Whales 'can feel and suffer as humans do'

reply to post by Big Raging Loner


Uh... Rats can too. I call bogus.

reply to post by Gorman91


Ok rats reproduce like crazy and I suspect, although I admit I don't know for sure, they don't have an emotional pain response. DO they sense pain? Of course they do that is not the issue, all animals will be able to detect pain to alert injuries and instinctive defence responses. The point is whales apparently have a more sophisticated sensory perception which essentially means they have 'feelings' not just damage reports. I certainly don't kill rats personally anyway nor do I know anyone who eats them.
As for cows and chickens, they are only alive as a result of forced breeding to create a populous food source by human interference, they would not exist in such numbers or in their current form otherwise. Whales on the other hand live completely in the wild and are only born as a result of the animals choice to procreate. I'm not here to discuss the God like powers, of which animal should live or die? Which are more valuable. The simple fact of the matter is that whales are not needed as a food source, are endangered, and I would also like to point out in the original post, that I requested information about the uses of whales and possible alternatives.

[edit on 20-6-2010 by Big Raging Loner]

Originally posted by Big Raging LonerI would love to hear also some of the uses of whales currently, and if there are adequate substitutes available.

Well, whale is the fruit of the sea. You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. Dey's uh, whale-kabobs, whale creole, whale gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There's pineapple whale, lemon whale, coconut whale, pepper whale, whale soup, whale stew, whale salad, whale and potatoes, whale burger, whale sandwich. That- that's about it.

Originally posted by muzzleflash

Originally posted by Big Raging Loner

I sincerely hope this is some hard evidence that can be used to ban whaling world wide

Why would we ban it at all?

Have we banned the wholesale slaughter of Human Beings yet? No.

Last I checked war still happens and no one banned that.

If we kill each other for ideological reasons, why the hell would we stop killing a non-human for actual economic reasons?

If I wake up tomorrow and whaling is banned worldwide, yet war still goes on; I will need some schizophrenia medications.

That's harsh. Two wrongs don't make a right. Are you advocating waiting until we have world peace until we stop hurting other animals?

Also, someone asked about substitutions for the stuff we get from whales. It might be dolphins, but I seem to remember someone saying hemp is a big substitute for a lot of the stuff we get from them. Don't quote me on that though, not sure, just going off what I remember.

reply to post by Bedlam


Thanks Bubba I hope I don't see a boat called Jenny docked in the harbour, i'll know what your up to!

reply to post by Big Raging Loner


Right now there are some 6 intelligent species on Earth, including us, with such higher intelligences. I certainly take precedents over preserving them for the excuse that they are cool to watch and look at.

What concerns me is the point of it all? Even cells feel pain and respond.

Emotions even are nothing more than more chemicals and more electricity. They are only as special as we make them. We can chose to through them out vulcan style, or embrace them and fail at life. Neither extreme is much good. I personally chose logic, and in my stoic like ways, have nearly destroyed anger from my mindset.

That said. Like, money, it's an imaginary element created for our own purposes.

That does not mean we should not listen to them. That does not mean that it is useless.

What it does mean is this. They're nothing to live by 100%, nor use in a judgement scale.

Logically speaking more intelligent animals are better to preserve for the simple fact that if we DO screw up, at least our dear Earth has another species to build up and develop to replace us. Perhaps, like planet of the apes, it will be the last act of our species, to ensure Earthy intelligence goes on.

How many people reading this thread think that killing whales is bad? Most I would suggest. How many are reading this will happily eat a hamburger or a port joint?

Is there really any difference between these animals?

Is anyone going to argue that it's okay to eat a cow because it's stupid?

Originally posted by Gorman91
reply to post by Big Raging Loner

 

Right now there are some 6 intelligent species on Earth, including us, with such higher intelligences. I certainly take precedents over preserving them for the excuse that they are cool to watch and look at.

What concerns me is the point of it all? Even cells feel pain and respond.

Emotions even are nothing more than more chemicals and more electricity. They are only as special as we make them. We can chose to through them out vulcan style, or embrace them and fail at life. Neither extreme is much good. I personally chose logic, and in my stoic like ways, have nearly destroyed anger from my mindset.

That said. Like, money, it's an imaginary element created for our own purposes.

That does not mean we should not listen to them. That does not mean that it is useless.

What it does mean is this. They're nothing to live by 100%, nor use in a judgement scale.

Logically speaking more intelligent animals are better to preserve for the simple fact that if we DO screw up, at least our dear Earth has another species to build up and develop to replace us. Perhaps, like planet of the apes, it will be the last act of our species, to ensure Earthy intelligence goes on.

Individual cells do not experience pain, not sure where your getting your information on this. If you want to be completely abstract about the issue where do you draw the line? What is the point in preserving anything? Why care about anything? Personally I will continue to live in the real world, I feel as though I am replying to Doctor Manhattan here

reply to post by mithrawept

I feel I have already addressed this issue see below or above your choice.

