Chimp asks to be released.

[!on]

what do you make of this. I find this quite sad. Sure the animal has an enclosure but seems not to be happy there. Visitors should be seeing animals as content as possible in near enough natural environment as the zoo can make. Is surely the whole point of a zoo, no?

Link to article: Daily Wail Welsh Mountain Zoo: Chimpanzee 'asks' visitors to free him from enclosure in heartbreaking film | Mail Online

Things like this question my faith in humanity. Some humans are war mongers & animals are forgotten in such times. Here it seems some humans are further down the evolutionary scale than we (as a whole) like to think.

It reminded me of this

I find it disgusting (but not surprising) that scientists are using these animals for entertainment. It's bad enough that they exploit & harm these creatures in the name of consumer capitalism, but that's usually in the background & so horrific that most of us have to turn a blind eye - we understand the reasons but it is still very bad. These animals did not volunteer.

 

[cammykool]

Thats a smart monkey!

 

[cwhatever]

there was food on the floor, and he/she wanted it and when the monkey moved to ther window stopped trying to get out. look closely again.

 

[!on]

Eh.... not so sure about that... I see a couple of stones, the two orangey things could be stones also.

I think the point is the visitors thought it was asking out, but they found this amusing.

 

[Martimus]

Things like this question my faith in humanity. Some humans are war mongers & animals are forgotten in such times. Here it seems some humans are further down the evolutionary scale than we (as a whole) like to think.

If you'll forgive me, let me answer your question with a rhetorical one of my own. How would you feel if you were locked up in a cage? Wouldn't you want to get out? The challenge sometimes with people, in my opinion, is that people forget that they are simply "more intelligent" animals.

With respect to "war mongers", it is my belief that we are not the only species on this planet that is violent in our nature. Walk through an African game preserve alone and unarmed and see how long you can go without being attacked? Walk through a jungle or rain forest alone and unarmed? Without attaching Human behavior to animals, it is believed that they will often see you as a possible food source or as a potential rival invading their territory.

 

[!on]

I think the question is should we have evolved beyond the point where we kill others simply for food. I wouldn't call killing another animal for food "war". The requirements for survival in all creatures are basic & very similar. The fact is, other creatures survive without doing what we do, & we have gone too far.

If it comes to a point where our greed for the things we lust for (beyond survival) causes us to resort to MAD nuclear war, I really can't see many of us going back to zero & starting again. We will have reset ourselves to the level of other creatures trying to survive, if indeed there are any of us left.

For non-religious scientists, it's sure funny how some of them dream of relocating to other planets. It's funny because, there will be no malls or gas stations, no means of fulfilling what we have evolved into today. We'd need to live in a bubble made of this earth. We'd be back to zero. So what's the difference? Being "back to zero" in an alien world, or back to zero in the world we killed?

 

[Martimus]

I think the question is should we have evolved beyond the point where we kill others simply for food. I wouldn't call killing another animal for food "war". The requirements for survival in all creatures are basic & very similar. The fact is, other creatures survive without doing what we do, & we have gone too far.

Unless you happen to be Doctor Doolittle and know, for a fact, what motivation an animal uses when attacking another, then I suspect this discussion is academic.

There are numerous documented cases where our "perception" is that animals stake out territory and guard it from others. This seemingly happens with Lions and other predatory animals. Is this their true motivation? Who knows! There is only so much that science can learn purely from observation.

Sadly the challenge I see with the human race is that we think we are the most intelligent species of animal on this planet... and we think we understand the less evolved species around us.

Oh and with respect to all things nuclear, I'm tempted to suggest that anything at the sub-atomic level is dangerous. Especially if you consider that we really don't know what the ramifications of our actions might be. The particle collider at CERN is a great example. What happens if they accidently collide a matter particle with a theoretical anti-matter particle and it releases enough energy to make an Atomic bomb look like childs play? Is this a risk? Who knows! They may not even be any of these so-called anti-matter particles. But until we try, we live in fear of the possibility of what might happen while shying away from our ability to learn and grow as a species.

 

[phw8558]

Intelligence is only relevant to us as we use it to categorize other species. Lions have sharp teeth, fish can live under water and we have excellent cognitive abilities. It is just a trait that has allowed us to be "more fit". Or has it, we seem to be putting the entire eco system out of wack because we are still driven by basic animal instinct. There is a joke I enjoy about two aliens destroying all intelligent beings they come across. They decide to leave us be when they conclude we are not intelligent as we are pointing our weapons at ourselves.

 

[phw8558]

I think the question is should we have evolved beyond the point where we kill others simply for food. I wouldn't call killing another animal for food "war". The requirements for survival in all creatures are basic & very similar. The fact is, other creatures survive without doing what we do, & we have gone too far.

If it comes to a point where our greed for the things we lust for (beyond survival) causes us to resort to MAD nuclear war, I really can't see many of us going back to zero & starting again. We will have reset ourselves to the level of other creatures trying to survive, if indeed there are any of us left.

For non-religious scientists, it's sure funny how some of them dream of relocating to other planets. It's funny because, there will be no malls or gas stations, no means of fulfilling what we have evolved into today. We'd need to live in a bubble made of this earth. We'd be back to zero. So what's the difference? Being "back to zero" in an alien world, or back to zero in the world we killed?

An earth like atmosphere could be created on mars if we had someone brave enough to travel there and "start the reactor"

 

[!on]

Intelligence is only relevant to us as we use it to categorize other species. Lions have sharp teeth, fish can live under water and we have excellent cognitive abilities. It is just a trait that has allowed us to be "more fit". Or has it, we seem to be putting the entire eco system out of wack because we are still driven by basic animal instinct. There is a joke I enjoy about two aliens destroying all intelligent beings they come across. They decide to leave us be when they conclude we are not intelligent as we are pointing our weapons at ourselves.

Well, there are some weird theories about crop circles & aliens intervening at those cold war times when we were a bit too trigger happy. I like to think someone just bottled it & decided to blame "aliens" for not pushing the button!

It's true what you say about our animal urge causing us to corrupt nature. It's a perversion of our evolution to become dependent on oil & consumer goods when all that can easily be lost, probably if we fight over these things. I believe we're coming to the end of our evolution as we are distancing ourselves from nature, dreaming of other planets & delegating our food sourcing to other people (meat processing, etc). So much still to explore of our own planet & so much to learn from our neighbour creatures. The answers to our survival lay here on earth, not in space. Sure, we could probably mine something up there but it wouldn't be food!

Alas, I think we've booby trapped this world with so many pollutants & weapons in storage, the future looks bad unless someone has the balls to steer us towards keeping food available - that means healthy crops, not messing with the weather, not killing to many animals at once & not poisoning nature.