On June 26 2012 06:17 PassionFruit wrote: Dunno, I find it more sad that he lived in a cage for at least the last 40 years. No means of perpetuating the species, so let 'em die while roaming in the seas. The cage was already a living death. Probably died so young (they said 200 years is avg for subspecies) from being cooped up in a pool of water all day long. It's pretty perverse how we cage animals away from their natural habitat, then champion that it's in their best interest. It's not in their best interests, it's in our best interests. Ridiculuous as hell. Okay time to stop the I hate zoos rant. Anyhow, RIP turtle...
Conversely, in their natural habitat such a creature would have already been poached to extinction. So, I believe you can see the dilemma here...
Of course I see the dilemma, but the ridiculousness that I point to is the fact that people actual think a proper solution is to take the animal out of his natural habitat and put 'em in a zoo. Somehow this is supposed to be better than the alternative? Try to prevent poaching. Lobby for the preservation of a habitat or stricter regulations. But to take an animal out of his natural habitat, put 'em in an artifical one (that's a joke compared to the real thing), then say high-five gg problem solved? How is that even a solution? And even moreso in the present situation given that he's an infertile final member of his species. It's ridiculous. But we can't forget the other consideration of having kids come goggling at the animal for a small entry fee. So I say just leave 'em in the wild. Poaching is bad. But constructive imprisonment is even worse.
But it's just a thought really. Basking in my hypocrisy, I enjoy zoos too. Especially the bears. I like bears.
It's not a solution. No one puts an endangered animal in a zoo and says 'Ok, all is well now'. However, most people think it's better to keep them alive, even if 'imprisoned', than let them be killed in their natural habitat by a completely unnatural predator. And at the same time they'll fight against poaching and habitat destruction, even if it is a losing battle.
Bippzy United States. June 26 2012 07:21. Posts 1334
On June 26 2012 06:02 HomeWorld wrote: Now to be very cynical, it amuses me to see so many "saddened" ppl by the death of the last specimen on earth (insert any endangered specie here). Why this sadness, knowing that you did nothing to prevent the extinction of that specie ?! Is it me or humans are able to show regret (or try to do someting) only when it's too late ?! Think.
Are you a human? You come across as an alien.
Anyhow, the presumption most of us make is that there are tons of good causes, but it would be mindbogglingly boring and difficult if we took them all up. We like other species because they're cool. A species goes instinct, we're sad. You could look at it as shallow, or you could look at it as human.
On June 26 2012 06:02 HomeWorld wrote: Now to be very cynical, it amuses me to see so many "saddened" ppl by the death of the last specimen on earth (insert any endangered specie here). Why this sadness, knowing that you did nothing to prevent the extinction of that specie ?! Is it me or humans are able to show regret (or try to do someting) only when it's too late ?! Think.
Are you a human? You come across as an alien.
Anyhow, the presumption most of us make is that there are tons of good causes, but it would be mindbogglingly boring and difficult if we took them all up. We like other species because they're cool. A species goes instinct, we're sad. You could look at it as shallow, or you could look at it as human.
Yeah. That's what other people are for, there's a dedicated group of activists and/or scientists working to preserve these species, and its just sad to see that their efforts were unsuccessful. Its kind of crazy to expect everyone to be involved with everything. There's a group of people that manage policing, power generation, management, wildlife protection, etc. We all try to help in one of those areas but we can't do everything, so we just hope that other people are taking care of things as best they can. And it doesn't always work out well.
But I hope they try to preserve a sample of his DNA as best as they can. I'm sure several years down the road they might be able to clone him somehow, and then clone another copy of "him" but as the opposite gender (by manipulating DNA somehow?) and then they can mate together? I guess that's kind of disturbing when I think about it
Last edit: 2012-06-26 07:35:59
Jitsu United States. June 26 2012 07:37. Posts 900
On June 26 2012 06:17 PassionFruit wrote: Dunno, I find it more sad that he lived in a cage for at least the last 40 years. No means of perpetuating the species, so let 'em die while roaming in the seas. The cage was already a living death. Probably died so young (they said 200 years is avg for subspecies) from being cooped up in a pool of water all day long. It's pretty perverse how we cage animals away from their natural habitat, then champion that it's in their best interest. It's not in their best interests, it's in our best interests. Ridiculuous as hell. Okay time to stop the I hate zoos rant. Anyhow, RIP turtle...
Conversely, in their natural habitat such a creature would have already been poached to extinction. So, I believe you can see the dilemma here...
Of course I see the dilemma, but the ridiculousness that I point to is the fact that people actual think a proper solution is to take the animal out of his natural habitat and put 'em in a zoo. Somehow this is supposed to be better than the alternative? Try to prevent poaching. Lobby for the preservation of a habitat or stricter regulations. But to take an animal out of his natural habitat, put 'em in an artifical one (that's a joke compared to the real thing), then say high-five gg problem solved? How is that even a solution? And even moreso in the present situation given that he's an infertile final member of his species. It's ridiculous. But we can't forget the other consideration of having kids come goggling at the animal for a small entry fee. So I say just leave 'em in the wild. Poaching is bad. But constructive imprisonment is even worse.
