There are good reasons to destroy animals that get habitated to human contact. Bears are a classic example in the NorthEast; once they lose their fear of humans and start invading camping areas they will be relocated and if that doesn’t work, they’ll be destroyed.
But a random bear in the backcountry of Montana who will rarely encounter humans probably doesn’t warrant being killed if for example a human gets between a sow and her cub (which BTW is unlikely to result in death to a human even then). Hikers going into wild areas are aware of the risks; this is bear habitat and we are the intruders. If we can’t co-exist, it’s the humans who should back off for the benefit of the animals, not vice versa.
People moving into rural areas also need to understand that the animals were there first. You don’t get a free pass just because your human. Certainly, a mountain lion that stalks people is going to end up getting killed, but before that happens the people need to evaluate why they’re there, and what steps they can take to avoid conflict.
In terms of pets, my rule would be harsher in the other direction: Put down any pet that bites anyone. The current rule of “every dog gets one free bite” seems wrong.
You are wrong, even in a completely human-centric value system. Regardless of your opinion, a great many people DO value animals, and consider their lives worth preserving. That, in itself, gives them value.
First of all, I wanted to share this YouTube vidof a tiger attacking. The vid may take a few minutes to load, but is worth watching. Just watching it gives the adrenaliny feeling resulting from being attacked by an animal. Which is something few of us will ever experience, as we see animals fall victim to humans so incredibly more often. So I feel that watching that video makes me more objective in this debate.
But tigers are a bad example of the OP, in that they are one of the* very *few wild animals that can decide to hunt humans as a food source.
I feel (and yeah, I know that’s a Miss World-esqe line) that animals and humans should try to understand each other and try to live together. Animals do understand humans: they stay away from us and our roads, (the penalty for not learning that is often death) and try to eat our garbage. Those two things makes me feel they understand us perfectly
I feel humans lose all claims to being the intellectually superior race, if they, in turn, don’t use their intellect to find out how to co-exist with animals. This brochureon how to deal with the backyard roaming black bears of New Yersey is a good example.
But there will always be accidents. Some are caused by wildlife; wildlife that has wandered off to where humans are. The stingray is also an accident.
I think there’s also wildlife that is sick (rabies, anyone?) confused or mad -I do believe that animals can go mad. But most of the statistics of hurt humans will be caused by humans, simply because there are so much more humans around then wildlife, these days. So I think that humans will cause the majority of accidents by being ignorant, stupid or careless.
In the case of accidents caused by humans, I feel the animal should either be left alone, or relocated if the accident is likely to repeat. For instance, if the accident happens near a newly made parking site.
In the case of the animal being at fault, I say find and kill the animal. For many reasons; to save humans from harm and allow them to make a living (Indian rural people in woods shared by a man-eating tiger, Kenian peasants whose crops are destroyed by elephants escaping from the reservartion). In the case of mad/sick animals, the most humane thing to do is to put the animal out of its misery. If nothing else, a pychotic or predatory animal on the loose is bad PR for other animals.
In all other cases, I think the best thing to do is to accept that accidents happen, that the world, either inner city or wildlife preservation, isn’t a hundred percent safe. And that humans have a responsibility to inform themselves and to be cautious. We teach our kids how to survive traffic; why should we not teach them to notice warning signals in the behavior of a dog, cat or horse? Not only is it the most etical thing to do, but also, in the long run, the safest.
The bears that kill are typically not truly ‘wild’ animals anymore; they have come to depend on human food and food-trash as a source of food. They attack humans to get the food. (*cite required).
To ‘Reverse the Food Chain’ would require that all large omnivores eat microbes and invertebrates. Which large omnivore eats the other is up for grabs.
Black bears - the only bears east of the Mississippi - are not very aggressive. They have to learn about humans and food, otherwise they tend to stay far, far away from people. They are omnivores and are opportunistic about eating meat but the majority of their diet is vegetarian and stuff like grubs.
