Chimpanzee "Personhood" Lawsuits Fail In New York Courts

sciencehabit writes "Three lawsuits filed last week that attempted to achieve 'legal personhood' for four chimpanzees living in New York have been struck down. The suits, brought by the animal rights group the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP), targeted two chimps on private property and two in a research lab at Stony Brook University in New York. NhRP says it will now appeal each lawsuit to a higher court, and that it will continue its campaign to grant chimpanzees, dolphins, and other cognitively advanced animals legal personhood nationwide."

Comments

so how will they earn a living

[alen]

ok, so they free all the smart animals. what next?
send them back to the wild to fight for food and die fast?

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Anonymous Coward]

whats next? collect taxes from them!

Re:so how will they earn a living

[DoofusOfDeath]

I assume the chimps will be immediately subject to prosecution for bestiality, paedophilia (they apparently start giving birth around 13-14 years), and failure to file tax returns.

Or if they're found to be incompetent to function in human society, they could become wards of the state, I suppose. Of course, then they'd need lots of prescription meds to control their behavior. Which, fortunately, have all been animal-tested.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[DoofusOfDeath]

I don't have any point to make with what I'm about to say (seriously). But your point strangely reminds me of the debate about sending former American slaves back to the countries from which they or their ancestors were first taken.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[DoofusOfDeath]

A good case could be made for electing them to Congress.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Anonymous Coward]

A good case could be made for electing them to Congress.

Screaming and throwing feces at each other? It would be an improvement.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[paulmac84]

Give them jobs as librarians? If an orang-utan can do it, why not a chimp?

Re:so how will they earn a living

[jawtheshark]

Didn't you have a chimp as Persident of the United States a few years ago? /me ducks and runs...

Re:so how will they earn a living

[P-niiice]

The Dole lobby would be huge.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Anonymous Coward]

We still do.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[LoRdTAW]

It makes no sense as the chimps have been in captivity. There is no possible way to reintegrate them back into existing, indigenous, wild African chimp societies. Its like forcing a family to adopt someone, it won't work.

And what is their definition of freed from captivity? An animal is either wild or in captivity. So we do what, turn them loose into the streets? Maybe they can get a job at walmart as a greeter. A zoo is still captivity and chimps privately owned are still in captivity just like dogs and house cats.

I understand the idea behind the suit but this is such a stupid case that it almost sounds like a prank. I cant explain it any other way.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Dishwasha]

In that same vein, I'll consider granting personhood to other species when they themselves can communicate and stand up for rights those species believe they are entitled to. Like a chimp or dolphin Frederick Douglass.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Mr D from 63]

Good. The court will come back with the inevitable conclusion they are not people, precedence will be set, and we won't have to see this stupidity again. And best of all, New Yorkers will pay for it all.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Anonymous Coward]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-human_electoral_candidates

Re:so how will they earn a living

[asylumx]

Weren't they free before they were held captive by humans? In which case, wouldn't they return to the same style of life they had prior to captivity? This doesn't sound very complicated.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[asylumx]

Yes, just not the same one.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[asylumx]

Is this the same line of logic that claims blacks were better off as slaves than they are now as a free people?

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Sarten-X]

Hardly.

I actually appreciate that clause. It conveys the idea that the commenter is not intending to troll, and is intentionally not including any opinion for or against what follows.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Anonymous Coward]

Make them the CEO of a corporation. Since corporations are "people", they can be a person by proxy. And get a golden parachute to boot.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[pr0fessor]

Weren't they free before they were held captive by humans?

No, many of them were bred in captivity {tfa didn't mention the origin of these chimps} and do not necessarily have the skills needed to survive in the jungles of FLORIDA?!?!?

Anyway they would need to adapt since they have never foraged for food, been made to face weather, or fought off predators and would probably need to be looked after until they did adapt. Not completely uncomplicated but not unsurmountable either.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

How do you know they're not communicating and standing up for things like that? Maybe you just don't understand their communication any better than a wild chimp understands your speech.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[MightyMartian]

The idea behind this is that chimps are extremely close relatives of ours, with many of the differences being of degree and not a lack of capacity. P. troglodytes, in particular, are tool users with at least some linguistic ability (far less than humans admittedly), form societies of fairly surprising complexity and size, and show at least some degree of sentience in general. I know this is a shades of gray kind of argument, but being that these are sentient creatures, at some point you have to ask yourself ethical questions about how you treat them.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[wvmarle]

Why bestiality? They're supposed to be persons, not animals. So sex with chimps would not be bestiality. Just make sure you're not doing it with an underaged chimp.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[DoofusOfDeath]

Ooh, good call!

Re:so how will they earn a living

[mythosaz]

It's a combination of how pretty and tasty they are, and very little to do with their intelligence.

The English Bulldog, for example, is "cute" (in it's own special way), and probably one of the dumbest of all dog breeds, but we'd never think of eating poor Petunia. I don't know how bulldog tastes, but I suspect it's not terrible. [Dog gets eaten a bit around the world, but not much where I live.]

A pig, on the other hand, smart, but ugly, and tasty. Dig in!

Tuna are butt-ugly, and tasty. We don't care how smart they are. Dolphins are pretty, so we're happy to not eat them -- probably a more important factor that their intelligence. [See: Pigs.]

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Diamonddavej]

Great Britain and New Zealand already recognise Great Apes as persons e.g. New Zealand’s Animal Welfare Act of 1999. Accordingly, experiments on Great Apes is banned in these countries.

"As indicated above, some countries, including Great Britain and New Zealand have already enacted strong protections for great apes that are geared
toward apes as individuals." Kober (2001)

Ref.:
Kolber, A.J. 2001. Standing Upright: The Moral and Legal Standing of Humans and Other Apes. Stanford Law Review, Vol. 54, p. 163 to 204.
http://www.maf.govt.nz/biosecurity/legislation/animal-welfare-act/index.htm

Re:so how will they earn a living

[jythie]

Many fights over civil rights started as ridiculous lawsuits that did not have a snowball's chance in hell of making it through court. However they tend to get the ball rolling and start a paper trail for examining who gets what rights in society. This is the same basic process we went through to convert 'non-people' into 'people' over the last few centuries.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[jythie]

Not really. This will not end it any more then early court cases that came to the inevitable conclusion that women, blacks, children, and non-christians were not people either.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Dishwasha]

In a human dominated society that currently doesn't recognize other species as persons, the burden of proof is on the other species. The point I was trying to make is that even though there were sympathetic politicians from the north, in order for a caucasian American society to recognize that African American slaves had the same cognitive abilities as their owners, it took an exceptional African American slave like Frederick Douglass to travel the country and demonstrate a slave reading, writing, and giving oratory at an educated mans level to convince society to revert their longstanding opinions. Likewise until these other species provide a similar demonstration of abilities, it is unlikely that any sympathetic organization will be able to provide enough compelling evidence to convince any majority society or authoritative body of law to recognize the personhood of any other species. Nobody human is going to be able to provide a better burden of proof than something directly from the species itself, rather than by proxy.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[LoRdTAW]

WTF? What the hell are you going on about here? The free blacks were human beings and once freed had the ability to make a living for themselves.

The issue here is giving a person status to a chimp to allow existing laws meant for human beings to now apply to the chimps. This would make testing on them illegal and also other forms of torture illegal.

They speak of freeing them but what do they consider free? If being confined to a small cage cruelty/torture? Where do they go, a bigger cage? How big does the cage have to be in order to be considered not cruel? And that is where the problem lies. If a chimp is a person and given the same rights as a human can they legally be confined at all? If a chimp person can be placed in a zoo than why not a human person? Can a cage big enough to be considered not cruel for a chimp also be not cruel to lock a human in? It becomes a duality of law where the chimp has the rights of a human but is not a human and can not function in a human society.

Either way the chimps have to be confined to a habitat which at the end of the day is a cage. They can never truly be free unless released back into the wild where they will surely die.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

In a human dominated society that currently doesn't recognize other species as persons, the burden of proof is on the other species.

I'm not sure I agree with that. Maybe it should be our responsibility to change how we think, to change how we perceive other living animals. We are the more capable animal, so maybe the burden is on us. Maybe one day we will come to consensus that it is not ethical or moral to kill another living animal and eat it, for example, and that our history of doing so will be seen as barbaric. Maybe one day we will be of the mindset that all living animals, regardless of their intelligence or communication capabilities or anything else, deserve the right to life just as much as we do. A chicken will never be able to speak to us, but maybe one day we will have evolved enough to realize for ourself that the chicken does not want to be killed and eaten, and that we shouldn't do such a thing to another animal. That burden is on us, not the chicken.

This comes to mind, a very thought-provoking essay:

http://stonybrookfarm.wordpress.com/2009/11/07/consider-the-slaughterhouse/

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

I should have included this with my post above, but that article relates to your comparison with racism:

A little more than five years ago, I encountered for the first time Peter Singer’s concept of speciesism, which I have discussed on the blog before. Basically the speciesism argument goes that we think it is okay to eat the meat of various animals because we believe they have lower moral standing because they are fundamentally, permanently, and definitely different than we are. Cows, while indeed sentient beings capable of suffering that have some moral standing (we shouldn’t abuse them, they should be well cared for, etc.), do not have a high enough moral standing to outweigh even our interest (it is not a need) in cooking (most often) and eating their flesh. The danger of speciesism, Singer argues, is that speciesism is no different than racism or sexism, which were based on the same belief in the lower moral standing of the subject based on what were believed to be at the time identifiable differences. It is speciesism above all else that interrupts me because it is so clearly the true ground for my meat eating justification. A pig is not a person. In fundamental and permissive ways, a pig is less than a person. In light of speciesism, with it, in fact, constantly tapping on my shoulder in an effort to get my attention, I make a reverse Pascalian wager and act as if the threat of speciesism will never come to pass. That threat being, recall, that we will discover one day, just as we did with racism and sexism, that there is no difference there and that animals of different species have equal moral standing.

Like I said, that cow will never be able to tell us what it wants or what it thinks. It's just not going to happen. The burden is not on the cow, it is on us.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Arker]

Fortunately enough work has been done on other primates that we can be quite certain about their lack of capabilities here. Like most other animals their 'communication' system is based on involuntary responses rather than voluntary, and while their abilities are astonishingly advanced in comparison to some other species, they still clearly lack language, abstract thought, and thus moral agency.

If you are looking for sentient non-humans on the planet, I would say the cetaceans are a more likely place to find it, although the evidence so far says no there as well, the results are less conclusive at this point.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

they still clearly lack language, abstract thought, and thus moral agency.

I don't agree, see my replies above. All animals do in fact have some moral standing. It is not OK to torture an animal, for example. Moreover, language and abstract thought are not requirements to have moral standing. Plenty of animals have a wide range of thoughts, certainly more than we're aware of (since we can't communicate with each other). Elephants exhibit PTSD, for example. A young elephant that witnesses its mother being shot and killed will exhibit many of the same symptoms in later life that are associated with PTSD in humans.

http://www.elephants.com/ptsd.php

Re:so how will they earn a living

[LoRdTAW]

But those "non-people" were human beings who were discriminated against. Chimps are wild animals. Big difference.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[dryeo]

Orangutans are smarter. A zoo keeper once described the differences between the great apes. If you give a screwdriver to a gorilla, it jumps back in fear and will then tentatively take the screwdriver and try to eat it. A chimp will take it and try to use it for everything except unscrewing things. An Orangutan will take it, act stupid and hide it and when no-one is looking, use it to disassemble the cage.
Actually they aren't that smart. One who had figured out how to open his cage using a piece of wire, some cardboard and brute strength was smart enough to hide his actions from the zoo keeper but didn't stop to think that the intern working by the door would tell on him.
Google orangutan zoo escapes for examples.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[lgw]

The burden is on the creatures without a powerful military to justify their personhood to the creatures with a powerful military. Arguing the morality of it all is just navel-gazing.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[LoRdTAW]

Another dumb thought. Imagine if this law passes or makes it high enough in the courts and republi-neo-right-winger spin machine will have a field day.They will be yammering about how this law will allow people to marry chimps and how people will be marrying dogs and cats and how it all started with letting the gays get married. That will be a fun, yet sad thing to watch.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Arker]

"I don't agree, see my replies above"

I understand you disagree, but your rationale appears to be faulty.

"All animals do in fact have some moral standing."

On what basis do you assert thant?

"It is not OK to torture an animal, for example."

It is wrong to torture an animal because of the ill effect it has on "you" (the torturer) and possibly on others around you. This does not imply that the animal has any legal rights.

"Moreover, language and abstract thought are not requirements to have moral standing."

I disagree, on the basis that moral rules apply only in interactions with moral agents, and moral agency requires the ability to think abstractly (in order simply to comprehend moral obligations.) If you have a rationale for your contrary assertion it is not apparent.

"Elephants exhibit PTSD, for example. A young elephant that witnesses its mother being shot and killed will exhibit many of the same symptoms in later life that are associated with PTSD in humans."

And that relates to moral agency how?

Here's the point. Moral rules are two-way rules. I am expected to respect your rights, and you to respect mine. As long as we are both capable of understanding our rights and obligations that can work.

However, what if one of us is not mentally capable of understanding this? It would be absurd, in that situation, for one party to be expected to respect the 'rights' of a being who is not capable of understanding that respect or returning it.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[vux984]

ok, so they free all the smart animals. what next?

Presumably we'd treat them the same as we treat any reduced capacity human person. Children, those suffering from dementia, or alzheimers, or in a coma...

send them back to the wild to fight for food and die fast?

Only if that's how you plan to deal with all the other people in the country today who aren't able to care for themselves.

I don't think you realize what person hood would mean at all.

In any case, I am not at all for these lawsuits, I think they are misguided at best. But ignorant arguments like yours aren't doing the conversation any favors.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[MetaPhyzx]

The example you are using to make your point involves members of the same species which says more about who we are when we have power versus how intelligent the represented other is.

Those championing American slavery for the most part knew full damned well that what was taking place was morally wrong, but had no intention of giving up the free labor/industrial power and freedom it provided.

