Ryder said:
I have no compassion for my steaks Beastt. I think you confuse that which is meant for food and that which is meant for companionship. Just because humans get along with some animals does not mean that all animals are meant for that same exact purpose. I love our family dogs. I go hunting from time to time. I have no conflicts in any ways regarding this. Also, if you'd like to paint humankind as non-predatory, may I suggest that you've got an impossible job ahead of you. With all the wars and bloodshed clear through recorded history, the use of animal meats all through recorded history, and all the aggression man is capable of, you're saying to us that we are naturally compassionate? I don't even subscribe to your line of thinking, knowing that killing animals for food is no sin in the first place. But just for a second I'll play along. You're saying that we are naturally too compassionate towards animals to be a predatory species?!!! And this is shown in our history where? I think you may want to review the broader human history some. Looking back, I'm not even sure one could say we are naturally compassionate to our own species, never mind the blooming cows!
I never said we are too compassionate to be a predatory species. This is a deft attempt at skewing the point I'm making. We display a compassion for the same species that many of us also see as food. This is not the trait of a predator. It's about traits - things which can be accurately utilized to categorize biological organisms. You have no compassion for select animals now, Ryder, but that's a learned response, not a natural one. The exercise with the carrot and the rabbit illustrated that clearly. No matter what you may wish to say, in your own mind you know exactly what the outcome of such an experiment would be. And if you brought home a young mouse and gave it to a small kitten, you know exactly what the outcome of that would be as well. The point is clear. Species with a predatory nature cannot have such compassion because it would short-circuit their means of feeding. Man has this natural compassion because he is not a natural predator. Most species seem less capable than man of altering their thought toward natural emotions. If a man comes upon a deer stuck in a mud bog, many will try to help the deer to escape. This is nothing like the reaction that would be offered by a wolf pack, mountain lion or bear.
Turning to history in an attempt to claim that we don't have any natural compassion is going to fail almost before you start. If I turn to man's history, I can easily make the claim that man has no compassion for other humans, doesn't instinctively know that genocide is wrong or that rape is wrong. I could cite examples of this all day long but likewise, I could cite examples of man's natural compassion to man as well as to animals for an equal if not much greater length of time. The natural compassion of a child is obvious. Adults are the result of whatever brainwashing parents, peers and society have applied to them.
Suggesting that an aggresive nature indicates a predatory nature also falls quickly. Many herbivorous species have a seasonal rut during which they show a decided aggression. Non-predatory animals may show aggression to defend their territories or even just as a natural defense. Many won't approach you but look out if you approach them. I assume when you're hunting you know better than to try to walk up to a bull elk. Elk aren't predators, they're herbivores but they'll make short work of you if you encroach.
As for your contention that it would be an impossible job to paint man as non-predatory, I understand where you get this idea, but it is in error. Certainly if I had to do it myself, it would be nearly impossible, but all of the work has already been done. Even in Darwin's day biologists were beginning to understand that man could not be classified as a predator or an omnivore. Nutitionist know the consequences of eating as a predator as do many of the doctors faced with the problems that arise. The problem is that there is a large division between what we know of man's place in the natural order and the practices man chooses to continue. No concept finds ready acceptance when it opposes long-held beliefs. But just as with the flat Earth and the geocentric universe, acceptance is slowly growing.
Ryder said:
Well, I don't believe in evolution myself, but one does have to make something of the fact that man has been eating animals for all of recorded human history, save for the antediluvian period before the flood. I make little of this, believing we are allowed to eat meat since the flood.
Genesis 9:2-3 KJV
The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands. Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.
I would be surprised if you did believe in evolution. Despite the fact that from a layman's standpoint, evolution is a declared fact, most Christians continue to try, (unsuccessfuly), to deny it. People are often mislead by the term "theory of evolution". What most fail to understand is what "theory" means in a scientific context. Evolution is a theory much as gravity is a theory. When people hear "theory of evolution" they think that means it's still just a concept, yet to be proved. But hopefully, we all know that the "theory of gravity" is more than an unproven concept. Evolution is a theory in the same context that gravity is a theory. For our purposes, both are proven facts. Some people still don't believe that the Earth is flat and a century from now, some still won't believe in evolution.
You must realize that a few decades ago, many cultures could make a claim very similar to yours, stating that they have always practiced cannibalism and therefore, it must be a part of man's nature.
I suspect from your comments that like most Christians, what you perceive as the theory of evolution is far removed from what the theory actually states. Evolution is not apparent in the behavior of a species but in the anatomy of a species. Though some behavioral modifications may accompany anatomical ones, evolution is not a behavioral process.
