HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: sherw@ocf.berkeley.edu (Gregory Sherwin)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Colorado Hunters under attack
Date: 4 Jan 1993 23:48:51 GMT
Organization: U.C. Berkeley Open Computing Facility
NNTP-Posting-Host: sandstorm.berkeley.edu

In article <1993Jan4.221422.26200@Firewall.Nielsen.Com> jkapson@ad-29.Naitc.Com (John Kapson) writes:
>Nonsense.  Hunting is a means to put food on my table economically and I
>don't consider that a sport.

Okay - then if this is the true purpose of hunting for you, then I have no
complaint.  I think that is a perfectly valid reason.  However, you made no
claims to some sort of "heritage" nor are you doing it for recreational
purposes - which I think is true of a good majority of hunters I know.
That is the sport - the reason for many magazines, for gun sales in sporting
goods stores (eg. Sportmart), etc. - and the reason I don't find hunting ethical
for the most part.  By using hunting for a means of sustenance, you
are an exception to that.

greg
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
From: proberts@informix.com (Paul Roberts)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Silver Spring monkeys
Date: 10 Jan 93 01:10:10 GMT
Organization: Informix Software, Inc.

In article <mhulsey-090193145029@fatrat.fcs.uga.edu> mhulsey@hestia.fcs.uga.edu (Martin Hulsey) writes:
>
>The case of the Silver Spring monkeys was a legal defeat for PETA for two
>reasons:
>
>1) Taub was fully exhonorated.

No, he just got off on a technicality.
From: black@che.serum.kodak.com (Robert Black (x37236))
Subject: Re: Silver Spring monkeys
Organization: Clinical Products Division, Eastman Kodak Company
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 21:34:50 GMT

In article <1993Jan6.155025.11029@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu> jhoskins@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (James M Hoskins) writes:
>In article <1993Jan5.215833.969@informix.com> proberts@informix.com (Paul Rober
>ts) writes:
>
>>>According to your understanding of the facts of this case, why didn't
>>>Alex notify authorities at the first moment (ie., his first day on the job)
>>>he observed the substandard and unlawful conditions?
>>
>>Perhaps because this would have one single result: he loses his job, and
>>thereby loses any chance of getting the conditions for the monkeys improved.
>>
>>The "authorities" are hardly going to act based on undocumented claims
>>made by an employee who lasted exactly one day on the job.
>>
>>This seems almost to obvious to be worth saying.
>>
>>Paul
>
>
>How long then should Alex have let the monkeys suffer?
>
>Your assumption is that nobody would take seriously the concerns
>of a neophyte lab employee who observes unethical behaviour toward
>lab animals.  At my university, any accusation from any source
>indicating lab animal abuse would be taken extremely seriously.

Remember we're talking about 1981 here.  Much has happened in the
intervening years.  Greater publicity and the accelerated search for
alternatives, both fueled by the AR movement, have changed the
environment considerably.  Pacheco's actions, properly understood,
must be viewed within a valid temporal context.

---
Robert Black 
black@serum.kodak.com  - The ONLY email address that MIGHT work.
These views are not necessarily the views of my employers.

Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
From: itsmine@med.unc.edu (Greg Popken)
Subject: Re:  "add 20 yrs to our lives"
Organization: UNC-CH School of Medicine
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 04:22:16 GMT

In article <1993Jan11.222329.18743@informix.com> proberts@informix.com (Paul Roberts) writes:
>GP = Greg Popken
>PR = Paul Roberts
>
>Of someone's eventual demise...
>
>GP> Which will be approx. 20 yrs later thanks to medical research.
>
>PR> Statistically speaking, medicine has done little to increase life
>PR> expectancy.
>
>GP> Paul, were did you get this from? My estimate of 20 yrs is from a 
>GP> U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services report.
>
>OK, here's the reference I promised:
>
>------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>            TRENDS IN DEATH AND DISEASE AND THE CONTIBUTIONS
>                          OF MEDICAL MEASURES
>
>                      John B. McKinlay, PhD  (1)
>                      Sonja M. McKinlay, PhD (2)
>                      Roger Beaglehole, MD   (3)
>           
>  Chapter to appear in Handbook of Medical Sociology, Fourth Edition,
>  Edited by H.E. Freeman, and S. Levine, Prentice Hall, New Jersey, 1986.

