The Reasons why "Just Following Jesus" Doesn't work

[Redbeard The Pink]

Various documentaries have shown a basic set of morals in the ape family.  Does this mean your god gave morals to the apes?

According to my world view, I am a human being, and I value myself more highly than a tree because my species has evolved with a survival instinct that inspires me to value my life (the same way it does in other humans, usually). There are humans that I value about the same as a tree, or a table, or a feral cat, and this is because of a concept known as the monkeysphere. Theoretically there are other humans out there that place little to no value on my life, even if they know who I am and maybe even if they know me personally. Value, like morality, is another one of those funny things that's always subjective; nothing has absolute value, only the value attributed to it by the individual. It's the same reason you see faith as valuable and I see it as a detriment to one's mental health.

So I am not trying to attack you but understand you. The reason you value your life over a tree is because you have a survival instinct? If this is what you are saying why does it matter than your progeny survive or that they Human race survives? How does a species become aware enough to see the need to survive?

Not every animal cares deeply about the survival of their offspring, but in humans this tendency is likely also the result of evolution. Beings that don't produce a lot of offspring at once tend to be very protective of their young, and this is likely because beings with low birth rates who didn't protect their young didn't survive as a species. Spiders don't have to care for their babies because there are so many; statistics says that at least a few will survive, even though they're so tiny and edible. Humans, on the other hand, most often have only one baby at a time, which means we would have died off if we hadn't tended toward caring for our babies. The tendency to survive long enough to replicate itself seems to be an innate quality of life that doesn't even require a consciousness to function. Survival even at the microscopic level takes some work, so things that don't work toward survival don't achieve it. Awareness is simply an evolved quality that makes the survival of certain species more likely. The need for survival predates the need for awareness; not all levels of life require awareness to survive.