I'm not really sure what you mean by "same level."  Same level of what?  I also don't understand why the choice between a mouse and a chimp is clear.  Clear based on what?  Size?  Cognitive abilities?

I don't favor one species over another.  A life is a life.  It's not for me to decide that one life is more significant than another based simply on size or how similar they are to human beings.

I'm still not sure i get the question, though.  By "equivalent," do you mean, deserving equal treatment by human beings?  Equally deserving of life?

I would not/do not purposely kill any animal. I'm sure that I unintentionally step on bugs on the ground, in the grass, and I'm told I eat a certain number of them in my sleep, but this does not apply to chimps or cows. I don't see why I would be in a position to choose between saving a chimp or a mouse, and I also don't see why it's clear to choose the chimp..

I do not understand how so many can quite easily kill countless mice for scientific research...but could never harm a chimp. They are all living beings on their own right.

I'm not sure where I stand on this spectrum of equality, but it's probably something close to Peter Singer's belief that a being's moral consideration is determined by sentientism. He defines most of what humans do to animals who have the capacity to "feel" as speciesist. If you're interested in reading something a bit more radical, check out Paul Taylor's "Respect for Nature" or the beliefs of biocentrism. Very interesting stuff, yet still controversial in this day and age.

I like this quote by Jeremy Bentham, although it's somewhat overused: "The question is not, 'can they reason?' nor 'can they talk? but, 'can they suffer?'"

"All beings tremble before violence. All fear death. All love life." (Buddha)

This quote is on the shirt I'm wearing today!

Dude, I need to get that shirt!

I get kind of tired of these debates which exist entirely in the realm of hypotheticals--"If you HAD to choose between a chimp and a mouse, which would you choose?" and the like.  As if we are the main character in Life of Pi and we have to choose between a hyena, a tiger, and an orangutan.  Never gonna happen.  These types of debates are not useful to everyday situations and distract us the reality of what we can do to prevent the most harm and do the most good, realistically.  But, here we go again.....

Hill171 (nice to meet you, by the way....you should introduce yourself!), what type of situation are you talking about where we are hypothetically choosing between a dog and fleas?  Do you mean, a flea and a dog are standing in front of me, and I have to press a button to kill one of them?  Or do you mean, is it vegan to treat my dog's fleas?  Let's ask the specific questions we mean to ask, for clarity's sake.

In regards to the former, if I HAD to simply choose between saving a dog and a flea, arbitrarily (again, never gonna happen..), it would be a toss up.  I would feel terrible killing either.  Again, I can't wrap my brain around a situation where this would occur.

In regards to the latter, it doesn't make sense to me to have one being suffer at the expense of saving another.  That is, it doesn't make sense NOT to treat a dog's fleas and have the dog suffer.  And it's too bad there is no humane way to treat fleas, but we just have to do our best to try to keep our dogs from getting fleas and deal with it.  To me, it's similar to, say, stepping on bugs when I walk down the sidewalk.  I COULD be ultra-vigilant (and I do try to be vigilant), and even never walk outside again, but that would severely cripple me from living my life.  So, c'est la vie.  I just have to do my best.  But you said you were not asking about pets, so I'm not even sure if this is what you were asking.

Again, I'm SO tired of debates that exist entirely in some parallel, hypothetical universe.  Such as, "If you were on a desert island, and the only things for you to eat were a cow, a dog, and chicken wings that fell from the sky, which would you pick, and would you still be vegan?"  Totally irrelevant to everything we do on a daily basis.

The word "hierarchy" scares me.  A hierarchy of animals is at the heart of animal exploitation.  We have a cultural hierarchy which arbitrarily places dogs and cats above chickens and cows.  The hierarchy is totally contrived and meaningless to me.  So, I think we are good at creating these hierarchies, but I don't think they "really" exist.  Again, what would such a hierarchy be based on?  Similarity to human beings?  Useful contribution to the ecosystem?  In the second case, bugs would probably be quite close to the top.  Again, I'm still kind of confused.

Thanks!  But AC, I love your quote that you gave about all beings fearing death.  So good here!  ;)b

created?  ???  hierarchy?  ???  I respectfully reject the terms that you use and the ideas that inspired them.   
And while I'm being devil's advocate  >:D  (yay!  I just wanted to use that emoticon) ...  I gotta disagree with Buddha too (sorry B!) ...it's  violence not death that animals fear.  I've been with (too) many animals when they died and I've never seen any hint of fear.  A dog being beaten to death will die afraid, one that dies of illness or old age will just cease to live.

I am not sure I agree here.  Animals don't necessarily know they are going to die when they are about to die of old age, for example.  If we could somehow communicate to them that they were about to die, I doubt they would be so peaceful.  Like, if I told you that you were about to die without violence--say, by drowning or suffocation--you would be afraid too.  But that's all speculation when we are talking about nonhuman animals, really.

Also, why do animals fear violence?  They fear violence because violence means harm and possible pain, and pain means that their lives are in danger.  There's a reason our bodies work this way.  Pain exists as a means to signal to our brains that a threat to life imminent, so get far away from the source of pain!

I agree KMK, animals avoid pain because it hurts.  That's the point of pain, it teaches us to avoid harmful things.  Why do animals have to know when they're going to die for their reaction to be valid?  Is the question really, how would animals react if they saw the world as we do?  Speculation is a good word for it. 
My closest experiences are with dogs, but I've noticed they don't make the same production about food or sex or body shape that humans do either.  Not a lot of reflection or regret but that doesn't mean they live any less or are lower in some (externally imposed) hierarchy. 
I'm pretty sure (well, I'm completely sure but it's pure supposition and I don't want to be argumentative) that dogs don't have tomorrows.  They are truly Zen. 
AC: blissful?  hm, it does have its moments.  If you're ever in my neighborhood you're welcome to drop by and be engulfed by the pack.  They love having company. 

Yeah, you're definitely right, pooh bear, that top-down kind of thinking is engrained/programmed into us.  I kind of think it's like the way we learn history in this country--from the perspective of the old white guys who wrote our textbooks.  This skews our view of which historical events are significant.  I don't think the way we perceive the animal kingdom is too different.  There are also a ton of other things--the way certain animals are anthropomorphized from the time we are children, the fact that it is easier to identify with mammals like ourselves, and the limits of our own perception of the lives of bugs.  I mean, it's not surprising that people think in terms of this hierarchy.  But it isn't right either.

And savvy, I definitely hear what you are saying about dogs.  Lots of interesting things to think about.