Marc - the quote in the OP wasn’t posted as a source - it was an article from the CNN website, which evidentally chose to accept the Japanese figures. A natural reading of this shows that it isn’t supposed to support anything, as its more or less impartially written: I posted it to start this debate.
Gaspode: for my own information if nothing else, I’d like to to this straight.
If you have a small breeding population, then taking away a large part of it must cause that population become extinct.
If you have a large breeding population, then taking away an equal proportion (equal to the percentage of the proportion which you took away from the small population, not the actual numbers), the population would not ordinarily be jeopardised.
This is because the large population has sufficient numbers to rebuild or maintain the population, whereas the small population does not.
If this isn’t correct, then please let me know.
In terms of the IWC’s position on minkes, and as to whether or not they’re threatened, I was quoting the guy from the CEI, who seems to think the IWC thinks they’re threatened. The link you are refering to is a quote from a site referring to the ICUN and the WCMC’s assessment. The IWC themselves, to correct myself, don’t actually say, either in the BBC report, nor their own website, which is consistent with their claim of not knowing numbers.
As far as I know, there is no burden of proof arising in this. One could make out an argument that a burden could run either way, either with whalers or with conservation ecologists.
The issue to do with the Soviet fleet whaling beyond their quota, raised in the BBC report, above, got me thinking last night. Its a flood gates question: if the IWC allowed an expansion of quotas on minkes, would we next have people like the Soviet whalers dragging in every whale in the sea? The Soviets’ conduct provides an exact precedent for this, although I gather there is better monitoring of numbers nowadays.
Why is it that every time a non-western country eats something that the West finds despicable, it is described as “a delicacy in their country?” Whale meat is not a delicacy here. It is seen as the food everyone ate while they were poor after the war because they couldn’t afford real meat.
Also, I am not aware of any “whale sashimi.” Has anyone here actually seen or read about it? Is it really available in SUSHI restaurants? Whale ain’t fish. It sounds to me like a generalization aimed in an accusatory manner at Japanese culinary culture in general: “those weirdos eat their FISH raw, for god’s sake, I bet they eat their whale raw too!”
I believe in protecting endangered species, but there are other issues to consider, such as the livelyhood of the whalers. The OP himself has referred to whales as “majestic creatures,” and though I know when cornered he would jump to defend even less majestic endangered animals, but that doesn’t change the fact that a lot of the hooplah over whales is the fact that they are cute. If being majestic is a condition for being allowed to survive, I can think of a few people who ought to be first on the truck.
Flippancy aside, I understand the OP’s concern that we can’t be 100% sure. And if the whaling could be stopped without affecting anything else, I would have no problem with that. But don’t the whalers depend on whaling? You can’t tell a bunch of whalers that they can’t work because you’re “not absolutely sure.” I personally think the evidence presented in this thread indicates that the Minke whale poplutation can withstand some culling.
By the way, I’ve had whale. It was grilled and pretty uninteresting. Not bad, but nothing I’d go looking for.
Population ecology isn’t that clear cut (God I wish it were). For starters this statement is only true for most animal species if you’re talking breeding females. Male numbers tend to be irrelevant. Secondly the term small breeding population is so subjective as to be meaningless. IIRC chimps in the wild number about 2000, a pretty small breeding population. They’re in no way threatened as things stand and populations are quite stable. At one time there were probably hundreds of thousands of chimps. So if we imagine 760,000 chimps and we killed off all but 2000 of them you’d have to concede that’s a large part of the breeding population killed off. Yet if we did this we’d have the situation we have today, but the population isn’t going to become extinct.
You see it all comes down to replacement rates. That’s what a sustainable harvest is all about, killing so few animals that normal breeding will allow the killed animals to be replaced so the population remains constant. The replacement rates of species is dependent on a great many factors including disease, predation, climatic conditions and competition, not all which could ever be known.
Simply not true. Again because replacement levels are so co-dependant with so many other factors. For example many fish are mass spawners, billions gather together to release eggs and sperm into the water in the hopes they find each other. Actual success rates for sperm are fairly low which is why there is a need for so many fish in such a small volume of water. If populations at any given spawning event fall below a threshold, which may be in the trillions range, the volume of water mixed with the eggs is so high that fertilisation becomes a rarity. Once this starts to occur the following generation will have even less breeding individuals and so even less fertilisation and a spiral towards extinction is inevitable. It’s thought this has led to the rapid decline and what looks likely to be extinction of several species.
