Whaling

sxereturn said:
I'm in the filthy hippie corner with this one. Regardless of how sustainable it is, they shouldn't be harvested simply out of respect for how fucking awesome they are. They are incredibly intelligent animals, having complex hierachies and are among the only "self-aware" animals in the world. This is proof that they really are magnificent creatures, unlike other creatures that are revered by some cultures.

Sink their boats!
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proof please, before you go insulting Hindus, with references!

"among the only" WTF does that mean? either its 'among the few' or its 'the only'
 
Arete said:
As for the magnificent creature argument, fucking please. The Hindus have worshipped cows for thousands of years, and I'm pretty sure if they started violently demanding the end to us harvesting all things bovine most people here wouldn't be too impressed. Besides, it's a bit hypocritical when AUSTRALIA was in a large part to blame for the mass destruction of Southern Ocean whale populations, NOT the Japanese.
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You should read the "The Deep Range" by Arthur C Clarke. I reckon you'd enjoy it.
 
Age journalist Andrew Darby recently released a book titled Harpoon. Traces the history of whaling and that wonderful institution the IWC. Worth a read if your truly interested.
 
tnankie said:
proof please, before you go insulting Hindus, with references!

"among the only" WTF does that mean? either its 'among the few' or its 'the only'
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http://www.wdcs.org/dan/publishing.nsf/allnews/713EDD5FDA2E042B802571FB0057B0DF

I think "among the only" is grammatically correct. "Only" applies to a single entity, but that entity can be a group. Amongst that group you have a number of entities, that all share one or more things in common that lead to them being placed in a group together. In this case, it's self awareness in animals.
 
sxereturn said:
http://www.wdcs.org/dan/publishing.nsf/allnews/713EDD5FDA2E042B802571FB0057B0DF

I think "among the only" is grammatically correct. "Only" applies to a single entity, but that entity can be a group. Amongst that group you have a number of entities, that all share one or more things in common that lead to them being placed in a group together. In this case, it's self awareness in animals.
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Sorry can't except that...at the very least its 'amongst the only self aware species'...I still feel that since you are bundling chimps, apes, dolphins and whales into the one group (I'd include several other species...but they are debatable) that you need something that implies the wide range of species...and then there is the whole issue of how self aware is defined.


ok I just followed that link I didn't read the primary paper that the article is based on, however I have seen cattle exhibit those behaviors, which I'd not really consider a particularly inteligent animal.
 
tnankie said:
however I have seen cattle exhibit those behaviors, which I'd not really consider a particularly inteligent animal.
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Cows are the most intelligent animal of them all. they've spent generations evolving themselves into tasty juicy prime porterhouse goodness. This ensures that -providing those pesky killjoys at the Heart Foundation don't get their chicken and lettuce eating way- Cows shall never go extinct. In fact if you look at the amount of Amazon rainforest that gets cleared to give them a bit of leg room, or the regular massages and beer fed to Kobe cattle, cows have it pretty damn easy compared to other species...
 
Disclaimer: I have not yet read the actual paper.


Sorry, I'm really dubious about the scientific credibility concerning this report. First reason:

Whales and dolphins are indeed highly intelligent, as has long been believed – this is the conclusion of a new paper from Mark Simmonds, International Director of Science for WDCS. The research stands in stark contrast to some recent reports that such animals fail to exhibit intelligence.

What does WDCS stand for? Whale and dolphin Conservation Society. Not exactly an impartial party to the research. Big conflicts of interest and massive scope for confirmation bias. He obviously undertook the research due to an emotional grounding concerning the subject. This is also evidenced here:

'Anyone who has interacted with dolphins usually swiftly and intuitively realises that they are meeting intelligent, emotional and extraordinary animals’.

Intuition, not exactly a celebrated scientific method and demonstrates a preconceived personal conclusion prior to conducting research.

As for the finding summarised in the article, nothing new here. Yes, dolphins do have self-awareness; I've seen the videos of the experiments, same with chimps and us, granted. But, tool use is found in many creatures not credited with what we cal intelligence; birds and small rodents like squirrels use rocks to crack nuts, spiders use foliage for camouflage and doors to dwellings, etc. Also, many other creatures have very strong social hierarchies and consciousness. Take the meerkat for example, along with the lemur. Strong hierarchies, care for their own children adoption of other children if a parent is killed, etc. Wild dogs also show signs of community and care. Elephants have their own graveyards that they visit and pine for lost partners, etc.

