dogsmilk wrote:
But unless you're religious in which case God may have elevated man above other life forms,
Why would such an opinion require religion?
Some religions venerate other life forms.
Animals have always been regarded in Buddhist thought as sentient beings, different in their intellectual ability than humans but no less capable of feeling suffering. Furthermore, animals possess Buddha nature (according to the Mahāyāna school) and therefore an equal potential to become enlightened. Moreover, the doctrine of rebirth held that any human could be reborn as an animal, and any animal could be reborn as a human. An animal might be a reborn dead relative, and anybody who looked far enough back through his or her infinite series of lives would eventually perceive every animal to be a distant relative. The Buddha expounded that sentient beings currently living in the animal realm have been our mothers, brothers, sisters, fathers, children, friends in past rebirths. One could not, therefore, make a hard distinction between moral rules applicable to animals and those applicable to humans; ultimately humans and animals were part of a single family. They are all interconnected
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And I could easily provide further examples.
Secular people may be just as likely elevating humans by considering humaniy to be the highest form of evolution and animals as lower forms on the evolutionary ladder.
Not necessarily of course.
I wouldn't want to make the same mistake you have.