Large populations don’t necessarily have sufficient numbers to maintain a population and small populations aren’t necessarily headed for extinction. A small population with high fertility and survival odds and naturally stable populations can be far more viable than large populations with low fertility, high juvenile and adult mortality rates and fluctuating populations. In reality the size of a population is largely irrelvant to a species’ conservation status until we get down to a few dozen individuals and inbreeding becomes a threat in its own right. Until then stability and fluxes are what are important. The reasons for population fluxes are varied and complex and all factors can never be known for any wild species. That’s why the argument that we don’t have all the facts is so highly flawed. If we waited until we had all the facts we’d never be able to harvest any species.
Yet they are not classified as being threatened in any IWC or independent literature and the Japanese government representative I quoted says “the International Whaling Commission’s Scientific Committee has calculated that 2,000 animals could be taken each year for the next 100 years with no risk to the population”
So basically the greenies say they’re endangered, no one else agrees, and the Japanese claim the IWC says that harvesting at well above current levels is sustainable and poses no threat whatsoever (a claim that is also unsupported at this stage).
So we come back to my initial summation: the facts to hand so far consist of Greenpeace stating that the whale numbers appear to be in decline and everyone else in the entire world saying that they haven’t got a clue what the whale numbers are. Not very conclusive.
Of course you could, which is why I said * my view*. There is of course no burden of proof legally, but morally is another story. It’s my fervent belief that before any person can infringe on anyone else’s livelihood, happiness and security they need to provide evidence of the harm that person’s activities are supposedly causing. Telling someone that they’re not to engage in an act simply because I am ignorant of the facts is not morally justifiable. By that line of reasoning I could tell someone not to engage in homosexual sex because there is no way I can know all the possible outcomes of that action. IMHO that is morally deficient in the extreme. I’m sorry if it offends you but the fact is it’s nothing more than an argument from ignorance.
A slippery slope argument?
Firstly we’re not talking about expanding quotas, we’re talking about justifications for the current situation. Japan killed 440 whales last year, it’s going to kill 440 this year and has AFAIK killed about 440 every year for the last 20.
Secondly even if we were talking expansion of quotas I wouldn’t have a problem if the quota was sustainable. I said that in my first post and have held that position throughout… I’ll repeat: “Unless someone can show me some evidence that Japan’s whale ‘harvest’ is any more harmful than America’s bison ‘harvest’ then put me down for a whale steak anytime.” This isn’t a flood gates question. If we want to use a dam analogy it’s a ‘controlled release for commercial supply’ question. Quotas would still be in place. Catches would still be monitored and regulated. People wouldn’t be any more able to drag in every whale in the sea than they are now. The only way to over-harvest would be to ignore the IWC quotas and risk international reprisals, which any nation is quite free to do now.
To which I should probably add the other logical flaw that usually goes hand in hand with the argument from ignorance: ignoring the obverse.
We can’t be sure what the effect of killing Minke whales is it’s true. But people have been hunting Minke for centuries if not millenia. If we don’t know what the current population levels are and what effects hunting is having then we can’t know whether we can afford to stop. What will be the effect of suddenly ceasing whaling? How can we know that cessation of culling won’t lead to catastrophic population reductions and extinction. It’s happened with other species. I’ve already provided a cite that an increase in Minke whales may be responsible for killing the far more endangered southern blue whales, what are the other effects? One could make a case for actually compelling the Japanese to continue their harvest based on the exactly same ignorance as the greenies are using to compel them to stop, so why go with option A ? Is there a logical reason or is this purely emotional?
Kyomara - I was careful to avoid an argument that whaling should be banned because they are “majestic”. “Majesty” is entirely subjective, and dependent upon cultural and personal preferences. And I would certainly never say, as a former resident of Osaka, that Japanese are “weirdos”. Keredomo, sushi ga mecha oishii desu ga natto ga mukatsukaseru yo!
