No, it's a proxy for intelligence and higher forms of conscious awareness. There's no such thing as right to live for non-humans - if the world stops eating pigs, how many do you think would be alive? That applies in nature too where survival comes down to fitness and luck. But the higher the life form, the more human-like it is and the more humanely we should treat them. Ants get different dispensation from cows, and cows from dogs. Dolphins and elephants should get better treatment still, but this is not currently the case.