"As for cows and chickens, they are only alive as a result of forced breeding to create a populous food source by human interference, they would not exist in such numbers or in their current form otherwise. Whales on the other hand live completely in the wild and are only born as a result of the animals choice to procreate. I'm not here to discuss the God like powers, of which animal should live or die? Which are more valuable. The simple fact of the matter is that whales are not needed as a food source, are endangered."

reply to post by mithrawept


Just to add that from a purely economic perspective there is absolutely no chance of stopping the slaughter of cows, pigs, lamb, chickens etc, as they are too important a resource. Whales on the other hand is an entirely different matter.
We could stop this now, as I stated earlier they are not that important a resource anyway, this coupled with incredibly sophisticated pain perception and emotional ability, makes it a particularly heartless venture, like hunting for sport. Pointless. We can't protect all animals, so lets try to help the ones we can. There have been bans in effect in the past which have for the most part worked, however as an earlier poster mentioned we are now seeing changes in this too, for the worse.

The first of the four noble truths: Life is suffering.

reply to post by Big Raging Loner


Pain is define by a response to a bad stimuli. Weather you feel the human equal of pain is irrelevant. If you are hurt and run away, you feel pain. Everything alive does this.

Just because it does not say owe or growl, does not mean it feels no pain. Just because it is not based on electro chemical nerves, does not mean it feels no pain.

The rule is simple. Responding to stimuli is a rule to be alive. To respond to stimuli is to feel pain. Therefor, all things feel pain.

What you are stating is a homo-centralist view on things.

You're not the only thin gin the universe. Just because its alien, doesn't mean its not pain.

Cells have biochemical circuit systems. When one cell dies, it signals others to run/defend, etc etc. This interaction of single celled organisms is the first step towards multicellular evolution.

Without it, you would not feel human pain.



What do you save? decency. Common sense. Humans are worth more. We should not eat or kill each other. And animals are going extinct we should preserve them. Saving animals preserves biodiversity.

reply to post by Big Raging Loner


So an animal bread in a cage has less of a right to exist than one in the wild. Just because you have farmed the animal doesn't give you the right to kill it.

Animals as a resource? We're doing a real good job of managing our natural resources. Look at overfishing in the North Atlantic, it won't be long until there are no fish left.

reply to post by mithrawept


Hello sorry took so long to reply, was offline there! Anyway I understand the sensitivity of the issue you bring up, but I feel we have to draw our own lines personally. Animals if they are farmed in a humane manner, have a good life, and are only in existence due to human intervention, can be killed and used for food, and whatever else in my opinion. I personally try my best to only use free range products, and local farmers markets (I'm lucky to have one 200yards from my house)

But this I admit looks hypocritical if you value all animals as equal. Just wondering though are you vegan? Realistically we can't survive on this planet without killing and eating other living things that's just the way it is, but what we can do, is decide what is necessary and try and make the smallest impact on the planet as possible.

WARNING: there is no justification for this type of behavior...

reply to post by Big Raging Loner

Explanation: Endangered???

NOPE! Here is why...

Obama's "mind-numbingly dumb idea": lift a 24-year international ban on commercial whaling. (ONLY OL's posts) [ATS]

Personal Disclosure: :shk:

Originally posted by alaskan
I was actually just 'talking' with someone the other day who wondered if dolphins could feel pain like we do.

I just don't get it, like, did millions of people just grow up ignoring dolphins like they were some kind of jerks?

Don't get it either.

If ANYONE has ever owned a pet dog, cat, or other mammal, they already KNOW that those animals can reason to a certain extent and surely feel pain and emotions.

And that's just mammals. Think birds and other animals are much different?

Also don't get the "scientists" and other people that think that what we think and feel as humans isn't part of evolution. They seem to think that only humans can reason, feel emotions and pain, when those things must also have evolved along with everything else that we are.

In another news after 30 years of the study the japaneese finally released their result

Yes they needed to kill that many animals to get these results.

reply to post by centurion1211


Apparently scientists think that we are the only creatures with nerve endings, senses, and a super computer in our head...

IBM’s BlueGene/L supercomputer contains 4,096 processors, each tricked out with 256MB of RAM. It crunches out 360 trillion floating point operations per second. But as University of Nevada researchers have discovered, it doesn’t hold a digital candle to the mind of a mouse:

"The mouse cortex has roughly 8×10⁶ (8m) neurons and 8,000 synapses per neuron," state researchers James Frye, Rajagopal Ananthanarayanan and Dharmendra S Modha. "Assuming an average firing rate of 1Hz, the entire memory must be refreshed every second, each neuron must be updated at every simulation time step, and each neuron communicates to each of its targets at least once a second." As the team says in a gloriously deadpan way: "Modeling [sic] at this scale imposes tremendous constraints on computation, communication and memory capacity of any computing platform."

However, even this huge processing effort still only managed to run at a speed 10 times slower than real time, and only for 10 seconds – the equivalent of one second of mouse-thought. Barely enough time for a mouse to register a hungry cat in the vicinity.

Source

Even the brain of a mouse facepwns the most advanced super computer to date.

I think its also the same case for Dolphins.