A.Suarez's Treatment on a Pope's Formulation for Original Sin's Transmission!

All right!

This amounts to say that God (at some point during the Neolithic) formed Adam of an adult Homo sapiens creature by enlightening his mind with divine inspiration: After this inspiration there was a human person, Adam, who God called to reach eternal life and become like God; thereby God created “mankind in the image of God”.

Do you agree to this?

yes.

Eternal life is an everlasting relationship of parent and child, for becoming like an infinite God takes forever.

Our infinite potentiality reflects God’ infinite actuality. That is what makes an eternal parent child relationship with God possible for it means there is no end to what we can receive from God. However the bad habits of sin destroy a lot of that potentiality. I just don’t see this “image of God” as a stamp of absolute difference between man and animals the way you do. To be sure, our potential, with our language and minds, is vastly greater than the animals.

While all living things have the basic ability to become more through growth, learning, and evolution, this does not mean all are equal. That ability is greater in some living things compared to others. It even greater in some people compared to others. Some people are more aware, more creative, do more to embrace the challenges of life, and then there are the good and bad habits they have which have, also affecting their ability to learn and grow. Jesus saw such differences in people.

You may notice that I resist being led in this way.

My view is that like Adam each human person comes into existence by means of “a divine inspiration”, a “direct creative act” on the part of God.

This hold in particular:

  • For the genetic descendants of Adam God formed of fertilized eggs.

  • For the new human persons God formed of the millions of adult Homo sapiens creatures living on earth at the time of the creation of Adam.

In other words, in order a human person in the image of God came and comes into existence, “memetic inheritance” alone does not suffice, it is necessary a “direct creative act of God”, exactly as in the case of Adam.

I feel that you do not share this view, and this may be the fork where our explanations deviate from each other.

Then apparently I did not make myself clear. By divine inspiration I am not talking about some magical transformation, I am talking about communication. Adam became a human being and God’s child because God took the role of parent in raising him. God taught Adam to be a human being.

I believe in God, the parent, not god, the genetic designer, or god, the necromancer sorcerer.

And God takes that role of parent with each one of us, teaching us through our experiences. But when it comes to what God taught Adam, we get that from our own parent. The inspiration of God rains down upon us in a torrent because God is everywhere in every book and TV show (to varying degrees and in different ways). So yes God is creatively involved in the creation of us all. But no God does not start from scratch with each of us.

Correct. In my case this is much more about a relationship God wants with us than some special difference we have from the animals.

“I believe in God, the parent, not god, the genetic designer, or god, the necromancer sorcerer.”

Then it clearly makes sense to drop “memetics” as your “tool of choice.” God is not a “meme-spreader” or “memetic designer” either. :grin:

“God is everywhere in every book and TV show”

Hmm, even those that spread destruction? It’s the same dilemma for ID theory with “evil intelligence”, which they don’t have an answer for.

" in order a human person in the image of God came and comes into existence, “memetic inheritance” alone does not suffice, it is necessary a “direct creative act of God”, exactly as in the case of Adam." - @AntoineSuarez

Yes, this is agreeable. It’s the same problem that “memetics” cannot account for “minds” themselves, since minds are obviously not “memes”. It’s only the “survival after the arrival” that the ideology of memetics tried to explore, and failed badly at, perhaps as Mitchell says, because Dawkins’ was an atheist/agnostic and tried to build a materialistic theory of cultural replication.

In my view Genesis 9:3-6 is the universal and foundational archetype of any knowledge, including certainly quantum physics!

Genesis contains the remarkable philosophical view that knowing “what is” and knowing “what ought to be” are a same act of knowledge, two sides of the same coin.

For more details see this paper.

This said, I would like to stress:

I discuss the question of “Transmission of original sin” on the basis of the following Statement :

In the light of the available data we are led to conclude that God’s creative act and declaration referred to in Genesis 9:3-6 did happen at the time of emergence of man’s first civilization, when the size of the Homo sapiens population on the planet was 7-10 million.