When you rely on the Bible as an accurate text, you must also believe that there was once a large reservoir of water above the sky - apparently unaffected by gravity yet held above the stratosphere rather than drifting into space. You must believe that it never rained before the flood, that the unfathomable quanties of hydrogen present in the Sun were drawn together by the infinitesimally slight draw of gravitation within the course of a day. You must even believe that one large body of water can be properly and accurately be referred to as "seas" (plural).
Ryder said:
But I would think that even an evolutionist has to make something of the fact that humans have essentially been predators in virtually every sense for so long. To say we aren't 'meant' to be is kinda weird. 'Meant' by who? If evolution created us (again, this is hypothetical on my part) than we aren't 'meant' to be anything but what we wind up being. So I think it looks like men have already become predators, they already eat meat. Technically omnivores I guess.
Do me a favor if you will. Follow
this link and take a look at the attached picture. Then come back and tell me we're omnivores. If you don't find that sufficiently compelling, then try giving this
chart (post #2) a good, sincere reading. There is a lot more to being a predator than eating meat. And when you look at a few facts, it's not so hard to understand where man came into the practice of consuming animal flesh. Humans, like most other animals, have a body which is designed to cope with the possibility of starvation. As such, we do have a taste for fats because fats are more dense calorically than either proteins or carbohydrates. But most of us now live in a situation in which obesity is a larger problem than starvation and we still hold that taste for fats. In a natural setting, man is poorly equipped to obtain fats on any large scale but we overcame that a long time ago. So we can easily develop a taste for fats such as meat and we can now obtain meat, though we do so very unlike any true predator. But our bodies still don't process meat well. As a result, we live in a society that looks upon heart attack as something to be expected as we grow older. We see cancer, stroke and heart disease as being normal when this is anything but the case. It is only normal to die of these things if we continue to force our herbivorous bodies to consume the foods of an omnivore.
Every animal has a biologically natural, normal behavior. If we spend enough time, (as biologist and naturalists have), noting the specific physical traits of animals, we can accurately determine which ones are predators and which are not. We can show which possess an anatomy designed for digestion of animal flesh and which do not. Man is consistent with a non-predatory herbivore; like it or not. It's not a matter of "whom", it's a matter of anatomy.
Ryder said:
I appreciate the sentiment but that's just something that doesn't happen anymore.
Ryder said:
It's the little gray head, where you can see the darker brain. Leave your cursor over that and it'll say atheist. As for Naturalistic, it's like materialistic, meaning nature is all that there is (material processes). And it's a good guess than an atheist will be one.
Beastt is welcome to correct me if I've goofed somewhere, but I'm not sure an atheist can technically be anything else.
You're both right and wrong here, Ryder. Firstly, you're correct in your description of the atheist icon. But unless my posts appear differently to others than they do to me, I shouldn't have one on my posts. Too many Christians will pre-determine their take on any post if they see that an atheist wrote it. It's as though they actually believe that atheists are incapable of accurate thought. And atheism is about one thing - the non-existence of God. Beyond that, atheists can and do believe in the whole gamut from spirits to psychic ability... you name it. Some believe in evolution, others believe in something similar to creationism but with the universe itself playing the role of a god. Just as some Christians believe in evolution, atheists can believe in everything but God and still be atheists.
jiminpa said:
WRONG! In Western Pennsylvania, the only predator that God provided for the white tailed deer is man. We are part of the equation. The predators weren't killed off. We are it. Environmentalists want to eliminate the predators and extinct the herd.
I think you'd better be ready to do a little historical research if you plan to support such a claim. Nature doesn't work that way anywhere - never has. Predator species will populate any area that provides them what they need to live. That means, more than anything else, a food source.
Ouch said:
Why does it matter whether or not they have predators besides humans? I don't see how that makes a difference as to whether or not Christians may hunt.
This isn't about whether Christians "may" hunt. It's about whether hunting is right or wrong for those who hold to Christian beliefs. From my stance, Christians are no more or less human than anyone else. Since humans are not natural predators, predation is wrong.
Whether or not any prey species co-exist with natural predators comes into play when people claim that human hunting is necessary to control populations of prey species. This is a simple refusal to see the facts. Nature has a multitude of ways to control species population. Most of them are very simple, yet very effective. We're all familiar with predation as a control measure. Fewer seem to understand that animals living in areas with food scarcities, lose the urge to mate and produce fewer offspring. In some species, mating will cease altogether until resources become more abundant. But when man steps in as an unnatural predator, and hunts the predatory animals in ecological niches where they are an important population control measure, the game species can overpopulate because man has instigated an unnatural change to the balance which happens far more quickly than most any offered by nature. Hunters are very fond of claiming that they fill a necessary role in culling populations, but in fact, they are the cause of the problem to begin with and not a healthy answer to the problem they have created.
