if you'd known this, would you still have bought a kobo

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by cybmole

so you are OK with killing and eating something that is far more intelligent than you are ?

Well, to be fair, the whale is on a plate and he is in front of it. I'm kind of marking against the whale for intelligence on this one.

Lots of animals eat lots of other animals in the wild, I believe one of the deciding factors is bigger teeth rather than how well they can score on a mensa test. Lots of things eat animals more intelligent than them: Jaguars eat monkeys, pretty much everything eats goats and pigs, supermodels eat lettuce etc.

[cybmole]

Originally Posted by MikeB1972

Lots of things eat animals more intelligent than them... supermodels eat lettuce etc.

nice one.- not sure if a lettuce is an animal but +1 on the intelligence argument


Before I sink
Into the big sleep
I want to hear
I want to hear
The scream of the butterfly - Jim Morrison

[leftright]

Originally Posted by Joques

As a Norwegian who enjoys a bit of whale steak now and again (from decidedly non-endangered minke whale, mind), I am a little perturbed by the premise of this discussion :-)

Sir. what you do in your back yard is your business, one hopes that the slaughter of "mobile protein" in your back yard is executed in a humane way. However, if you've hunted your favourite food in your back yard to extinction then surely you would respect international law and boundaries and not poach the food that you crave from someone else's back yard.

[murg]

Originally Posted by MikeB1972

Well, to be fair, the whale is on a plate and he is in front of it. I'm kind of marking against the whale for intelligence on this one.

In a way, I have to agree with this.

Let's look at the facts: whales live underwater, sound travels far underwater, whales have good hearing, whales generate sound (and presumably understand these sounds), whales are allegedly intelligent, whales aren't on Twitter or Facebook.

How much intelligence does it take to get from 'hear boat' to 'swim away'? Or even from 'hear boat' to 'dive, swim behind boat, surface, moon boat'? Cockroaches have it down: 'see light' leads immediately to 'run and hide'. And they're smaller than the barnacles on a whale.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by murg

whales aren't on Twitter or Facebook.

Is that an argument for or against the intelligence of whales?

[SteveEisenberg]

It's hard not to see this thread as too political, but what the heck.

I think that not buying a Kobo for this reason is equivalent to boycotting any Japanese company with even a toehold in what amounts to classified advertising, and just because there is one aspect of Japan's national policy you don't like. This strikes me as extreme to the point of being unfriendly to Japan.

According to the advocacy group making the claims here -- the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA):

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_...AJ201403190129

Amazon and Google have stopped all sales or advertisements of whale, dolphin and ivory through their Japanese e-commerce sites, and Rakuten must do the same

OK, but if you believe an earlier EIA report, the stoppage of Amazon ivory sales must have been one year ago, or less:

http://eia-global.org/news-media/ama...ter-of-africas

Amazon.com is Selling Thousands of Ivory Items as the Slaughter of Africa’s Elephants Intensifies

March 12, 2013

So, assuming that most people choose Kobo over a year ago, the alternative you would have chosen might also have had imperfections.

Also, there is such a thing as legal Ivory:

http://www.cites.org/eng/news/pr/200...07_ivory.shtml

If Rakuten has, or starts having, a system to verify that these vendors are honest, that would be good. But, more likely, the current all-over-the-internet anti-Rakuten moral panic will result in them dropping such third-party vendors, further driving the trade into the unregulated underground.

[Joques]

Cybmole, did you just use a piece of fiction to support your notion that whales are more intelligent than humans?

Leftright, like I said, minke whale is abundant and nowhere near endangered.

[eschwartz]

I'd like to point out that whales (well, one, anyway) are on Twitter, at least.

[cybmole]

Originally Posted by murg

whales are allegedly intelligent, whales aren't on Twitter or Facebook.

clause 2 proves clause 1. there are no beings beings of superior intelligence on Twitter or Facebook.

it would have limited use for createures that can communicate over 100's of miles via sonar, (even to tweet, whaler ships coming, dive dive dive)

[cybmole]

Originally Posted by Joques

Cybmole, did you just use a piece of fiction to support your notion that whales are more intelligent than humans?

NO, I quoted scientific american ( and gave the link); whoever wrote their article came up with the MD v Ahab idea, not me. Nice idea though.

[Joques]

Ah, sorry

[filmo]

Yes I would have bought all 4 of my Kobo Readers if I had known and will buy another.

[TechniSol]

I find any number of shades of this discussion fascinating from a sociological and biological standpoint as an, in place, and therefore imperfect observer of the human condition:

1. On any given day, by an overwhelming margin, we are the predominate species present on the planet. So far as we know the only one that ever dominated to the degree that we have. (Yea, though I walk through the valley of death, I fear no evil 'cause I am the baddest and likely best armed mother... But, perhaps I should keep an eye on my "buddy" 'cause it's always frag your buddy day...)

2. We didn't get the "championship" by being faster, stronger, longer lived, able to survive in a wider range of climate, but by being more intelligent. Not intelligent, per se, just more than the rest of the competition, overall -not necessarily individually.

3. Despite our "success" to the point where the only predators we normally must fear as a species on any regular basis are others of our own species, or ourselves, we are still sort of stupid when it comes to the long term view in areas like conservation of resources or a clear plan of what we should accomplish as a species.

All that said, I still wonder that there is no direct connection between Kobo ereaders and Rakuten ad incomes, unless the Ivory ereaders have actual Ivory cases... Doubtful.

Further, as a philosophical point, what is our prime directive or purpose? Is it merely the biological imperative? Reproduction so that evolution can continue on? Do we owe other species a place at the table if they can't protect themselves?(Put the torches down, I'm playing Devil's Advocate, or maybe Natural Selection's Advocate...) Do we have a duty to protect that which can't protect itself? Are we going to foul up our mismanagement of resources so badly that the next predominate species might be asking themselves some of the above concerning whether we deserve to be protected... More importantly, will we be the creators of our own replacements rather than discoverers of silicon based lifeforms from elsewhere?

There must be a few good stories in there somewhere, but in no way should one enjoy them if they have a Kobo ereader in an actual Ivory case! Bad Rakuten, BAD!

[jandrew]

Originally Posted by TechniSol

...
1. On any given day, by an overwhelming margin, we are the predominate species present on the planet. So far as we know the only one that ever dominated to the degree that we have.

And, on any given day, a human is just a microbial ecosystem (microbiome) containing ten times as many microbial cells as human cells, and vastly more microbial genetic material than human genetic material.

The idea that humans are "predominate" is just in our heads -- along with many "other" things we may be hesitant to think about

[hoichi]

Our hesitancy to think is also in our heads. And one could argue it doesn't take a lot of mindfulness to simply repeat that notion.
( I'll just drop this link here: http://xkcd.com/610/ )
Also, by any sensible definition, microbes or fungi or cockroaches don't dominate. They persevere at best. You could say no species has full control over Earth's biosphere, but if you name one that has the most of it, it has to be Homo Sapiens.