Peter Singer quote: “The notion that human life is sacred just because it is human life is medieval.”

“Entertainment is a sacred pursuit when done well. When done well, it raises the quality of human life.”

Michael Chabon (1963) Novelist, short story writer, essayist

“It is because human needs are contradictory that no human life can be perfect. That does not mean that human life is imperfect. It means that the idea of perfection has no meaning.”

John Gray (1948) British philosopher

'Modus Vivendi' (p.29)
Gray's Anatomy: Selected Writings (2009)

“Men are alive on this earth, only because the imperative human desire is to attack the enemies of human life.”

Rose Wilder Lane (1886–1968) American journalist

Source: Discovery of Freedom: Man's Struggle Against Authority (1943), p. viii.

“All men strive and hope for nothing other than eternal life in their human nature. For this they instituted purgations of souls and sacred rites, in order to be better adapted in their nature to that eternal life.”

Nicholas of Cusa (1401–1464) German philosopher, theologian, jurist, and astronomer

De Pace Fidei (The Peace of Faith) (1453)

“I insist that there is nothing sacred in the life of an invader, and there is no valid principle of human society that forbids the invaded to protect themselves in whatever way they can.”

Benjamin Ricketson Tucker (1854–1939) American journalist and anarchist

Individual Liberty (1926), Anarchism and Capital Punishment

“Our puny sentimentalism has caused us to forget that a human life is sacred only when it may be of some use to itself and to the world.”

Helen Keller (1880–1968) American author and political activist

Quoted in, The Black Stork: Eugenics and the Death of "Defective" Babies in American Medicine and Motion Pictures since 1915, (1996), Martin S. Pernick, Oxford University Press, New York, NY., ISBN 0195135393 ISBN 9780195135398Part I: Withholding Treatment, ch. 4, Eliminating the Unfit: Euthanasia and Eugenics, p. 92, https://books.google.com/books?id=IJJVYrnImOsC&pg=PA92&dq=%22our+puny+sentimentalism%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=q2xmVd7AL4XPsAX43ICoAw&ved=0CC8Q6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=%22our%20puny%20sentimentalism%22&f=false citing New York Call Magazine, Novermber 26, 1915, p. 5. https://books.google.com/books?id=gQfbAAAAMAAJ&q=%22call+november+26+1915%22++++black+stork&dq=%22call+november+26+1915%22++++black+stork&hl=en&sa=X&ei=d25mVfC4DoGLsQXDnYHgCg&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAA Compare: "The laws of nature require the obliteration of the unfit and human life is valuable only when it is of use to the community or race." - Madison Grant, The Passing of the Great Race: Or, The Racial Basis of European History (1922), Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, p. 49. https://books.google.com/books?id=AdcKAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA49&dq=laws+of+nature+require+the+obliteration+of+the+unfit+and+human+life+is+valuable&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Q15mVcfBCsfusAX-0IDQCg&ved=0CCIQ6AEwATgU#v=onepage&q=laws%20of%20nature%20require%20the%20obliteration%20of%20the%20unfit%20and%20human%20life%20is%20valuable&f=false ("Hitler thanked Grant for writing the Passing of the Great Race and said that 'the book was his Bible.'" See, Nazi Connection: Eugenics, American Racism, and German National Socialism (1994), Stefan Kühl, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0195082605 ch. 8, p. 85, https://books.google.com/books?id=UGYfRv3DWuQC&pg=PA85&dq=Leon+Whitney,++bible+grant&hl=en&sa=X&ei=DmZmVdSkC4eRsAXtiIHQCw&ved=0CCgQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=Leon%20Whitney%2C%20%20bible%20grant&f=false Kühl cites: Leon Fradley Whitney (1894-1973), unpublished autobiography, 1971, Whitney Papers, APS, 204-5. https://books.google.com/books?id=NiX6ol8VO0oC&pg=PT264&dq=unpublished+autobiography+of+Leon+F.+Whitney,1971,+Whitney+Papers,&hl=en&sa=X&ei=VmlmVZz3BMX7sAXBjYAI&ved=0CDIQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=unpublished%20autobiography%20of%20Leon%20F.%20Whitney%2C1971%2C%20Whitney%20Papers%2C&f=false Compare also: "As a result of our modern sentimental humanitarianism we are trying to maintain the weak at the expense of the healthy," Adolph Hitler, as quote in A.E. Samaan, From a "Race of Masters" to a "Master Race": 1948 to 1848, Create Space, ISBN 0615747884 ISBN 9780615747880p. 318. https://books.google.com/books?id=JkXJZtI9DQoC&pg=PA318&dq=%22As+a+result+of+our+modern+sentimental+humanitarianism+we+are+trying+to+maintain+the+weak+at+the+expense+of+the+healthy.%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=sGBmVa_UMMyqsAXeooGIAg&ved=0CCMQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=%22As%20a%20result%20of%20our%20modern%20sentimental%20humanitarianism%20we%20are%20trying%20to%20maintain%20the%20weak%20at%20the%20expense%20of%20the%20healthy.%22&f=false

“If anything is sacred, the human body is sacred.”

Walt Whitman (1819–1892) American poet, essayist and journalist

“Destroying human life in the hopes of saving human life is not ethical…”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

Speaking regarding his veto of the most recent stem cell research bill http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2007/06/20070620-8.html (June 20, 2007)
2000s, 2007

“Our ethics and our politics assume, largely without question or serious discussion, that the division between human and 'animal' is absolute. 'Pro-life', to take just one example, is a potent political badge, associated with a gamut of ethical issues such as opposition to abortion and euthanasia.
What it really means is pro-human-life. Abortion clinic bombers are not known for their veganism, nor do Roman Catholics show any particular reluctance to have their suffering pets 'put to sleep'. In the minds of many confused people, a single-celled human zygote, which has no nerves and cannot suffer, is infinitely sacred, simply because it is 'human.”

Richard Dawkins (1941) English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author

No other cells enjoy this exalted status.
But such 'essentialism' is deeply un-evolutionary. If there were a heaven in which all the animals who ever lived could frolic, we would find an interbreeding continuum between every species and every other. For example I could interbreed with a female who could interbreed with a male who could ... fill in a few gaps, probably not very many in this case ... who could interbreed with a chimpanzee.
We could construct longer, but still unbroken chains of interbreeding individuals to connect a human with a warthog, a kangaroo, a catfish. This is not a matter of speculative conjecture; it necessarily follows from the fact of evolution.
A successful hybridisation between a human and a chimpanzee. Even if the hybrid were infertile like a mule, the shock waves that would be sent through society would be salutary. This is why a distinguished biologist described this possibility as the most immoral scientific experiment he could imagine: it would change everything! It cannot be ruled out as impossible, but it would be surprising.
Richard Dawkins Chimpanzee Hybrid? The Guardian, Jan 2009 https://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2009/jan/02/richard-dawkins-chimpanzee-hybrid?commentpage=2

“Around this sacred word cluster the joys and sorrows, the agonies and ecstasies, of the human race. The mother walks in the shadow of death that she may give another life.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

Is Divorce Wrong? (1889)
Context: To me, the tenderest word in our language, the most pathetic fact within our knowledge, is maternity. Around this sacred word cluster the joys and sorrows, the agonies and ecstasies, of the human race. The mother walks in the shadow of death that she may give another life. Upon the altar of love she puts her own life in pawn. When the world is civilized, no wife will become a mother against her will.

“The notion that human life is sacred just because it is human life is medieval.”

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