Whether or not “evolutionary science” is the appropriate term to refer to the sources where I gather the “available data” I rely on, it may be an interesting epistemological query on its own, but as such is irrelevant for the “transmission” question.

If you can provide better (“non-evolutionary”) sources backing (or refuting) my basic Statement above, please do it. Meanwhile, and in view this enjoyable discussion may make progress, I dare to ask:

Do you agree to this Statement ?

“In my view Genesis 9:3-6 is the universal and foundational archetype of any knowledge, including certainly quantum physics!”

Self-knowledge, which is not what physics treats of. I’m just trying to figure out where the “social scientist” or “social philosopher” in you kicks in, where he’s hiding in there, because when I speak of topics like, agent, person, and even “creative act” (though we are both speaking about Divinity in this thread, so that is clear between us so far), it really “means” to be interpreted differently than the language you are using.

The “quantum physicist” who was able to speak “reflexively” about this would bring onto the table an entirely new entity that would be difficult for proponents of “scientism” to handle. (It turns out that I recently read, all the way through, two books on theology and physics, and theology and (the history of) mathematics, so this “quantum” you raise isn’t too mind-boggling or far fetched at the current time to consider.)

Your “Statement” is difficult to accept because it is too long & winding for a single sentence. And it’s not a “scientific” statement, so must be treated as a personal historical-philosophical-theological statement, more than as a statement about a “transmission of sin theory”. “The time of the emergence of man’s first civilization” is particularly broad, and ending your “statement” with the word “million” makes no sense.

I believe there is a way to reframe and improve your statement. But forgive me, sir, if I won’t address it here publicly. Perhaps soon elsewhere. Please be welcome to connect privately by DM.

“If you can provide better (“non-evolutionary”) sources backing (or refuting) my basic Statement above, please do it.”

Yes, I believe I can do that. And I’m not joking when speaking about either “non-evolutionary” or “trans-evolutionary” change. Others on the level have affirmed this to give confidence that “better (“non-evolutionary”) sources” is what you can expect outside of listening to atheist/agnostic anthropologists. Most stop at them, though, in pop culture (Diamond, Harari, Pinker, et al.)

Returning to schedule, it has taken me longer than anticipated to get through your Scientia et Fides paper due to other items popping up. I’m moving forward on it, but responding to it will likely come next week. A long-awaited call today will bring up your name and your paper, and your relationship with a certain someone now promoting secular genealogistics and scientism, under the guise of asking a question: “what does it mean to be human?” I am very careful when listening to answers by computational biologists, physicists, chemists, and other natural scientists on this question given their “amateur” status. Instead, I look for healthy interdisciplinarians, some natural scientists, some social scientists, some humanities scholars, and why not even a theologian or more, who are able to flexibly adapt language outside of their current disciplinary limits and apply it in a proper, coherent and engaging way.

Both “evolution” and “memetics” are imho unsuitable (inaccurate, imprecise, too fuzzy) languages for the “change” involved in “ancestral sin”. I’m not sure how “original” ancestral sin is to you, Antoine. Aristotle’s “there must have been a first”, then Aquinas’ universalism, then indeed, Marshall (whose “four effects” mirror Aristotle’s “four causes”, which very few people are even aware of!) caches out the trio with your Aristotle, Thomas, McLuhan → the extensions of mankind, made imago Dei. But it’s a leap in another direction towards culture, away from the language of physics that is needed in making the assessment. Good wishes.

p.s. that’s quite a bit to put on those particular 3 verses in Genesis! :blush:

Wrong. I don’t agree with your hangups with Dawkins and the meme terminology.

meme 1 : an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture.

