[scalio]

Have you created great works of art, literature, architecture and poetry or built complex machines? That's precisely the kind of arrogance the author is arguing against. Yes, as a species we create art and complex machinery, and we write. How exactly does that make us better than every other life form on Earth? What does 'better' even mean? How is an elephant supposed to hold a pen? Elephants can be very agile with their trunk, but that's just one member. We've got ten of them. We can physically do more nifty stuff.

Who are we to deem an elephant's mind inferior to our own? Its brain is three times as massive as ours! Perhaps elephants have long solved questions we aren't even considering, handing down knowledge from generation to generation. Maybe their memory is more reliable than ours and preserves knowledge perfectly. How can we know?

This human arrogance seems to stem from the fact that communication with other beings is difficult at best. We have no practical way into their minds, and they don't write, so they can't show us what they're pondering all day. That does not mean they sleep, eat and fuck waiting for the coffin like the rest of us. Make no mistake, humans are more physically sophisticated, but mentally? Bar the rare individuals that advance our civilization, we're a bunch of wildly destructive animals held together by a set of rules we can't actually agree on. We're the only species that destroys environment and life just for the heck of it.

I like humanity a lot. It has a great ability to transform its environment, and writing things down certainly helps in enabling its intellectual progress. As you rightly point out, we've only come this far through competition, but I think we have reached a point in our technological development that enables us to shed that character and refocus. We should turn inwards, because the outside is reaching the limits of what it can give us. Our minds are something we have no grasp of, and provide those who look with endless wonder and discovery. If we want to be truly more advanced than any other life form on this planet, we have to get our shit together regarding the mind, otherwise it's all for nothing (i.e. will physically be blown to pieces sooner or later).

[cmdrfred]

I'm sorry. It is preposterous to claim an elephant has greater level of intelligence than a human being. Cooperative behaviors require little individual intelligence (look at ants or bees). It is competitive and predatory behaviors that require cunning and sophistication. We are more intelligent because we have been constantly doing battle with the apex predator on this planet since the dawn of our existence. Conflict is what has shaped us into what we are today. Human technology and ingenuity does not exist despite our tendency toward violence but because of it.

I for one am filled with extreme pride when I look at the works of my human ancestors. We descended from the trees and will soon travel those distant points of light that filled us with wonder so long ago. Billions of us have died in that effort, your comment betrays their noble contribution.

Elephants are great. We should endeavor to protect them and show them kindness, but the reason we are able to do so is because we are vastly superior to them.

[scalio]

You're right, we've come this far because intelligence is a competitive advantage. However, we do not fully understand the mechanisms of evolution, and I thus find it hard to categorically deny all other beings' ability to think extensively. Their intelligence probably wouldn't be competitive ("how do I get there before that guy"), but maybe there are other kinds of intelligence. Kindness and compassion is not a human invention, and may well be an evolutionary advantage under some circumstances (grouping is needed for survival, and the group survives better by sharing), leading to intelligence based on kindness and not focusing on any single individual.