Being members of the same species with the same verbal communication capacity (with formed language being the only barrier, not significant biological difference) a Frederick Douglass was never required; remember, free Blacks had been in America since its founding and some were slave owners themselves.

Once you factor in biological differences, you're stacking the deck against a species who cannot verbally communicate with you. Considering that there are members of some of these species that apparently can communicate with us via other means of language (sign/symbol), maybe this silliness regarding the burden of proof will die.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[nytes]

They would certainly have better ethics.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Dishwasha]

You are really selling the cow short while at the same time attempting to defend it with presuppositions. What makes you so certain that cows will NEVER be able to tell us what they want or think? I find that extremely speciest and unfounded. Now say extremely unlikely and you're less definitively limiting the future capabilities of cows, but then supporting a stereotype that might take cows a millennium to see squashed outside of the extreme corners of the galaxy where the CCC meets in secret.

Since we're now down to generalizations, I will generalize that it will take a VERY long time for a significant enough portion of the population to agree with your view set while only humans are advocating for cow personage. Show me a cow advocating for personage and THEN a significant enough portion of the population will begin doubting the morality of using cows as a food source. Once again, the MAJORITY burden is on the cow. Perhaps at some point it truly can comprehend its identity as self and wants not only itself eaten, but that of any of its species as well. Otherwise the minority burden is on this small minority of people who prefer to anthropomorphise animals to compensate for their own lack of evidence and rigor to delineate between morally valid and invalid food sources. After all, what makes <insert non-human animalia> any more deserving of not being eaten than <insert any plantae, fungi, chromista, protozoa, or bacteria>? You know those nuts you are eating are something's fertilized or aborted baby and its womb, right?

Re:so how will they earn a living

[c_woolley]

Screaming and throwing feces at each other? It would be an improvement.

It would certainly make philbusters more interesting.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Arker]

"Exactly, well put. It is entirely moral for me to torment a retarded child, who can't understand or return respect to me."

Are you even trying?

If it's wrong to torture an animal it's certainly wrong to torture a child, and if you think a retarded child cannot understand or return your respect you clearly do not know any. So you failed to address the argument in a compound fashion - you shot at the wrong target, and missed everything!

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

"All animals do in fact have some moral standing."

On what basis do you assert thant?

On the fact that they are alive. Anything living animal has some moral standing. I don't see any reason to assert otherwise.

It is wrong to torture an animal because of the ill effect it has on "you" (the torturer) and possibly on others around you. This does not imply that the animal has any legal rights.

That's a pretty awful and selfish stance. The reason why rape is illegal is not because of the trauma that might be inflicted on people witnessing the rape, it is because of the trauma inflicted on the victim. That sentence is correct regardless of the species of the victim. I'm not talking about legal rights. It is objectively wrong to rape another animal, just as it is objectively wrong to kill one for pleasure.

I disagree, on the basis that moral rules apply only in interactions with moral agents, and moral agency requires the ability to think abstractly (in order simply to comprehend moral obligations.) If you have a rationale for your contrary assertion it is not apparent.

An interaction with a moral agent does not require that both agents have morality. If I stomp on a cat's head and crush it, that is not a moral thing to do regardless of whether or not the cat has any concept of morality. I know that it is not moral. What the cat knows is irrelevant.

And that relates to moral agency how?

It is an illustration of the possibility that abstract thought might not be restricted to humans.

However, what if one of us is not mentally capable of understanding this? It would be absurd, in that situation, for one party to be expected to respect the 'rights' of a being who is not capable of understanding that respect or returning it.

That is absolutely not absurd. Brooke Greenberg was not capable of understanding morality, even at 20 years old. That does not make it moral for me to sexually abuse her, does it? She would even be of the legal age, but what would happen to me if I was found having sex with her? Is she capable of consent? No, she's not, because of her lack of mental capacity. The lack of mental capacity does not mean that she loses her inalienable rights. I am suggesting that it is true that animals also have inalienable rights to life, liberty, and happiness. I see no compelling justification for why that should not be the case, other than the fact that the animals have no representative among themselves to assert those rights in a way that we can understand. The animal is alive, so what exactly gave you the authority to kill it? You do not have that authority, it was never given to you and it is not something that can be taken or simply asserted. When someone asserts the authority to kill another animal then they are looking directly at a moral paradox when they expect others to not assert the authority to kill them.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[DM9290]

Exactly, well put. It is entirely moral for me to torment a retarded child, who can't understand or return respect to me.

Thanks for clearing that up!

Not so. Because humans have empathy and you can't torment a "retarded child" or a dog or an ape without indirectly tormenting yourself.

the child or animal would exhibit symptoms of distress which you can understand on an instinctive level because you are a human being and you would want to provide assistance to relieve the suffering. If you didn't feel such motivation then arguably it is YOU who don't understand respect and can not return it.

Furthermore there is an entire legal process that would be triggered by such an action which necessarily entails a great deal of unpleasant labour by other people to deal with your actions, perform a criminal investigation, etc and so you are tormenting other moral agents as well.

The rest of us, having every reason to believe you have empathy and understand the consequences of those acts would judge your acts as immoral. And if you proved you felt felt no empathy or understanding of the concept of law we would judge you as being criminally insane and thus not a moral agent yourself.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Arker]

"On the fact that they are alive. Anything living animal has some moral standing. I don't see any reason to assert otherwise."

Are you a Jain? Do you walk barefoot and sweep the sidewalk as you walk to avoid stepping on a bug?

If so, I will respectfully disagree but give you credit for consistency and sincerity at least.

"The reason why rape is illegal is not because of the trauma that might be inflicted on people witnessing the rape, it is because of the trauma inflicted on the victim. "

And victims of rape are human beings, moral agents with rights that have been violated.

"That sentence is correct regardless of the species of the victim. I'm not talking about legal rights. It is objectively wrong to rape another animal, just as it is objectively wrong to kill one for pleasure."

Well now I know you did not grow up on a farm.

The notion of 'raping an animal' is just as ludicrously wrong as the notion of putting a wolf on trial for murdering sheep. Go witness the breeding of a cow or a horse sometime and get your eyes opened up.

Rape is penetration without consent. Consent is only a meaningful concept in regards to moral agents.

"It is an illustration of the possibility that abstract thought might not be restricted to humans."

I am certain that abstract thought is not restricted to humans, and eager for any evidence to demonstrate that it is not. Unfortunately this does not do it.

"That is absolutely not absurd."

Then file murder charges against a wolf. Or an alligator, a bear, a bull, I dont care. The next time a nonhuman kills a human in your area put him on trial for murder... come on. You really cant see how silly that is?

"Brooke Greenberg"

To avoid repeating myself, I just answered that line of thought here.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Darinbob]

We'll put them on disabled benefits.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

Are you a Jain? Do you walk barefoot and sweep the sidewalk as you walk to avoid stepping on a bug?

I do not, but that doesn't mean that I'm not conscious of the moral paradox. I also don't go out of my way to purposely walk on bugs. If I notice a bug on the sidewalk then I'll avoid it.

Then file murder charges against a wolf. Or an alligator, a bear, a bull, I dont care. The next time a nonhuman kills a human in your area put him on trial for murder... come on. You really cant see how silly that is?

You are arguing that it is not immoral for an animal to kill a human, and I am arguing that it is immoral for a human to kill an animal. I would also say that it would be immoral for a more advanced species to land on our planet and, unable to communicate with anything for whatever reason, proceed to exterminate all life on the planet. I don't have a social contract with those hypothetical beings, but that doesn't mean that the lack of a social contract makes it OK for them to kill everything. I don't have a social contract with lambs, and I don't feel like I need a social contract in order to make it immoral to kill and eat My Pretty Girl. It's the moral paradox that many people are aware of and which we suppress - the thought or knowledge that it is not morally right for us to kill and eat other animals, but we do it anyway because we think of the animals as less than ourselves. That line of thinking would make it justifiable for any species more powerful than us to kill and eat us.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

After all, what makes any more deserving of not being eaten than ?

Put simply, the apparent lack of capacity to suffer. Animals are capable of suffering, I don't know of any species of plant capable of suffering. From what I can tell suffering requires a nervous system, even a basic one. The best a plant can do is grow branches towards the light, and roots towards the water. If you injure any animal, it will feel suffering and will attempt to escape beyond some sort of basic reflex response.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

I should rephrase that. "Suffer" should be "feel suffering".

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Arker]

"You are arguing that it is not immoral for an animal to kill a human, and I am arguing that it is immoral for a human to kill an animal."

If it is immoral for a human to kill an animal, then it would be likewise immoral for an animal to kill a human, yes. Were these two moral agents they would have an obligation to let each other be. My position is that known species of animals are not moral agents, they are incapable of moral right or wrong, their actions are not subject to our morality. It is not part of their world.

"I would also say that it would be immoral for a more advanced species to land on our planet and, unable to communicate with anything for whatever reason, proceed to exterminate all life on the planet."

Your moral outrage in such a situation would doubtless be impotent, and I would say misplaced as well. Your energy in such a situation would be better directed towards finding a way to communicate before we were exterminated. Only once that is accomplished would the moral argument have any force.

"It's the moral paradox that many people are aware of and which we suppress - the thought or knowledge that it is not morally right for us to kill and eat other animals, but we do it anyway because we think of the animals as less than ourselves."

That sounds like an awful position to be in, it must be a horrible strain to feel yourself so compromised. If you really believe this you should definitely become a vegetarian. Except plants are alive too... you poor thing, however shall you eat?

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

If it is immoral for a human to kill an animal, then it would be likewise immoral for an animal to kill a human, yes.

I don't agree with that. I don't see any correlation there.

My position is that known species of animals are not moral agents, they are incapable of moral right or wrong, their actions are not subject to our morality. It is not part of their world.

I agree with that. Animals most likely do not understand morality, and so their actions towards us are not subject to morality. I don't believe the opposite is true though. We understand morality, therefore whether we like it or not our actions towards other species are always subject to morality, because we understand it. Choosing to say that we don't need to act morally towards a particular species because that species does not understand morality is burying your head in the sand. As moral creatures, it is our obligation to respect morality towards any other sentient creature.

Except plants are alive too... you poor thing, however shall you eat?

Like I said elsewhere, I don't see any evidence that plants are capable of feeling suffering, and therefore I see no problem with eating them. The same is not true of animals. Causing another animal to feel suffering is not moral, that's the end of it. Quite frankly, causing another animal to feel suffering is a sadistic trait.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Arker]

I dont think we will ever agree but I do have a better understanding of your position and enjoyed the conversation. Thank you.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Riceballsan]

"failure to file tax returns"

Just being a person doesn't mean you can go to prison, just ask Bain capital, or wells fargo, or bank of america, none of those people have faced any jailtime

Of course, I suppose it depends on how much they get on the former slavery lawsuits... if they don't have money... yeah those monkeys will be in jail in hours.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Dishwasha]

To use your own logic:

How do you know plants or fungi or bacteria don't suffer? Maybe you just don't understand their suffering any better than a plant understands your cries of pain.

Check out http://www.smithsonianchannel.com/sc/web/video/titles/12151/do-plants-respond-to-pain and you might consider re-evaluating your qualification for what has the capacity for feeling suffering. Then you'll have to backtrack on what can be eaten and what is qualified for personhood, or go the other way and begin to starve yourself to death.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[easyTree]

A good case could be made for electing them to Congress.

Screaming and throwing feces at each other? It would be an improvement.

It's nice that congress-critters are aiming for self-improvement but why should the Chimps have to suffer through that?

Re:so how will they earn a living

[amicusNYCL]

I don't know for a fact that plants do not "feel" pain or suffering, I assume that they do not because they lack all of the systems which animals use to feel anything at all. I do know for a fact that animals can feel pain and suffering.

I understand that plants have responses to various stimuli, such as light. Slime molds for example will avoid light and will re-connect if separated. Other plants will grow towards a light source. Venus fly traps will shut their trap to catch an insect, but I would not consider that intelligence because if their pad is touched at all by anything (even something they can't eat), they will still close. I've also seen plants that rapidly close their leaves if you brush by them. I see all of those as primitive response to stimuli, or a reflex. Even with those examples I don't see evidence that a plant would necessarily "feel" anything. When I brush by a set of leaves and they close, only those leaves close. Other leaves on the plant, even those right next to the ones that closed, did not close because they were not touched. That is a response by the individual leaves, not a decision taken by the larger organism. If it were, then it would also close nearby leaves for the same reason. A plant does not have a nervous system, and therefore I don't see evidence that it can feel pain or suffering. I know for a fact that animals will feel pain though, there's no question about that.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[asylumx]

I don't think you understand how analogies work.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Dishwasha]

Could you not even be bothered enough to watch the entire article video I linked in my last post? Not only was the researcher able to suppress the leaf response through the entire plant using the same agent typically used to suppress a human's central nervous system, but he was also able to measure an electrical response throughout the plant slower but similar to an animal's central nervous system when he burned a leaf on that plant with a lighter.

Once again I think you need to reevaluate your qualifications. A central nervous system may very well not be the deciding factor of whether or not a living thing can feel pain or feel suffering.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[david_thornley]

I have a REAL problem with the notion of moral rights without moral responsibilities. I don't believe in beings above morality, who can do as they please and still claim rights. (In the case of young humans, they'll develop moral sensibilities as they age. In the case of defective humans without moral knowledge, it doesn't hurt to treat them like other humans.)

Animals don't have rights. People have responsibilities.

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Dabido]

Wouldn't that lower their chances of being declared legally human?

Re:so how will they earn a living

[Optali]

What's wrong with your second sentence?
Why would that be negative?

ook?

[Anonymous Coward]

ook! ook!

Re:ook?

[wonkey_monkey]

Stupid mon-

Roddy McDowell

[rossdee]

Was not available for comment

selling there votes

[Joe_Dragon]

as when they are a person they have the right to vote.

A small consolation

[blackbeak]

At least chimps can still comment on /.

Re:A small consolation

[Minwee]

And they still qualify to be Mayor of Toronto, or at least have a set on City Council.