God most certainly is a meme-spreader and the transmission of memes is exactly what parents do as well. As for “meme-designer” that is a very strange invention of your own that Dawkins certainly wouldn’t use. Instead Dawkins coins the word “designoid” for things which have the appearance of being designed but are not. I agree with this completely. Life and design are fundamentally incompatible. Design produces machines not living organisms. What about “genetic design”? To the degree that something is the product of genetic design they are machines rather than living organisms. But so far what we call genetic design is really just breeding and “design” is not a really good word for it… or they are rather small mixing alterations. Things are not alive just because they are composed of the molecules of organic chemistry. Life is a process of self-organization.

What definition of “meme” are you using? It must be a pretty strange one.

It seems to me this just about the power of ideas and how they take on a life of their own. Your opposition sounds like you are sayings that ideas are powerless and God doesn’t inspire any ideas. This is so foolish, I think it more likely that your opposition is base a some other definition or it doesn’t have any reasoning behind it at all.

Yes. Evil and sin corrupts. It does not create. So just because something turns toward evil doesn’t mean God had nothing to do with it. It just means that evil won that particular battle. You are aware that God is omnipresent, right?

Human beings spread destruction and yet God created them. Not everything God does turns out quite the way He would have liked.

The “memetics” you have lodged in your brain and your cultural science soapbox has nothing to do with anything I have said. And I will continue to use the term “meme” in the ways which are useful, caring nothing for your disapproval. Frankly, it fits hand in glove with the extension terminology you like to use, and your opposition doesn’t make much sense to me. Human development is an extension of evolution from the alteration of genes to the alteration of memes.

The human mind as a living organism is a vastly better idea than the dualism of Neoplatonism and Descartes.

I said nothing of the sort. I said Dawkins was trying to justify the atheist claim that religion was a disease and thus used memes as a way of comparing religion to a virus.

First of all I doubt that Dawkins was trying any such thing. Perhaps people tried to use his idea in “cultural science” and that is what failed and from your description this is either because they had a limited understanding of evolution or because it was opposed by people with the same kind of limited understanding of evolution as we see in creationists. Variation is the driving force of evolution NOT natural selection and thus a full understanding of evolution would give more attention in “memetics” to the generation of new ideas rather than just the “survival after arrival.”

Mitchell,

Could you please do me a favour. I’m asking directly now, after indicating it above. I do not wish to discuss “memetics” or “memes” in this thread with Antoine as I don’t find it worthwhile or valuable. The topic of “memetics” should instead be moved to another thread, unless you’d like to make a claim about “memetics” and “original sin” relevant specifically to this one.

I would be willing to start this other thread to specifically discuss memetics within 2 weeks, or you can: be welcome to choose. In any case, would you please be so kind as to respect my request this time, so that I may continue in conversation with Antoine & GJDS here without any haunting or caricature from memetics hanging around in the air?

You have just asked for my definition of “meme”, yet above I sent you an academic paper that I wrote on the topic, adding that there is another follow-up paper available to it. Please, for this other thread, instead go find a quote there, since I was very focused on “memetics” and “memes” when I wrote it and you’ll find lots of relevant quotes there to grapple with. Your volume of posting and tendency towards declarative statements is too high for me here right now, making this a less than enjoyable encounter so far.

And no, sorry, no offense meant, but I really don’t have a “hangup with Dawkins”. Are you an anti-realist? There are not a small # of evangelicals in this conversation who do have such hangups, so I don’t blame you for flailing at me with that one, since this site is visited mostly by evangelicals. However, as rarely as possible, and only when needed, I engage his ideas in the fields in which I am trained, competent and produce work. I don’t go way outside my fields of competence, like Dawkins did, to propose a “theory” in a field in which I am not trained. Are you actually supporting that switching fields “method” of “knowledge production”, Mitchell? Admitting “No” would go a long way to show who you are in conversation.

So far, you seem unwilling to concede even the simple fact that Richard Dawkins was not trained in the study of culture, yet he proposed a cultural theory “memetics”. This makes trusting you in conversation much more difficult, as it reveals a basic denial of reality. It displays anti-realism about Dawkins’ intentions, qualifications and background training for coming up with “memetics”.

