Re: [OPE-L] Anthropogenesis

From: glevy@PRATT.EDU
Date: Thu Nov 23 2006 - 11:03:17 EST


> It is very fashionable in the West these days to argue that humans are
> little better than animals, and to accentuate what humans have in common
> with other organisms, rather than what sets them apart and makes them
> unique. In good part, this is simply a result of the sexual revolution.


Jurriaan:

What has been fashionable in Western civilization(s) -- even before the
birth of capitalism -- is the perspective that humans are a superior
species which, by virtue of its inate and natural superiority and the
franchise given it by God -- have ownership and doiminion over the Earth
and all other 'inferior' species which inhabit it.  This is a common
perspective in Juadaism, Christianity, and Islam -- although it is a
perspective which historically has not ben shared by many non-Western
cultures.  It remains BY FAR the dominant -- most "fasionable" --
perspective globally on the relation of humans to non-humans.

In solidarity, Jerry


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