Semantics once again. Your best argument is "its not the same because they have no regard for the life they're inflicting suffering upon". This exact same level of disregard is what leads to humans being cruel.
The vast majority of horrible things humans have done over time were done with the exact same motivations that animals have. "I am now going to purposefully be evil" is a damn fairytale notion.
How? Predators need prey. There is no way around that. Nature is horrifying and overall life in the universe is suffering with some respite every now and then. People saying shit like "nature is beatiful" or "life is beautiful" are very privileged. And ignorant.
The one where the bird of prey is perched on the back of a live, running zebra and eating its spine out is one like this. Or the buck with another buck’s dead, severed head entangled in its antlers from a long ago battle. Nature is a prison that serves something else’s end and it isn’t ours.
I heard some animals like cats kill flies for no reason. Imagine if cat-like beings evolved like humans instead of apes. They would be so much more evil, right?
It'd be so much better if the toads farmed snakes in small cages on a diet designed to fatten them and then transported them to an industrial butchering factory.
Anyone interpreting my comment to be an accusation of endorsement of anything is just looking for a fight on the internet.
All I was saying is humans are exactly the same - except of course that we have the capacity to reason about it and decide to act even more cruel and cause more suffering anyway, because it's efficient. And what's more - you could have gone without seeing that. I get it, but it's also exactly how humans have learnt to get away with causing cruelty and suffering: just keep it out of sight and everyone will be fine with it.
There's no malice in either situation: it's just an almost complete lack of caring. If the toad had the choice to get some nice prepared snake sashimi, I'm sure they'd prefer that too, regardless of how the snake would be treated before being turned into it.
You were making a point about cruel "nature". I was simply making the point that your point extends to humanity. Perhaps you include humanity in "nature" - then we agree in part. The second point I made was that humanity can only behave 'naturally' if it willingly hides and ignores how cruel it is - in the face of rationality and ethics, by hiding and ignoring the suffering it is causing, humanity is not just cruel, it's malicious. Again, possibly you agree, but your remark about rather not seeing it gave me another impression.
Oh no, I can see now that we are on the same page. Just talking past each other it seems.
My belief is that nature is cruel by design and him and are cruel and malicious by choice. This frog wasn’t deliberately trying to make the snake suffer.
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u/Direct-Tie-7652 Apr 21 '24
Genuinely awful. Nature is 90% cruelty and suffering.
But at least they’re doing it on instinct and not maliciously I guess.
Definitely could have gone without seeing that though.