Runner, I've never read a single thing that you've ever said that would be worth repeating.

Your brain, such as it is, has been in neutral for decades and is completely unused.

I hope that mankind, one day, will become intelligent. People who believe in gods and angels will never be!

Them's the breaks!

Divergence
Biologists do not comment on human values in their capacity as biologists, because biology no more qualifies them so to comment than anyone else.

Positive scientists too often falsely assume that the all-important human values are just mere technical details to be solved unproblematically after enough power has been centralised in the hands of government. Their assumptions are wrong.

Those who trumpet that human use of natural resources is immoral should show some moral leadership and stop using them. Until they do, the rest of us can be excused for dismissing their blandishments as so much pious nonsense.

Jardine,

"Human values" might change if people understood the long-term implications of what they are doing. A lot of them care about their children and grandchildren. Biologists can certainly comment on that.

Yes, there are kleptocratic governments that do dreadful things, but you can't blame all the world's problems on government. It doesn't matter whether the stupidity is being driven by the government or by the people themselves. For example, the Rwandan government has introduced programs that have greatly improved child survival. They also have also made efforts to give everyone access to family planning. Unfortunately, many people have refused to take advantage of it, so the same inadequate amount of food has to be shared among more siblings.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/19/rwanda-malnutrition-children

Apart from senseless waste, whether consumption of material resources is a problem depends on how many people are doing it. It is hard to feel guilty if you aren't responsible for the overpopulation.

Divergence,
Thanks for your post, but I can't help feeling you're in the wrong site if you're looking for rational discussion. This is the place where freethinkers meet bigots mired in the morass of their dogmatism and childhood indoctrination. And that's the problem with the internet. instead of promulgating ideas, insight, wisdom and debate, it has provided enclaves for people with similar views to reinforce their beliefs and prejudices, without ever meeting different ideas. That's the tragedy of the death of a free press. there is now no mass medium whatever that provides all readers/viewers/listeners with a wide variety of factual, unbiased information. Endless war, overpopulation, pollution and the destruction of the natural world in which we evolved is the inevitable consequence.

Around here the only wildlife that is in decline is native wildlife.
The foxes are thriving (although not the ones I shot last night), the feral cats are multiplying, the bunnies are on the increase as are the feral pigs and the deer, in fact last Friday I had to brake heavily to avoid a very healthy looking doe that decided to run in front of the car. She was in a place, on the Gwydir Highway, where I've never seen deer before.