Unfortunately, many here on Grist don't seem to care whether whaling is profitable or not- as long as it's "sustainable" they're ok with it, which is short-sighted and undermines environmentalism.

J.S.

I teach environmental economics and blog at www.voicesofreason.info.

One thing you should note upfront: Iceland regards whaling is an important dimension in it's overall strategy of sustainable use of their marine ecosystem resources. It is a fact that these whales do eat a certain quantity of fish, and whether this is significant to human fisheries or not (which are well managed in Iceland) is still an open question, which I'm sure we can all understand why Iceland is interested in answering, given that the backbone of their economy is marine product export.

> The supply is whales (we'll consider this low, since they're endangered and all).

The supply has been very low in recent times because there has been a temporary pause in commercial whaling, which Iceland has observed since 1989 until now.

So why don't we assume that whale meat supply has been almost non-existant?

> Then there's demand, or in this case, lack thereof.

Interesting you claim that, because in the Japanese news media a report appeared saying that when the Icelandic Fisheries Ministry was contacted about the possibility of the meat being exported to Japan, the media were told "the majority of the meat will be consumed domestically", and that since marketers had been hired to find markets for whale meat by-products from Iceland's scientific programme, consumption had increased by 400% over the 3 years.
I've blogged it here:
http://david-in-tokyo.blogspot.com/search/label/Iceland

> but no one will buy their meat ...

What your article actually says is that the Fin whale meat needs to be tested to confirm that it is safe for human consumption.

> A recent poll by the International Fund for Animal Welfare found that only one percent of the Icelandic population eats whale meat once a week, while 82 percent never eat it at all.

Funny that, considering that there has been a temporary pause in commercial whaling since 1989, isn't it?
Oh wait...

By the way, I believe the poll that IFAW is actually refering to was Gallup poll, which also showed very high levels of support for commercial whaling amongst Icelanders (something like 70% +, with only about 10% opposed). I guess IFAW didn't want the western public to hear that bit. I actually have a copy of the poll, so let me know if you'd like me to forward it to you for you to see for yourself.

Japan and Iceland both hold CITES reservations on these whale species for the precise reason that  they didn't trust the IWC to move to implement sustainable whaling as is the IWC's mandate.

> So to recap: low supply + virtually no demand =

Well, you are right about low supply, but you are probably confusing demand with consumption. You can not consume what is not supplied - you may want to eat it though, although it may not be available.

> no financial justification to resume commercial whaling. Not that business principles should be driving any decisions regarding whales in the first place.

Right, and ultimately it seems that the whalers in Iceland have more of a clue about the feasibility of the whaling business than some people in other parts of the world.

By the way, whale meat consumption in Japan has risen by more than 2,000 tonnes in the past year (to the end of August). I've blogged it here:
http://david-in-tokyo.blogspot.com/2006/10/japan-whale-me...

Well in this case Iceland is only hunting 9 Fin whales and 30 minke whales, which will work out to be maybe 200-250 tonnes of meat I imagine. I think the Icelandic market has the potential to absorb that much meat, and well, the Iceland Ministry of Fisheries does also.

Currently by the way Japan doesn't buy whales from anywhere, although if the Icelanders did wish to find a market in Japan I'm sure that they could (yes I saw the reports about Japan's ambassador saying it wouldn't be needed, but I don't think she really knows the details). The fact is that whale meat in Japan wholesales at around 2,000 yen a kilogram, with actual consumer retail prices often 3 times that. This is significantly more expensive than whale meat substitutes, which seems to me to indicate further potential consumption. If Iceland's whalers were to get permission to export their meat (hypothetically here) I image that if they undercut the Japanese government's wholesale prices they could probably rake themselves in 2 million USD from this small little hunt. I'm not sure exactly what the situation would be in terms of restrictions in the case the government did permit the imports though.

> It's not economic for them

Scientific whaling is not economic, but the long term goal of commercial whaling is. I refer you to the historical fact that whale meat production peaked at 226,000 tonnes in 1962, and today annual supply is less than 10,000 tonnes, with whale meat prices remaining high (despite everything you may have read in the western environmental media - the figures are on my blog, if you wish to see for yourself).

> Unfortunately, many here on Grist don't seem to care whether whaling is profitable or not- as long as it's "sustainable" they're ok with it, which is short-sighted and undermines environmentalism.

Thought you'd get another plug in on this concept ;-)

I couldn't resist giving my own punching bag a good beating either ;-)

I didn't bother disputing Andrew's claims that Iceland's whales are endangered though, although I could have... I'll just post this link to the IWC Secretariat instead:
http://iwcoffice.org/conservation/iceland.htm

Can't see Iceland exterminating their whales any time soon, at their current rates.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1501AP_Self_Aware_...

Elsewhere however, conservationists have been pushing their case:

http://david-in-tokyo.blogspot.com/search/label/Eugene%20...

#1: We are discovering that animals are way more intelligent and self-aware than we thought

#2: Environmentalists are increasing efforts to kill them in order to "save" them

Anyone besides me notice the contradiction??

J.S.

I teach environmental economics and blog at www.voicesofreason.info.

I just hope it doesn't turn nasty though, with violence and such.

