Quote from Jeff

There's a HUGE difference! That's why physical anthropology splits up humans into three general racial classifications! Don't downplay that difference by wording like there's not a whole lot of difference, if you were going to ignore these kinds of distinctions then you might as well lump every living thing in existence together into one category called "beings."

Nope. Is scientifically incorrect to use the term race for mankind, gene differences between the various races are only 7%, not enough for that word. I deduce that "HUGE" is an exaggeration.

Quote from Zed

This exactly. You could classify things by nationality, race, species, or fact-that-they're-sentient. Probably a few others. There's no clear reason why the line should be drawn to make English people equal to Irish people but not Aliens equal to humans.

I don't understand what you're trying to say. How can you put together the example English-Irish with Aliens-Humans? It's like comparing cow-spotted cow and cow-crocodile; this time there is a huge difference.

Quote from Euge

Nope. Is scientifically incorrect to use the term race for mankind, gene differences between the various races are only 7%, not enough for that word. I deduce that "HUGE" is an exaggeration.

I seriously doubt that 7% figure, the genome of a chimpanzee is about 98% similar to humans.

Quote from Exilement

I seriously doubt that 7% figure, the genome of a chimpanzee is about 98% similar to humans.

Ops, I translated wrong the article were I read it :p
Anyway any genetic study agree on the thing that human races doesn't exist.

Quote from Jeff

There's a HUGE difference! That's why physical anthropology splits up humans into three general racial classifications! Don't downplay that difference by wording like there's not a whole lot of difference

Physical anthropology doesn't acknowledge racial classification as a useful measure of human diversity, at least not anymore. There are differences, but they're mostly social, with physical differences resulting from regional differences in climate. Either way they're far from "HUGE", at least compared to the truly huge similarities found among humans from all around the world.

There's a difference in that it is possible to easily distinguish between the two. The point I'm trying to make is that a distinction like this does not translate into a difference for morality. You still treat them all the same. You can't just say it's ok to treat a different species as a lesser species without backing it up in some way.

Well I haven't read the whole thread, but it seems like a justifiable reason to treat a species differently than you'd treat your own. But determining morality based on that alone isn't something you could logically defend.

I think I could just as well argue I should treat other races differently to mine. The species is in no danger of dying out so my evolutionary objective has to be to help the genes closest to me to propagate themselves above all others, and I do that best by genocide.

I don't think you could, considering the genetic variation between members of the same race is just as large as the variance between members of different races. That was my point.

Quote from Zed

There's a difference in that it is possible to easily distinguish between the two. The point I'm trying to make is that a distinction like this does not translate into a difference for morality. You still treat them all the same. You can't just say it's ok to treat a different species as a lesser species without backing it up in some way.

Here we are walking away from the main post. Of course rationally you shouldn't treat other sentient beings as lesser; but here we got in a terribly destructive war, where two species are trying to wipe out each other. As they demonstrated first, there is no mercy. Kill or be killed.

Is the comic you are mentioning called Gantz? Just for me to clear it out.

Quote from Euge

Here we are walking away from the main post. Of course rationally you shouldn't treat other sentient beings as lesser; but here we got in a terribly destructive war, where two species are trying to wipe out each other. As they demonstrated first, there is no mercy. Kill or be killed.

From the details given, we haven't been told that they're going to attack again. Maybe they destroyed half the planet by accident. Maybe it was one renegade alien who has since been court-martialled.

Like I said earlier, if there is other information available then sure, a defensive strike is justifiable, but it doesn't seem to be like that. Otherwise I don't know why the main character's girlfriend would be trying to stop him.

Quote from Zed

From the details given, we haven't been told that they're going to attack again. Maybe they destroyed half the planet by accident. Maybe it was one renegade alien who has since been court-martialled.

Like I said earlier, if there is other information available then sure, a defensive strike is justifiable, but it doesn't seem to be like that. Otherwise I don't know why the main character's girlfriend would be trying to stop him.

Well, if the comic mentioned actually is Gantz, then i can give some background.
The alien invasion is an attempt to colonize the Earth, since their homeworld is destroyed. For a period of time aliens were indiscriminatingly wiping out the majority of human population. Those who somehow survive the extermination, are usually captured and used as food. At some point humans finally manage to perform a counterattack on one of the alien colony ships. Events, which are mentioned in the beginning of the topic, happen when a main character manages to get close to one of the crucial systems of the ship and gets a chance to destroy it. The colony ship itself is an extremely large moving city. It is worth mentioning that aliens generally consider humans nothing more than animals and pay zero attention to their culture.
Main character's girlfriend is trying to stop him mostly because one the aliens (actually 2 or 3, but that doesn't really matter) helped her, so she believes that they have as much rights to live, as humans do.
Again everything I said is legit only if the comic actually is Gantz. From the information we are given, it sure looks like it.

The original post described a planet, not a ship.

that's what's going on in gantz? wow, the anime left the viewers in the dark hardcore. I don't even remember them remotely explaining anything about the aliens, other than that they're supposed to kill certain ones. though I'm sure the "comic" is super far ahead of what was adapted.