Why do we consider apes special? I do not approve of this. We don't have any good way to judge sentience, level of conscious and intelligence. And you can find evidence that dogs have more of those than apes, so while it seems natural to consider our cousins special, I'd be very cautious here. Dogs might be closer to the level of mind that we have than apes. So could dolphins. Just because they're not a part of our family doesn't mean that don't possess our abilities, judge animals by their individual merit, not only by their close relatives. You might have convergent evolution, or you might have a totally novel evolutionary path that leads to intelligence.
I would treat apes the same way I would treat dogs, dolphins, elephants, etc., and I'd consider adding certain birds to the same group. If you do something to dogs, you should be able to do the same to apes.
And how do you know if it is less stressful and painful to the animal if it is closer to us than if it is not? I mean, I'd feel bad if I was a retard, or if I couldn't communicate thoughts that I have because my language abilities are very limited, or if I couldn't understand the world around me.
I'd personally love if the experiment is done with an animal whose mind is very close to ours, because it could result in a real non-human person, which would be amazing. And it would be a definite example why we aren't special.
I would treat apes the same way I would treat dogs, dolphins, elephants, etc., and I'd consider adding certain birds to the same group. If you do something to dogs, you should be able to do the same to apes.
And how do you know if it is less stressful and painful to the animal if it is closer to us than if it is not? I mean, I'd feel bad if I was a retard, or if I couldn't communicate thoughts that I have because my language abilities are very limited, or if I couldn't understand the world around me.
I'd personally love if the experiment is done with an animal whose mind is very close to ours, because it could result in a real non-human person, which would be amazing. And it would be a definite example why we aren't special.