The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Attila Dimedici]

The basis for their case is saying that African-Americans are no better than chimpanzees and since African-Americans have rights, chimpanzees should as well. Oh, they dress it up differently and try to make it sound like that is not what they are claiming, but that is what the case law they cited amounts to.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Dcnjoe60]

To bad you got modded down as a troll because actually you are more or less correct - they are comparing chimp captivity to slavery. From a summary about the case:

n each case, NhRP is petitioning judges with a writ of habeas corpus, which allows a person being held captive to have a say in court. In a famous 1772 case, an English judge allowed such a writ for a black slave named James Somerset, tacitly acknowledging that he was a person—not a piece of property—and subsequently freed him. The case helped spark the eventual abolition of slavery in England and the United States. Wise is hoping for something similar for the captive chimps.

The irony is that their proposed solution, if they win is to house the chimps in a preserve in Florida. The claim it would be like the Native American reservations. However, there people are free to come and go, but the chimps would not have that right, so effectively, they would still be captives. They would just have different masters/caretakers.

I guess for the NhRP different classes of persons are entitled to different rights. Then again, that is pretty much what slave owners thought, too.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Vegan Cyclist]

Bear in mind these are dependent beings....not unlike a child or elderly person. They both have rights as well, but we don't 'let them go in the wild'. (Queue jokes.. ;) We care for them, as they're unable to care for themselves.

The point of the lawsuit is not as focused on current animals (all of whom are dependants), but more-so for future generations (free-living/wild chimpanzees). If granted personhood, they wouldn't be used in the first place, and animal sanctuaries would be needed less, and demand for them (poaching, breeding) would fall. This way, they wouldn't be in zoos, in labs or other exploitative environments, and instead would be where they ought to be - in the wild.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[mcgrew]

Exactly, which is why I posted a link to Heinlein's Jerry Was A Man in the first slashdot story about this. Heinlein, like these lawyers, was a racist (although in his defense, everyone was in 1947).

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[mcgrew]

I guess for the NhRP different classes of persons are entitled to different rights. Then again, that is pretty much what slave owners thought, too.

Incorrect. Slave owners didn't think of slaves as "persons" at all, to them they were simply another species of farm animal, no different than a dog or a horse or any other working farm animal. Just as you have "house dogs" and "field dogs" they had "house niggers" and "field niggers".

This is, in fact, why blacks are so offended by the word "nigger". If you call a man a nigger you're saying he's not human. Also the same reason calling a black man "boy" will, with good reason, raise his ire. "Here, boy!"

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Isn't that precisely what modern pro-choicers also think? That different classes of persons should have different rights? The difference being that most aren't willing to call fetuses people....

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Marxist Hacker 42]

and just like calling a fetus not a person....

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[RoLi]

Hmmm, maybe you should search on youtube for "knockout game" and/or "flash mob robbery".

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[ChromeAeonium]

Kind of reminds me of the time PETA compared chickens slaughtered for KFC to Jews during the Holocaust, as if the two are even remotely similar.

Stay classy, animal rights activists.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[BringsApples]

To say that slavery has a race is simply the stupidest thing that I'll hear today. They're not pointing to racial facts, but rather inhumane actions that took place only with slaves. Color of the slaves skin didn't matter as far as their point in concerned. You are the one that brought race into the picture here, kiddo.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[GrumpySteen]

their proposed solution, if they win is to house the chimps in a preserve in Florida.

And then, since the chimps are now people in the eyes of the law, they can vote!

Because Florida's election results aren't wacky enough on their own.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Dcnjoe60]

Isn't that precisely what modern pro-choicers also think? That different classes of persons should have different rights? The difference being that most aren't willing to call fetuses people....

One could argue that, however, I don't think the overall pro-choice view takes into account the fetus, but instead the woman and her choice. Even Roe v Wade was about a woman's right to privacy. The courts have never ruled on whether a fetus is a person or not, nor do abortion proponents want them to do so.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Dcnjoe60]

Bear in mind these are dependent beings....not unlike a child or elderly person. They both have rights as well, but we don't 'let them go in the wild'. (Queue jokes.. ;) We care for them, as they're unable to care for themselves.

The point of the lawsuit is not as focused on current animals (all of whom are dependants), but more-so for future generations (free-living/wild chimpanzees). If granted personhood, they wouldn't be used in the first place, and animal sanctuaries would be needed less, and demand for them (poaching, breeding) would fall. This way, they wouldn't be in zoos, in labs or other exploitative environments, and instead would be where they ought to be - in the wild.

A ruling by a US court on the personhood of animals would only have jurisdiction in the US and it's territories. As such, it would have minimal impact on poaching, breeding, zoos and labs, etc.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[psithurism]

Yes! If someone doubts a fetus is a person, we should summon that fetus to testify by writ of habeas corpus (which allows a person being held captive to have a say in court) and then, once acknowledged as a person, we can free the fetus from captivity.

Also, don't call them "fetters" or "boy" it really offends them.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[LeadSongDog]

1947? Hell, everyone has always been racist and always will be. Can't help it. Xenophobia is in the genes because it is a survival-trait behaviour. We just change our perceptions about which "race" we apply our zenohobia to. Right now, we mainly apply it to machines. Come the singularity, machines will be racist too. We can only hope that they will find us amusing pets rather than serious threats.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Likely because it would open a can of worms that would be hard to close. After all, I don't know anybody who skipped straight from conception to childhood, do you?

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[DM9290]

Isn't that precisely what modern pro-choicers also think? That different classes of persons should have different rights? The difference being that most aren't willing to call fetuses people....

Nope. I didn't have a right to embed myself into my mother's body when I was conceived, nor when I was 4 months a fetus, 4 months a baby, or 40 years old.

I think nobody has the right to be embedded into any woman's body without her continuing consent EVER.

The instant a mother wants to retract her consent from a fetus is the instant she has a right to an abortion and it absolutely trumps any claims the fetus has.

So - go ahead and call a fetus a human being or a person or whatever you want. I'm still pro choice.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Marxist Hacker 42]

So you'd agree with the current attempts to limit abortion to before 20 weeks, since that's scientifically proven pain-capable? Or maybe 8 weeks, which is detectable EEG and thus thought?

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Consent was given by your mother when she had sex, except in cases of rape and incest.

Continuing consent is another issue. Say she decided not to consent to feeding you after birth, did she have a right to starve you?

I ask because I find many of the pro-choice arguments are not very well thought out.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Attila Dimedici]

They are pointing to a ruling that said a black man had rights that did not go away just because he was a slave. They are saying that if a black man had those rights, so should a chimpanzee.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[BringsApples]

If that's the case, then you have a point - not that I agree that they're being racist, but I can see where you're coming from. However I didn't see that in the article posted here. Have you got a better link than the one provided?

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Dcnjoe60]

Likely because it would open a can of worms that would be hard to close. After all, I don't know anybody who skipped straight from conception to childhood, do you?

While your question is rhetorical, the implication is real. If a fetus were deemed a person under the law, then the fetus would have all of the protections of any other person under the law. Now, while still an embryo, it is unlikely that such a declaration would be made, but if a six month fetus which should be viable, at least with assistance would be declared a person, then the courts would be faced with a woman's right to privacy (abortion) and the fetus' right to life. Then if six month and beyond is a person, what about 5 month and 29 days? It becomes a slippery slope. That is exactly the case the pro-abortion people don't want to be heard but the anti-abortion people do want.

Interestingly, that is also why many anti-abortion groups support granting personhood to animals as it tends to bolster their case. It is also why many pro-abortion groups oppose it.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Marxist Hacker 42]

But if the mother's consent is all that matters, then child protective services is intervening as much as any other pro-lifer in forcing her to care for the child.

I'm firmly of the belief that consent is so irrational as to be an impossible to judge metric. As you say, it's a case by case thing.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Vegan Cyclist]

Yes and no..it would knock out the US as a market, and hopefully other countries would follow. We have to start somewhere..nothing else is going to end it overnight either.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[david_thornley]

I don't know of anybody who's pro-abortion. I know quite a few people who believe women should have the right to abortions, but they aren't actually in favor of increasing the numbers of abortions. Lots of people think abortions should be safe, legal, and rare.

If a fetus were a person under the law, things would get weird. A miscarriage would require a forensic examination. The tension between women's rights and fetus rights would get really intense. Could a pregnant woman have a beer? Refuse to exercise? What would be the legal dietary requirements? Since almost anything a pregnant woman does can affect the fetus, there'd be big-time conflicts. I'm not sure this would do anti-abortion proponents any good.

It would also be vital to know when conception took place. When my wife got pregnant, we made sure we made love on four nights of highest predicted fertility. Odds are it was one of those four, but which one? In our case, they were all in the same year, but what if they had been over a year break? How do we tell whether we could claim the embryo as a dependent? One advantage of birth is that it's definite and obvious. I know very well when my son was born. So how would one enforce a six-month rule?

As an abortion-rights proponent, I like the idea of anti-abortion types making stupid claims, such as that animals are people also. It makes them look wrong.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Dcnjoe60]

I don't know of anybody who's pro-abortion. I know quite a few people who believe women should have the right to abortions, but they aren't actually in favor of increasing the numbers of abortions. Lots of people think abortions should be safe, legal, and rare.

If you are in favor of there being legal abortion, then by definition, you are pro-abortion. If you are opposed to legal abortion, you are anti-abortion. Terms like pro-choice or pro-life are simply euphemisms to soften the reality.

As to when life begins, that is beyond the realm of science to determine. It is in fact a philosophical debate, whether that philosophy is religious or secular. However, not all people opposed to abortion are religious, just as not all people in favor of abortion are anti-religious. The two are not synonymous and it is dangerous to simplify abortion as merely a religious issue.

It's also important that women do not have a right to an abortion, there is no such thing as abortion rights. Women, according to the SCOTUS have a right to privacy and what people collectively refer to as abortion rights are, in reality, privacy rights. That is why those who are pro-abortion are concerned over these attempts to grant personhood to animals.

Since a viable fetus is much closer to being a human person than a chimpanzee or a dolphin, if a chimpanzee or dolphin were to be granted personhood, then abortions would not be permitted if a fetus were viable - the courts have already determined in other areas that an individual persons right to life takes precedence over another's right to privacy. Since most six month fetus are sustainable, that would end third term abortions. From there it would be a slippery slope earlier and earlier into the pregnancy.

So, while you may feel that this would be a stupid claim by anti-abortion types, first, it was not their claim, although they support it, and second it has the potential to be as upsetting to the abortion industry as the ipad was to the computer industry.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[david_thornley]

If you are in favor of there being legal abortion, then by definition, you are pro-abortion. If you are opposed to legal abortion, you are anti-abortion. Terms like pro-choice or pro-life are simply euphemisms to soften the reality.

I'm in favor of neo-Nazi propaganda being legal. I'm not pro-neo-Nazi-propaganda. There are many things I consider immoral that I think should be legal for various reasons. As I said, I'm in favor of abortions being legal. That's all. I'm not debating the morality here.

Alternately, you can derive abortion rights from the right not to be a slave. In no other case is an individual legally required to do something arduous and somewhat dangerous for the medical benefit of another. If my brother needs bone marrow, I can refuse to donate mine. I can initially accept, then after his has been killed refuse to donate mine. (Note: I'm claiming this is immoral in general, but AFAIK it's legal.) Pregnancy is arguably more crippling, and definitely more dangerous, than donating marrow.

Nor is a viable fetus necessarily closer to being human than an adult chimp; depends on your point of view. It would be logically consistent to draw a big line between not-yet-born and born, and a lesser line between species. Birth is a very useful marker, being far more easily determined than viability, or the date of conception.

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[Dcnjoe60]

I'm in favor of neo-Nazi propaganda being legal. I'm not pro-neo-Nazi-propaganda. There are many things I consider immoral that I think should be legal for various reasons.

You only have three choices, you can be in opposed to something, often referred to anti-something. You can be in favor of something, often referred to pro-something and you can be neutral on the subject, thereby being neither pro, nor anti. Those are the only choices. It doesn't matter whether it is a moral issue or not. You could be talking about abortion or NASCAR, you can only be pro, anti, or neutral.

Alternately, you can derive abortion rights from the right not to be a slave. In no other case is an individual legally required to do something arduous and somewhat dangerous for the medical benefit of another. If my brother needs bone marrow, I can refuse to donate mine. I can initially accept, then after his has been killed refuse to donate mine. (Note: I'm claiming this is immoral in general, but AFAIK it's legal.) Pregnancy is arguably more crippling, and definitely more dangerous, than donating marrow.

Except in slavery on is being enslaved by another. In pregnancy, it is biology. It is not the government forcing her to be pregnant or a man forcing her to be pregnant. It is a fact that the woman is pregnant. If you want to take the slavery route, then if a fetus is deemed to be human, what about its rights? Or are you arguing that it is the fetus that is somehow enslaving the woman? Trying to using the trappings of slavery and oppression as the reason for abortion doesn't work. It's probably why in the cases that went to the Supreme Court didn't use them and instead focused on privacy.

Your argument about not compelling somebody to do something dangerous for the medical benefit of another may be valid. But that would be a dangerous argument because a third trimester abortion usually is more dangerous for a woman than a natural delivery and following that argument, shouldn't be allowed. Before arguing that it would be a woman's choice to take on that extra risk, remember that the argument you are proposing is that not allowing the abortion is dangerous so the government should allow it. If it is shown that the abortion is more dangerous, why would the government intervene to permit an even greater risk to the woman?

Nor is a viable fetus necessarily closer to being human than an adult chimp; depends on your point of view. It would be logically consistent to draw a big line between not-yet-born and born, and a lesser line between species. Birth is a very useful marker, being far more easily determined than viability, or the date of conception.

The courts have already determined that killing a fetus during a crime, in many jurisdictions, can get someone charged with murder/manslaughter. So by law, a viable fetus already is considered human with limited rights. A chimp is not. Birth is not a very useful marker, it is a very convenient marker. First, there is already case law regarding harming the fetus during a crime, mentioned previously. Second it is generally accepted in the medical community that a six month fetus is viable and is no longer considered that extraordinary measures are needed but instead standard treatment. (That doesn't mean it still isn't risky, just that it is commonplace enough that there are standard procedures and treatments that lead to good prognosis for the premature child). Third, conception, although I am not arguing that, is just as useful a marker as birth. Both are arbitrary objective events.

