Foreword: I tried writing a bunch of quotes/replies, but I’m going to use fresh dot-points to express my views since that’s more clear. Plus my previous post may have been misleading about a thing or two so I won’t re-quote that.

So, here goes.

-I agree that both sterilization and killing of individuals amount to genocide. I disagree that both forms of genocide are the same thing.

-I think sterilization of humans and sterilization of animals is comparable. Means of sterilization aside, the harm (or lack thereof) is equal.

-I think there is a difference in the killing of animals vs the killing of humans on an individual level. The difference comes down to the latter being able to comprehend their sense of self, having a concept of time and future, and what murder/killing/death means in relation to that. Animals vary in their understanding of the above. Not all animals are equal.

To give some examples here, I’d say that the hierarchy of least to most immoral killing would be something like:

5wk embryo = 32wk foetus = 2 day old baby
Demented person lacking awareness but knows hunger and sleep etc = random mammal.
Human/being with higher order thought processes intact.

-Being able to communicate with the victim doesn’t change the morality of killing per se. It changes whether or not other options are available to explore. The morality of killing depends on the victim’s sentience as above. Communication (either one-way or two-way) does help us establish how sentient each party is however.

-I share Darth’s sense of scale when it comes to large scale killing. When it goes beyond an individual level and we’re talking about thousands of lives, I can’t process the comparison of animals vs humans and I consider them effectively a number/statistic. They might as well be equal.