One thing I wonder about is this: For every whale killed, how many thousands (I'm not sure but I guess even 6 figures or more perhaps) of lives are saved from being eaten by that whale?

How big (or whatever the criteria) does a lifeform have to be before we start wanting to ensure it's welfare? Is it acceptable for humans to improve "net welfare" by knocking off large predators (besides ourselves)? If for example we place equal importance on the lives of sardines (which are quite expensive here in japan right now, though that's unrelated) as we do with whales, by limiting the number of whales we can probably influence / increase the carrying capacity of sardines, and this would see sardines live perhaps longer more fruitful lives.

Perhaps whale lives and sardine lives aren't equivalent for some reason - if that's the case are say 100,000 sardines worth one life? Or does it not work like that?

As you know, biodiversity conservationists have that thing about trying to preserve the balance of the ecosystem by taking actions such as hunting, for example, sardines predators as well as the sardines themselves, and I was wondering whether this could also be viewed positively from an animal welfare point of view. Another aspect of that is that there is more than 3 tonnes of meat on even the smallest of whales. Many more chickens than 1 must suffer in order to provide humans with the same quantity of meat.

But we should not be misled into thinking that animals deserve from us a responsible consideration of their interests only if they first demonstrate for us their ability to leap through certain intellectual hoops.  We have responsibilities, of one kind or another, to all sentient beings.  We owe them just conduct, respective each according to its kind.

The interesting observation in the story that David-in-Tokyo sent from SeattlePi, that three Asian elephants in the Bronx Zoo behaved rather differently when confronted with a mirror, should come as no surprise.  Elephants, observed in the wild, exhibit different talents, interests and personalities.  There is no reason to conclude that the elephant who seemed to leap through the primatological hoop regarding the mirror is anomalously intelligent or anomalously self-aware.

Barbara Gowdy's fascinating fictitious account of the harsh experiences of a number of African elephants, in the novel "The White Bone," is, she tells us, based on her own observations, and on those of many people who have dedicated their professional lives to studying African wildlife.  Her novel is accompanied by a substantial bibliography.  One of her principal characters, separated from her family following a devastating massacre by human hunters, discovers in her wandering a broken-off side-view mirror.  The way she interprets it, and uses it, is fascinating.  Probably Ms. Gowdy could explain why she felt justified to propose that a young, especially sensitive elephant might use that artefact as she does.

A disgression on an evolutionary note, since something was said at the end of the SeattlePi piece about mammoths: It seems fairly well established that the common ancestor of any of the several mammoths, Mammuthus spp., and of the Asian elephant, Elephas maximus, was genealogically more recent than was the common ancestor of either of them and the African elephant, Loxodonta africana.  In other words, Asian elephants are more closely related to the extinct mammoths (of which several species are known, the last persisting perhaps into historic times) than they are to African elephants.

On leaping through hoops, falsely: It seems that both Jason and David-in-Tokyo are only pretending to answer the challenges of their opponents.  Neither is going to give way, in fact, no matter what the other says.  And much the same charade has taken place on countless threads at this point.  Well, fine.  But that should be generally recognized.  Neither David nor Jason is a fool; surely they both have each other's measure.

And on top of that, Jason has now been expressing himself at length on the subject of distinguishing the several species of global-warming-denying ideologues, and on the impossible difficulties of communicating with them.  Not unlike the many conversations between him and David-in-Tokyo, no?

My guess is, each of them is playing to an assumed crowd of "lurkers" (a pretty well-known term, not especially flattering, used recently by a commenter in a similar thread).  So, great, David and Jason, go for it.  Maybe one or another of those "lurkers" will happily surprise you on Valentine's Day.  It sounds rather Halloweenish to me, though.

Of course, it should be quite clear that in this matter at least, the argument that tolerating the slaughter of whales does not behoove environmentalists committed to keeping animals alive, I am on Jason's side.  It looks like we argue for the same end in different ways, actually.  It also looks like he really does not care a fig that he has an ally, in spite of the way he ended his message of 1:11 AM, 10/31.  Fine, that is his call.  But then, if he should ever complain that he is left friendless, on this matter at least, we should all recognize that he lies.

At the beginning of the thread, Biodiv wrote,
<<
You mean killed don't you? Let's cross our fingers that consumer preference kills this business. If we can just convince the Japanese consumer to shun it...
>>

Well put!  Nice double-entendre!  "Killing this business" would plainly be very satisfactory indeed.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

The reason why people take moral stands on issues relating to whales, endandered species and what-not is simply because there are no property rights in these animals, which exist in open-access situatons where anyone can take them.  There is no problem when the take is a traditional, subsistence level, but things can quickly spiral out of control with advances in technology create a race to capture.  Thus the near extinction of whales and crashing of countless fish stocks.  

The solutions lie in creating agreed management systems under which individuals have transferrable property rights.  Ron Bailey at Reason has recently written up a number of these that the US and others have implemented domestically; it has been the added international complexities that have held things up, but we know the right directions in which to head.  The technologies for tagging and tracking fugitive resources has grown and can be implemented.  People should put aside there respective moral grandstanding and focus on creating property rights that will give everyone an economic voice - and will turn whalers and fishermen into conservationists, and also allow more concerned groups to throw their economic weight around.

