(February 17, 2013 at 6:09 pm)Drew_2013 Wrote: I agree atheism doesn't mandate atheists subscribe to any particular belief or philosophy. Nevertheless, if true human beings are nothing more than the unintended consequences of the laws of physics and from that point of view there is nothing special about humans, they have no special rights, they're not endowed with unalienable rights. You can't infer from that perspective that humans have a right to live. What right does something that was never intended to exist in the first place have to live? On the other hand if the universe was created for the purpose of hosting human beings then we do have a philosophical basis to infer that humans are special, should have special sanctions such as the right to life and equality. Doesn't mean we do those things perfectly, but we do have a basis for it.
Let me see if you are capable of understanding the depth of your logical failure.
First of all, here you employ a logical fallacy called denying the antecedent. Consider this:
A: If it is raining, the roads are wet.
B: It is not raining.
C: Therefore, the roads are not wet.
Do you see why the conclusion is wrong? The roads could be wet from a variety of reasons, like it rained last night or the water main broke, causing flooding, or because of the morning dew.
You employ this fallacy with regards to your misrepresentation of atheistic position in the following way:
A: If humans are intentional and purposeful creations, then they have inalienable human rights.
B: Humans are not intentional and purposeful creations (being the result of mechanistic processes).
C: Therefore, they do not have inalienable human rights.
Do you see now the error of your position?
Furthermore, you assume that if someone was intended to live then he/she has the right to live. Where is the justification for that? How does the fact that something out there intended for me to live give me with the "right to life"? And how does that make me equal everything else that it might also have intended to live, thus giving me right to equality? And clearly, these rights are in no way inalienable. After all, since they are based upon the entity's intentions, then as soon as it no longer intends for me to live, I no longer have the right to live.
No matter. We'll overlook this lack of rationale for now and assume that if the creator of a living entity intends for it to live then it has the right to live. As it happens, the people most directly responsible for my creation are my parents. They most certainly do intend for me to live. Why isn't that sufficient to grant me the right to life and all the other rights my special status in their eyes would ensue? You might argue that if we go back far enough in the past, we won't find any intention or purpose behind human existence - but if it is intention and purpose you are looking for, then we don't need to back far in the past - it is present here and now.
But you might say that the only intention that matters is god's. Ofcourse, this is a special pleading fallacy, but let's put that aside for the moment. According to your logic, this creator would not only be responsible for intentional and purposeful creation of human beings but that of all living creature. Which means, he intended for all of them to live. Why, then are humans any more special than the rest of them? Wouldn't all of them have the same rights to life and equality that you have?
Finally, lets get to the fallacy of equivocation. You start off by insisting that life is special because certain conditions on this tiny speck of floating dust support it (anthropic fallacy - addressed elsewhere). And then somewhere along the line you go from life to human life. Somewhere along the line you go from insisting that the universe was created for the purpose of hosting life to arguing that it was created to host human life and hope that no one notices the switch. That much is patently false even on earth. Most of the areas of this world that do support life would not support human life. Almost everywhere that humans live, they've had to modify their surrounding to suit their needs precisely because the natural surroundings would not adequately support them. If anything, that would make humans less special than a myriad of other species eminently more suitable. If you are looking for a living entity for whom this universe could arguably have been made, look no further than the beetles. There are about 400,000 different species of them and they make up for about 30% of all animals, thereby proving that if the biosphere was made to support any kind of life, it was theirs. Remember that the next time you are walking down the street and be careful not to step on any creepy-crawlies - they are way more special than you and have the philosophical basis for much greater rights of life and equality.
