The thing is we humans, in our maturation from babies to adulthood, go through a gradual process of mental development where our consciousness seems to progress in little steps from that of lower levels as toddlers to higher levels as adults. Consciousness is not all-or-nothing. It seems to progress along a continuum and that makes it possible that bees and and flies could be conscious.

It could also be that there's a minimum number of neurons you need for consciousness to become manifest.

Perhaps sex is like an addictive drug. Once you try it you need to keep having it! Some, perhaps those not exposed to this drug, don't think it's a necessity. Anyway, necessity for what? Clearly, sex is a necessity evolutionarily.

A real hero has no need for fame or recognition. To him there are things more important than the celebration of victory, things far worse than defeat. A true hero does his deeds out of a clear conscience for the benefit of others and then disappears from view as if he never existed. The anonymous donor to a charity is more heroic than Jesus or other well known heroes.

The true hero is invisible.

I can think of ways of torturing someone by depriving him/her of sex. We feel pain (and experience torture) when we're deprived of our basic rights. Therefore, yes, sex is a basic right of the individualX-)

I don't like the consequences of any justification that permits of the killing and consumption of animals because first of all, we are animals and there's a remote possibility that such justification may be used by aliens to kill and eat us. If such a thing happens will we, can we, comfort ourselves in that what's being done to us is morally permissible?

Each one of us doesn't actually fit in perfectly in our own societies. Our thoughts may not resonate with that of others, our values may be rejected as undesirable. Our behavior may not agree with others. Etc.

We're all refugees of some sort. Perhaps we should treat other people, labelled explicitly as refugees with the same degree of respect and concern as we ourselves would like to be treated.

I'm listening to a sound argument. It's beautiful even when it hurts to hear the conclusionX-)

The problem with this approach - that of only being concerned with whether animals suffer or not - is that it seems applicable to humans too. That is to say if aliens rear humans under humane conditions and kill us for food with minimum suffering then killing humans for food would be morally permissible. We find this instinctively wrong. Perhaps we consider ourselves different from other animals - being intelligent and capable of great psychological suffering.

That makes me feel as if any and all killing is wrong even if suffering was reduced to a minimum. There's something seriously wrong with killing using whatever method.

I find it odd that the top predator on this planet, man, is burdened with a guilt-complex arising from what seems to me to be natural behavior.

Another odd thing: with our intelligence and emotional depth, we humans are best suited to appreciate life. And yet, when we examine life, it appears to be devoid of any meaning.

Rather peculiar, wouldn't you say?