Category: Animals

AI, Animals, Big Food, Rights, TechnologyLeave a comment

The dangers of AI farming

Fernando Kaskais

At a Best Genetics Group pig-breeding farm in Chifeng, China; 27 February 2022. Photo courtesy Tingshu Wang/Reuters AI could lead to new ways for people to abuse animals for financial gain. That’s why we need strong ethical guidelines Virginie Simoneau-Gilbert is a DPhil candidate in philosophy at the University of Oxford with the support of a Rhodes scholarship and a doctoral scholarship from the Fonds de recherche du Québec Société et Culture. Her research interests include animal ethics, practical ethics, moral theory, and philosophy of emotion. Jonathan Birch is a professor of philosophy at the London School of Economics and Political … Continue reading The dangers of AI farming

Animals, Eco, Planet, ScienceLeave a comment

Orca hunt was like ‘a military exercise’ — scientist describes unexpected encounter on Cape West Coast

Fernando Kaskais

 Two Orcas spotted in the Cape’s West Coast region. (Photo: Supplied) By Liz Clarke In his 15-plus years of doing research on whales and other cetaceans, University of Pretoria scientist Chris Wilkinson has never experienced such an interaction. Chris Wilkinson is a scientist. He thinks like a scientist. He makes sense of things like a scientist does. But one day he stared into the eyes of a giant killer whale (Orcinus orca) a few metres from him. Wilkinson describes the interaction without hesitation: “This was by far the best cetacean interaction of my life.” To put things in perspective, an adult … Continue reading Orca hunt was like ‘a military exercise’ — scientist describes unexpected encounter on Cape West Coast

Animals, Brain, Curiositys, ScienceLeave a comment

What It’s Like to Be an Owl: The Strange Science of Seeing with Sound

Fernando Kaskais

Art by Jackie Morris from The Lost Spells BY MARIA POPOVA “We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mystical concept of animals,” the great nature writer Henry Beston wrote in his lovely century-old meditation on otherness and the web of life. “In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear.” In the century since, we have come to unravel some of the wonders of the non-human sensorium — from the tetrachromatic vision of bees to the choral communication … Continue reading What It’s Like to Be an Owl: The Strange Science of Seeing with Sound

Animals, Climate Change, Planet, ScienceLeave a comment

Book Review: The Ripple Effects of Climate Breakdown in Nature

Fernando Kaskais

Top: A southern yellow-billed hornbill in South Africa. The birds have experienced a dramatic drop in reproductive success due to slightly higher average daytime temperatures. Visual: Annick Vanderschelden Photography/Moment Open via Getty Images Adam Welz’s “The End of Eden” is a powerful warning about “the intimate ecological breakdowns” imperiling life on Earth. BY ERICA GOODE THERE IS A MOMENT IN Verdi’s Requiem when the hushed, somber tones that end the first movement give way to the lacerating chaos of the second. The Verdi scholar Julian Budden once described this second movement, the Dies Irae (literally, “day of wrath”), as “an unearthly storm,” with its “tutti … Continue reading Book Review: The Ripple Effects of Climate Breakdown in Nature

Activism, Animals, Literature, Philosophy, RightsLeave a comment

Milan Kundera on Animal Rights and What True Human Goodness Really Means

Fernando Kaskais

Art by Alice and Martin Provensen from a vintage edition of Aesop’s fables BY MARIA POPOVA “Man, do not exalt yourself above the animals,” Dostoyevsky admonished in his largehearted case for animal rights. A quarter century before him, on the other side of the world, Whitman instructed in his radiant advice on life to “love the earth and sun and the animals,” then went on to celebrate the dignity of nonhuman animals as creatures “so placid and self-contain’d” that they put our human follies to shame: They do not sweat and whine about their condition,They do not lie awake in the dark and weep … Continue reading Milan Kundera on Animal Rights and What True Human Goodness Really Means

Animals, Eco, Living, PsychologyLeave a comment

Care about animals? Then you need to stop treating them like humans

Fernando Kaskais

A recent encounter between sailors and killer whales highlights the need for deeper understanding of the natural world. By Victoria Gill A French sailor named Lou told me recently about his frightening encounter with a group of orcas, or killer whales. The majestic marine mammals were behaving troublingly. Five of them approached and rammed into the hull of the yacht he was sailing, spinning it around repeatedly.   This whole incident lasted 80 minutes and resulted in the small sailing vessel’s rudder being split in two. The orcas then appeared to play with the floating foam that leaked from the insides of the broken rudder, … Continue reading Care about animals? Then you need to stop treating them like humans

Animals, Curiositys, History, ScienceLeave a comment

The dinosaurs didn’t rule

Fernando Kaskais

A Cretaceous coastal landscape (detail). © Karen Carr Studio Inc and courtesy the Sam Noble Museum, Oklahoma When we think of changes in Earth’s history as changes of dynasty we miss out on understanding how life really works Riley Black is a science writer and author of several books, including Skeleton Keys (2019), Deep Time (2021) and The Last Days of the Dinosaurs (2022). Her bylines have also appeared in publications such as National Geographic, Slate, The Wall Street Journal and New Scientist, among others. The worst day in the entire history of life on Earth happened in the northern springtime. On that day, the last of the Age of Dinosaurs, a roughly seven-mile-wide … Continue reading The dinosaurs didn’t rule

Animals, Literature, Media&Culture, Philosophy, PsychologyLeave a comment

The Donkey and the Meaning of Eternity: Nobel-Winning Spanish Poet Juan Ramón Jiménez’s Love Letter to Life

Fernando Kaskais

Art by Spanish artist Roc Riera Rojas from a rare edition of Don Quixote “Come with me. I’ll teach you the flowers and the stars.” BY MARIA POPOVA Beneath our anxious quickenings, beneath our fanged fears, beneath the rusted armors of conviction, tenderness is what we long for — tenderness to salve our bruising contact with reality, to warm us awake from the frozen stupor of near-living. Tenderness is what permeates Platero and I (public library) by the Nobel-winning Spanish poet Juan Ramón Jiménez (December 23, 1881–May 29, 1958) — part love letter to his beloved donkey, part journal of ecstatic delight in nature and humanity, … Continue reading The Donkey and the Meaning of Eternity: Nobel-Winning Spanish Poet Juan Ramón Jiménez’s Love Letter to Life

Animals, Brain, Curiositys, ScienceLeave a comment

Many Things Under a Rock: The Mysteries of Octopuses

Fernando Kaskais

By David Scheel, David Scheel is a professor of marine biology at Alaska Pacific University and has researched the behavior and ecology of octopuses for over 25 years. He holds a Ph.D. in ecology from the University of Minnesota. 1. Octopuses are like us, with a twist. All animals share universal needs: food, safety, and the need to find suitable mates. To decide which of our many needs to pursue in any given instant, animals must weigh those felt internal needs against opportunities and risks in the environment. Octopuses are no exception to this pattern; and octopuses thus experience primordial … Continue reading Many Things Under a Rock: The Mysteries of Octopuses

Animals, Eco, Health, PoliticsLeave a comment

Cat-astrophe

Fernando Kaskais

Niki Usagi for Noema Magazine Outdoor cats are considered one of the worst invasive species by ecologists. And humans are bitterly torn over how to respond. BY CARRIE ARNOLD, Carrie Arnold is a freelance health and science writer living in Virginia. Waking me at dawn is no easy task. A night owl through and through, I am far more likely to see the dawn by just not going to bed. So when my husband announced that he was headed to Old San Juan for some dawn photography, I was inclined to sleep in and join him several hours later at a … Continue reading Cat-astrophe