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Swedish, Nature conservation freak, Passionate about Africa, Loving Peace, Politically neutral

Wednesday 18 February 2009

Wasting resources on saving a dolphin

A dolphin that was attacked by a shark has been rescued outside the shores of Queensland. The mutilated aquatic mammal was taken to Sea World were he/she was operated and reported to be making a speedy recovery. What I don’t understand is what makes this particular non-human individual so special that he/she deserves medical treatment. Why wasn’t the dolphin just left to die? How many starving children in Africa could we have saved if we didn’t waste our money on this “Flipper”...?

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3 comments:

Björn Nilsson said...

Just found this:

"Five exhausted dolphins have been trapped behind drifting pack ice for several days and now need rapid rescue, the mayor of an eastern Canadian village said Wednesday."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/19/dolphins-trapped-behind-d_n_168123.html

Maybe dolphins in need look nicer than starving Africans? And there is probably no economic mechanism which automatically diverts money from, say dolhpin help to starving people.

By the way, one or two years ago I read a statement by a South African scientist: he claimed that dolphins are more stupid than fish. A fish trapped in a net tries to get out, but a dolphin in the same situation just dies!

Anonymous said...

It’s impossible to compare things like that. I’m pretty shore that you don’t spend all your spare change and money on contributing to world hunger or other aid. If so you still shouldn’t own a TV, computer or anything like that, because nothing like that could be more important than starving children of the world. If you compared things like that all the time you could always find something that’s even more important than the thing you found in the first place. You would live in a cave after a while with tree leafs as toilet paper and roots and nuts for dinner, no dental care and no aspirin for your headache.

Sea world doesn’t finance there rescues with public savings and assets, but with the profit of visitors and private funds and grants. If people want to spend money on visiting sea world and learning more of aquatic animals that’s their business and it isn’t more stupid than spending money on other stuff like home electronics, candy, cars, holidays and things like that.

I do understand your view on the subject, and it’s excellent that you want to help starving children, but that don’t have to out rule everything else. I also think that animals has the same right to life as you and me, and if sea world and it’s visitors wants to spend money on wounded animals: good for them.

Interesting subject, have a nice weekend!

Kind regards

Frida

Geoffrey Goines said...

>Björn Nilsson

Yeah, you are probably right. The money "wasted" on dolphins wouldn't get allocated to starving people if it was an option.

Interesting observation about the dolphin vs fish intelligence.


>Frida Skoglund

Well it depends. If I can save more starving people having a computer and TV, then it would be irresponsible of me to get ride of those things. But your point is very valid; there is also something more important that we should deal with (at least in the eyes of those observing our actions).