The problem with either of them is that the whole issue, especially for the courts, is a subjective one. The courts never said that a fetus wasn't a human being (they never said it was, either). No, they sidestepped the whole issue by framing the discussion as a privacy issue. Most constitutional lawyers conclude that if the courts had or do determine at some point between conception and bi

Re:The Lawyers for NhRP are racists

[david_thornley]

It is true that I can be only for, against, or neutral for a specific thing, but that doesn't hold true across a range. I can consistently be for early-term abortions of fetuses with serious congenital disabilities, against late-term abortions, and neutral towards other early-term abortions. I can consistently be against some (or all) abortions, while also being against laws that will disallow them. Whether something is moral is not the same as whether it is legal. I gave an example earlier: I'm strongly for legal freedom of speech, and hence strongly against laws inhibiting said freedom. I'm also strongly against things like hateful neo-Nazi propaganda. I can dislike NASCAR, but want it to be legal.

Assuming a fetus is human, that fetus has no right to be a literal parasite on another human. In any other case, a person can refuse to provide such assistance to another person. Making abortion illegal would be the anomaly here.

Conception is not as useful a legal marker as birth. Birth is obvious to determine and is well recorded. Conception isn't. I know the date my son was born. Even had I been keeping appropriate records, I'd just have a good idea that my son was conceived during a particular week, not any certainty. Bright lines are extremely useful in law.

intelligence

[magic maverick]

Considering that chimps are as intelligent (at least) as two and three year olds, I think they should be given the same sort of rights. The right not to be tortured, and mistreated for one.

Oh but they are beasts and awful, and rape and stuff. Yeah, humans are horrible aren't they.

Humans aren't special. Get over yourselves.

Re:intelligence

[wonkey_monkey]

but by definition if you are not human you are an animal.

Or possibly a bowl of petunias.

Re:intelligence

[Mr D from 63]

Considering that chimps are as intelligent (at least) as two and three year olds,.....

Really? Maybe some really stupid 3 year olds.

Re:intelligence

[Anonymous Coward]

You might want to learn a bit about chimpanzees.

They "have the ability to plan, use tools, and effectively modify our environment."

They go on murder parties to other chimp groups. They strip out all natural resources that they can access in an area (food). They can actually communicate, not just mimic.

Also, "by definition if you are not human you are an animal" you might want to go look up the biological definition of Homo sapiens. We're animals too.

And "humans are responsible for their actions. Humans that are not, we lock up." Chimps behave in similar ways by shunning, punishing or even killing those chimps that don't conform to group behaviors.

So maybe you need new definitions, and obviously knowledge, of the differences between humans & chimps.

Re:intelligence

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Pretty much any animal with consciousness should not be tortured. I'm highly skeptical of the necessity for experiments without sedation or pain killers.

Re:intelligence

[glwtta]

Humans aren't special. Get over yourselves.

Don't see any chimps or dolphins wringing their hands/flippers over who has what rights. That seems to be a pretty special human trait.

Re:intelligence

[mark-t]

I agree with most of your points above, but I wanted to point out that the issue with tools and animals is not so much in the ability to use them, but the ability to craft them... to take existing resources and combine or modify them in some way as to be fit for a specific class of purposes, and *then* to use said tool. Many animals can use tools, taking something which already exists in a state that is suitably fit for some purpose which may not itself be part of nature, and using it for such, but there are, as far as I am aware, only isolated cases of animals actually crafting tools in nature, specific only to the individual creature so discovered doing so, and this trait is not generally shared even by others of the exact same species.

Re:intelligence

[Dcnjoe60]

"The difference is on average humans have the ability to plan, use tools, and effectively modify our environment."

Chimps do all of those things. I don't understand why people need to define a special category for intelligence which basically boils down to "things humans do". We are obviously more intelligent than chimps. On the other hand, chimps are obviously more intelligent than mice. Personhood is a sliding scale, and should be treated as such.

The flaw in your thinking is that personhood is a sliding scale, it is not. Personhood, a human construct, is only applicable to human beings. Is an invalid less a person than an athlete? No, they are both equal persons, but they have different capabilities. Society may value those capabilities differently, but it doesn't change the personhood.

People trying to elevate lower species to persons rely on things like intelligence, or sentience and the like. If that is the case, then all of us, if we are asleep or unconscious, cease to be persons. A person in a coma is still a person even if at that moment is less intelligent or sentient than a chimpanzee or dolphin. What makes a person a person is not their intellectual ability or any other ability. It is an inherent trait of being a human being.

As such, personhood is not subjective, it is an absolute, yes or no. All human beings are persons. All persons are human beings. There is no gray area or sliding scale. It is as simple as that.

Re:intelligence

[Chrisq]

Considering that chimps are as intelligent (at least) as two and three year olds, I think they should be given the same sort of rights. The right not to be tortured, and mistreated for one.

Oh but they are beasts and awful, and rape and stuff. Yeah, humans are horrible aren't they.

Humans aren't special. Get over yourselves.

Most humans become civilised. Some however revert;.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

Tool manufacture. Not just picking up a stick, but breaking off a branch to the right length, stripping off the leaves, whittling down the right size. Yeah, apes do that too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool_use_by_animals#Primates

Re:intelligence

[bobbied]

A third is that we are humans and granted the rights to ourselves.

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

The Declaration of Independence.

Re:intelligence

[hey!]

The difference is on average humans have the ability to plan, use tools, and effectively modify our environment.

It's almost certain you can't separate chimps from humans this way. Chimps not only use tools, they *learn* to use certain things as tools and the knowledge spreads between chimpanzee groups through individuals -- in other words they have a rudimentary technological culture.

Chimpanzee groups engage in warfare to annex territory, and it's not just a case of encountering other groups and spontaneous fights breaking out. They *invade* the territory of other groups. Surely that shows rudimentary planning. Within a group there is politics. The dominant male is not necessarily the strongest; a clever male can defeat a strong one by forming alliances.

Psychological experiments support the notion that chimps have a consciousness of self. Chimps have been taught American Sign Language, and appear to use all the cognitive features of language. Objections have been raised that this is just operant conditioning, but the same objections would apply to human use of language.

A hundred years ago, the idea that chimps might be persons from the point of view of ethics would be ridiculous. They were just animals in the forest. But a century of research has seriously undermined nearly every substantive distinction between humans and chimps. At this point the verifiable differences between chimps and humans aren't ones of *kind*, but of *degree*. Chimps use tools, but simpler ones than humans do. Chimps can use human language, even learn it spontaneously, but their vocabulary is in the hundreds of words, not thousands for a fluent human speaker.

If there is a defensible *ethical* distinction between the status of chimps and the status of humans, that distinction ought to arise out of clear-cut differences between humans and apes. At present there are only two clear-cut distinctions between humans and chimps. The first is genetics; chimps are close, but past attempts to create human/chimp hybrid have failed. Second, humans *rely* upon our advanced behavioral capabilities to survive. Tools are useful to chimps, but *essential* for us. Yet it is hard for me to see how we get from "chimps can get along without tools" to "it is immoral to experiment on chimps." One doesn't follow from the other.

If the answer is "well, they just aren't *human*," that has implications which are nearly as counter-intuitive as the notion that chimps have some of the same rights as humans. Most people would assume that if we ever met an alien, non-human civilization made up of self-conscious individuals, that hunting those individuals for pleasure would be morally wrong, and perhaps legally impermissible because while not human, they are "natural persons" with at least some of the basic rights of humans. Furthermore, if genetic tribalism is the ethical basis of law, why not favor Europeans over Africans, or vice versa?

Re:intelligence

[TheLink]

That's why I find it worrying when people do research into human-animal hybrids, etc. The technology may be ready long before human society is ready for the results.

Would the benefits be worth it? And what would the "benefits" be - a new class of slaves?

More and more we should start considering whether we should do research on stuff based on the long term consequences than merely it can now be done, or "someone else will do it if I don't" (that someone may only do it much later).

Re:intelligence

[amicusNYCL]

All human beings are persons. All persons are human beings. There is no gray area or sliding scale. It is as simple as that.

The law doesn't agree. See "corporate personhood". If a corporation can be recognized as a legal person in the eyes of the law, why not an intelligent animal? Chimps are good candidates, so are dolphins or elephants. Guess which animal is next on the list of intelligence: pigs. Imagine what would happen if pigs had civil rights all of a sudden, where killing a pig would bring a murder charge. A lot of money would be thrown at politicians to make sure that would never happen. Regardless of how intelligent they are, pigs also happen to taste pretty good so they're damned. Chimps are lucky we don't eat them.

Re:intelligence

[amicusNYCL]

So do crows.

Re:intelligence

[MightyMartian]

Chimps plan, use tools and modify their environment.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

Seriously? Humans *can't* survive without tools?

I'm pretty sure we can, it's just a very hard life. We build/make/use tools to make life easier/better.

But they're not *essential*.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

That's pretty much what the GP said, just less flowery.

Re:intelligence

[hey!]

Sure. Take away *all* human tools, including the lever, the rock, and the pointed stick, there are very few places on Earth where anatomically modern humans could survive.

Physically, if you were well-trained you could run a deer to death from exhaustion. Then you'd be stuck, because with your itty-bitty incisors you wouldn't be able to eat the carcass without some kind of cutting tool.

Re:intelligence

[jythie]

Many humans are not legally responsible for their actions yet still are considered granted personhood (and the protections that come with it).

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

Agriculture can sustain a human. See vegans.

Re:intelligence

[jythie]

Since 'personhood' has changed multiple times, I do not think one can say that it is an absolute, otherwise it would have been settled a long time ago. Even today look at all the debate around abortion and contraception. No, there is quite a bit of subjectivity and arbitrariness going on here.

That being said, yes, it is a human construct, meaning we can change it to mean whatever we want. We get to choose what rights and protections we extend to those who lack the ability to fight for themselves. As a civilization we weight the economic advantages of minimizing those protections vs the ethics of what it costs others.

Re:intelligence

[coinreturn]

Don't see any chimps or dolphins wringing their hands/flippers over who has what rights...

That's because you only pay attention to the human media.

Re:intelligence

[jythie]

The necessity for skipping sedation or pain killers is primarily for the psychological health of researchers and people who talk about research. If you believe that non-human animals do not feel pain then that provides a bit of a blank check to inflict it. However if you acknowledge pain by reducing it, that means that one IS inflicting serious injury and eventual death on an unwilling test subject. So the belief that such creatures simply do not feel or comprehend the way we do is really important to these people.... otherwise they would have to face the implications of what they support or simply accept that they have sociopathic tendencies.

Re:intelligence

[Arker]

You are wrong. No chimpanzee has ever mastered ASL. They learn the equivalent of individual 'words' and use them in interesting ways, but they appear to lack any ability to understand the deeper underpinnings of true language. Syntax is beyond them.

Re:intelligence

[hey!]

Try farming without tools to plant, harvest, process and cook the result. Same goes for foraging. Without tools to process and prepare foraged food, you'd do very well in vitamins and minerals but you'd never get enough calories to support the needs of your anatomically modern human brain. Go to the produce store and imagine living off this stuff if (a) you had to find it and (b) you couldn't use tools to prepare and cook it. You need about 1000 calories per day to survive. That's ten pounds of spinach -- if someone harvests it and hands it to you. If you forage it for yourself you might need to eat 20 pounds of tender plant leaves.

People often imagine our ancestors living in a Garden of Eden filled with modern, selectively bred fruit trees (e.g. hybrid apples grown on grafted trees) bearing year-round. But such a favorable environment has never existed. The ability to prepare and eventually cook difficult-to-eat foods such as roots, grains and nuts with shells was a major driver of later human evolution.

We also imagine *chimpanzees* as the way we see them in the Tarzan movies, but in fact those are always baby chimps. Adult male chimps are much larger; not quite as big as an adult male human but 4x as strong a human of comparable size. Look at the way chimps climb; humans can't do that without some kind of aid. Just take a look at chimp teeth. Obviously chimps are much better prepared than humans to survive without tools.

Re:intelligence

[Arker]

"Physically, if you were well-trained you could run a deer to death from exhaustion."

*ROFL* obviously you have no experience with deer.

The most athletic human on earth racing a deer is going to be like my 8 year old niece on her bicycle trying to race against a stock car. You're insane if you think the human would have any chance at all. Not only can you come nowhere near the target in speed, you're even more outclassed in terms of endurance.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

Why would you be harvesting spinach or plant leaves?

Try caloricly denser foods like beans/potatoes/corn/nuts/fruits. 4 season rotation, most can be stored for more than a season, esp if dried.

Pretty sure a small (20'x40') garden would give you enough to survive just fine.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

They do just fine on understanding deeper meanings. They can ask for a freaking pet for Christmas, and name it.
Or combining words to come up with new ones.
I think they're doing pretty well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koko_(gorilla)#Use_of_language

But, yeah, they're not great on syntax

Re:intelligence

[Arker]

What's happening there is not that the animal has learned the language and is using it properly, but that the animal has (just as I said) learned some words, sticks words together in creative ways, and human beings that are highly motivated to do so are often able to make the leap and attribute real meaning to their utterences. But they still havent the syntax, which means they are simply not capable of understanding or dealing with the concepts of morality.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

Syntax = 'real' meaning?
Syntax = morality?

WTF are you on?

Re:intelligence

[hey!]

That's a strawman argument. Why would a chimp have to *master* ASL, which is of course a human language, in order to show it has the same kinds of cognitive capabilities as humans? In other words is human language grammar the dividing line between a human with rights and an animal with none? Why should that be necessary? What does this say about humans afflicted with aphasia?