In short, I won’t engage you about “memetics” or “memes” in this thread anymore & request you at least not to address me (it’s Antoine’s thread, after all) with regard to these terms either. Deal?

I would be ecstatic if you would drop this topic from this thread. By all means start a different thread on this topic. Good idea!

Not finding a link in any posts to me only in a post responding to AntoineSuarez… Collective vision - Social Epistemology Review

I certainly agree with the criticisms presented. What I don’t agree with is your use of this as cause for moratorium on the terminology. Part of the problem here is that I would give the same criticism of the description Dawkins gives for genes in the same book “The Selfish Gene” (not one of his better works). Genes are not autonomous manipulators of life any more than memes are autonomous manipulators of social media. Instead they are units of information the survival of which is affected by the utility they have for those mediums. Thus the validity of the parallel drawn between the two is quite a different matter from Dawkins’ portrayal of how they work.

Are you talking about moral anti-realism or Platonic realism? I think the whole issue of moral realism confuses reality with language. It it the problem I see with a lot of the philosophy of the ancient Greeks and others before the advent of modern science. I think there are both absolute and relative elements to morality as well as both objective and subjective elements to morality. But I am certainly an opponent of Platonic realism and closer to nominalism. Universals are constructions by abstraction as useful tools in understanding things – that is all.

I do not recognize the authority of all academic fields equally. Those dominated by subjective opinions like theology cannot be equate with those based on objective evidence like the hard sciences. For those in-between, the ones closer to the former (softer) should be considered with a corresponding quantity of salt (i.e. skepticism).

So I agree that Dawkins’ work “The God Delusion” was a bit amateurish but not that it is unworthy of evaluation even if most is criticism. In my case, I do not disagree with the majority of it. I consider all the proofs of God’s existence to be lacking in objective validity. The biggest flaw I see in the book is his treatment of God as a scientific hypothesis. It is no such thing and can never be any such thing.

Sounds promising. I likewise request that you do not jump on my posts to others with your soapbox on cultural theory and “memetics.” Let’s keep that to a thread which is actually on such a topic.

Your belief is my belief!

Neither am I!

There is a precise moment when God makes a Homo sapiens creature to the human being and God’s child Adam. It is the moment Genesis refers to by stating “God made mankind in the image of God”. At this precise moment a relationship parent-child started between God and Adam, which subsequently developed in various ways.

God is creatively involved in the creation of each of us the same way as He was in the creation of Adam: There is a precise moment when God formed you of some biological stuff; thereafter a relationship parent-child between God and you started, which subsequently improved, first of all from what you got from your own parents, but also because “the inspiration of God rains down upon us in a torrent”.

As we are taught by Genesis 9:3-6 both aspects are tightly united:

God wants to share a parent-child relationship with us humans, what is another way to state that God makes us in the image of God. This relationship has implications for the relationship of humans with each other, in particular that we respect each other as brothers and sisters: humans are not allowed to kill other humans for one’s own convenience. By contrast God did not take the role of parent in raising animals: God did not make animals in the image of God, but allowed us to use them as resources for our convenience, in particular for food.

So, by the very act of “making mankind in the image of God”, God gave mankind rules of behavior (commandments) which presuppose that each human can clearly distinguish which creature is human and which is not.

To this aim, God guided evolution by means of a highly complex ecological regulation to establish the sharp difference between humans and animals we observe today (as we are taught by evolutionary biology this difference was definitely established by 12,000 BP). Thanks this specific anatomical difference we have from the animals, we can distinguish which creatures are in the image of God and which are not. In other words, at the very moment God takes the role of parent with Adam and each of us, God engraves in our minds the “dictation of divine law” you refer to:

Notice that it is crucial to assume that there is a precise moment in history such that, afterwards, the belonging to the species Homo sapiens is the clear sign of being in the image of God, the observable mark of a spiritual parent-child relationship with God. Without this assumption the door is open to all kind of arbitrary discrimination and racism.

Once again: Evolutionary science allow us to read deeper into Scripture, and Scripture allow us to better explain why evolution worked the way it worked in terms of human evolution.

