🚀 go-pugleaf

>On the contrary, the foundation of the whole idea of rights IS
>human life.  If you claim that species rights are more fundamental
>than individual rights of humans, then some non-human and/or
>non-individualistic definition of rights and of morality must be 
>under your argument.  If you would care to expose this, I can
>comment further on it.
 
Quite correct, I do not *define* morality in terms of individuals. 

Aldo Leopold gave the deepest definition: "an ethic is a constraint on 
freedom of action in the struggle for existence." Its purpose is to increase
the survival chances of the group above what the pure sum of human actions 
aimed at maximizing individual fitness would produce: for example, individual 
fitness maximization is quite compatible with a tragedy of the commons. 
A group ethic -- or regulations -- to prevent such a tragedy will not allow
each individual to maximize individual fitness to the same degree as he would
otherwise: it is a constraint on freedom of action. Yet by ensuring the 
survival of the commons, it helps ensure the survival of the group. *Some*
immediate individual fitness is given up to provide enough *group* fitness 
for group survival. 

Our ultimate survival group is the living biosphere. That fact, coupled
with the above definition, leads to an ethic -- ecocentrism -- which
provides a framework for human civilization. Humanistic definitions of 
ethics and individual rights are not supplanted completely but must
exist within that framework. Something of human fitness must be given up 
in order to provide fitness for other species so that the biosphere --
our survival group -- can itself thrive. 

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Alan McGowen