your intelligence and your ability to communicate on others before giving…

> The dog analogy comes to mind: Dogs are smarter than people because they understand us but we do not understand them.

Having owned a dog, a cat and numerous small animals, I can say that I think that at times I was definitely able to have a two-way conversation with most of the higher animals, but not the lower. I think the Guinea Pig I had when I was 8 was about as low down the evolutionary scale as I could have any understanding at all (lots of squeaks meant "hungry").

My Gerbil was a black box, I fed him and cleaned his cage and he ran around for a few years, but other than that, not a lot to say. My cat and dog, on the other hand, most definitely told me when he wanted outside, or didn't like this brand of food, or needed his litter box changed, or was unhappy when we moved, was cold, needed into a room and the door was closed, was happy to see me after a long trip, etc. All it took was a little bit of observation.

Research into Apes and Dolphins seems to have revealed very similar levels of two-way interaction.

I'm not saying they were particularly interesting conversations, but there was definitely an effort to communicate something by both parties and we managed to understand each other I think a fair amount of the time.

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#45

Post by warfangle » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:48 AM UTC

CapitalistCartr wrote: post #16

itistoday wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article is not discussing the ethical question of "mistreatment", but rather that of legal rights. This is an important distinction. Anyone can advocate for dolphin rights, but, as scientists who have done research on dolphins, they are in a position to make ethical arguments against keeping dolphins in a zoo for public entertainment. The rationale behind these arguments are grounded firmly in science. You have t…

"Anyone can advocate for dolphin rights, but, as scientists who have done research on dolphins, they are in a position to make ethical arguments against keeping dolphins in a zoo for public entertainment." "The rationale behind these arguments are grounded firmly in science. You have to be able to show the research that proves that one animal has no sense of self, while another (a dolphin) does, etc." We are all in a…

This is more about not treating dolphins as animals, not whether or not we should treat them humanely. There's a subtle but distinct difference.

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#46

Post by ugh » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:50 AM UTC

jerf wrote: post #30

ugh wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I realize that this is supposed to be a joke, but there is an answer to your question and it is (of course) no. Our law could easily deal with dolphins that enjoy human rights protection. Babies are given the full protection of human rights, yet they cannot vote, cannot drive and cannot be made responsible for any crime they may commit. Why not give certain animals a similar status?

Rights come with obligations; those who can't discharge those obligations get their rights taken from them. That's not a moral statement, either; that's a descriptive statement of what the current situation is. That is the way it is because it must be that way. Rights are, ultimately, the power to draw on the resources of others in the society (even "the right to free speech" is nothing more and nothing less than the…

Well, a nice definition of rights, but also one I don’t share. In my mind rights don’t come with obligations, and I would argue that many (for example) constitutions share that definition with me. (I know the German one does. It’s less clear with the US constitution but in context I would say it does – you know, all the talk about inalienable rights and stuff.) It’s kinda pointless to argue about definitions so I’ll stop here.

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#47

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:50 AM UTC

DarkShikari wrote: post #6

grellas wrote: post #2

Marino and Reiss will present their findings at a conference in San Diego, California, next month, concluding that the new evidence about dolphin intelligence makes it morally repugnant to mistreat them. It is morally repugnant to mistreat animals regardless of the intelligence of the animal and being a scientist has nothing to do with making such a judgment, since it is not a scientific judgment but an ethical one.…

Thus, the new-found evidence discussed in the article serves only to dramatize something these scientists want because of their philosophical predispositions, I don't think this is entirely true here. You've loaded the question by making an assumption, "It is morally repugnant to mistreat animals regardless of the intelligence of the animal" which not everyone will agree with. In fact, I suspect the vast majority of…

[deleted]

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#48

Post by elblanco » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:50 AM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #38

elblanco wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about when dolphins violate human laws? Like breaking undersea cables or eating fish hauls still in net, or attacking a human or some other such violation? This would seem to be most closely analogous to an international border violation.

No, you are still trying to treat Dolphins as human persons. Dolphins could not violate human law since they are not human. International implies nations, Dolphins probably would not recognize nations. For an encore, with a wink to Douglas Adams, they might not even recognize humans as particularly intelligent.

Of course we both know that mice are in charge. :)

I think though, what this shows is that there is the potential for a very interesting and lively debate as to how far something like "non-human person" extends. If we don't hold them liable to any kind of responsibility for particular extensions of rights beyond what we'd show any other animal, then are we not just treating them like another animal -- and thus the new classification as a "non-human person" is simply superfluous?

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#49

Post by jimbokun » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:52 AM UTC

davepeck wrote: post #12

Locke1689 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We make moral judgements to the contrary every day. Our implicit acceptance that humans are "worth more" than other animals acknowledges both an innate desire to defend one's own species over all others, but also that a heirarchy of superiority. For example, you would object to a massacre of puppies but would not over a massacre of bacteria. The question lies in how you decide superiority. Thr religious tend to belie…

> I define my heirarchy by the ability of the species to comprehend the universe and its disruptiveness to other species. This is probably equally arbitrary, but it has at least some logic behind it. I have a very similar view of the world, and when a friend tried to get me (last night!) to put it on firm logical footing, I was unable to. Why should our ability to comprehend the universe be the yardstick by which we…

"Why should our ability to comprehend the universe be the yardstick by which we measure ourselves?"

The movie Avatar (obviously on my mind because I recently saw it) tries to bring the audience around to the opposite conclusion. The movie makes clear that the humans better comprehend the universe (star ships, ability to create bodies to control remotely, etc.) but then unequivocally roots for the aliens who demonstrate no interest at all in the scientific method.

Which I guess is a long winded way of saying, the ability to comprehend the universe is certainly not accepted as the most important yardstick of worth by all your fellow human beings.

Re: Scientists say dolphins should be treated as 'non-human persons'

#50

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Jan 04, 2010, 3:58 AM UTC

randallsquared wrote: post #42

jacquesm wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would want evidence of bidirectional conversation before calling them "people". There are plenty of people that are not capable of that in any way that most people would recognize. The dog analogy comes to mind: Dogs are smarter than people because they understand us but we do not understand them. edit: We seem to place the onus of proving your intelligence and your ability to communicate on others before giving…

David Brin starts off one of his articles talking about this: http://www.crackaddict.com/~nalgas/David_Brin-Dogma_of_Other...

That's a really good read. It's interesting how in his interaction with his audience people have an enormous problem letting go of their usual frame of reference.

The Dolphin example is a great one because just like with chimps (or pigs!) there is obviously some modicum of intelligence there, it's an alien one because of the lack of shared references but it comes with all the ethical issues that the discovery of an extra-terristrial species of similar capability would have.

I'm pretty sure that there are some ethical lines that you probably shouldn't cross with any creature, intelligent or not, and we're a long way away from even establishing those boundaries (as per our imagined feelings placing ourselves in the shoes of the subject).

Dolphins are mammals, have adapted to living immersed in a 3D salt water environment, I wonder how we'd feel if they would be able to communicate and declared that henceforth ships are to pay toll or else :)

It would be a sad day for biologists and there would be a glut of Dolphin steak if our past with other species is any lesson.