Whaling

A1) My opponent has back tracked across his original argument about brain size (relative to body) and rights when he said, "This means that the whale may very well have a much bigger brain than it needs and is more intelligent than it may seem. Further study may be needed, but these figures are hard to ignore," and in his next round said, "but I would like to point out that, relative to it's size, the shrew has the largest brain of any animal. The humble shrew is far from the most intelligent in the Animal Kingdom, proving that brain size does not necessarily measure intelligence." Now my opponent suggests that rights be granted on the pressense of spindle cells. We still aren't sure what spindle cells are for, but we've found them in several animal groups, and not in all speicies of the animal groups (for example, they've only been found in 5 whales and 2 dolphins). Most whales and dolphin species do not have them. And even then, the size of them in not imporant, but their numbering and activity, of which humans posses the most and most active. None of these are good reasons to grant right for, as it would ditate that we remove the minimal rights we grant to most other animals (such as dogs and cats). Whaling is far from "as humane as possible" as my opponent states. He even stated that we sometimes like to drag whales backwards to drown them, and shoot their babies to keep the parents in the vacinity. Is that really the best we can do? No, of course we can do better, by requiring that whalers use drugs to knock whales out, allowing the to safely get close to whales, so they can preform a head shot allowing for a zero-suffering death (even if the whale heart keeps beating for a few moments, if the brain is destroyed, no pain can be felt). That is far more humane than what is currently being done and does not require an all out ban. C2) Government subsidies can be removed without banning the practice altogether, and their removal, by the nature of markets, would cause a decrease in whaling. But none of that suggests that placing limits and restrictions on the times one can whale, the manner in which a whale ought to be killed, and whale breeding programs would not be effective enough. Mercury is only harmful in developmental stanges for the brain, and so it is not harmful to most people (and the vast majority of americans, zing!). Of course, kids should have an extremely limited consumption of any mercury that is not balanced with selenium (neutralizes the mercury). This does not show anything that whaling should be stopped, only that kids probably shouldn't eat it. They also shouldn't drink wine (pending their age), but it is okay for the rest of us. The legal issues, I have no plans on bringing up because laws are completely subjective to each different nation. It is also a fallacious reason to not do something. Drunk driving being an example. You shouldn't drink and drive, not because it is against the law, but because it has extremely high risk of inflicting injury to yourself, property, and others. If the only argument is that it is illegal, than there is no argument. That being said, we shall proceed to the final round. Thank you,