: The eagles' "perspective" is uninformed by a cerebral cortex. The Hopi perspective IS. If you don't want to "act superior," as you would be if you couldn't condescend to speak to the Hopi, you might consider respecting the Hopi perspective for that quality that it possesses. That would be a start.I've begun a dialogue with the Hopi. In the meantime, consider your own status as a "superior" human animal in relation to nonhuman animals. It's good to remember that the belief that "I am superior to you" has been the rationale for countless atrocities in this world. Once you recognize that nonhuman animals are subject to the greatest of cruelties because we have designated them "inferior," you'll begin to see the injustice of human oppression of them. I'm an animal rights activist because animals are treated as slaves by people; when people stop considering animals property, to be used and abused as we see it,
then I'll happily give up my activism.
As for your contention that eagles lack our higher brain functions: eagles have brains and central nervous systems. Biologists are discovering more and more every day that animals are far more similar to us, with regard to their cognitive functioning, than once thought. They have language. They can learn. They have emotions. They can feel. It's the last ability which grounds my opposition to the Hopi's smothering of eagles. As Jeremy Bentham put it, the question is not whether they can think, but whether they can suffer. Eagles can suffer. Recognizing that they share with us this profound capacity to suffer, we have no choice but to treat them as we would want ourselves to be treated, that is, not to make them suffer.
None.
