Animals and Morality

[ReformedChristian]

Atheist like to claim Man and animals are the same in the sense of behavior patterns such as reproducing eating to survive and so on. Well the problem with this arguement is that it is a non sequiter. Just because there may be some similarites does not prove causation. Another problem is that animals kill out of instinct, humans kill out of spite and for no reason at all. Further Atheist say well have you ever seen a mother kill it's young? well for that answer I say have you ever seen the Discovery channel? there are plenty examples of that on the program.

 

[Pergamum]

If we are the same as animals, why do even atheists support conservation efforts for dolphins and whales...our evolutionary competitors?

I say we wipe those suckas off the planet so we don't have to have Human-Dolphin wars in another 10 million years as we struggle for dominance.


Somewhere down deep man knows that he was put on the earth to tend the Garden and was made as custodian above the animals.

 

[larryjf]

Humans have an inherent dignity that animals don't have. I wonder why an evolutionist would think that we "evolved" into the practice of respecting the dead with different funeral-type services. I don't think it helps us survive.

What do animals have that this evolved from?

I digress.

 

[Mushroom]

Ah, but crows do hold 'funerals' of a sort after a member of their murder (the proper collective name for crows) falls dead, and geese appear to mourn the loss of their mates. Yes, animals do not possess the image of God that gives us humans both a dignity and a responsibility. The responsibility is both as custodians and as the cause of the fall that has burdened animals with the cursedness we see in much of their behavior.

Rom 8:19-23 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. (20) For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope (21) that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. (22) For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. (23) And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.

 

[larryjf]

Ah, but crows do hold 'funerals' of a sort after a member of their murder (the proper collective name for crows) falls dead, and geese appear to mourn the loss of their mates.

I was not aware of that...how interesting.

 

[Mushroom]

Yeah, pretty strange.

The thing that strikes me when I see the curse played out among animals is the fact that my sin contributed to it, was in fact enough by itself to have brought it all about. It grieves me to know that the bluejay stealing the eggs out of the cardinals' nest in my backyard while the parents chirp mournfully and flit helplessly about was a result of my sin.

And when you consider the exhaustive extent of the curse, it brings into greater focus the amazing wonder of the redemption wrought by our Jesus, and the inestimable power of His resurrection.

 

[VictorBravo]

I would just add that cows do something similar. I remember once trying to move a herd from the hills down to the lower pastures when we came across a bull that had died. Every single cow in that 150 head group had to stop and check out the body. It was almost like a wake. They'd stare, sniff, and then sort of sulk off.

(As an aside, now, when I commute in heavy traffic I see similar behavior on the freeway. If there is an accident on the side of the road and not blocking traffic, the herd of cars still has to slow down and pay its respects, or gawk, or whatever.)

I think it is pretty clear that animals, at least some of them, experience emotions like joy and shame, desire for community, etc. The key difference between humans and animals is that humans also have the capacity to reflect on such things as their emotions, their being, and their purpose. Animals seem not to be self-aware in that sense.

 

[AThornquist]

Elephants also have funerals of sorts and exhibit very interesting emotional traits.

 

[mvdm]

I would just add that cows do something similar. I remember once trying to move a herd from the hills down to the lower pastures when we came across a bull that had died. Every single cow in that 150 head group had to stop and check out the body. It was almost like a wake. They'd stare, sniff, and then sort of sulk off.

(As an aside, now, when I commute in heavy traffic I see similar behavior on the freeway. If there is an accident on the side of the road and not blocking traffic, the herd of cars still has to slow down and pay its respects, or gawk, or whatever.)

I think it is pretty clear that animals, at least some of them, experience emotions like joy and shame, desire for community, etc. The key difference between humans and animals is that humans also have the capacity to reflect on such things as their emotions, their being, and their purpose. Animals seem not to be self-aware in that sense.

I suspect it is hard to prove whether the cows are really sad/ sulking/ paying respects, or that crows/geese hold funerals. It is possible that dim-witted cows simply like getting a quick sniff of a rotting carcass. Or the crows/geese may be gathering to mock the fallen weakling bird.

 

[VictorBravo]

Or the crows/geese may be gathering to mock the fallen weakling bird.

Of course, if crows can mock, that suggests they have a sense of pride.

Seriously, I'm not saying we can read the minds of animals. I'm only going by exhibited behavior. Watch calves or young horses in the Spring, or a cat with a toy, or dogs chasing each other, and try to convince yourself that they don't have some sense of joy or delight. I just don't think they have the ability to contemplate what they are doing through self-reflection.

