OT - Über's Open Debate Thread

You heartless beast.

 

I want one, how much do they cost? Does it get wi-fi, and can I have a graphene one please?

Animal experimentation.......can't see any need for it except to advance medicine. Even there its use has dramatically declined due to computer modeling etc. Unfortunately I don't think it can be eradicated until technology (growing non sentient human like things from stem cells??) has moved on a lot. Here I think animal rights protesters have actually had a positive impact, though whether the violent end of that spectrum was necessary to achieve this I'm not so sure.

We'll get to fox hunting and control of pests next....I don't like cruelty to animals, but would happily see the end of the (sub) urban fox, as my dog has a penchant for rolling around in fox ****. And the little field mouse which has recently decided to share our home will regret it. It must be obliterated as I can't stand the hysterical reaction to it from certain family members.

 

My wife works in a school and I did for many years, the perception that teachers work cushy hours and have long holidays is well wide of the mark. Many teachers are in school as early as 7.00am doing planning and preparation, they also stay long after the 3.30pm finish at year meetings or doing more work in classrooms. They have local authority inspectors as well as headteachers/deputies doing regular classroom assessments and are often required to write up reports on all sorts of things related to their classes. They also have to do risk assessments for even the most trivial activities related to their pupils. Some classrooms resemble war zones where problem children have to be 'included' despite severe behavioural problems, schools don't like exclusions on their data.

I know of at least three very good teachers who have left the profession in the past two years because the job intrudes so deeply into their personal lives. They have found well-paid jobs in the private sector in different professions where they have a far better work/life balance. The days when school jobs, particularly in Inner London problem areas, were seen as 'cushy' are long-gone...

 

No mouse lasts more than a few hours in our house!!

 

I would agree with the point about homework promoting independent work etc., but I also think there is also a greater emphasis on encouraging parents (if am I allowed to use that term these days?) to engage in their child's education, rather than leave it to the teachers, which some are prone to do.

Little Miss Uber's homework, always printed out and neatly pasted into her exercise book, is always written addressing the parent more so than the child. It is not uncommon to get wording such as 'we would like you to assist your child with...'

I don't think this is a bad thing.

It can be quite amusing, however, to see some parents becoming ultra-competitive when it comes to certain creative projects. The current Mrs Uber made a nice volcano once.

 

Is that a euphemism Ubes?

(Ah........the volcano....I helped to make one for each of my Sons in their respective years.

 

Not heartless... but if you teach kids that it is okay to torture insects, where do you stop...it is ok to torture a cockroach but not stan's annoying dormouse....oK it is okay to torture the mouse but not the fluffy white kitten...it is Ok to torture the man with different religious views, but not your guys.

It is an extension of the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment...when you allow "hardening of the emotions"....the line is then impossible to draw

 

Warwick had a locator chip inplanted too so he could be always located, and another in his brain, so his wife could be aware of his emotions I believe.
I am a scientist....but ....

They took me to the hospital
And pulled aside the sheet
They said, "Look at that pulsating
Just listen to the beat"

They showed me the incision
Then took away the heart
And isn't nature wonderful
But is this art?

They took me to the scientist
Who opened up a phial
He said, "This is only chicken pox
And rhino bile"

And they showed me what it did to mice
Said, "This is just the start"
And isn't nature wonderful
But is this art?

They took me to the tenement
And kicked down the door
They said, "Have you seen the copulation
Practiced by the poor?"

"We select the ones to breed now
Then we reject the part"
And isn't nature wonderful
But is this art?

 

Betty, you never cease to impress when you allow the full weight of your considerable intellect flow freely down onto these pages. Its great that we have so many learned people contributing to this Board.

Keep her lit, girl.

 

C'mon now. You know Willy and I rarely see eye to eye but that would be going a bit too far!

 

Vern,

Being somebody who tries to reflect on issues rather than go steaming in (because when I do go steaming in, I say crap and get myself into trouble, as no doubt I have demonstrated on numerous occasions on this board before), I have given further contemplation to your assertion that the sort of people that do research on animals are 'sick'. This is more your area than mine, of course, you being a neuroscientist and all, so I would be interested to understand whether this assertion is purely your opinion or if it is supported by some scientific or medical diagnosis. Are we straying into Phineas Gage territory?

