Christians, (sorry, I tried to explain the best I could)...?

Question

Other than the fact that humans are smarter (sometimes) and on top of the food chain, there is not alot that makes us more "special" than animals.
We say we are civilized but so did people thousands of years ago that we now consider "savage". We have a conscience and animals do not but how does that make us any greater than them?

Don't you think the only reason humans and not animals have a god and afterlife is only because we have the capacity to think such a thing up?

Answer 1

Jeesh. Of course we're more special than animals! If you believe in the bible, then you should know that man has dominion over all the animals in the world. If you don't believe in the bible, then you know that morality must place its highest value on human life.

Would you donate your hard earned money to help animals when there's so many humans who are suffering and in dire need? If so, I'd have to challenge your priorities.

Answer 2

How can you prove that an animal does not have conscience? Would you say a conscience would be knowing right from wrong? My dog knows when she does something I would not like her to do. To me this means she has a conscience.
Every animal has their traits in behavior and physical being. Just because humans can not understand an animal's behavior or its importance to earth does not mean it is less than our own species. There is an ebb and flow between species which create the living systems of our world. We may be at the top of the food chain, but unless we value what is below us in the food chain we will cut off our own source.

Answer 3

Well, it probably depends on your belief system. The Bible does say that God gave man dominion over the animals.

And, in all honesty, animals can communicate, but not in a manner that most people can understand. Some are monogamous, some have a pack mentality, but none has the capacity to erect a sturdy shelter or grow nourishment or devise a method of transportation (tame a horse, build a car).

The animal that has those capabilities will naturally float to the top as the cream does over the milk.

Answer 4

I will try ok, human in the first place afraid to die and death and if we are so animals death is the end for us but religions all kinds ok has an extension or the afterlife, reincarnation. It is the fear and question of death after that were do we go. Basically what you said is true because animals kill because they need to eat and survive but they have also intelligence, unlike us we cooked up a stew called religion to make us fear a higher being god for some individuals intangible for some tangible.

Answer 5

Humans are given a soul, animals aren't. Education is progressing all the time. Would you call Alexander Graham Bell, Henry Ford, or Thomas Edison dumb? Dumb because their inventions may have had some flaws and dumb because their inventions are being upgraded all the time. What they invented won't work in today's society but that doesn't mean that their ideas, are uncivilized or dumb. Mankind could always reason and can reason even better today than he/she could a long time ago. With all this education and reasoning is religion still around? Are the values that are taught in the Bible (10 commandments, etc.) still relevant today? Sure they are. I doubt that some people came up with the idea of religion and all that goes with it, because they had nothing better to do. because Jesus died to forgive the sins of ALL mankind, not just those of people that lived a long time ago. The Bible, Christ, commandments, salvation, are as relevant today as they were a long time ago.

Answer 6

Men have had the vanity to pretend that the whole creation was made for them, while in reality the whole creation does not suspect their existence.
— Camille Flammarion

The chimpanzee and the human share about 99.5% of their evolutionary history, yet most human thinkers regard the chimp as a malformed, irrelevant oddity, while seeing themselves as stepping stones to the Almighty.
— Robert L. Trivers

Man is a marvelous curiosity...he thinks he is the Creator's pet...he even believes the Creator loves him; has passion for him; sits up nights to admire him; yes and watch over him and keep him out of trouble. He prays to him and thinks he listens. Isn't it a quaint idea."
– Mark Twain

The idea of an incarnation of God is absurd: why should the human race think itself so superior to bees, ants, and elephants as to be put in this unique relation to its maker? . . Christians are like a council of frogs in a marsh or a synod of worms on a dung-hill croaking and squeaking “for our sakes was the world created.”
— Julian The Apostate

Humanity sees its reflection in the mirrors that surround it, and thus gratified, calls this image perfect, good, merciful, omniscient, omnipresent, holy, just, and above all, love. So enchanted are these hairless apes with this, that they invent a special word for it: 'God'.
— Unknown

The cosmos is a gigantic fly wheel making 10,000 revolutions a minute. Man is a sick fly taking a dizzy ride on it. Religion is the theory that the wheel was designed and set spinning to give him the ride.
— H.L. Mencken

I once heard the survivors of a colony of ants that had been partially obliterated by a cow's foot seriously debating the intention of the gods towards their civilization
— Don Marquis

A great many men believe in providence until they get caught in a railroad accident.
— Lemuel K. Washburn

(Providence: "The care, guardianship, and control exercised by a deity; divine direction; Foresight; care; especially, the foresight and care which God manifests for his creatures; hence, God himself, regarded as exercising a constant wise prescience.")

When man comes to the realization that he is not the "favorite" of God; that he was not specifically created, that the universe was not made for his benefit, and that he is subject to the same laws of nature as all other forms of life, then, and not until then, will he understand that he must rely upon himself, and himself alone, for whatever benefits he is to enjoy; and devote his time and energies to helping himself and his fellow men to meet the exigencies of life and to set about to solve the difficult and intricate problems of living."
— Joseph Lewis, "An Atheist Manifesto”

Answer 7

This may come as a shock to you...the bible supports your position.

Ecclesiastes 3:18-20 (New International Version)
I also thought, "As for men, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals. Man's fate is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath; man has no advantage over the animal. Everything is meaningless. All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.

Answer 8

or becaue it was given to us. just because you choose not to believe in God, does not mean we don't. and just because you believe there is no difference in humans and animals doesn't make it true. humans are brutal.. no one ever said we weren't. we're sinful by nature.
The God I believe in is not one that fits in the tiny confines of my imagination. if it was only my imagination, I can assure you, I would be dead by now. the laws of physics don't just stop working randomly and then start again. even if I only believed what I saw, I would have no choice but to believe in God. but I believe in science, and that proves God. I believe in history, and that proves God, and I believe in what I see, and that proves God. I believe in what I have experienced.

just because you don't doesn't give you the right to question us, not in this manner. it's ridiculous. there is no way you can "not offend" someone when you basically say "can't you see that I'm right and you're wrong and anything you believe is stupid?"
if you want to question God's existance, fine. or question the Bible, that's fine. but don't take limited knowledge taht isn't even scientific and then use it as a way to mock anyone who doesn't agree with you. that's just barbaric.

Answer 9

Well, I'm not so sure animals don't have an *afterlife*. My reasoning is that God said that His word would not return to Him void(as nothing) His word was spoken and animals came into being. If His word does not return to Him as nothing, then it seems logical that animals, being innocent, would return to Him as something in an *afterlife* . Peace.

Answer 10

But does that not then lead to the next question Where did we get the capacity? If everything evolved for the benefit of the species what would be the point of our being given a ( some say ) genetic need for a God?

Answer 11

How do you know that animals don't have a good afterlife?
Do you not realize that the animals were the ONLY
ones NOT thrown out of the Garden of Eden? Why? They did not sin.