Gaspode- I accept what you say. Obviously the issue isn’t as clear cut as I thought, especially having regard to popualtion ecology. No doubt I am suffering from a 1980s perspective based on reports of imminent humpback extinction. Thanks for your explanation.
As I was the one who mentioned whale sashimi, I thought I should respond to:
Yes, there is such a thing as whale sashimi. If you don’t believe me check out this this lovely picture, taken from the book Mrs. Ohnishi’s Whale Cuisine. (Written by Mrs. Ohnishi, whom we’re told prepared whale dishes at the 1991 IWC meeting in Iceland.)
Sashimi is not just raw fish. I’ve had: beef, horse, deer, scallop, abalone, sea slug, Ise lobster, octopus, and of course squid. (There is also chicken sashimi, but I’m not stupid enough to try it.) Appart from the horse and deer, which are unusual, the rest is fairly common.
I should add that raw fish is all the rage now in North America and Europe. Sushi bars are spreading as fast as Starbucks. (Subjective observation, I don’t have numbers to back this up.)
Merriam Webster’s has this to say about delicacy:
Whale meat is a delicacy in Japan, in that it is not daily fare. Restaurants that serve whale are usually on the fancy side. The days of the (apparently) god-awful canned whale of the post WWII period are long gone. Most Japanese either weren’t even born or were too young to remember.
Osaka ni sundoru’n ya kedo na, shojiki yuute na, kokorahen ironna yaccha oru nen na. Hen na mon, hen yanai mon mo. Maa horaa, dokorahen de mo see yaro naa. (I’m done showing off now ;))
How exactly is this an “argument from ignorance”? Am I ignorant because I don’t know the number of whales in the wild? Wouldn’t the Japanese be ignorant for the same reasons? In the analogy that I used, I showed that the population of a group of penguins was grossly overestimated, and that if the planned harvest had proceeded it would have been disastrous. I just want to know that whales aren’t going to be decimated because their populations were overestimated as well.
**
I, like many people, enjoy whale watching. The harvest of any whales infringes on the happiness and awe that I feel when I see whales.
I guess the bottom line question is why does Japan have to lie about whaling? They say it is for scientific research. Didn’t Joseph Mengele say what he was doing was research? What does Japan intend to learn that they didn’t learn last year, and that they won’t learn this year?
OK, from here
"Arguments of this form assume that since something has not been proven false, it is therefore true. Conversely, such an argument may assume that since something has not been proven true, it is therefore false. (This is a special case of a false dilemma, since it assumes that all propositions must either be known to be true or known to be false.) “Lack of proof is not proof.”
Basically the tree-huggers are saying that because the staement “whaling has no detrimental effect on whale numbers” hasn’t been proven incontrovertibly true by Japan it must thereore be false. ie because we can’t prove whaling isn’t going to cause extinction, it must therfore be going to cause extinction. Textbook argument from ignorance.
Yes, and yes. That’s exactly my point. Both sides are equally ignorant, why should we support your side? What compelling logical or moral argument do you have that says your beliefs are the correct ones? Since the Japanese are content to respect your rights to believe and conduct yourself in a way conducive to your life, liberty and pursuit of happiness I have no problem with their ignorance. The greenies on the other hand wish to impinge upon the life, liberty and pursuit of happiness of the Japanese. Morally they need to produce some evidence of harm to allow them to do this.
Which is exactly why this is an argument from ignorance. Because the Japanese can not prove “that whales aren’t going to be decimated because their populations were overestimated” you are making an assumption that it might be true.
To appreciate why this argument is illogical apply the obverse. Koala populations in several locations have been severly underestimated leading to disastrous starvation events. I just want to know that whales aren’t going to be decimated because their populations were underestimated as well. Therefore the whaling has to continue until such time as you can prove that cessation of whaling isn’t going to decimate populations.
To get really silly: I just want to know that whales aren’t going to be decimated because the IPU blesses any species hunted by man. Therefore the whaling has to continue until such time as you can prove that the IPU doesn’t bless such species.
That’s the problems with arguments from ignorance, any conclusion drawn is equally logically justifiable.