I disagree with several things here.

  1. Man is created more in the image of God, not only man created in the image of God.
  2. God gave us a custodial and steward’s responsibility over animals and all His creation.
  3. God did not give any such approval for using all animals as merely a resource for our convenience.

As a Biblical basis for this I would point to prohibitions against cooking a kid in its mother’s milk, against eating bird together with her young. Even for animals there should be some respect. For modern man it is obvious that we are not so different and having no respect whatsoever for animals just a little too close to having no respect for people either. Whether this is translated as being completely vegetarian, giving thanks to the animals which gave their lives for our sustenance, or something else is a matter of personal conviction. But at the very least we should be protecting pets and endangered wildlife against profiteering poachers.

Understanding and accepting that human beings are persons and more than just a resource for our convenience is a big part of our humanity. Those who do not behave accordingly are rightly called inhuman and monsters requiring the taking of action to stop them. But none of this means this is a sharp black and white dividing line. We can see the blurring of this line on both sides such as in psychopaths and different animal species – people who are missing some of the human capabilities and animals who have a great deal of those capabilities. And I certainly disagree that the differences are purely anatomical and biological, let alone genetic. And I see thinking to the contrary as having more of a role in supporting discrimination and racism.

I see no reason for this to be narrowed down to an instant in history any more than I agree with you that this is such a black and white dividing line between man and animals. It is more than sufficient that a good portion of the change is far in the past. But I think we can clearly see that our humanity is far from a sharp line but is something which has been improving and continues to do so – with our respect for human life, freedom, and dignity increasing all the time (and I think an increasing respect for animals and nature are a part of this too).

We would certainly be wise to conform our understanding according to the findings of science. That is what will make our understanding of scripture more reasonable.

Scripture, however, has no role in science whatsoever. Science is based upon procedural ideals of honesty (testing hypotheses) and objectivity (written procedures giving the same result no matter who or what we want or believe) in which the things of religion has no part whatsoever.

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Are you claiming that certain animals are persons while human psychopaths are not?

I have never claimed that “the differences are purely anatomical and biological”.

What I state is:

Ascertaining which creature is a person and which is not, requires a clear observable difference.

Since God made the first human persons of Homo sapiens creatures (12,000-5,300 BP), the clear observable difference is the anatomical and biological difference between the species Homo sapiens and any other animal species.

And this is exactly what Genesis 9:3-6 means: At this very moment God declares that all Homo sapiens should be treated as human persons.

Very much along what you yourself propose:

Are you claiming that psychopaths can be our example of what it means to be human?

I was only proposing that as an improvement for your theology, I was not saying that I would agree with it.

I repeat and emphasize:

> I see no reason for this to be narrowed down to an instant in history any more than I agree with you that this is such a black and white dividing line between man and animals. It is more than sufficient that a good portion of the change is far in the past. But I think we can clearly see that our humanity is far from a sharp line but is something which has been improving and continues to do so – with our respect for human life, freedom, and dignity increasing all the time (and I think an increasing respect for animals and nature are a part of this too).

I am certainly not claiming such a thing. As psychopaths treat other human persons as animals, they are flagrantly transgressing the principle of Genesis 9:3-6 that humans are in the image of God, and thereby despising humanity.

What I claim is that psychopaths are human persons. If you deny this, you are exactly doing the very same psychopaths do: denying the status and dignity of a person to a Homo sapiens individual after God has declared that all Homo sapiens creatures on earth are persons in the image of God.

Psychopaths, no matter how criminal they may have been, as long as they are not in hell, they are children of God, capable of repenting and coming again to love. Remember that Jesus Christ was crucified along with two criminals—one on his right, the other on his left. One of them acknowledged: “We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.” (Luke 23:39-43).

So, it seems you disagree with your proposal that “God has declared that all these homo sapiens should be treated as human persons”. But then, you are clearly opening the door to ideologies claiming that certain groups of Homo sapiens do NOT deserve to be treated as human persons.

