Good points Shawn though I'm not sure what your obsession with eating bodily waste is.
God's Perfect Creation
by MrFreeze 54 Replies latest watchtower bible
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sabastious
Wait, how do you draw the line on what has a soul? Brain capacity? Okay, so at what "brain capacity" do you no longer have a soul?
Think of it this way. Do you feel bad when you see insects fight? Does it incite any emotions in you? What about birds? Fish? Mammals? What about monkey's eating other monkey's? Does this image create any response within you?
^ I personally am put off by the idea of monkey cannibalism especially when I see a picture of it. Why is that? My answer would be that the less complex a species the less complex their souls are. We are primates and the larger the social circle of the primate species the larger it's brain will be. Therefore, the more complex the primate the more complex the soul of that primate is. Which is why at the top of the chain you find a species that has a strong taboo on cannibalism. That sense of right and wrong is what transcends our animals self and gets into what we call Souls which reside in what we have always called the heavenly realm.
-Sab
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cofty
Sab - Do I get an answer to my question?
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still thinking
sab....humans have a history of cannibalism...and not so long ago.
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MrFreeze
So you base your decision on what has a soul off of their ideas towards cannibalism?
You also misunderstand the scientific definition of complex. A dog is no less complex than a human in scientific terms.
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sabastious
No it wasn't, you are behaving like a typical evasive theist faced with a difficult question.
No offense, but I don't trust your sense to tell the difference between someone who is being "religiously evasive" or not which is clearly a concept you have created by your own and others bias. Another explanation for the lack of content would be lack of motivation to respond in detail.
Please address the points below....
If animals were not originally designed to kill why are Cheetahs perfect killing machines?
Killing and dying are two separate things. The former is enforced upon another whereas the latter is the recipient of that enforcement. What are the characteristics of a Cheetah? In my life I have studied the behavior of domestic cats which are the distant and removed cousins of the Cheetah and all the big cats. What gives the Cheetah's their place in our world goes beyond their sharp teeth and their incredible speed. They actually live in family units which means they have that special connection that we see in our species that we call love. What came first the love or the teeth? It was actually love because the Cheetah is just a link in the evolutionary chain; it's just a form. So, you could say that they evolved teeth and speed to protect the love that had been placed into them at the beginning of time. The teeth are for making sure their babies get food and protection. Their teeth are there to preserve their generation until the next "change."
Same goes for birds like ospreys, owls and gannets.
And the same reasoning would go for all species that can be identified to love their young.
How long would it take for the oceans to become overcrowded without the amazing food chain that exists there?
This is where the Human Steward comes in. The human mind was especially tailored to tend to the animals with it's ability to change the natural world (within a limitation of course). Right now survival of the fittest is king and the fittest in the human word are the liars. At the south side of a city I grew up around has always had a mafia that controls substance in the area. They lie, cheat, murder and steal to make sure they control what they want to control. My local government and law enforcement is scared of them. Why? Because mafias are known to exact justice in a way that brings fear and trembling to the lands they dwell within. Families get hurt and no one wants that, so the rules are set by them. Domination is a lie because there is no substantial reason for why the people on the top are there. They simply extort power from others.
So, why are there fish feeding on each other? Because the sea kingdom is in yet another classifcation and it has to do with BRAIN CAPACITY. The fish that I have caught in my life are not sentient in the slightest form. Therefore the "soul" that exists there would be collective. We could call it the Fish Soul or something like that. Then the only way that soul could die is when there are no fish left. Extinction is another form of death that you are not factoring in. This line of thought would work for insects and bacteria and even viruses. Everything that has some form of life in the earthly realm has a soul in the heavenly realm.
There is your quantification. You don't compare a single human with a single bird. You compare a single human or group of humans with the existence of a certain type of bird. Would someone give their life for a species? I think people do that all the time in a variety of ways. Death can merely be considered a cause and effect exchange involving life in some form. If someone gives up time with their kids to save a fish species you have the exchange right there. Why do we as humans believe that extinction is wrong? We don't all, but modern day consciousness is very eco-friendly because of the people who drove those ideologies home with their own sacrifice.
Why do animals have camoflague?
Because all animals are subject to the same death that humans are. All souls are interconnected just as life is all interconnected through the process of evolution. Because animals have a sense of danger they adapt to their own environments and over long stretches of time those behaviors get worked into their DNA and subsquent generations.
