Gruesome shark attack.

There has been another fatal shark attack, this time in Australia. The details of the attack are pretty gruesome to put it mildly, my heart goes out to the unfortunate guy and his family. But Im left thinking 'why do people continue to surf and swim in areas where potentialy dangerous sharks are know to feed? With the increase of shark attacks year on year, probably because of a lack of their natural prey, you would think people would start using some common sense.

Full story here:www.dailymail.co.uk...

Because if people only swam where there weren't feeding sharks, there would be far fewer vacation destinations.

Do you think that the increase in shark attacks is due to a decline in the natural prey that sharks tend to feed on? Really? I don't. Sharks don't attack people as "food", generally it's territorial, defensive, or exploratory. I think it has to do with the number of idiot tourists increasing and has nothing to do with any other ecological change.

I feel bad for the guy, but how many shark attacks are there every year? According to wikipedia, around 60 shark attacks are reported every year. I'll take my chances when they're 60 out of 6.5 billion.

reply to post by ravenshadow13
I agree with what you say, but there have been a lot of recorded instances of sharks attacking
and devouring people in recent years.
news.discovery.com...
www.dailymail.co.uk... aters.html
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov...
There are lot more cases of people actually being eaten, but i think you get the idea.
I understand that sharks do not normaly view us as prey, but there is evidence that under
certain conditions they will attack people as a source of food. The main point i was trying to
make in my op was that its stupid for people to take the risk, even if that risk is low.

reply to post by Atzil321

Originally posted by Atzil321

But Im left thinking 'why do people continue to surf and swim in areas where potentialy dangerous sharks are know to feed?

Why do people live on islands, alongside active volcanoes?
Why do people fly in airplanes, knowing they can crash?
Why do people live inside houses, that are made from flammable materials?
Why do people step outside during storms, when lightning can strike?
Why do people shower, knowing that they can slip, and hit their head?
Why do people drive vehicles, knowing that a majority of the other drivers are idiots?

Why do we even bother trying to live?

reply to post by Atzil321


None of those sources, including the abstract, suggest that those attacks were because the shark saw the human as food except for one mention of possible "scavenging" as opposed to an attack.

I found a source earlier today that mentioned how humans are such a non-ideal prey for sharks, because of our low body fat content, that it would hardly be worth the effort. Therefore, it seems more likely to me that it has nothing to do with diet. I don't care how conservation-minded you are... there is still enough food out there for sharks that they don't need to go chomping on people to survive. That's not why.

Just because something devours something else does not mean that it's eating it because it's hungry.