| User | Rokhal | | Topic | Dolphins | | Message | Dolphins have the highest brain-to-body ratio of any animal except humans. The mirror-mark test implies they are self-aware. They sculpt with bubbles, respond to music, and systematically test their trainers’ hearing range.
Do dolphins have rights? They have many attributes that humans associate with the soul.
Why hasn’t anybody given them all iPods yet? |
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| User | Th_Plonk | 2006-04-29 | | | Subject | untitled | | Message | Erm... apart from the Right to Not Be Fished To Death, the Right Not to Have Their Ecosystems Destroyed, and the Right to Be Treated As Sentient...
If you think about it though, we haven’t exactly extended those to all humans yet either. |
| User | Th_Plonk | 2006-04-29 | | | Subject | untitled | | Message | The problem with giving rights to dolphins is that it causes us to think about exactly what rights dolphins _need_.
Consider, for instance, the basic freedoms enjoyed by your average wild dolphin. He can go anywhere he wants, as long as there’s water and fish. Dolphins are notorious for their freedom of speech, and spend most of their time making up jokes and limericks, probably about us. Freedom of religion... well, it’s possible that there’s a morbidly athiestic Dolphin regime suppressing the basic religious rights of our bottlenosed friends (or a viciously authoritarian Church Of Better Fish) but I highly doubt it. Dolphins don’t have to work, have few natural predators, and spend most of their time goofing around with bubbles, and (probably) making jokes about us behind our backs.
Erm... exactly which rights were we planning to give ’em?
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| User | Rokhal | 2006-03-25 | | | Subject | untitled | | Message | An unfortunately tiny selection of pictures may be found here: http://www.earthtrust.org/delringgallery.html
And the link to the Project Delphis web page leads to interesting research on dolphin mental capacity, including the mirror test.
Dolphins learn to play with bubbles by watching other dolphins, and practice making them on their own, not for rewards. They perform many complicated slimming motions to prepare water currents to create movement effects, like shooting a ring bubble sideways. |
| User | Sasha Lynn | 2006-03-24 | | | Subject | untitled | | Message | Forget the iPods! What about cell phones?! I’m sure that the person who begins to distribute Waterproof cell phones to dolphins will become very rich. What an untapped market we have discovered! Everyone back off! its my idea- My money!!! ;)
what do you mean exactly when you say they sculpt with bubbles? I have a weird picture in my head that has Michelangeo’s "David" constructed entirely of tiny bubbles. Its pretty!
SASHA LYNN |
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