Why do snakes have venom?
Poisonous snakes are generally considered evil. Anything with poison that kills something greater than the poisoner is resorting to measures that secure life in an immoral way. The Human Brain again is the answer for this challenge as it developed a high standard of morality. In tribal culture where poisonous snakes exist they will have warriors that learn how to seek out and destroy them. In civilized culture we have education for our youths as to how to avoid being killed by this "evil" phenomenon. We also seek out and destroy potential threats like our tribal ancestors. For how many children have been taken in the night by poisonous snakes the whole species was not really worth it. Too many familes have been broken up in order for them too exist. The only snake that is worth it is a snake that's poison is only lethal for prey that it can actually eat (which makes very large snakes an enemy). Otherwise they are sought out and destroyed. This perfectly paints the inherent dilemma that all of humanity faces which is spoken about in the Torah. There is a very specific reason why a snake was used in it's imagery.
Why do shark embryos kill hundreds of their siblings in the womb before they are even born? Why do they have a conveyerbelt of deadly teeth if not for ripping flesh?
Embryos are held in a different classification of ethics. Once again the teeth are for providing protection for their young and providing food. See the Cheetah Family explanation.
Why do crocodiles have such powerful jaws?
Crocs are an interesting species because they don't really possess a strong family tie. They just sit in the water and wait for prey. They live for incredible amounts of time and consume massive quanties of organic life around it.
So basically what I am saying is that the slate of existence that we have been dealt is not what was meant to be. There is a clear and definable foe that requires vanquishing. This is what the Torah states when it introduces the reptilian character to the story in Genesis 3. Survival of the fittest IS chaos and we live in the midst of chaos right now because of the abuse of free will. You could easily say that things like lethal venom and a hidden jaw of mass destruction are things that this world could do without. But there will always be humans who will fight for the right of each and every species. This is because deep down we all know that we have chosen this existence and that no blame should be put on the snake or the croc. We yearn to exist in harmony and eventually we will. Does that mean that God is going to file down the crocs teeth? I don't think so, but the future may not have them. I think we just have to learn to avoid them while we wait for whatever is going to happen to take place. This too shall pass and that even means the entire predator vs prey concept. Matter never goes away it just changes forms, but the souls that live through the material world are eternal.
-Sab
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cofty
Too much like hard work trying to distill a straight answer out of all that Sab.
Obfusaction and prevarication.
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sabastious
sab....humans have a history of cannibalism...and not so long ago.
For all intents of purposes it has been weeded out of our psyche. This is evidence that we indeed are in a completely different category than the animals. Which is why the Torah makes this distinction by allocating a chapter to just humans in Genesis 2. What is your explanation for how the writer(s) of the Torah knew that animals came before humans?
-Sab
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sabastious
Too much like hard work trying to distill a straight answer out of all that Sab.
That's how I feel when I read the Torah. The answers are not straight forward and it's important to try to put yourself in the writer's shoes. The Torah speaks about two separate realms of existence and that's the vantage point they are coming at it from. You and the evolutionsts come at existence from a "one realm" approach. Just as you would have faith in an archaeologist who has an opinion about an ancient ruin I have faith in what the Torah says about the creation of souls and the spirit realm. And esspecially how it affects the natural world which would include the animal kingdom. When I look at their "woes" I see a very similar grouping of problems that humans share. Therefore when Genesis says that the animals in the Ark were souls I understand that as that everything living has some intrinsic connection to the spirit realm. My post was an attempt to parse that concept.
Obfusaction and prevarication.
I'm not trying to bewilder or back out of the questioning. I am merely coming at it from the angle at which I believe the Torah positions itself from.
-Sab
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sabastious
So you base your decision on what has a soul off of their ideas towards cannibalism?
No, I assert that cannibalism is a concept that exists and use that as a logical anchor to work from to some conclusion about the nature of the entities committing the act. I ask why do we as a species move away from things like incest and cannibalism? What fundemental values are at work there behind the scenes? I say it has at least to do in part with what religion calls the Soul. I believe that the soul is connected to the purpose of life and that purpose unfolds as we change from form to form. Indentifying behaviors that are completely shed by species, which springs forth change, is important in determining their ultimate purpose.
-Sab
