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Value of Life - 1 by Bruce Malone |
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The value of anything must always be set by something outside of that object. A coin is no more valuable than a pebble except by common agreement that it can be exchanged for something with a purpose. Humans are unique in their ability to assign abstract values to inherently non-functional and otherwise useless objects. A diamond ring, a thousand dollar bill, or a gold bar has no more value to an animal than a smooth pebble, shiny rock, or fuzzy leaf. Animals cannot even assign value to their own lives. Apart from survival instincts and some mutually beneficial biological relationships, animals either ignore or eat one another. Tears are never shed as one group of animals seek to destroy another in their own quest for survival. Animals make no judgments concerning the value of biological life. Only man is capable of recognizing the value of animal life and seeking to protect it. But who is capable of assigning value to human life?
If human value is set by the mutual consent of other humans, it is subject to change at any time. This has happened countless times throughout history. Many ancient cultures sacrificed live children in order to pacify the gods. Not all that long ago the U.S. Supreme Court declared slavery legal, effectively removing human status from Negroes. Aborigines in Australia were shot and skinned less than 200 years ago because they were not considered human. In the last 3 decades the abortion industry has profited from the destruction of 35 million unborn children whose value and rights were stripped away by the Supreme Court.
There is a war of values raging in our country. Most of us are aware of the surface skirmishes, but all too few are aware that the basis of the war is a deep philosophical difference about reality. The basis of America's cultural war is the question of man's relationship to God. Either life's value is based on God's personal existence (meaning absolute values do exist) or man sets the standards. There are no other possibilities. The consequence of 150 years of indoctrination with evolutionary principles is the acceptance that man is part of the natural forces which shaped us. The inevitable result of this line of reasoning is the removal of an objective basis for determining the value of anything. Thus, mankind either arbitrarily assigns value to things (including people) or all life becomes of equal value. In the case of the former, atrocities such as human sacrifice or passive acceptance of abortion occur. In the case of the latter, absurdities occur such as animal rights groups equating the murder and mutilation of humans with the slaughter of chickens1. Both of these responses are inevitable outcomes of following the evolutionary humanist philosophy to its logical conclusion. Christianity is rooted in the fact that a personal God exists. Thus, life is inherently valuable. Furthermore, we have no right to do with life as we arbitrarily please. There is something special about all humans and no-one has the right to remove their value by murder, abortion, or euthanasia. 1 Charles Nicoll & Sharon Russell,"Animal Rights Literature", Science 244 (26 May 1989):903 |