The key ability demonstrated by ape language experiments isn't grammar; it is the ability to form cognitive categories. This in turn underpins an ability to conceive of oneself as distinct from everything else. That ability to conceive of oneself as a distinct actor seems to me to be connected to a right to life. Compare a chimpanzee to a clam; they're both animals, but a clam doesn't have any sense of self. A chimpanzee does. Therefore it's quite consistent to draw a line somewhere between a chimp and a clam. You can even argue for a right to chimpanzee liberty without arguing for a similar right for clams, because chimpanzees have the cognitive ability to make use of liberty and clams do not.

Let me stress I am undecided on the idea of chimp personhood. I'm not convinced, but I see no reason not to entertain the possibility if the facts suggest that chimps are more like us than we thought.

I expect one problem with thinking in this area is the assumption there has to be just *one* cognitive that separates humans with their *entire* package of rights from animals. It seems to me the right to self-determination, the right to life, and the right not to be treated cruelly -- all of which rights humans possess -- might well stem from different sources. For example we might agree that torturing a dog is wrong, but it makes no sense to talking about torturing a clam.

Re:intelligence

[Arker]

You think you can convey, discuss, or in any way address the subject of morality, of rights and obligations, by stringing together concrete nouns with no syntax?

What are YOU on?

Re:intelligence

[Dcnjoe60]

Since 'personhood' has changed multiple times, I do not think one can say that it is an absolute, otherwise it would have been settled a long time ago. Even today look at all the debate around abortion and contraception. No, there is quite a bit of subjectivity and arbitrariness going on here.

That being said, yes, it is a human construct, meaning we can change it to mean whatever we want. We get to choose what rights and protections we extend to those who lack the ability to fight for themselves. As a civilization we weight the economic advantages of minimizing those protections vs the ethics of what it costs others.

That is false. Based on what you say, that it is up to society to decide who/what is a person or not, then society could decide a gay is not a person or somebody who is fat is not a person or a black man is not a person, etc. No, what is and is not a person is not the same as what is and is not a planet. It might be acceptable for some group or committee to determine whether a rock in space is no longer a planet, but since only a person has rights, do you really propose that as a solution for who is and is no longer a person?

History has shown us that when a society views a group as somehow less a person than themselves, really bad things happen.

Re:intelligence

[Arker]

"Why should that be necessary?"

Because morality involves rights and obligations. Your right to be left in peace is only half of it - the obligation to respect the same rights in others is the other half.

Unless an entity is at minimum capable of understanding that dialectic it's absurd to apply morality to them at all. They are not evil when they violate your rights (they dont understand that you have any rights, they arent capable of conceiving of rights, let along understanding how to respect them) - it's absurd to attribute moral failure or malice to an animal because they simply are not capable of such things.

And the other side of the same coin is, just as it would be absurd to charge a chimp for violating your rights (he is not a moral agent) it is absurd to attribute rights to the chimp for the very same reason.

"I see no reason not to entertain the possibility if the facts suggest that chimps are more like us than we thought."

Me either. I have followed chimp research with great interest and nothing would make me happier than to have come to a different conclusion. It would be great to have a non-human moral agent around if only to prove that it's possible. And it seems certain we will eventually discover one - but also certain that chimps are not it.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

Three strikes law:

Harm. Bad.
Two harm. Go.
Three harm. Go far.

Could be taken directly from a gorilla:
http://www.koko.org/world/talk_aol.html

Re:intelligence

[Dcnjoe60]

All human beings are persons. All persons are human beings. There is no gray area or sliding scale. It is as simple as that.

The law doesn't agree. See "corporate personhood". If a corporation can be recognized as a legal person in the eyes of the law, why not an intelligent animal? Chimps are good candidates, so are dolphins or elephants. Guess which animal is next on the list of intelligence: pigs. Imagine what would happen if pigs had civil rights all of a sudden, where killing a pig would bring a murder charge. A lot of money would be thrown at politicians to make sure that would never happen. Regardless of how intelligent they are, pigs also happen to taste pretty good so they're damned. Chimps are lucky we don't eat them.

The concept of a corporation being a person under the law is not the same thing as being a person. Is a corporation free to marry any other person? Can a corporation get a passport or VISA? When filing taxes, does a corporation fill out an Individual Return and take an exemption for itself? No, to all of the above. If a corporation were a person, it would have all of the rights as any other person. What the courts declared is that a corporation is recognized as a person under certain parts of the law, such as having the right to free speech. They did not say that a corporation was a person.

Re:intelligence

[hey!]

Pretty sure a small (20'x40') garden would give you enough to survive just fine.

I agree. But that's not the question. The question is whether it can do that without any tools whatsoever. That means no baskets and jars for storage and re-hydrating your beans. No fire for cooking them either. You'd eat those potatoes raw, which greatly reduces the calories you can extract from them.

I'm talking about having no tools at all; no hoes, rakes, clippers or knives; no stakes for your beans to climb or cordage to tie them up with. No rocks for grinding your grains, not even pointed sticks for planting seeds. Nothing to crack your nuts with but your teeth.

As for fruits and corn, the huge, succulent varieties we take for granted are dependent upon (tool-based) agriculture. Wild apples are crab apples. Wild maize looks more like wheat. In any case without lime (the byproduct of fire) maize is a very poor foodstuff.

With tools and fire, 1600 sq ft is easily enough to support the nutritional needs of one human. With nothing but your bare hands, teeth, and nails, you'd need hundreds of acres of prime foraging habitat per individual -- habitat like modern chimpanzee habitat. But we're a lot less well adapted than chimps to exploit that habitat, from our relatively weak limbs to our puny, brittle teeth.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

Yes, you can store things underground, in a tree hollow, underwater,

You can still plant & harvest modern corn/fruits without using tools.

Why do you think you can't dig a few trenches 40' long with your hands in one week, plant the next week, harvest 3-6 months later? Rotate crops & trenches every month.

You don't need to forage.

Also, chimps use tools for breaking nuts, getting insects, etc. because it's easier & better.

Re:intelligence

[Arker]

Uh, and?

If you do X then Y will hurt you is something a cockroach can understand, it has nothing whatsoever to do with the issue of moral agency.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

Really? So does an ape not know right from wrong in their group settings? Yes they do. They punish, shame & shun those who continue to be bad actors in their groups.

And they can communicate that. To other apes & humans.

Not sure what the hell else you really expect. As if complex verbs are required for moral agency.

Re:intelligence

[hey!]

Sure, deer can outsprint humans, to the point where the human loses track of the deer, but nothing outruns a human over long distances. There was an article in Runner's World back in the 70s about running down deer in the Pacific Northwest. It takes about 4 hours.

The Tarahumara Indians of Mexico are famous for hunting deer precisely this way. Tarahumara have been known to run distances up to 200 miles without rest.

Humans aren't wimps; we're just specialized.

Re:intelligence

[hey!]

"Why should that be necessary?"

Because morality involves rights and obligations. Your right to be left in peace is only half of it - the obligation to respect the same rights in others is the other half.

You are taking me out of context. I was asking "Why is it necessary for a chimp to show he can master human grammar?" You have not addressed that question.

Because morality involves rights and obligations. Your right to be left in peace is only half of it - the obligation to respect the same rights in others is the other half.

This is an interesting position, but it seems to me to have some problems. If I understand your position, rights and obligations arise out of each other. In other words, if I expect you to respect my private property, then I have to respect yours. That seems reasonable, but this framework also seems to suggest that I can opt out of this arrangement; that I can steal from you as long as I'm OK with you stealing from me.

Your framework also suggests that children have no human rights until they have the developed the cognitive capabilities to understand their responsibilities. They cannot participate in any kind bargain over rights and responsibilities. Likewise mentally handicapped people could be murdered since they can't understand the philosophical bases of the anti-murder bargain.

Likewise under your framework torturing an animal is OK, as long as the animal isn't capable of understanding the philosophical basis for why torturing animals is wrong. I understand that some people believe torturing animals is OK, but not because animals can't understand why torture is wrong. Most of those same people would say it is wrong to torture a mentally incompetent human.

Don't get me wrong, I certainly *do* believe in your basic principle -- that which we demand of others puts an obligation upon ourselves. I just don't think ethics can be entirely reduced to that principle.

Re:intelligence

[dryeo]

Ravens solved this problem by getting a wolf to do the initial ripping apart of the animal. I guess it can be argued that using a dog is a form of tool using.

Re:intelligence

[dryeo]

Living beside the ocean would allow a pretty good diet without tools. at least the way the ocean used to be. Of course just like a chimp or crow, people will use a rock to break open things and a stick to poke into things.

Re:intelligence

[hey!]

Well, you can't express complex ideas without grammar, but that's not the same as not being able to have complex ideas. If you know anyone with stroke-induced aphasia, you know that one of the immense frustrations of aphasia is not being able to express what you have conceptualized. You can SEE it happening.

I had aunt in a nursing home who had expressive aphasia. She as always getting mad at her roommate for moving stuff onto *her* side of the room. Clearly she could *conceptualize* "My side" vs. "her side", and even property rights (my stuff vs her stuff). She just couldn't put it into words.

Re:intelligence

[Arker]

If you have such trouble grasping the distinction between bullying each other and maintaining pack solidarity like every other species of social animals on one hand, and a moral agent who has a full theory of mind and the ability to sacrifice his own life for an abstract ideal, then I guess this conversation is simply beyond you at this point in your life.

Re:intelligence

[NatasRevol]

Well, you have one thing animals don't have.

Re:intelligence

[Whorhay]

You can also catch fish bare handed, along with other small animals like frogs. Native americans used to chase buffalo off steep drop offs, horses made that easier but they weren't required.

Using tools isn't really all that valid of a criteria anymore though. We've found many species that use tools but aren't anywhere near our intelligence. Otters, alligators, crows and wasps but to name a few have been observed using tools.

Re:intelligence

[Arker]

"I was asking "Why is it necessary for a chimp to show he can master human grammar?" You have not addressed that question."

Where I was talking about syntax you have substituted grammar. I am talking about syntax. And it would not be necessary for them to master *human* syntax specifically, were there any other syntax available to test them with I would have no objection. But it does seem that the ability to master syntax of some sort is a prerequisite for moral agency.

"If I understand your position, rights and obligations arise out of each other. In other words, if I expect you to respect my private property, then I have to respect yours. That seems reasonable, but this framework also seems to suggest that I can opt out of this arrangement; that I can steal from you as long as I'm OK with you stealing from me."

I dont think that I am suggesting it, but yes, that seems an accurate description of the reality. People do have the choice to go wild, to go outlaw, to rob and steal and rape until they are put down, and some people do so.

But those who behave like humans should be treated like humans.

"Your framework also suggests that children have no human rights until they have the developed the cognitive capabilities to understand their responsibilities. "

In a sense, yes. An infant is not an active moral agent, but that is still clearly what it is here to become. I would argue that this puts it in a special class of its own, but at worst, if we deny it any moral rights at that stage, aggression against it would still violate the rights of the infants parents or guardians.

"Likewise mentally handicapped people could be murdered since they can't understand the philosophical bases of the anti-murder bargain."

You may be the second person today to read that into what I am saying and I must think you do not know any mentally handicapped people, because in my experience that paints them with far too broad a brush.

That said, yes, there are some very severe cases where that would apply. But that is already acknowledged in law today - you may have heard of not guilty by reason of mental incapacity?

We dont just a priori define the mentally handicapped as animals, and we shouldnt, the strong presumption is that if you are human and not in a coma you are a moral agent. (And even in a coma you still retain rights based on the presumption you still have a chance to wake up. Only in extreme cases where it appears there is no chance left do we tend to pull the plug.) But at the same time we sometimes find people not responsible for their options, and at that point they do lose their rights, become subject to arbitrary detention, made wards of the state, etc.

"Likewise under your framework torturing an animal is OK, as long as the animal isn't capable of understanding the philosophical basis for why torturing animals is wrong."

This is emphatically incorrect.

Torturing an animal is not a violation of the animals rights, but the notion that anything that does not involve the violation of rights is "OK" is quite an unsupported leap. At the most there may be an argument to be made that this should not be intrinsically *illegal*. There are many things that are not OK, that are bad things, that nonetheless may not be illegal and maybe should not be illegal.

Torturing an animal, in particular, is a horribly dehumanizing thing to do - to yourself. Without taking a position at the moment on whether it should be illegal or not (it seems to me that's a deep subject and any good answer would probably be fairly long and nuanced, not a straightforward yes or no) it is certainly far from "OK."

Re:intelligence

[DM9290]

Considering that chimps are as intelligent (at least) as two and three year olds, I think they should be given the same sort of rights. The right not to be tortured, and mistreated for one.

Oh but they are beasts and awful, and rape and stuff. Yeah, humans are horrible aren't they.

Humans aren't special. Get over yourselves.

intelligence is not the ONLY reason we give 3 year olds rights.

the other reason is that 3 year old grow up into 4 year olds, then 5 year olds, then 20 year olds etc. Chimps never grow up into adult humans.

the differences don't stop there.

Re:intelligence

[ExecutorElassus]

holy crap, why are you the only one who seems to have understood what this lawsuit is actually about, and not (like every other upmodded comment) immediately freaked the fuck out at the word "person"? Every time this case has been discussed the last week, every thread is full of people waving these bullshit arguments about how now we have to let chimps vote or whatever, instead of actually reading about what is meant by the idea of non-human personhood. It's really disheartening to read that much stupid.

Re:intelligence

[amicusNYCL]

Pigs make great pets, there's nothing "indecent" about keeping pigs.

Re:intelligence

[hey!]

But those who behave like humans should be treated like humans.

This is where I disagree with you. Human beings should be treated like human beings, regardless of their actions. Anyhow "treated like humans" is too broad for our purposes.

>

You may be the second person today to read that into what I am saying and I must think you do not know any mentally handicapped people, because in my experience that paints them with far too broad a brush.

Here you are doubly wrong. My late brother had fragile X syndrome. When died in his 60s, he was intellectually about five years old. He could not have participated in the discussion we are now having. He did not have *less* rights because of his handicap; his handicap imposed a greater duty of care among those around him. We had to defend his rights because he could not do so himself.

I am not saying you believe that mentally handicapped people don't have human rights; I'm saying your formulation of the basis of ethics towards animals is faulty.

Torturing an animal, in particular, is a horribly dehumanizing thing to do - to yourself.