Paul,
     I just finished scanning this chapter, and am not impressed.  The
information give here (and in McKown's paper, 1976, of which this is an
extension) are controversial *at best*.  The paper only analyzed 12
infectious diseases.  Last time I heard there were quite a few more.
     In addition, the paper focuses on the *percentage* of total
mortality.  To enhance their position they included what they term "three
major chronic conditions" in the selective data they analize.  These are
heart disease, cancer, and stroke.  Only the three top causes of death today.

     Let me explain something.   People will die.  If not from one
aliament, then from another.  To present data based on percentages of the
total is misrepresentative.  There will always be 100%.  In order to
support their premise they include, in the analysis of the data, the cause
of death that increases as one decreases death from another aliament.  
(see fig. 1)
     Regardless, you have still not refuted my claim.  That is animal
research has extented the life expectancy of the average american by
approx. 20 yrs.  Don't give me information on the trends of diseases.  If
you wish to refute this claim give me numbers on the life expectancy and
rational, reliable evidence that my claim is not true.

BTW, I changed the subject heading. Don't make claims you cannot support.
If you want more references regarding my claim I will be happy to provide
them as soon as I get a chance. 
-- 
The opinions expressed here are my own.  **   Knowledge goes on forever! 
Which is to say they belong to me.       **   Spelling stops at the 
And these opinions, which belong to me,  **   end of the page.
are mine.                                *******************************
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
From: donb@igor.tamri.com (Don Baldwin)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals,alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Alaska Wolf Killing Suspended / interventionist conservation
Date: 11 Jan 93 16:02:49 GMT
Organization: TOSHIBA America MRI, South San Francisco, CA

In article <1ikv98$939@agate.berkeley.edu> sherw@ocf.berkeley.edu
(Gregory Sherwin) writes:
>Now on the
>one hand you have a group of people who believe that human interference in
>the lives of these pinnepeds is wrong and does not give due respect to
>them as somewhat equal co-residents within the ecosystem, but on the other
>hand they also see fit to impose their whims and ideas on them (ie. another
>form of human interference) as if they were house pets.  Do you
>see the obvious inconsistency here?  It is a form of hypocrisy.

Oh come on, get serious Greg!!  So what if they occasionally bring in a
critter that isn't actually hurt?  Don't you realize that the Marine Mammal
Recue center is in Great white Shark territory?  Those fuzzy little seals
are probably queued up, just waiting to be taken in and cared for!  Hell,
I know that if _I_ was a seal in shark land, I'd thank those people when
they took me in!

Of course, that also makes me wonder if the people working there ever
experiment with a wee bit of barbecued sea.  I know I would; I hear it's
quite good, tastes remarkably like chicken...

Getting back to the comparison between taking in an uninjured seal, it's
not as if the critters have to keep to a schedule or anything, is it?  How
many marine mammals have IRS interviews, dentist appointments or tea parties
to go to?  All they do is eat, fuck and die; what's a day or two away from
that, in the grand scheme of things?

>You can tell me animals are animals and ignore simple biological facts that
>humans are also animals who have developed an intelligence to experience
>a self-proclamation to superiority and a touch of megalomania, as that is
>simply your opinion.  We can't argue opinions, we can only argue facts.

Sure we can argue opinions.  My opinion is that your logic is fuzzy and
you spend excessive energy worrying about things that don't really matter,
in the grand scheme of things.  Oh, and you have an absurd tendency to
anthropomorphize...

>If you can prove that humans are superior to animals on some universal and not
>an ethnocentric (or make that 'species-centric') reference level, then I
>will accept your word as fact.  Until then it is purely conjecture and
>has no more basis in truth than does the Serbian who claims he is ethnically
>superior to the Bosnian Muslim.

We have the power to blow up the planet; that makes us more important than
any other species, IMO.

>Please - your arrogant attitude reflects a lack of maturity and an
>inability to discuss issues thoughtfully without resorting to childish
>self-amusement.