There have been a handful of documented cases of Black bears stalking, killing, and eating people. But in nearly all cases attacks by bears on humans have come from people getting between sows and cubs, bears that are acclimated to humans who were looking for food that humans carry, not that humans are. The problem isn’t bears trying to eat people, it’s that they don’t react like bears should react.
People who spend time in the wilderness quickly learn to deal with animals and respect their terrain. It’s a much bigger problem when potentially dangerous animals (and bears are dangerous, just not vicious) are around people’s homes. As animals move back into terrain I can easily see controlling their numbers. As humans move into animal’s terrain, I have much less sympathy for the people. Learn to live with animals, it’s not that hard.
Well, I’ll grant that perhaps the bear needed to be destroyed to protect the recovery team. I know it’s crass to suggest that they should have just left the remains until it was safer (for both the bear and the people) to recover them.
But you are absolutely right about the responsibility resting on Treadwell’s head. He not only got himself, his girlfriend and a bear killed, he endangered the lives of rescue workers. For what? His ego? Hopefully, somebody learns a valuable lesson, as it’s too late for him.
The thing is that people that stupid are quite capable of getting other not so stupid people killed and that person could be you or one of your loved ones.
So their loss to the gene pool is mankinds gain.
Anyone who gets themselves killed by acting stupidly,whether by animals or not have got whats coming to them.
Also, there’s a huge surplus of stupid people in the world. We are sort of running out of the largest predators at a scary rate because people don’t like them. So… I bet we can all do the math there.
Funny, I find the viewpoint that animals are worthless horrific. My viewpoint comes from a horrible potential future - a world populated entirely only by humans and species that co-exist with humans (dogs, cats, raccoons, etc.). I want a world that has all the biological diversity that we have now (we’ve already lost countless species to human habitation). A turtle does more than eat, poop, and make more turtles - every turtle fills an ecological niche, as did all the species that we’ve already done in. It is fantastically short-sighted of humans to think that we can get rid of all the other species in the world and still have a world that is friendly for humans to live in at the end of all that.
Would I swerve for the squirrel or the child? That’s a specious argument, and not what we’re discussing here.
Do you have any concept of how you sound when you say something like this? (To say nothing of the fact that you distorted what I said into a straw man, which is usually the first resort of zealots.) Humans “invade”? From where, pray tell? The humans-only continent where no other animal lives? Outer space? WE are a part of the natural envionment. WE are the Earth’s apex predator; I highly doubt lions or hyenas have ethical dilemmas before they tear their prey limb from limb and start eating it while it is still alive. Nor do they have any qualms about attacking any threat to their offspring. How are we obligated to be more kind than they?
“Furry friends”? :rolleyes: You sound like someone who has never spent a day around wild animals in your life. By all means, the next time you see a real mountain lion, walk right up to it and try and be “friends.”
Of course, I never compared these things directly to each other; yet another straw man. I compared two situations, both lethal, to show how the OP’s logic made no sense.
You have correctly identified the difference between an animal and a person: A deadly human is still sometimes granted the right to live. A deadly animal is not. So? Why should anyone have a problem with that?
It’s not an “argument,” it’s a simple question, based on your stated views that animals are more valuable than people. if you really believed that, you would avoid hitting the squirrel, or else you are intellectually dishonest.
Sorry it has taken so long to respond. My associate was killed about two years ago on Cape York Peninsula in Queenaland Auatralia. He was living virtually in an aboriginal settlement. The power failed and he went out to check the wires and didn’t take a firearm with him. A feral boar killed him. I don’t know many more details- it was only after his death I heard (second hand) what happened.
I was referring to big cats killing villagers on the sub-continent (tigers) and Africa (lions). I don’t have specific cites but you could watch a few programs on the National Geographic or read a book by Jim Corbett.
Rather than go into detail on here, here’s a link to a summarised account of what happened, and why that wasn’t possible. Yellowstone bearman warning - detailed, gory and possibly not safe for work. Unfortunately if a bear has started to actively hunt humans, it is likely to continue (as this one did), placing anyone in the area at risk.
However Treadwell’s actions got two bears (one of which seems to have had nothing to do with the event), himself and his girlfriend killed, which is a tragedy.