Here is the problem with your formulation; the transactional basis you have posited for ethics doesn't work for you in this case, so you are patching your model with a totally different ethical basis: aretaic ethics. I actually think you'd have better success using *that* as a basis for ethics than some kind of social contract theory.

Re:intelligence

[Arker]

"When died in his 60s, he was intellectually about five years old. He could not have participated in the discussion we are now having."

That's probably below the line of having an understanding of right and wrong, sure. Such cases, as I wrote, are already acknowledged legally when they must be - courts do not today treat such people as having human rights, though they will try to avoid phrasing it like that it's a fact. And it's unavoidable.

"Here is the problem with your formulation; the transactional basis you have posited for ethics doesn't work for you in this case, so you are patching your model with a totally different ethical basis: aretaic ethics."

Actually it's not a patch on the model, it's a shift to an entirely different level of analysis. As I said, not everything that is wrong should be illegal, and not everything that is wrong is wrong for the same reason, or in the same way either. Torturing a moral agent is wrong, and torturing a non-agent animal is wrong, but they arent wrong in the same way or for the same reason (although torturing a moral agent may be said to be doubly wrong, since it fails by both yardsticks, whereas only one is applicable in the other case.)

Re:intelligence

[mark-t]

That is an excellent example of an isolated case like I was talking about. The trait is not generally shared by crows... most will not do that.

All corporations are people

[Anonymous Coward]

just not all primates.

Re:All corporations are people

[Dcnjoe60]

Some corporations are people, they are called Corporation Sole, in those jurisdictions that allow for it. Most US Corporations are not people. However, they are persons under the law.

This isn't about animal rights

[sl4shd0rk]

It's about people trying to force their extreme beliefs on others. If they were seriously interested in the humane treatment of animals, they would be pushing for tighter restrictions on mistreatment and better living conditions of corporate farm animals. At least put the court tax dollars to some better use than trying to push your "religion" on people.

Re:This isn't about animal rights

[StripedCow]

At least put the court tax dollars to some better use than trying to push your "religion" on people.

Religious would be to see the chimps as different from us (the current status quo).

But in fact, that pile of atoms you're made of has no clear boundary. It's not like you, the pile of atoms, is a separate entity from the pile of atoms that makes up the chimp. So in fact, you and the chimp are one entity. You *are* the chimp. Don't you think it's time somebody stood up for your rights?

Re:This isn't about animal rights

[Anonymous Coward]

It's about people trying to force their extreme beliefs on others. If they were seriously interested in the humane treatment of animals, they would be pushing for tighter restrictions on mistreatment and better living conditions of corporate farm animals. At least put the court tax dollars to some better use than trying to push your "religion" on people.

That's what the plantation owners said about abolitionists' views on slavery. That they were wasting time and resources, trying to free the slaves. That if they really cared about the slaves they would fight for better living conditions and restrictions on mistreatment by their owners. That a slave wouldn't know what to do with freedom if it ever was obtained because it was just a dumb farm animal who needed the protection and care of its owner. I'm not saying this is the same thing, but your argument is creepily close to theirs.

Re:This isn't about animal rights

[Smauler]

That's the same argument that claims graphite is the same as diamond, and is just as wrong.

Re:This isn't about animal rights

[Vegan Cyclist]

I'm sure most of the lawyers are vegans, and already speak up for them as well. Keep in mind that a victory for any other species opens the door for the rest - including farm animals. If a chimpanzee is granted personhood, and a pig is nearly as smart as a chimpanzee...you can see where this goes.

Re:This isn't about animal rights

[misexistentialist]

Most of those animals are so dumb your time would be better spent setting up ant crossings to save ants from being run over and stepped on

Re:This isn't about animal rights

[drinkypoo]

If they were seriously interested in the humane treatment of animals, they would be pushing for tighter restrictions on mistreatment and better living conditions of corporate farm animals.

Just like if the GNOME developers were seriously interested in improving GUIs for Linux, they would work on KDE, or vice versa?

You are engaging in logical fallacy, and it saddens but does not surprise me to see your comment at the top of the discussion.

Re:This isn't about animal rights

[TangoMargarine]

I like to wrap clothes around my atoms to prevent them getting in people's faces

Human soceity not ready for this

[It doesn't come easy]

Human society is not ready to grant intelligent animals sentient or human status. It sounds like an enlightened idea, but our laws and societal norms cannot accommodate granting these rights without significant and fundamental change.

Take any law that governs the interaction between two humans and apply that to a human verses say a dolphin and you immediately run into serious and unworkable situations. Imagine having to grant a dolphin the right to confront their accuser in a court of law. Really? What about applying laws concerning manslaughter or murder or accidental death? What about representation in government?

Yes, I know the New York case was not about all of these things, but once the door is open you can never close it. Just look at the legal ruling that corporations are legal persons to understand what I mean.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[DaveV1.0]

Enlightened idea? No, this is just foolishness.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[bhspencer]

Consider that we provide children a special status in our society. We consider children to be persons and afford them rights as such. Yet we do not hold them accountable for murder in the same way we do for human adults. Giving a chimp the status person does not mean we have to give them the same rights as human adults.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[Danathar]

They are asking to grant "person" status. Not Human status.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[eyenot]

I like how you're saying that homo sapiens isn't ready for lower primates. That's pretty clever, I like how you did that.

You don't think it has something to do with more fundamental problems, do you? Like how we're the only living thing with a voice box capable of producing speech? That, might not be a big issue in your model of the Amazing Human World of the Future?

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[anyanka]

Like how we're the only living primate with a voice box capable of producing speech?

FTFY.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[Vegan Cyclist]

Well said, i hope this gets modded up.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[ediron2]

Legal entities have been around for centuries. Ships stolen, then used for piracy, have been found guilty of crimes and destroyed. They were represented by agents, so 'facing one's accuser' was solved centuries ago. Other legal fictions include: companies, cooperatives (co-ops), coprorations, municipalities, political parties, sovereigns, states, temples, and trade unions (src: wikipedia 'Legal Entity'). And this isn't even that new of a question: Thirty years or more ago, a legal brief and book started to ask whether a tree could have standing, since it was understood that it would be granted standing if carved into a boat. In the last decade, a couple specific watersheds and ecosystems have gathered a degree of standing (seems like this was in New Zealand and Ecuador, perhaps?). This was done so that case law could form around protecting these directly, rather than forcing someone to prove their own personal damage by an abuse by another.

Each Legal Entity (aka legal fiction) may have limitations on what they're allowed, laws to govern their agents, limitations on what laws they're held liable for.

Slashdotters also easily see this becoming an issue due to technology: will technologically-created entities be granted rights? What level of tissue regeneration crosses from a 'vat grown organ' to enough sentience to earn rights? Can we clone ourselves completely to have 'hot spares', or does a sentient clone gain any rights? Similarly, several proponents of Singularity believe they'll copy themselves into code. Does the originator retain their rights and possessions? Can they 'claw back' stuff they signed away to their code alterego? Does the code alterego get any rights?

As for us not being ready, that's baloney -- If anything, an unwillingness to cause big upsets seems like a trait of an ossified and post-climax nation or culture. When we need to, we routinely write laws out of expediency. When there's big money at stake, legal challenges routinely slow progress for financial, not ethical immaturity reasons. There's no reason a legal system can't step into this 'personhood of a chimp' tangle, decide that the benefits outweigh the impacts and declare that a chimp or critter of another species has some rights, gets a guardian ad leitem (like CASA does for kids), and faces some laws/limits/penalties. Heck, in the case of endangered species, such a process could be more effective than current actions/measures. I bet we'll see other nations continue to experiment along these lines.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[Diamonddavej]

The UK and New Zealand recognise Great Apes as non-human individuals / persons; see 174 page in Kolber (2001). Medical experimentation on them is banned.

Kolber, A.J. 2001. Standing Upright: The Moral and Legal Standing of Humans and Other Apes. Stanford Law Review 54, 164–204.

http://www.maf.govt.nz/biosecurity/legislation/animal-welfare-act/index.htm

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[InsightfulPlusTwo]

That reminds me of a famous incident where a circus elephant named Mary was hanged by the neck until dead for committing murder on a human. She got angry at her human handler for prodding her and stomped him. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_(elephant) for the details and a pic of Mary's hanging. I don't think she got to defend herself in a court of law, though.

My two cents on the subject is I think the law could accommodate intelligent animals, but each species should probably be treated differently based on their nature and capabilities. I don't think treating them as persons is the right idea.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[Artraze]

> Human society is not ready to grant intelligent animals sentient or human status.

It's the intelligent animals that aren't ready for "human status" and sentience has nothing to do with it. The natural order of things one of 'strongest makes the rules' and that's true regardless of sentience. Humans, however, decided that constantly struggling for dominance wasn't a very efficient way of doing things and figured that if everyone played nice life could be better. The agreement to 'play nice' is human society and things like rights and freedoms are the benefits to joining in. Humans are still free to opt out and follow the natural order, but as it turns out all of the other humans together are pretty strong and more than capable of exerting dominance, usually by putting the offender in a cage.

In other words, society isn't about sentience or intelligence, it's about agreeing to a social contract. That contract puts restrictions on you beyond the natural order (e.g. you can't just beat someone up because they are weaker than you) but also gives you benefits too (e.g. people stronger than you aren't allow to beat you up). If a human doesn't (criminals) or can't (children) sign up we generally throw it in a cage or keep it as a 'pet' (usually respectively). The same is true for nonhumans, the only real difference is that society is opt-out for humans and (theoretically) opt-in for them.

This wasn't opting it; it was a farce. It's a bunch of humans trying to force some animals into an agreement with the full understanding that the animals don't understand it and will never even try to honor it. The goal basically being to change their label from 'animal' to 'criminal' (I don't think they're even trying for any stage in between) in hopes that the latter will provide some benefit that the former doesn't. If a nonhuman is willing and able to enter into the human social contract, then I honestly think there will be a place for it. Sure there will be xenophobes as there always are, but I think society as a whole would view it as an interesting and worthwhile experiment. Until that time, however, if you want animals to be treated better make that case not some nonsense personhood case.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[Arker]

"It sounds like an enlightened idea"

No, it sounds like the exact opposite actually. Like a sly way to attack enlightenment values and push society back towards the dark ages.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[bhspencer]

What about humans who have developmental disabilities that prevent them from ever mentally progressing from the level of an infant? We still consider these beings to be persons even though we are confident they are not ever going have the mental capabilities of a human adult. And yet we don't consider them to be responsible in the way we consider adults responsible. I think a case can be made that there are chimps that have greater cognitive abilities that some developmentally disabled humans.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[twmcneil]

Imagine having to grant a dolphin the right to confront their accuser in a court of law.

You just got the attention of thousands of eager lawyers.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[bhspencer]

Perhaps but it is a question of degree. You don't typically hear people arguing that 3 year olds should be tried as adults. If this were the case just about ever kid pre-school would be likely have a long criminal record for assault.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[bhspencer]

I think you have misunderstood the meaning of the word sentience. Sentience is the capacity to feel not the capacity to reason. Your position that "Animals will never progress to sentience" is not a widely held belief. It is generally accepted that animals can feel and can suffer and are therefor sentient. For example: 'In 1997 the concept of animal sentience was written into the basic law of the European Union. The legally-binding protocol annexed to the Treaty of Amsterdam recognizes that animals are "sentient beings", and requires the EU and its member states to "pay full regard to the welfare requirements of animals".' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentience#Animal_rights_and_sentience

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[eyenot]

Gee. You other nerds on Slashdot, you're all so THMART.

Except when you're arguing with somebody who's actually aced a college level course in Anthropology.

"The larynx, or voice box, sits lower in the throat in humans than in chimps, one of several features that enable human speech. Human ancestors evolved a descended larynx roughly 350,000 years ago. We also possess a descended hyoid bone â" this horseshoe-shaped bone below the tongue, unique in that it is not attached to any other bones in the body, allows us to articulate words when speaking. "

http://www.livescience.com/15689-evolution-human-special-species.html

btw -- FYFY (fixed you for you)

BTW, NONE of the shit you or the other guy said knocked down what I was saying about chimps -- they're not going to be human. Get over it. God, I can't get some of you geeks. Next time try somebody in your own high school.

Re:Human soceity not ready for this

[eyenot]

Gee. You other nerds on Slashdot, you're all so THMART.

Except when you're arguing with somebody who's actually aced a college level course in Anthropology.

"The larynx, or voice box, sits lower in the throat in humans than in chimps, one of several features that enable human speech. Human ancestors evolved a descended larynx roughly 350,000 years ago. We also possess a descended hyoid bone -- this horseshoe-shaped bone below the tongue, unique in that it is not attached to any other bones in the body, allows us to articulate words when speaking. "

http://www.livescience.com/15689-evolution-human-special-species.html [livescience.com]

btw -- FYFY (fixed you for you)

BTW, NONE of the shit you or the other guy said knocked down what I was saying about chimps -- they're not going to be human. Get over it. God, I can't get some of you geeks. Next time try somebody in your own high school.

I can't help but imagine you protested my remarks out of some desire to live out some fantasy related to your formative-years viewing of a "planet of the apes" sequel.

And put cognitively disadvanced ones in captivity?

[Quila]

Like these morons.

From cages to prisons

[coldsalmon]

The want chimpanzees released from "illegal detention," but if we treated them like people, they would end up in prison very quickly. I would give them two days before they were guilty of trespass, theft, assault, and battery. They would be ruled incompetent to stand trial, and probably placed in a psychiatric prison in solitary confinement. That is what we do with people who act like chimpanzees.

Re:From cages to prisons

[DaveV1.0]

You forgot the possibilities of malicious wounding, attempted murder, and murder. Chimpanzees are incredibly strong and often violent

Re:From cages to prisons

[dkleinsc]

I would give them two days before they were guilty of trespass, theft, assault, and battery.

Heck, they'd probably be done in for indecent exposure in a matter of hours.

This is animal rights groups being really stupid. Smart animal rights groups focus on things like protecting endangered wild animals, putting a stop to puppy mills, rescuing pets, and ensuring humane treatment of captive animals, because those are what most people are comfortable supporting.