 

[Peairtach]

If God wants to give animals a degree of "morality", which will be in some ways different to ours, because not being made in God's image they will relate to God differently, why shouldn't God do that.

How has animal behaviour been affected by the curse? Were animals even nicer in the uncursed World? Do some animals, although not made in God's image, have (temporal?) souls? How do they relate to God, if at all? How do they relate to God in His general revelation?

It's instances of animal "altruism" - apparently selfless behaviour by animals and humans - that evolutionists find difficult to explain.

So far evolutionists have failed miserably to explain animal and human altruism in a world supposedly red in tooth and claw, although they wouldn't give you that impression. This book debunks some of the smoke and mirrors, and absolute twaddle of evolutionary sociology:

Darwinian Fairytales: Selfish Genes, Errors of Heredity, and Other Fables of Evolution: Amazon.co.uk: David Stove, Roger Kimball: Books

Quote from Christopher

Animals and Morality
Atheist like to claim Man and animals are the same in the sense of behavior patterns such as reproducing eating to survive and so on. Well the problem with this arguement is that it is a non sequiter. Just because there may be some similarites does not prove causation. Another problem is that animals kill out of instinct, humans kill out of spite and for no reason at all. Further Atheist say well have you ever seen a mother kill it's young? well for that answer I say have you ever seen the Discovery channel? there are plenty examples of that on the program.

You've got yourself trapped on the wrong side of this argument.

The really difficult Q for the evolutionist is why are animals and humans, being evolutionally committed to self-survival, should be nice to any other creature at all? The above book shows that this is the real problem that evolutionary sociologists have. In their godless world of animals and humans without God, why aren't humans and animals ruthlessly selfish.

If a child is nice to its mother is that just a pseudo-niceness, because it wants to survive, while all the time it is suppressing the fact that it would eat its mother, if she was of no survival advantage to the child?

This is where the evolutionary dogma of the survival of the fittest leads, although evolutionists do not want to present it that way.

Dawkins has now located this selfish principle not in the individual creature, not in the individual creature and those most closely related to it, but in the gene, although there is no evidence that genes can be selfish, anymore than prime-numbers can be sex-mad. Yet Dawkins has been hailed by some for his ridiculously titled book, "The Selfish Gene"

If animals have some kind of morality, that doesn't prove that we're related to them, any more than the fact that lions and men have beards proves they're (closely) related, or if we share 40% genes with bananas means we're 40% banana.

The explanation may be that bananas, lions and humans have a common creator.

 

[KaphLamedh]

If we are the same as animals, why do even atheists support conservation efforts for dolphins and whales...our evolutionary competitors?

Good point!

God set man above all animals, so do animals see man as image of God?

 

[Pilgrim Standard]

I found it interesting when I realized that Animals do not worship, while humans do.

Pehaps you could ask the Atheist to deny God's curse and live forever?

 

[Mushroom]

How has animal behaviour been affected by the curse? Were animals even nicer in the uncursed World?

If this is what an uncursed world looks like, then I would say so:

Isa 11:6-9 The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them. (7) The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. (8) The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den. (9) They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.

 

[Peairtach]

There are differences between humans and animals which the evolutionist wants to minimise when it suits him, so that he can imply that humans are not so unique and must be related to the animals. But even if we were more like the apes, it wouldn't logically follow that we were/are related.

But God could if He had wanted made animals even more like humans, and for all we know things were very different before the curse.

How much has the principle of the "survival of the fittest" and "natural selection", which evolutionists rightly recognise as important in life in the wild, but make far too great claims for its ability to produce new creatures; how much has "altruism" been lost in the animal world (aswell as the human world) since the Fall and the Curse? (Romans 8:18-22)

Someone - I can't remember who - has said that Man is Made in the Image of God, and that individual animal species reflect particular aspects of Man's Image, so that Man can see something of himself in aspects of the lifestyle and behaviour of different animals.

Someone somewhere will have done a study on how different creatures are dealt with in Scripture in relation to human characteristics and how different species in their own way reflect some aspect(s) of Man.

Maybe someone on this board will know of such material.

 

[mvdm]

For fun, here's a humorous spin on this topic:

Ant Colony Comes To Halt After Death Of Popular Worker | The Onion - America's Finest News Source