Jesus defines himself many times as “the son of man”, and never as “the son of any animal”. Thereby Jesus Christ (the Son of God) establish the same “black and white dividing line between man and animals” as Genesis 9:3-6 does: mankind is in the image of God (because the Son of God is the son of man), while animals are not.

If you deny that each Homo sapiens individual today is a human person, then rather than promoting respect for animals you are fostering the abolition of man.

So according to you, psychopaths are human persons who are not an example of being human.

You insist on a genetic definition of humanity as homo sapiens even though in your own words you realize this doesn’t really make someone human.

Such blatant contradictions…!

Here is a clue. You can acknowledge that genetics and species doesn’t make someone human while also recognizing that the law has to treat them as human because we cannot allow people to disregard human rights based on their own subjective judgement. It is the nature of subjective judgement that there can be no reasonable expectation that others accept this as true. Law has to be base on what is enforceable. It requires as much objectivity as we can acquire because that is the only basis for a reasonable expectation that others will agree – the kind of agreement which is essential for making something enforceable. This was the lesson we leaned in the US regarding prohibition – you simply cannot enforce laws which too people do not agree with.

I do not believe in a genetic definition of humanity. THAT is the essence of racism. Not only is our way of thinking and behavior also an important portion of our humanity, as you yourself have recognized, but you have to treat people according to their behavior as measured by the law. People who break the law are deprived of certain rights and liberties in order to enforce the law.

At this time we have no evidence that any other species on this planet has enough of the same capabilities to be recognized as equal to human but many have enough of the same capabilities to be recognized as worthy of some respect and protection. If in the future, we do find a species with enough of the same capabilities to be recognized as equal to human then I would hope that any religions insisting on depriving them of this on the basis of some rigid theological nonsense would be quickly eradicated from the earth before the whole universe has cause to see the human race as monsters using religion to justify psychopathic behavior. After all the human race has had a long history of treating portions of its own species in such a way.

I see no contradiction in what I am proposing, but I try to reformulate things more accurately to avoid possible misunderstandings:

God made all Homo sapiens to human persons at the dawning of the earliest civilization, a moment when species are distinct and there is a clear anatomical and genetic difference between Homo sapiens and any other animal species. Certainly the difference regards also mental capabilities and moral habits, as you rightly state. However, it is the anatomical difference that, since this very moment, becomes the primary clear observable sign to ascertain whether or not a particular creature is a human person, and assign rights correspondingly: Each Homo sapiens creature is a human person in the image of God, while creatures of other species are not; a human person deserve rights and is called to be child of God (Genesis 9:3-6).

Notice that before this moment it does not make sense to speak about law and rights.

A criminal psychopath is a human person who is despising the own dignity of being child of God, and thereby cannot obviously be considered an example of what it means to be human in the image of God. But the psychopath, as long as he is not in hell, he is a child of God, able to repent and reach everlasting life, as Jesus Christ himself proclaims (Luke 23:39-43).

In this respect it is worth considering what happened at the beginning of the colonization of the New World in the 1600s. The settlers supporting that the Native Americans “should be treated as brutes” argued that these indigenous people practiced human sacrifice and cannibalism (see “Valladolid debate”), and took this fact as pretext to claim that they were no truly men. By contrast, Pope Paul III declared that “the Indians are truly men […] and are by no means to be deprived of their liberty or the possession of their property, even though they be outside the faith of Jesus Christ”.

On the other hand, a disabled infant or child has to be considered a human person even if his mental capabilities are inferior to those of chimps.

Excellent clue: “Law has to be based on what is enforceable”!

And the very first conditions to have this, are the following two:

  • There must be a clear observable basis to assign human rights, and this is the anatomical modern human body, which is clearly distinguishable from the body of any other species.

  • Law has to be promulgated, and this motivates Writing in order to ensure “objectivity” and hinder “people to disregard human rights based on their own subjective judgment.”