Re:From cages to prisons

[Daniel Hoffmann]

Not to mention they walk around naked all the time. They would be arrested the moment they step outside their (tree) house!

Re:From cages to prisons

[chihowa]

Anything less is hypocrisy.

I'm all for animal rights and the ethical treatment of animals, but how is not extending human rights to animals hypocrisy?

Re:From cages to prisons

[LeadSongDog]

But are they capable of malice aforethought, or do they simply live in the moment?

Re:From cages to prisons

[DaveV1.0]

If they qualify as sentient, then yes.

Legal Fiction

[Anonymous Coward]

From my understanding, the lawyers were hoping to create a legal fiction such that habeas corpus would be applicable to the chimpanzees, similar to the way that personhood is granted to corporations for many different purposes. A corporation needs to be a "person" so it can be sued. But corporate personhood does not grant corporations every right that people have. The same thing is happening here. No one wants to give chimpanzees the right to vote.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_fiction#Corporate_personhood
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habeas_corpus

Re:Legal Fiction

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

This is exactly the kind of thing a democratic process should handle rather than courts (who can't "discover" new things out of centuries of contrary precedence without decades of free speech persuasion shifting the populace anyway.)

You simply cannot have courts adding to potential political power without the consent of the governed. Otherwise it is a power grab. Even if no chimp ever votes.

A similar thing must be done for artificial intelligence lest somebody spawn off a hundred trillion voters they control.

Re:Legal Fiction

[eyenot]

No, of course not!

We just wanna sue the monkeys!

We're not crazy or anything!

grunting truth to power

[hirundo]

This isn't about giving power to animals. It's about giving power to guardians of animals. Just like organized religion is about giving power not to God, but to priests.

Re:grunting truth to power

[Dcnjoe60]

This isn't about giving power to animals. It's about giving power to guardians of animals. Just like organized religion is about giving power not to God, but to priests.

Interesting, since not all religions have priests, nor do they all have a deity. Might your anti-catholic bias be showing?

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[NatasRevol]

Chimps are not bonobos.

Waste Of Taxpayer Dollars

[Greyfox]

YOUR Taxpayer dollars. Can society sue people who file such frivolous lawsuits to force them to pay for the court's time and legal costs of defending against such silliness? Because I already have to pay for enough silly shit without adding stuff like this to the list.

hierarchy of rights

[dingleberrie]

I'm trying to keep up, but I think this is the hierarchy of rights that I have seen in the US.
It's hard to settle on the exact order. Each item could up or down one level.

1 People in my country.
2 Corporations
3 People in other countries
4 People in other countries who look like they have nothing
5 Cute animals
6 Monkeys that aren't so cute
7 non-cute things that can't harm me
8 scary things

Re:hierarchy of rights

[glwtta]

2
1
5
3
6
4
7
8

Re:hierarchy of rights

[Bob the Super Hamste]

1 US Corporations
2 Foreign Corporations
3 People in my country
4 People in other countries
5 People in other countries who look like they have nothing
6 Cute animals
7 Monkeys that aren't so cute
8 People in countries the US government doesn't like
9 non-cute things that can't harm me
10 scary things

FTFY

Re:hierarchy of rights

[the eric conspiracy]

1 Rich People in my country.
2 Corporations (based anywhere)
3 Rich People in other countries
4 People in my country who pay taxes
5 Cute animals
6 Monkeys that aren't so cute
7 non-cute things that can't harm me
8 scary things
9 Poor people in my country
10 Poor people in other countries
11 Poor people in other countries who want to be free.

Incorporation

[Larry_Dillon]

That monkey needs to incorporate!

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[Dcnjoe60]

Actually, the pedophilia would work. If chimps are deemed persons, then in the US, they would be required to abide by the laws of this country. In the US, the age of consent would still apply and since laws regarding pedophilia are age based, even if chimps are sexually mature, they would still be guilty of it. If you enact legislation permitting it for chimps, then you open up equal protection suits for human pedophiles as the two classes of person would be treated different under the law.

More likely what would happen if chimps were granted personhood would be that they are deemed incapable of caring for themselves in society and have to be institutionalized, just as they are now. I'm sure the group pushing for this would want them to be returned to the wild, however, as persons, here, but not there, they have no citizenship abroad for us to deport them. In addition, any of them born here, as persons, would be US citizens and could not be deported.

In the end, the court did the right thing. Animals, no matter how intelligent are not persons under the constitution. The appellate process will find the same thing.

so what if we ruled in favour?

[nimbius]

1. giving a chimp personhood status would simply galvanize the deep south to further refute and disregard the theory of evolution. everything from parking meters to toilet seats at countless courthouses would be etched with the 10 commandments. obama earns another 40 cities he cant visit without staying in the car, and a grumbly subset of abortion doctors just put on another layer of body armor.
2. im sure more than one pet foods company and pharmaceutical conglomerate would be a bit furious at the prospect of having to pump more cash into IT to purchase machines to simulate their drug interactions and metabolic research, but IT would finally be able to afford that Killer Instinct arcade game on Ebay.
3. professor Random's intern would have to update her facebook status to 'removing 124 tubes from each monkey this weekend, FML'
4. courts would open a pandoras box of steaming culture war shit about personhood. everything from human emrbyos, zygotes, and electrons surrounding the lint clinging to the hair on a human testicle would be demanded status as a person. shaving a landing strip into my naughty bits turns into a 10 year prison sentence and every time my kid smacks her head on the playground i get to pick up trash on the highway.
5. we cant have another reboot of planet of the apes, because now its just a documenary about some bigoted astronaut with a superiority compelex and anger management issues.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[JustOK]

Well, they don't always see eye to eye.

Frontier Psychiatry

[eyenot]

That boy needs therapy. Psychosomatic. That boy needs therapy. Purely psychosomatic. That boy needs therapy. Lie down on the couch! What does that mean? You're a nut! You're crazy in the coconut!
What does that mean? That boy needs therapy.

I'm gonna kill you.

that's doctor lawyer chimp to you!

[Thud457]

but they can still take the bar exam, right?

Re:that's doctor lawyer chimp to you!

[MightyMartian]

And in the case of George W. Bush, aspire to the highest office in the world.

Re:that's doctor lawyer chimp to you!

[Anonymous Coward]

but they can still take the bar exam, right?

Yes, and if they pass they can work on pro bonobo cases.

Re:that's doctor lawyer chimp to you!

[ganjadude]

thatsracist.jpg!

on the internet no one cares I am a Chimp

[peter303]

enough said

Different status

[DrYak]

FWIW, most humans are done with puberty long before age 18, but that doesn't stop most prosecutors.

No, what stops most prosecutors is the fact that lots of jurisdiction put the limit at a lower age than 18 (for exemple in europe it varies between 14 and 16).

Now to go back at the subject of under-age sex, lots of jurisdiction tend to make a distinction between "underage sex" (sex with someone under the age of consent, not necessarily someone biologically under-developped) and "child molestation" (actual pre-pubescent children involved).

On the subject of personhood...

[mark-t]

Serious question, and probably a bit offtopic here, but could anyone who actually has a real understanding of how the law works explain in layman's terms what is really gained in society by considering corporations as people? I can imagine there must be some benefit, but I'm not sure what it is.

Re:On the subject of personhood...

[the eric conspiracy]

The main reason as I understand it is that if corporations weren't people then they would have no legal status. For example, you could not sue them. They could not form contracts and be held accountable for these contracts.

This legal doctrine goes back to a Supreme Court in the first 30 years of the Republic. Since at least Trustees of Dartmouth College v. Woodward â" 17 U.S. 518 (1819), the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized corporations as having the same rights as natural persons to contract and to enforce contracts. (Wikipedia).

The basis for the idea is that corporations are associations of people, and as such have most of the rights of the people that make up these associations. One of the most important aspects of this is that since people have the right to equal protection under the law, so do the corporations they form.

There are exceptions to these rights, of course. For example in the United States corporations are not given the right to vote.

It is this division, that is where do the rights of a corporation fall short of the rights of an individual. That I think is an area that needs work.

There is a better use of resources.

[macbeth66]

How about these nitwits find some better ways to improve the human condition before they go off to tilt at windmills. I am all for the prevention of cruelty to animals, but this has just gone over the top into nutcake land. I don't want anything to do with PETA anymore because of the looney positions they started taking in the past few years.

The whole lot of them, just look silly and make it a lot harder for reasonable actions to be taken.

Off to the higher courts

[BringsApples]

The higher up it goes, the more effective the ruling is.

Another thing I'd like to point out is that marijuana is illegal because they used chimps to demonstrate that if you suffocate a monkey with smoke, it kills them.

Re:Off to the higher courts

[PPH]

And now, the poo-flinging begins.

Re:Off to the higher courts

[BringsApples]

You're right, but they had to get proof of some kind. They decided to use chimps for numbers on paper. The acts that they did to the chimps were terrible.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[TangoMargarine]

Chimps tend to mature faster than humans. So at that age, the chimp have completely undergone puberty and are more or less adult.

You really think the law regarding age of sexual consent has anything to do with biological maturity?!

Re:tears & innocence spirit of life missing fr

[TangoMargarine]

Can you really be considered anything but innocent if you(r society) lack(s) a sense of ethics/morality?

IRONIC

[topic7]

Am I the only one who sees the irony in the fact that a case for personhood was filed by the "Nonhuman" Rights Project?

An infinite number of chimps

[Ukab the Great]

with an infinite amount of type and infinite amount of personhood will eventually form their own corporation.

or deportation?

[uqbar]

Maybe we can just deport the chimps back to where they came from....?

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[TheGratefulNet]

very true. in fact, there was a great nova special a few years ago (pbs tv) that contrasted the huge diff between bonobos and chimps. day and night diff. peace vs war.

I think I want to be a bonobo when I grow up ;)

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[amicusNYCL]

In the end, the court did the right thing. Animals, no matter how intelligent are not persons under the constitution.

Why is it then that intelligent animals don't deserve personhood, but corporations do? A sentient intelligent creature is not a person, but a legal entity is? That's pretty inconsistent.

That's a rhetorical question, by the way. The answer is obvious: money and corruption.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[rubycodez]

humans can have babies at 14 too.

As the saying goes

[DarthVain]

a sufficient number of them might actually do something productive...

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[MightyMartian]

Yes, Bonobos are sort of the idealized noble hominoid. Chimps and humans, sadly, are the nastiest of the lot.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[PPH]

Sexual activity generally plays a major role in bonobo society, being used as what some scientists perceive as a greeting,

And to think that I only tipped the cute barrista this morning.

Thought experiment

[hey!]

Suppose you are an alien judge in a galaxy-spanning, multi-species civilization -- something like the Federation in Star Trek, but humans haven't joined yet. Furthermore it's permissable for members, some of whom are carnivores, to kill animals, but not other natural persons.

A case is brought to you in which a research team has captured a human hunter who has just killed chimpanzee. They bring the hunter back for trial on the charges of murdering of a natural person.

What are your instructions to the prosecution? What dos the prosecution have to prove in order to get a conviction?

What are your instructions to the defense? What proof is sufficient to get the defendant off?

Stipulations: (1) The facts of the case are undisputed: the hunter did kill the chimp and did so knowingly.

(2) Personal ignorance on the part of the hunter is no defense. The hunter is guilty if, and only if, human civilization possesses enough facts to conclude that chimpanzees are likely to be natural persons with natural rights (what we would call "human rights") according to the galactic definition of "natural person".

(3) Only observable facts are admissible as evidence. Assertions about things like the presence or absence of a soul are not admissible.

(4) Your court has jurisdiction to convict any natural person of the murder of any other natural person, anywhere in the galaxy, even on non-member planets like Earth.

Standing Upright: The Moral and Legal Standing ...

[Diamonddavej]

The argument primatologists are putting forwards, Jane Goodall for example, is that Chimpanzees and other Great Apes should be accorded at least some rights of personhood, similar to the rights accorded to young children and the mentally disabled, which they cognitively exceed e.g. self awareness, empathy, complex planning, theory of mind etc.

Kolber, A.J. 2001. Standing Upright: The Moral and Legal Standing of Humans and Other Apes, Rochester, NY: Social Science Research Network. Stanford Law Review, Vol. 54, p. 163. http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=675851

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[NatasRevol]

Actually, much younger than that.

As much as a corporate entity

[ememisya]

Hey, if we can claim a corporate entity has a right to personhood, an imaginary concept, I don't see why a real live mammal would be excluded from it. They screwed the pooch when they agreed that anything other than a person is also a person. Anything alive can communicate in some way shape or form even if it's a basic thing like, "I require sustenance" (A plant moving towards sunlight would be a plant "communicating" intentionally or not that it needs more sunlight). So way to go, lets go back to agreeing that people are people, money is money and speech is speech.

what about...

[CosaNostra Pizza Inc]

If a corporation can be a person, why can't a chimp?

But bonobo are still chimps

[DrYak]

No but the other way around is still true.

Even if all chimps are not bonobos (there are also troglodytes), all bonobos are chimps (as much as all troglodytes are also chimps).

So if all chimps (including bonobos, including troglodytes) had got personhood status,
then bonobo's sex life would still relevant to the joke,
even if troglodytes wouldn't be concerned by this joke.

Re:But bonobo are still chimps

[NatasRevol]

Chimps are specifically chimpanzees.

The generic word you're looking for is ape.

As in 'aping a troglodyte is a poor joke.'

Jurisdiction

[DrYak]

In jurisdictions making distinction between underage sex and child molestation, it does.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[pagedout]

Ah, but like most rhetorical questions the answer is easy.

To put it in simple terms...
Just because some people decide to deal together as a group does not magically take away their rights so some rights of the individuals are exercisable by the corporation. Just because a chimp can recognize an apple does not mean that it can understand and enter into our social contract.