But it's just a thought really. Basking in my hypocrisy, I enjoy zoos too. Especially the bears. I like bears.
If he wasn't taken into a Zoo, I would bet some serious money that he would have died long before yesterday to a group of people who wanted to sell his body/shell/whatever as a Trophy.
You are correct. Poaching is wrong. So some people took him instead, and placed him in a Zoo, where he was cared for, fed, probably bathed and had his cage cleaned.
What you are insinuating is similar to an argument like "We shouldn't have elderly people go into nursing homes!" They get the care they need in a supervised environment, but it isn't an elderly person's natural habitat. Give me a break.
As Mike Ditka would say, "Stop it."
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Monochromatic United States. June 26 2012 07:43. Posts 634
On June 26 2012 06:17 PassionFruit wrote: Dunno, I find it more sad that he lived in a cage for at least the last 40 years. No means of perpetuating the species, so let 'em die while roaming in the seas. The cage was already a living death. Probably died so young (they said 200 years is avg for subspecies) from being cooped up in a pool of water all day long. It's pretty perverse how we cage animals away from their natural habitat, then champion that it's in their best interest. It's not in their best interests, it's in our best interests. Ridiculuous as hell. Okay time to stop the I hate zoos rant. Anyhow, RIP turtle...
Conversely, in their natural habitat such a creature would have already been poached to extinction. So, I believe you can see the dilemma here...
Of course I see the dilemma, but the ridiculousness that I point to is the fact that people actual think a proper solution is to take the animal out of his natural habitat and put 'em in a zoo. Somehow this is supposed to be better than the alternative? Try to prevent poaching. Lobby for the preservation of a habitat or stricter regulations. But to take an animal out of his natural habitat, put 'em in an artifical one (that's a joke compared to the real thing), then say high-five gg problem solved? How is that even a solution? And even moreso in the present situation given that he's an infertile final member of his species. It's ridiculous. But we can't forget the other consideration of having kids come goggling at the animal for a small entry fee. So I say just leave 'em in the wild. Poaching is bad. But constructive imprisonment is even worse.
But it's just a thought really. Basking in my hypocrisy, I enjoy zoos too. Especially the bears. I like bears.
If he wasn't taken into a Zoo, I would bet some serious money that he would have died long before yesterday to a group of people who wanted to sell his body/shell/whatever as a Trophy.
You are correct. Poaching is wrong. So some people took him instead, and placed him in a Zoo, where he was cared for, fed, probably bathed and had his cage cleaned.
What you are insinuating is similar to an argument like "We shouldn't have elderly people go into nursing homes!" They get the care they need in a supervised environment, but it isn't an elderly person's natural habitat. Give me a break.
As Mike Ditka would say, "Stop it."
He probably would have died to natural selection or poaching. But that's not the key issue. Here's the crux: it's essentially based upon how much value you place on survival over quality of life. Many think survival is all that matters. I tend to disagree. There is such a thing as living death.
It's almost impossible to determine whether an animal would prefer the simple cage of a zoo to the dangers of the wild (be it poaching or just plain getting pwned by wildlife), but I place a presumption on keeping a wild animal in its natural habitat even if there is a risk of getting poached by humans. The reason is simple humility to the fact that we are limited in our ability to mimic the provisions of nature to truly fulfill the needs of animals. Life is more than regular meals, a clean cage, and running water. But hey, that's just me.
Plus how you relate a zoo to a retirement home is pretty unsettling. I didn't know they tranquilized elderly people, throw them in the back of a black van while they're unconscious, ship them across the ocean, then confine them indefinitely in a room with only one other human being. Treat a human like a zoo animal, and you get the beginning of a horror film like "the saw," not a retirement home. ...-_- apples and oranges...
So what? Better to focus on the positives which is scientific advances that can bring the species back should we have any reason to. Scientists are currently working on cloning a Mammoth after successfully cloning mice.
On June 26 2012 09:49 B.I.G. wrote: Rest in peace George... Must've been hella lonely for you.. I hope your reunited with your turtle bro's in turtle heaven.
Don't forget the turtle hoes! RIP Georgio
It is better to be a human dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.- John Stuart Mill
On June 26 2012 07:04 MrBitter wrote: I wonder if, with modern technology, we couldn't just clone some of these extinct species?
They did clone an extinct species a little while back, some sort of Spanish Ibex or something if I remember rightly. Only recently extinct so they had good DNA samples and used a closely-related species as a surrogate to carry the embryo. But it died young, I think clones for some reason frequently have deformations and die early.
Also resurrecting an entire species to levels where it could continue to breed would be really hard and then tehre would be huuuuge inbreeding problems because they'd all be descended from like 2 parents (assuming you can find complete genomes for both male and female).
On June 26 2012 10:03 Cocacooh wrote: Was this the same species that it took 300 years to give a latin name, because they were eaten before they brought them back to Europe?
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Myles United States. June 26 2012 07:04. Posts 4072