Now here's an obvious case of the pot caling the kettle maroon!

If your self-image is so poor that you can only discuss issues with utter
seriousness, I suggest you abandon political discussion and subscribe to
alt.warm-fuzzies.

Regards,

    don
From: proberts@informix.com (Paul Roberts)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Silver Spring monkeys
Date: 12 Jan 93 05:27:54 GMT
Organization: Informix Software, Inc.

In article <mhulsey-110193164303@fatrat.fcs.uga.edu> mhulsey@hestia.fcs.uga.edu (Martin Hulsey) writes:

>Your point and mine are not mutually exclusive.  Even if the animal
>"rights" movement has gained some support, many more have been convinced
                                            ^^^^^^^^^
>that it is an anathema to humankind.  You folks shouldn't claim supporters
>that you don't have.

Evidence for that "many more"? What I have seen of public opinion surveys
on this subject (e.g. Gallup Youth Survey, 1992) suggests that my side
has a lot of support, and it is increasing. Can you document that
"many more", or are you just claiming a silent and invisible army of
supporters?

>In my home town, _Bambiphilus obnoxious_ is, thankfully, near extinction. 

Your case would be more convincing if you didn't so often feel the need
to stoop to sophomoric ridicule.
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals,alt.peeves
From: zursch@whizkid.wpd.sgi.com (Jeffrey B. Zurschmeide)
Subject: Re: A rat is a pig-headed moron is a ...
Reply-To: zursch@whizkid.wpd.sgi.com (Jeffrey B. Zurschmeide)
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc.
Date: Wed, 13 Jan 1993 01:27:16 GMT

 Alain van der Jekyll writes:
>WHAT!?!?  That apple, pear, or grape which you cruelly rip from the loving
>grasp of its mother branch is the offspring of that plant, and itself has the
>potential, and therefore the right to grow into a productive self-actuallized
>adult plant.
>You sir, are a foul murderer of plant foetus's.  A plant abortionist as it
>were.  You should be ashamed!
>Alain "learning to subsist on minerals" van der Heide

There is one option for us, Alan......we, the morally superior, could become
Breatharians. (Being careful to use screens, lest we violate the inherent 
rights of little airborne critters too "differently sized" for us to see...)

Peeve: idiocy in all its variegated forms

JZ
From: banta@abingdon.Eng.Sun.COM (242 lbs before cooking)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Hunter Kills Jogger
Date: 9 Jan 1993 00:39:34 GMT
Organization: FizzBall Racing
NNTP-Posting-Host: abingdon

(Mike Linan) writes:
>I write:
>>Oh, bravo, Tim.  Your succinct affirmation of United States justice
>>strikes fear into the hearts of hunters everywhere.
>
>I sense (perhaps wrongly) that you are a hunter drew.  

I don't see why it would be an issue.

>If so it appears that
>you may have read Tim's post and assumed it was coming from an AR or at least
>that is what your post suggested to me.  

If, by AR, you mean a "beast apologist", yes.  If that wasn't what
you were trying to say, Tim, I retract the "Sod off" line from my
original article.  I hardly think the US court system needs a
rah-rah in this audience, and therefore the rest of my article
stands.
 
andy
banta@abingdon.sun.com
--
"The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism
 by those who have not got it."
                                -- George Bernard Shaw
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
From: linan@argon.berkeley.edu (Mike Linan)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Better to be slaughtered than never to have lived? Re: Meat eaters (LONG)
Date: 11 Jan 1993 20:48:57 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
NNTP-Posting-Host: argon.berkeley.edu
Keywords: meat vegans vegetarian food veal factory farms

In article <1993Jan11.020801.166@zooid.guild.org> rwaigh@zooid.UUCP (Rosemary Waigh) writes:
>In article <1993Jan8.191555.2781@igor.tamri.com> donb@igor.tamri.com (Don Baldwin) writes:
>>indignant people, who are trying to force you to respect their exceedingly
>>arbitrary demands.  You are capable of hunting without trying to foist your
>>views off on them, whereas they lack the maturity and clear-headedness to
>>understand and extend the same respect to you.