This stuff goes back to my post #759 and I would humbly suggest that (in general, and not necessarily specifically in respect of Roachy) the definitions of 'sick' and 'normal' are set by those that sit within the normal distribution of behaviours. If the mean shifts, then so too will the definitions.

 

You surprise me, Stan. I had you down as somebody that would tranquilise the fox, box the mouse, drive 'em both deep into the countryside and release them.

 

I did not write that Swords ( I wish I had)...I am a literary desert...

It is from a levellers song, but the "originator" Simon Friend, said the lyrics were stolen from an O level poem he had to study when he was 15.
I have never been able to find out who wrote it.

Occasionally I show it to some of the students....so they understand the perspectives and ramifications of what they are doing. Even/especially in medical research people get hardened to what they are doing, and maybe cannot see the line.

It is true in all life...Did you read that article in the Sunday Times about a month ago "Women of the Third Reich"
About the dehumanizing effect on wife's and mothers being married to nazis had
Terrible...makes you think...would I have done that under those circumstances???????

 

I was referring to all your posts on this thread Betty, not that one wiv the poem.

After all, how could a Neuroscientist not be smart?!!

 

I'm glad I surprise you Uber, long may it continue. Been pheasant shooting a couple of times, but had to stop. It's really, really easy to shoot pheasant and quite boring quite quickly. So I just shot loads without getting the etiquette that you are supposed to leave some for other people. Declined the opportunity to shoot a deer on a managed cull, not out of principle, but because I didn't want to **** it up and wound the beast rather than killing it clean. I think rifle shooting is much harder than shotgun. I think Col will know more about this stuff than me.

 

I was wrong to use the word sick, I apologise. The case of Phiheas Gage and the assertion that his brain damage , caused his personality change (there are many many cases like that) is not quite what I am getting at..but I am worried about the hardening of the emotions experienced by ordinary people in the street to violence, the disregard of life, the disregard of other peoples feelings, rights etc.

If you allow kids to do this to cockroaches, they will not know when to stop..
A medical scientist is doing far far worse, but knows why he is doing it, and has rules he must observe....and he should be intelligent and educated enough to know when he is approaching the line, that must not be crossed. He does not do it for pleasure or a laugh, he does it to progress the scientific knowledge.

I have never met a person in medical science that enjoys animal research...but I have met a number of people in the outside world who seem to have no regard for animals (and also no regard for people)...and I believe they are linked.
No I am not saying that you Uber or Stan are sick/ evil or anything else, because you do not seem to care about Cocky)....quite the opposite (you conversations show me you are thinking people with a good sense of moral balance) and I bet if I turned up at the pub with a cocky and a kit to put a controller on its back...you would both walk away.

I would

 

The problem with pheasants is that they're bloody stupid, and this is exacerbated by the fact that many are practically hand-reared and domesticated before they're let out to be blasted. Around my way in rural Hampshire, as you approach October you can almost get out your car and hand feed them or pick them up, as they're so used to having humans about.

They're quite big targets and quite cumbersome in early flight, as you will know, so little surprise that bagging a fair few is relatively easy.

 

It's the gamekeepers (not all by any means) who kill/poison birds of prey prior to the shoot that need shooting!!

 

Thanks for your considered response, Beth. I think, however, that I will go down in your estimation, as I have to be honest and say that I would have little compunction when it comes to Cocky or Roachy. As an occasional fisherman I could hardly object to Cocky's treatment when I'm not averse to sticking a hook into a maggot or a number of times into a worm. There's many that would have the experience the fish is subjected to under these circumstances as cruel too.

Is there really that much real difference between the two pastimes, when turning Cocky into a cyborg and hooking and submersing Maggy are both essentially performed in the pursuit of amusement (I would suggest that angling is ultimately undertaken for amusement)?

 

Actually, I am obviously the odd one here...I can see a difference in the amusement value between the two. Admittedly I could not do fishing myself, for fun...but would to save my life on a desert island. I can also "understand" why men (hunter/gatherers) want to do it.

But I do not get this cocky thing at all....

Anyway I know I am the odd one here...when/if we meet I will explain why whilst I chew on my tofu burger