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Originally Posted by Cynosure
Which questions? In the "Why can't anyone prove ghosts?" thread?
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The questions I posed to you in my response to you in this very thread. Really, I have no idea how you can miss them. I'll reproduce the dialogue, here:
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Originally Posted by KnifeMissile
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cynosure
Methinks this – that ol' ax of yours, that you love to grind – is what's keeping you from conceding here that human beings are vastly superior to animals in intelligence.
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How so? What does our intellect as a species have to do with Creationism?
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So, seriously... If for some reason you had to save either a church full of Creationists, or a barn full of animals, and it had to be one or the other, which would it be? Seriously.
But, of course, it's a rhetorical questions, because we already know the great lengths a rescue team will go, and the enormous costs a society will bear, just to rescue a single human being in peril.
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How serious could your question have been if it's rhetorical?
Would you be surprised if I saved the idiot filled church instead of the barn? How is this question at all relevant? |
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I'm not sure what you're getting at, here. Whatever, we humans have surely – through research and invention, i.e. via our intellect, not our instincts – advanced in leaps in bounds in our ability to communicate with one another, e.g. engraving, writing, printing, telegraphs, signal flags, telephones, televisions, the Internet.
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Is your inability to predict where I'm leading with a question causing you to avoid it? I asked you whether or not you would consider language an aspect of intelligence
if you knew that it was instinctual instead of something figured out? In case you can't answer the question without knowing why I asked it, I'm going to show you that it is not something invented by ourselves but rather an innate ability we've evolved over time...
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For humans, superstition is a state of mind. It's not so much linked to our intelligence as it is, our emotions and our subconscious. Superstition can also be due to cultural influences, and individuals who know better may participate in superstitious beliefs and acts just to get along with their peers. Whatever, an individual can rise above it, if he chooses to. (Unless his superstition is a form of obsessive-compulsive disorder, and then it's a deeply rooted psychological problem that's not so easily left behind.)
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I'm not convinced that people can just "choose" to "rise above" their superstitions. It inconveniences their lives and yet they still persist. Cultural influence just means that we are swayed more by our society than we are by reality. I wouldn't consider that a trait of
intelligence. That's just the heard following their heard instincts...
---------- Post added at 09:59 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:45 PM ----------
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Originally Posted by twistedmosaic
Here's the thing: Humans are animals. We're pretty successful ones, by a lot of measures, but there isn't anything that actually separates us in any sort of meaningful way. We are a collection of useful abilities that have allowed us to survive and thrive, but we don't really have anything unique about us....just about every single thing we can do, some animal can also. We share 100% of our anatomy with various animals, we share brain areas, although some are more developed in humans than other species. Saying humans are superior to animals is ignoring the fact that WE ARE ANIMALS.
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Wow, you have come a long way!
I think we're very special animals but, of course, I'm biased. However, the notion that some (religious) people have that we are somehow not part of the kingdom
Animalia is just sheer stupid denial...