>It is impossible to hunt without foisting ones views on the victims of the
>hunt.

>>Basically, I don't understand how one can "live and let live" with a group
>>of petulant buffoons, when their objective is to eliminate some of your
>>freedom.  

>The objective is to eliminate unnecessary suffering.  Just as people should
>not to be free to kill other people, so they should not be free to kill other
>animals.

Can you believe that some on t.p.a. questioned why I said there were those
who equate animals to humans?  Exactly *why* do you think that "just as people
should not be free to kill other people, so they should not be free to kill
					 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
other animals?  What do you base your logic on and why should we accept that
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
if we agree we shouldn't kill other humans we automatically should not kill
other animals?  Please explain this so that is isn't viewed as just another
ARs *opinion*.



>Ro


Mike Linan
From: proberts@informix.com (Paul Roberts)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Silver Spring monkeys
Date: 5 Jan 93 22:03:33 GMT
Organization: Informix Software, Inc.

In article <1993Jan5.192739.27311@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu> jhoskins@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (James M Hoskins) writes:
>
>I still have problems with the ethics of Alex's actions.  He permitted,
>apparently, the monkeys to suffer under unethical conditions for four
>months.  (I realize this interpretation is open to question; important
>here is Alex's perception)
>
>Anyway, there's a larger issue here than why he didn't notify authorities.
>According to Russell, this Taub monkey business has become something of a
>cause celebre and served to clean-up the acts of numerous animal research
>laboratories during the past 10 years.  In your opinion, Bob, was the
>unnecessary and unethical suffering of the monkeys during this four month
>period, their individual suffering, worth it given the net result?
>

Well, I am not Bob, but: had he not waited as long as it took to
build up a body of evidence, then the monkey's suffering would
have gone on much longer, because the authorities would not have
shut down Taub's operation.

I think you are presenting a false choice.

Paul
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
From: russ@wpg.com (Russell Lawrence)
Subject: Re: re:rights?
Organization: WP Group
Distribution: na
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 01:11:13 GMT

From article <1992Dec31.210444.19909@samba.oit.unc.edu>, by itsmine@med.unc.edu (Greg Popken):
> I feel that among the criterion for rights should be the ability to 
> morally distinquish actions. 

Would you please explain how the goodness or badness of an action 
is determined by the ability of the victim to make moral 
distinctions, rather than by his ability to suffer the consequences
of our action?  

It seems clear that the ability of an individual to make 
decisions ought to figure in our willingness to let him/her make his 
own decisions, but I see no reason to believe that an individual's just 
deserts as a moral patient are predetermined by his own intellectual 
abilities.  

> To go from one person to the next, determining if this person
> meets this criterion or not is unjust.  To say humans have the ability to
> do this, hence all humans have this right is. 

Justice implies "fair treatment".  Is it truly fair to base our 
treatment of other individuals, not on their abilities, but on 
their membership in a class? 

-- 
Russell Lawrence, WP Group, New Orleans (504) 443-5000
russ@wpg.com   uunet!wpg!russ
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
From: mackenzi@McRCIM.McGill.EDU (Paul Mackenzie)
Subject: Re: re:rights?
Originator: mackenzi@haley.mcrcim.mcgill.edu
Organization: McGill Research Centre for Intelligent Machines
Distribution: na
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 93 15:09:05 GMT


In article <C0pnCp.DDr@wpg.com>, russ@wpg.com (Russell Lawrence) writes:
|> From article <1993Jan7.192910.4341@thunder.mcrcim.mcgill.edu>, by mackenzi@McRCIM.McGill.EDU (Paul Mackenzie):
|> > While with instinct there is no conscious choice of actions involved, with
|> > reason there is.  Therefore there must be courses of action based on reason
|> > that are geared to human survival, and these are known as ethics.  Rights
|> > are simply inate properties that humans possess to allow them to use their
|> > reason to survive.  In this way, a being that does not use reason does not
|> > have rights.
|> 
|> If rights are "innate", as you say, please explain why the concept
|> of personal rights, as we know them today, was unheard of in western
|> civilization prior to the late 17th century.