There’s two ways of dismissing that:
1)Prove it.
Prove to me that whaling at a level of 440 Minke whales per year will impact in any way upon the probabilities of your seeing a whale. Just because you believe that whaling is causing a reduction in numbers doesn’t make it true. With a complete ignorance of whale numbers or the impact of whaling you’re guilty of argument from assertion. You have asserted that “The harvest of any whales infringes on the happiness and awe that I feel when I see whales.” but have admitted that you have absolutely no facts or logic to back it up.
2)Logically extend it.
I, like many racists, enjoy going out in public. The presence of any niggers infringes on the happiness and awe that I feel when I see a mall wall to wall with only pure, white, god-fearing, aryan people.
I, like many people, enjoy seeing long grass waving in the wind. The mowing of any lawns infringes on the happiness and awe that I feel when I see grass waving in the wind.
And so on and so forth. You see why such an argument is invalid? It assumes that your right to pursue happiness overrides everyone else’s. Unless yo’re a complete sociopath that isn’t true. You have a right to pursue happiness and so do the Japanese. If those two pursuits conflict then tough shit. Since they are not expecting you to alter your behaviour and you are expecting them to alter theirs, they win. You’re free to go out looking for whales as much as you like. But if you want me to help you compel them to change their behaviour patterns you’d better have some compelling facts that support your position. If arguments from ignorance were acceptable then I could outlaw homosexuality tommorrow because we can’t be sure what other nasty disease like AIDS the filthy, depraved devils might be spreading. Better to stop them altogether until we can be 100% certain, yeah?
What’s the name of the law that says that someone must make a Nazi analogy within a certain time period of any online debate? Yes Mengele said that what he was doing was research, but then so did Pasteur, Boyle, Darwin, Einstein and Watson and Crick. 99% of people who say they are doing research are in fact doing research. Their is no denying their are marine biologists doing valid research on those Japanese boats just as their are on American trawlers. Are you implying they are doing experiments on unwilling human subjects?
IANA Marine Biologist, but in answer to your last question I’d have to say the same things that our MBs are learning by studying trawler catch: things like size and diet variations, growth rates and the effect of increasing population numbers. I’m surprised you think that we have an excess of information on whale biology. We don’t even have suffiecient information on cattle biology and we’ve been studying them in depth for centuries.
Why does Japan have to lie about whaling?
Firstly lie is a pretty strong word. Prove they’re lieing and the IWC will come down on them like a tonne of marshmallows. Obviously there’s no proof they’re lying.
The absolute answer I guess is all too obvious: it’s the only way they can get whale meat without international reprisals. The same way the US lies about its agricultural subsidies and Australia lies about its illegal weapons use. That’s the way the world works. It may not be right, but if you don’t like it change the law.
Gaspode: you say “Both sides are equally ignorant- why should we support your side?”. Because if the IWC is wrong*- a few Japanese people don’t get to eat a luxury item- I have seen nothing that indicates that the Japanese are starving and need the whale meat for survivial. BUT- if the Japanese are wrong- the world loses another species. I agree- nobody knows exactly what is going on. But there is virtually nothing to risk by giving up whaling, and a lot to risk by continueing it. You also mentioned that the Blue whale may never have existed as a species. Huh? What were they- just big whales? What species were the blue whale then supposedly a population of?
I know Kyo said it was not a delicacy in Japan- but Kyo also said it was a nessesary food adjunct “after the war”- which was 55 years and several generations ago. That was a temporary need caused by a War. That was then, this is now.
The point Gaspode has been making is that the whaling industry is being held to a standard no other fishery in the world could meet. Are you seriously suggesting that 4-500 minke whales a year will lead to extinction of the species without a long term noticable decline leaving time for a change of policy? Sure it is conceivable that such a small harvest could negatively impact the species but to equate that with extinction is ridiculous.
Since you bring it up whale meat still constituted 25% of animal protein consumed in japan well into the 60s.
And that is what is known as begging the question combined with a false dilemma.
Firstly if we reject the premise that whaling at current levels leads to population reduction then the conclusion, that we’ll lose another species if Japan is wrong about the effects of whaling, is unsupportable. If we reject the premise and say that whaling has either zero effect or a positive effect on whale numbers then the conclusion becomes ludicrous. Whaling increases whale numbers but if the Japanese are wrong the world loses another species!!! huh ???