I will get around to reading the paper, but I am very sceptical of this particular researchers objectivity in this case.
 
tnankie said:
and then there is the whole issue of how self aware is defined.
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Self awareness is usually defined by finding behaviours that exhibit an awareness that the creature itself is a living/existing entity. For dolphins, this is usually done with a mirror and a marker pen.

Dolphin has a mirror in it's pool and checks itself out. Person marks the dolphin's belly, where it is hard for the dolphin to see, dolphin swims to the mirror to check itself out. Secondly, person pretends to mark the dolphin but leaves no visible mark. Dolphin feels the stimulus of being marked, swims to mirror but cannot locate the mark. Dolphin gets confused, searches its whole body for a mark and leaves the mirror when a mark cannt be found.

This displays that the dolphin is aware that it is itself it can see in the mirror. It is aware that itself is a living/existing creature and consciously manipulates its surroundings to satisfy its needs.



Second to this is the awareness of thought patterns. Chimps are aware that we can think. Chimp in a cage, two boxes with keys (1, 2) outside the cage, two people (A, B) outside the cage. Person A walks into the room, places banana in box 1, locks it and hangs key on the wall next to key #2. Person B walks in the room, monkey points to box 1 with exitement. Person B attempts to open box 1 without key, Chimp notions towards key. Person B opens box, takes the banana out and eats it himself. Chimp plots to take over the world and enslave humans.

Person A walks in the room, places another banana in box 1 and locks returning key to wall again. Person B walks in, monkey gesticulates towards box and key 2 which person B opens to find empty, closes again and walks out of the room. Person A returns, chimp identifies correct box and key, chimp gets banana and calls off the revolution.



This shows that the chimp has particular cognitive features that allows him to understand the box needs the key to be opened. But most importantly, chimp is aware of the human's consciousness. He knows that person B wants the banana so he deceives him. To deceive another person you have to be able to guess what the other person is thinking. The bottom line is that you know the other person is thinking.

Monkeys have self consciousness because the same mirror/marker experiment for the dolphins also works on the chimps. But the chimps also "other consciousness", they understand that we are also self and other aware. This is the first faculty one requires to enact deceptive behaviour.
 
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ok i don't know if I'm high or just incredibly stupid but the kids at school call me terrorist so i think i could convince my Leader whose name i cannot say as ill get caught and get him to plan an attack on those whalers but i need my destructo license before i can do any of MUMBLE MUMBLE MUMBLE MUMBLE...
 
my_bike said:
ok i don't know if I'm high or just incredibly stupid but the kids at school call me terrorist so i think i could convince my Leader whose name i cannot say as ill get caught and get him to plan an attack on those whalers but i need my destructo license before i can do any of MUMBLE MUMBLE MUMBLE MUMBLE...
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what? :confused:
 
Arete said:
We have no idea what the pre whaling size of Minke, Finn and Humpback whale populations were, what the effective recruitment rate is, what the level of genetic structuring is, etc etc etc. in other words, no one knows how endangered they are, all we really know is we killed a lot of them and they stopped being abundant sudddenly, which is not good evidence for absolute and outright bans, or for a quota to be established. Like I said originally, we need the science to be done and an end put to the chest beating shitfight that is currently the status quo at the IWC.

I went to a conference a few years back where the head of NSW DPI fisheries was asked what he would do if it was found that a Minke/Finn harvest was sustainable. He said he'd investigate negotiating a fishing licence system with the Japanese fleet. Makes bloody good sense to me.

.
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Arete, I believe that the Japanese target a particular sub species of Minke that is comparatively rare and somewhat endangered. This is what I heard from, of all people, my mum. She took a bunch of whale biologists down to Antarctica for a research programme.

Surely though, the lifecycle of any of these larger mammals indicates that any kind of sustainable catch would be very, very small.

Not to mention that some of these species are probably recovering from a human induced near extinction anyway.
 
i remeber one of the jap dudes saying it's a part of i supose what thay just love doing maybe we should just drop a atomic bomb on em that will stop the killing ay
 
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