In my opinion the concept of individual human rights threatened the power
held by religious and feudal leaders prior to the late 17th century.  
People who started talking about human rights would eventually get the
attention of these power-holding folk and could be branded as trouble-makers
or heretics and killed.  Once this kind of power waned, the free thinking
began to surface.

|> BTW, I think you're overplaying the role of "instinct" here.  I think
|> you'd be hardpressed to explain the behavior of the dogs that live
|> with me without acknowledging the fact that they're capable of thinking
|> and learning.

You're right, I am probably using "instinct" to cover more than I should.
What I mean is that animals don't use reason, so I guess "non-reason-using"
is a more apt term.  I believe my arguments still apply though, since I have
yet to see a dog use rational thought (the dogs I've grown up with used
a combination of instinct and conditioned behaviours).

--Paul

Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
From: bast@wam.umd.edu (Jaguar)
Subject: Re: Colorado Hunters under attack
Organization: University of Maryland, College Park
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 1993 20:15:32 GMT

People today do hunt for sustinance reasons. Many of my friends hunt.
They eat deer burgers/potroast ect. all through-out the year. The hides
are tanned and kept. Antlers and skulls are used in craft projects.
These are people living in suberbia.
Many american indian tribes sustain thenselves through hunting and fishing
rights, given to them in treaties.
I am opposed to sport hunting, and the hunting of non-prey species.
If you are not going to eat/use it, do not kill it. Trophy hunting
to my mind does not qualify as justifiable hunting.
And as for hunting being inhumane...
here on the east coast the natural predators of deer have been eliminated.
The deer are overpopulated.
True, in time death and starvation will take care of that.
The main problem is that deer, when overpopulated can degrade the
environment. Ever heard of a brouse line? Look at the Shenandoha park.
Everything from 5 feet down that is green is gone. This means habitat 
loss from other species. Many have been driven near extinction localy.
Brids nesting in those lower 5 feet, cant.
Ideally, the best thing would be to re-introduce the natural predators of
the deer. There is a difference in what hunters take compared to that of
a natural predator. Hunters tend to take healthy, mature individuals, whereas
predators take the old, young or weakened.
Sadly, all it would take is one wolf mauling one human, and out go the
predators in the eye of public opinion.
Never mind hunters shoot each other, and many other humans each year, 
far greater in number than a predator attacking a human.
Jaguar
dropping in her nickle's worth
From: banta@abingdon.Eng.Sun.COM (242 lbs before cooking)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Deer Population Control Mechanisms
Date: 12 Jan 1993 15:54:37 GMT
Organization: FizzBall Racing
NNTP-Posting-Host: abingdon

(Ted Robinson) writes:
>Summary:

>Food source as a controlling mechanism, either through starvation or through 
>fertility regulation, provides a *restoring* mechanism that drives the 
>population back to the equilibrium point. Predator control, on the other 
>hand, exacerbates the problem, leading to a divergence from the equilibrium 
>point. Viewed this way, predator control would seem to be a really shitty way 
>to maintain equilibrium - Nature usually does better than this. 

>Comments?

Research?  Nope, just so much theoretical chicken choking.  Either do
some research or spare us your gooey, wanking fantasies of Bambi.

drew
banta@abingdon.sun.com
--
"The only sports are auto racing and bull fighting, all the rest are games."

						--Ernest Hemingway
From: proberts@informix.com (Paul Roberts)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Silver Spring monkeys
Date: 12 Jan 93 19:32:01 GMT
Organization: Informix Software, Inc.

In article <mhulsey-120193075831@fatrat.fcs.uga.edu> mhulsey@hestia.fcs.uga.edu (Martin Hulsey) writes:

>
>I haven't consulted my archives for the tidbit, but when I previously
>stated that PETA, etc. were "powerful interest groups," another participant
>corrected me, and said that animal "rights" activists comprise less than
>.01 percent of the population, or some other miniscule figure.  I don't
>recall if he gave a reference, but I will see if I can locate the exchange.
>

I think I recall it. The true figure is 370,000 which represents
0.14% of the US population. Can we assume that being off by one
and half orders or magnitude is typical of the accuracy of your
other statistics?

Paul
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals