Superior or not?

I had this discussion during biology. We are currently studying behaviour of animals and humans. This question soon arised:
"Are humans superior to animals or do we just want to think that?"

Some people immediately reacted as if it was a stupid question..."Ofcourse we are"

But then the teacher said something like: "If you'd be paying attention you'd have noticed our behaviour isn't much different." This triggered a discussion I didn't really bother following. Most people just kept screaming(or saying ) that God made humans above the animals.

I know a big part of the members here aren't really Christian or Muslim or whatever so I'm curious to what you think.

I myself think(after living with humans all my life) that humans are in fact different to animals in an intelectual and emotional sense. First there is ofcourse the fact we can learn better and use tools but every creature could evolve(if you believe in that theory) to that level. However I have never seen any experiencing emotions that humans do. Given a chance people like Hitler, Stalin or(more recently) Osama Bin Laden and Sadam Hussein(sp?) can bring up some pretty nasty things.

Ofcourse I'm not referring to every human but I've never seen or heard of an animal that enjoys the pain of others or thinks other are beneath it because of some reason. Animals kill because they need food and defend their teritory because otherwise it would get taken. Ofcourse I've only mentioned bad things but those are the most drastic differences I see right now.

So humans are different in my opinion but superior? I think not. So far I've met only a few people who made me doubt this and I don't find that enough.

Discuss!

EDIT: Why do I even bother? You guys just want to look at/discuss bishies.

(Sorry, I'm bumping again... But i found this, and it really is an interesting one, so let's give it another try!)

I read somewhere that the only thing causing humans to develope into "rulers" are our hands... Because of them we've been able too make things to help ourself and because of that we've survived and for each generation it's been improved into what we are today..

I don't necesserily believe in that, but look at my cat..
He can open doors, he's just not tall enough. But he would be if he had hands so he could build a door in his own size. (yeah, I know I'm overstating it, but think about it?)

So... I don't really know what I believe, but..
I guess we are superior to animals now.. But it's just a coincidence that we're the ones that evolved into it...
(I mean, it has to be a coincidence, if God really chose us... why would he make us this retarded? XD sorry...)

You heard the "Animal Song" by Savage Garden?

And I actually tink that animals can have just the same emotions that we can.. They get sad and glad and jealous and angry and yeah..

The only thing seperating us are our so called 'intelligence'...

After all we're just animals ourselves.
Homo Sapiens Sapiens
Mamal
Primate, Homandea-family
Origin: Africa
expansion: All over the Planet
characteristic: Humans have a highly developed brain capable of abstract reasoning, language, and introspection. This mental capability, combined with an erect body carriage that frees their upper limbs for manipulating objects, has allowed humans to make far greater use of tools than any other species.

Wow.... somebody finally bothered to write an answer.

So if I get this right you do think humans are superior but that's only because we are smarter and have opposable thumbs.

I don't think our hands have much to do with our current position on this planet. It is only natural that we make tools and constructions which are directed at our type of hands. If a dog or a cat would make something I'm sure it would look totally different (maybe requiring less finger movement). The use of a door doesn't say much in my opnion because it's just a trick; something which had succes and is therefore repeated (trial-and-error). It's not like the animal actually looked at the door and figured out how it works.

I also think they have the same (basic) emotions as us humans. We do however learn not to anthropomorfise(sp?) the behaviour of animals at school. The reason behind this would be that animals do not have the same feelings. This makes me think that maybe we just want to see these emotions in our animal friends en therefore see them. It's a tricky situation.

In the end I still don't think we are superior...just different. That's because when I think of 'being superior' I think of 'being better in every way'. Sure, we're smarter and have practically conquered the lands of Earth but does that make us better in every way? Hitler believed he was superior to Jews so he decided to exterminate them (the freak ) but did that really make him superior?

well, yeah.. I think we are superior.. kinda, but not in every way (as you say in your conclusion..) But yeah, we are kinda smarter, or at least we've evolved into some smartasses... And I'm not sure about the hands, I just heard it somewhere (TV I guess XPPP) but, we do have more move-able fingers than most animals, which have to make it easier for us to make tools, fitted for our hands or not...

As for the emotions... half a year ago, or so, we had two rabits that were supposed to live at my mother's workingplace (the kindergarten) They had a quiet shelter for themselves, but got attention every day as the employees feed them and stuff... But when they lived there they got really depressed and agressive, both of them...
When we moved them to our place (with pretty much the same conditions, except they got to be more in the sun), one of them quickly transformed to a more tame and cozy little rabbit, and soon the other one became more happy too...
Isn't that pretty "human"?

And yes, the cat learns to open doors as a trick..

But.. Isn't that the excact same way we learned it when we were kids?
We looked at the adults, tried it ourself and succeded...

I really like your conclusion though. because we aren't better than anyone, we're just different.

Hey, funny question... If we weren't around.. you think someone else would have conquered earth like we have? I hear the dolphins are pretty close us when it comes to "intelligence"...

XD

There would probably be different dominant species on every continent. Not many species have spread around the world without human help.

The rabbit story does sound very convincing but there probably is another explanation. Maybe because of the dark their body 'thought' it was night and that's why they were like that? I don't know though. I'm not a biologist yet!