But considering that 90% of the organisms that have ever lived on Earth have died without reproducing, and therefore you are the end result of a line of organisms every single one of which lived to reproduce, then yes, I'd say we are lucky to have been born at the end of this 4 billion year long process and to have a human brain instead of say, that of a slug. But slugs are lucky too.

I agree that you can grade respect based on how much people have earned it. What I'm criticizing here isn't levels of respect but disrespect.