I dare to insist: God creates mankind in the image of God at a moment when the species are distinct. This is the most important teaching of Genesis 1-2, 9. And we are taught by evolution at which moment the species are as distinct as they are today!

At this very moment man gives names to the different species. It is the begin of knowledge. And this knowledge is tightly united to “the knowledge of good and evil”, and in particular the prohibition of homicide. We can say that at this moment the species Homo sapiens becomes well-defined through the difference between it and the other species. And then it makes sense to go back in the evolution history and ask how life evolved to produce these distinct varieties we call species today.

From the non-temporal perspective of God one would rather say that God first decides the type of body He wants for his Son to incarnate, and then lets things evolve in order to produce this type of body, the human body, which is clearly distinct from other specific bodies. In this sense the Son of God is also the son of man, and “the firstborn over all creation” (Colossians 1:15).

Nonetheless, if William Wilberforce had followed this “postulate”, we would still have slave-trade today! You cannot give up the foundation of law, simply because at a certain moment people in power do not agree with.

The essence of racism, I dare to say, it is that you deny the status and rights of a person to a portion of the species Homo sapiens, after the moment God made Homo sapiens in the image of God. Racism happens always, even today, when one indulges in assigning the fundamental personal rights on the basis of capabilities or features other than the belonging to the biological species Homo sapiens. A blatant example of such a “racism” is the “ethical proposal” of the Australian author Peter Singer.

Humanity is entitled to deprive people who break the law of certain rights and liberties in order to grant the universal human good , as Genesis 9:3-6 implicitly declares.

Suppose a human person decides to act as a criminal killing other people. Although this human person does not cease to be a person in the image of God, a legitimate tribunal can restrict the personal rights of the criminal in name of the universal human good , also to prevent “lynch law” in favor of the criminal himself.

What do you mean by “enough of the same capabilities”? How much enough is “enough”? With this criterion alone you are falling into the sort of “racism” Peter Singer proposes.

This is a good point!

As said, at the moment when God made Homo sapiens in the image of God, the species are distinct: There is a clear difference between Homo sapiens and other species as well regarding anatomic and genetic features, as mental and moral capabilities. This gap arose because a huge number of intermediate varieties disappeared. Nature on its own will never fill this gap: “Species once lost do not reappear” (Charles Darwin); we will never find a non-human species “with enough of the same capabilities to be recognized as equal to human”, unless we humans are so senseless as to produce such a species in the lab by hybridization! We could, for instance, try to engineer a creature with a human brain and a dog or pig shape. So we would blurry the sharp difference between humans and other species, destroy the magnificent work evolution did, and foster the abolition of humanity!

In all such sad cases it was not “the human race” but “a portion of the human race” that “was treating other portions of its own species in such a way”. This is the very essence of racism! To avoid such aberrations, you have to declare that any portion of the human race, no matter how much capabilities it exhibits, deserves in principle the status and rights of human persons. And the reason for this, is that God became flesh and assumed a human body.

That is only a problem with your effort to make sharp black and white lines. When you accept that there is no sharp line and accept that this is a continuous spectrum then you are already treating those close to human with more respect and consideration than racism has done. It means that any mistakes you make will likely be fairly small mistakes. And you cannot avoid treating those with different capabilities differently because they are not capable of the same responsibilities and expectations. It is in ignoring the difference in capabilities which does great injustice.

In all this reasoning you are assuming “human” as the standard to define terms like “those close to human”, “those with different capabilities”, “those who are not capable of the same responsibilities and expectations”.

At the end of the day you are implicitly accepting a sharp line and taking the same standard as I do:

“the sharp anatomical and genetic difference between Homo sapiens and the other species we observe today”: This is the observable basis allowing you to distinguish which creature is a human being and which is not;

“the sharp difference between the mental capabilities and sense of responsibility Homo sapiens adults ordinarily exhibit, with relation to those of adults of other species”.

We can’t help defining reality with relation to humanity (i.e.: Homo sapiens as it appears today).