I would suggest this article if you are interested in the concept of the social contract: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_contract
Presuming the US here is a article on Locke: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Locke

And just to be complete here is one about how the social contract is wrong (which I would disagree with): http://www.animalethics.org.uk/contractarianism.html

I would suggest this article if you actually care what "personhood" they are talking about: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood
"Generally speaking, corporations may invoke rights that groups of individual may invoke, such as the right to petition, to speech, to enter into contracts and to hold property, to sue and to be sued. However, they may not exercise rights which are exclusive to individuals and cannot be exercised by other associations of individuals, including the right to vote and the right against self incrimination." - above link

Lose-Lose for Human Society

[eric31415927]

Stephen Wise was interviewed on a Canadian radio program this morning:
http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/episode/2013/12/12/granting-rights-and-personhood-to-animals/

He wants this case to go up the legal court ladders. This would get him more press coverage and more profits from sales of his book. The cost to society of his failed attempt would be judges' wasted time. The cost to society of a ruling somehow favouring Wise would be less effective drug testing, for the chimps he is trying to "free" are used in medical research. Either way, it is lose-lose for human society.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[Arker]

Pretty much, yes.

A corporation is a legal fiction. Giving it the attributes of a natural person is just bad case law and bad reasoning.

Giving those attributes to a chimpanzee would make no more sense and be no better law. It might satisfy a certain sense of fairness in the context you give it, but the old saw about two wrongs not making a right applies.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[rssrss]

Your "rhetorical" answer to your question only reveals that you do not understand the law.

First we must remember that the rubric "corporation", includes not only Microsoft and Wal-Mart, but also universities, hospitals, churches, municipalities, and clubs. The first corporation to assert constitutional rights in the US Supreme Court was not a business. It was Dartmouth College. ("It is a small college, but there are those that love it." - Daniel Webster).

Corporations are associations of natural persons (i.e. individual human beings), who themselves have full legal capacity and who themselves bear "rights". The associates include the directors and officers of the corporation.

Granting them corporate personhood allows them to own property and enter into contracts in their roles in the association. The Latin word for a role is "persona".

Doing this allows the property and contracts to inhere in the association so that if an individual dies or retires from his role, the property and contracts automatically transfer to the next individual who holds that role. If we did not do this, the property and contracts of the association would have to go through probate if one of the associates were to die, or be deeded for every resignation, or even worse, be subject to litigation.

The underlying social logic of this type of legal structure has been laid out by Nobel Prize winning economist Douglass North. In his view the open availability of institutional structures like the corporation is one of the hallmarks of advanced societies like the US. The lack of these structures defines base state societies like Afghanistan, Syria, and Sudan. See "Violence and Social Orders: A Conceptual Framework for Interpreting Recorded Human History" by North, Wallis, & Weingast.

IAAL. As Chief Justice Coke explained to King James I, (see "Prohibitions del Roy"), issues concerning the life, liberty, and property of citizens, are not decided by the King's natural reason, but by the artificial reason and judgment of Law, which is mastered only by long study and labor. But, the Law is the golden measure that protects everyone, governor and governed alike, in safety and peace.

Re:If companies can be people...

[pagedout]

Why?

I mean other than calling a corporation a "person" is a shorthand for a long and involved set of rulings that that don't make it a person but instead say that inherits some of the rights of those who own it?

Even if it really meant that a corporation was a real "person" why would a chimp be a better candidate? From a biological perspective a corporation is made up of member people so it is way closer to a human than a chimp can ever be. From an intellectual perspective a corporation is, usually, made up of relatively intelligent adults while a chimp is at best in the 3-4 year old category. From a law, or understanding of it at least, perspective most corporations far exceed even human standards, think of all the compliance, accountants and HR drones.

Re:Thank You.

[the eric conspiracy]

On a global frame the current US Democrat party has positions that would be considered slightly to the conservative side of center.

The mainstream Republicans would be considered hard right wingers, and the Tea Party types would be extremist right wingers lumped in with neo-fascists etc.

For example, compare the Tea Party with the British National Party.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_National_Party

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[DexterIsADog]

Ah, but like most rhetorical questions the answer is easy.

Why did you answer a rhetorical question? Hint: that was also rhetorical.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[DexterIsADog]

Pretty much, yes.

A corporation is a legal fiction. Giving it the attributes of a natural person is just bad case law and bad reasoning.

Giving those attributes to a chimpanzee would make no more sense and be no better law. It might satisfy a certain sense of fairness in the context you give it, but the old saw about two wrongs not making a right applies.

You're not really getting it - the answer is much more straightforward. Corporations are people because money.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[Dcnjoe60]

In the end, the court did the right thing. Animals, no matter how intelligent are not persons under the constitution.

Why is it then that intelligent animals don't deserve personhood, but corporations do? A sentient intelligent creature is not a person, but a legal entity is? That's pretty inconsistent.

That's a rhetorical question, by the way. The answer is obvious: money and corruption.

Corporations are juridic persons - deemed by law as opposed to natural persons. A juridic person has no rights except what the law grants them, which in the case of corporations was the exercise of free speech as related to political speech. The reason given was because the outcome of political endeavors impacts the corporation so the corporation should be free to present its support or opposition.

What was being proposed, on the other hand was not to declare chimpanzees as a type of juridic person but as a full person, the same as a human being with all of the rights afforded a person. Unlike a juridic person where rights are granted by the state, a natural person has rights by nature (or endowed by their creator). Leaving out the religious debate, the purpose of the state with regards to the rights of a natural person is not to grant them but to protect them. (The state can't grant them because the person has them by nature).

Yours might have been a rhetorical question, but it is the underpinnings of many comments on this article.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[pagedout]

Just because someone says something is a rhetorical question doesn't mean it shouldn't be answered. The labeling it as rhetorical question just shows that their mind is closed and they are trying to avoid debate, isn't that your intent? Oh don't bother responding that was a rhetorical question as the answer is obvious...

In this case you have a postulate hiding inside a rhetorical question. They do this, as you have so clearly shown, in order to try and keep people from remarking on the postulate itself. In order to be nice, as I try not to be a raving jack ...hint leaver..., I started with the easy joke that the answer was obvious and went in a different direction. Now obviously my comment, or comments in this case as I would include this one, are not for the commenter but instead are for the others reading as I have already deduced a curtain closed mindedness on the writers part. As a side note it is very easy to spot these rhetorical blunders as they usually are unsupported. This is done intentionally as if there was something outside of the rhetorical question and answer then there would be something to respond to or talk about and we have already figured out is not their purpose.

The judge should fine them

[daninaustin]

This was a waste of time and the judge should have fined the groups who filed the lawsuits.

So Biden is not a person?

[rcamans]

So Biden is not a person?

My dog has a bridge she's looking to sell.

[nbritton]

My dog said she wants to incorporate a business, is it ok if she signs with her paw print on the articles of incorporation?

My dog, cat, whatever should be a legal person, that way when it runs off or attacks something I can't be held liable. You'll have to arrest them and arraign them in court just like any other person, furthermore they'll have a right to court provided legal representation. Hopefully the judge will grant them pre-trial release, otherwise they might show bias against four footed persons. However, I'm fairly certain the judge would end up ruling they are incompetent to stand trial. Furthermore, they'll need protection under the Americans with Disabilities Act, since they can't compete with the abilities of humans. Thankfully they'll be eligible for social security supplemental income, medicaid, and medicare. Do they need a bank account, or can I be a trusty for them? What about taxes if they earn a living?

What's a reasonable wage to pay a coonhound for treeing a coon? Are they salaried or hourly?

Language

[DrYak]

Okay, maybe it's just my english not being up to date.

I was under the impression that:
Genus Pan == "Chimps", all of them.
Pan Paniscus == "Bonobo" or also "Pygmy Chimp"
Pan Troglodytes == "Troglodyte" or also "Common Chimp"

If "chimp" in english isn't used at all for bonobos, then not only does my joke about chimp sex life not work, but also I can't understand at all why only 1 specie of the "Pan" genus was proposed for personhood, specially the less sophisticated of the 2.

Re:What about Women?

[pagedout]

Er, so your trying to take the right to vote away from those pregnant? I think you would need a very compelling argument for anyone to agree with you.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[Zynder]

Utter Bullshit! Total total lies! Guys always say it'll be just the tip (they promise!) but usually you get the whole shaft....

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[atomicxblue]

I still wait for the day a corporation gets called for jury duty and then has a bench warrant issued because the physical building can't show up.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[atomicxblue]

More to the point, why should certain citizens have 2 votes? One as the biological entity and another as a corporation?

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[rssrss]

... why should a foreign national have more rights to free speech under the law just by forming a corporation ...

The question assumes that which is not in evidence. No one gains or loses rights by forming an association with other persons, foreign or domestic. A corporation is a species of association.

Why can corporations not go to jail.

A corporation cannot go to jail because it is not a tangible thing. A corporation can be convicted of a crime, and the consequences of conviction may not be trivial. Just ask the former employees of Arthur Andersen, several thousand of whom lost their jobs when the entity was convicted of obstructing justice. Conviction may also result in fines and asset seizures. Furthermore, the living human beings who animate the corporation can be, and have often been, sent to jail.

Why can corporations be made up of people with rights, but individual cells don't have rights? You can easily declare a corporation has all those things without being a person.

Because human beings. and not their parts are the rights bearers. Further they do not lose rights because they have formed an association. The personhood of a corporation is a consequence of its structure not a premise. See my post above.

It is specifically corporations like the East India Trading company...

Corporations are associations of individual human beings. They are neither better nor worse than their constituents. The British government could have done what they did in India without the East India Company, as they did after the 1857 Rebellion.

Corporations ... have become, above the law ...

I have no evidence of your assertion. Logically, though, corporations being creations of the law cannot be above the law.

Historically, you are wrong. At the time of the American Revolution, almost all of the corporations in the US were religious, municipal or schools. Not until the time of the Civil War were there many business corporations.

Corporations and lawyers are the root of nearly all evil in our country currently.

That is quite an assertion, do you have any facts to back that up?

... willful erosion of private rights and expansion of corporate rights.

The rights of corporations are the rights of their constituent individuals. The expansion of one is the expansion of the other, and the erosion of one is the erosion of the other.

When our politicians are literally allowed to be bought ... by corporations ...

There is nothing new about bribe taking politicians. They have existed since the greatest antiquity. The formation of corporations didn't make them accept bribes and the abolition of corporations would not stop them. The existence or non existence of corporations will not affect the propensity of men to do evil.

As Solzhenitsyn, who knew evil well, said: "If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[rssrss]

The issue people have with corporate personhood is the granting of civil liberty rights to corporations, not the ability to own property.

The issue you refer to is a lack of understanding of what rights are. There can be no useful distinction between the right to own property and any other "civil liberty rights" in the US constitution.

John Locke, whose writings in defense of the English Glorious Revolution of 1688, became the inspiration of the Founding Fathers of the United States and part of the basis of the Constitution said that: "The great and chief end, therefore, of men's uniting into commonwealths, and putting themselves under government, is the preservation of their property." Sec. 124 of the 2nd Treatise of Government http://oll.libertyfund.org/index.php?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=222&layout=html#chapter_16371.

The ownership of property is recognized and protected by Amendments 4 & 5 of the Bill of Rights and Amendment 14 as well. And, it and was deemed fundamental by Congress in the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which was the first civil rights act to protect the newly freed slaves. The provision is still part of the civil rights laws of the United States 42 USC Sec. 1982 - Property rights of citizens http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/1982&%238364;.

That association (including incorporation) does not impair civil rights is borne out by inspection of the First Amendment. Freedom of religion is exercised by the thousands of religious congregations that have incorporated. ABC, NBC, & CBS exercise the right of free speech, as do universities from Harvard to Slippery Rock, which are also corporations. The New York Times and the Washington Post depend on freedom of the press. Trade Associations and Unions are associations (some of which are corporations) formed to petition the government for redress of grievances.

And you can't disingenuously claim "it's religion freedom for JP Morgan or our whole society goes to hell", banking on the naivety of those which don't understand the law.

I cannot parse that sentence. As for the religious freedom of corporations, see above.

Like it or not, the law has _always_ bifurcated the public sphere into commercial and private parts.

And so?

Governments have wide latitude to control the behavior of commercial entities.

Subject, of course, to the overarching structure of the US Constitution.

Civil liberty rights ... were never intended to be applied to corporations, per se.

That is an interesting assertion. Perhaps you would care to provide some evidence for it. It is not, however a logical consequence of the laws.

Associations of persons, yes, but that's different than allowing the rights to inhere in a fictional entity.

It really makes no difference whether you think that rights inhere in an association or its members, unless you believe that individuals forfeit rights by associating.

For example ... unions are considered associations ... union officials and members can go straight to jail if the union as a whole doesn't abide by an injunction.

The conclusion does not follow from the premise. The consequences of a court order depend on whom it is addressed to and how they are notified of it, not on the legal rubric under which they have associated.

A corporation is a title that courts are free to ignore, especially when it comes to constitutional matters and rights that [normally] inhere in individuals.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[rssrss]

... what I see is they've been given rights identical to a person when there needs to be some restrictions.

What are those restrictions and why shouldn't they apply to individuals and non corporate associations as well?

The first issue is many things need to scale with the size of the legal fiction.

Same question.

Under oath large corporations can make claims that are blatantly untrue because they've filtered through layers of management and lost the level of uncertainty.

Simply not true. Corporations cannot take oaths. Only individuals can. Corporations have been convicted of Obstruction of Justice. The problem of organizations and communications is inherent in organization. Some corporations are organizations (some are one man shops), and are subject to the problems of organizations, but it has nothing to do with being a corporation.

A great example of this is the tobacco companies testifying to Congress that "nicotine was not addictive", to the executives they had enough doubt to claim it was so, but the reality was there wasn't any real doubt.

It is extraordinarily difficult to convict anyone of lying to Congress. Juries tend to believe that Congressmen cannot tell the difference between truth and lies. See the Roger Clemens case.

Furthermore as a former smoker who kicked a 2 pack a day habit, I have real doubts about the idea of nicotine addiction. I think it is an excuse used by weaklings to deflect their responsibility for their own health.

Re:Chimps' sex lives

[rssrss]

They donâ(TM)t. Corporations do not vote in public elections in the United States.