Secondly you give only two possible outcomes: Japan is right and the population continues to grow or Japan is wrong and the population vanishes. This is a classic false dilemma. We have the following alternatives at least:
Japan can be wrong and the population can grow despite this, or
Japan can be wrong and the population declines slowly and noticeably with more than adequate time to remedy the situation, or
the greenies can be wrong and whaling can actually lead to an increase in whale number or
the greenies can be wrong and a cessation of whaling will lead to immediate extinction, or
the greenies can be wrong and due to the cessation of whaling the population declines slowly and noticeably with more than adequate time to remedy the situation, or
everybody can be wrong and the IPU either blesses or curses the species and it either vanishes or supplants humanity.
Sorry but this is ludicrous. We have no evidence whatsoever for any given outcome, why choose those two? As I’ve said twice before, we have just as much reason to believe that whaling is beneficial to not only Minkes but to other species as we have to believe that it is harmful. Why not argue that Japan should be compelled to maintain its catch because we don’t know what the harmful effects of stopping will be?
It’s what taxonomists call a complex or superspecies. The more genetic research we do and the more we study animals the more we realise the species concept is completely artificial. Just as humans have many potential forms and colours that primarily breed within their own groups, so do animals. The blue/fin/humpback complex is just the same as the caucasian/mongoloid/australoid complex of Eurasia or the dog/coyote/wolf complex. Indisputably distinct forms exist, yet interbreeding has always been common and many transitional forms also exist meaning no biologically valid taxa exist.
By which argument we should stop the civilian use of any military technology that anyone objects to on any grounds? I object to synthetic rubber. It was a temporary need caused by war, get rid of it. Ditto for canned foods, crew cuts, synthetic fibre etc.
Jusr re-read Dr. Deth’s post and feel the need to adress the following fallacies:
1)If the IWC is right then "the International Whaling Commission’s Scientific Committee has calculated that 2,000 animals could be taken each year for the next 100 years with no risk to the population’ and we have no problems. It’s only if the IWC is wrong that we might have problems, not if they’re right as Dr. Deth stated. What he in fact meant is if the greenies are right.
2)In another false dilemma situation Dr. Deth implies that if the greenies are wrong the only outcome a few Japanese people don’t get to eat a luxury item. Of course this completely ignores the effects on employment and the economy of those towns dependant on the whaling industry. Having a job isn’t a luxury IMHO.
3)If the fact that ‘a few people don’t get to eat a luxury item’ and some people object to it with no evidence at all is sufficient grounds to stop someting then fine. Dr. Deth I hereby officially object to TV based on the fact that we don’t know all the possible effects. It could be causing brain tumours. If the I am wrong a few people don’t get to watch a luxury item BUT- if everyone else is wrong- millions will lose tehir lives. I also hold similar beliefs concerning private motor vehicles, cellular telephones, personal computers, air conditioning and hairspray. Are you going to throw away all those objects that you own now? If not explain how this is different to the Japanese whaling industry?
4)Saying “there is virtually nothing to risk by giving up whaling” ignores the fact that we already have evidence that Minke whales are killing the mor endangered blues. It also ignores the fact that there is virtually nothing to risk by continuing.
nani yuttendayo?!? natto wa meccha umai ze! mai asa kutteru mon…kono kansai yarou ga…
Maa…tashika ni sou kedo…sore gurai ohsaka ben dekiru tte taishita mon da na. jiman subeki da to omou yo.
gomen, isshun kireta dake da. demo ore no shitteru kagiri, kujira ga sensou no chokugo no mazushii hito no tabemono da to omowareteiru rashii. kujira ryouri senmon no mise toka mo mita koto nai shi…yappari yominaoshitara omotta yori okotteiru you ni kikoeta.
sore demo, kujira no baai wa “sashimi” tte iwanai daro? uma no baai datte “sashimi” ja nakute “basashi” tte yun ja nai? “sashimi” tte kotoba wa o-sakana dake wo sasu to omotteita…
???