I would just say that as an observer in Tokyo that it seems to me that the position taken by the Japanese has done great damage to its own foreign interests, including its interests in ensuring that the ocean actually has fish in it.  Japan should be leading the way in proposing and pushing for meaningful solutions of the type that appeal to everyone's interest, instead of its absurd, in-your-face approach to the world community.  It is more than a little ironic that actually there is at present no commercial firms involved in the research whaling business - they have all bailed out, leaving the Japanese government to own and run the whole loss-making, government subsidized business!

Also, of course baleen whales, which are the ones taken, largely eat krill, not fish.

We should start tackling these common-resource issues straight on, one at a time.  Property-rights approaches are much more productive than intransigence, and there are many different fisheries to be addressed.

Can you guys start talking about solutions, and not simply positions?

I don't think it is really necessary to place property rights on whales. I don't see why the current system couldn't work just fine if the participants had the will.

And I'm not sure how property rights would work, anyway. For a start, we don't even know with precise accuracy how many whales there are. Who gets the rights anyway? To me it seems that not that many nations have a stake in a given stock of whales that they shouldn't simply be able to sit down and discuss a mutually satisfactory agreement.

I would note that "traditional, subsistence level" whaling is pretty hard to define given that in Alaska they apparently use some modern gear in their hunt (not to mention that the US is the richest country in the world so of course could ship food there if required), and in West Greenland you can find whale meat on supermarket shelves. I don't know exactly where the line between this and Japanese coastal whaling ambitions is, but what I do know is that we should not automatically assume that whatever we do classify as "aboriginal subsistence" whaling, is exempt from proper conservation considerations. I would never support an ongoing bowhead hunt by the Alaskas were it to become apparent that say climate change meant that such a hunt was no longer sustainable.

We have indeed seen species go extinct in the past, even with traditional methods - the New Zealand Moa bird is just one such tragic case (boy would I love to have seen one of those things walking around...). Modern technology does provide us with greater capacity to do damage, but this does not mean we must use it. On the contrary I see modern technology as a positive because it means that we can achieve faster killing than has been possible in the past. So long as we recognise that those "resources" are not infinite...

> Also, of course baleen whales, which are the ones taken, largely eat krill, not fish.

Just out of curiosity, how much fish do they eat, and which species, and in which locations? Would love to read some research about this.

> Can you guys start talking about solutions, and not simply positions?

The USA has already started talking about solutions, working within the current framework. I doubt there would be much political will to throw away everything the IWC does have and start all over again. The problem is that the IWC only gets together once a year (and in fact they've been talking about only doing it bi-annually as well).

Let me elaborate on the concept of our conceited notion that we are 'super-natural': animals do not give other animals individual rights. If an animal, such as a mountain lion sees another animal, such as a deer, it does not concern itself with its individuality, it sees it as dinner or, if it is too full to chase it, as Deer, one of the individuals within the species of deer, otherwise indistinguishable from other individuals and hopefully eaten by the puma at some point. Vice-versa, deer would see the puma as a Puma, a predator to be avoided.

By suggesting that we view individuals of other species as individuals rather than as a representative of the species, we are in fact skirting our own natural instinct to lump things into groups or species. By suggesting that we should be worried about individuals, we are in fact using the very quality that was afforded to us by our strictly liberal individualistic society that led to suburban sprawl and car use. Here, we are attempting to use it on Nature, something that does not 'care' about individual animals. Well, in all honesty it doesn't 'care' about species either, since it is an abstract thought, but species matter within food webs, which is somewhat of a proxy for 'Nature' and its 'care'.

I have to run, but I will elaborate some more in the future.

When we talk about resources, we talk about Nature as something extrinsic to us, as well as when we talk about individual animal rights. We look at it from the almighty throne of the conqueror or ruler who is now trying to decide whether or not to be benevolent or pragmatic. There is a definite loss of connection for what we were or still are: an animal who became extremely good at communicating and rationalizing, but still an animal. What we need to do as a species is to attempt to reconnect with 'Nature', not as a hiker, or a supporter of organic agriculture, or what have you; but in a way that would make us understand that we have it within us, Nature as an intrinsic part of our own animality.

That is my argument behind the 'sustainable environmentalists' vs. 'animal rightists'. We, the sustainable environmentalists, cannot and probably should not, in good conscience suggest that killing an individual animal is wrong, because it would deny us our roots and thus OUR Nature. We did not evolve as vegans, otherwise we would look much more like gorillas, with their large frames and huge bellies capable of handling roughage. We evolved as hunters, whale meat included, and while whale meat is not a part of my cultural or evolutionary heritage, it is wrong to deny this heritage to the people who eat and hunt whales, either through animal rights or through unsustainable harvesting.

My apologies on being off the topic of economics.

Baleen whales eat a variety of small animals, including krill or other crustaceans, perhaps small squid, and, yes, small fish too.  For example, at the Stellwagen Bank, north of Cape Cod, the sand lance is a favorite food of the humpbacks and other whales that visit it.  And, yes, very many of them are eaten.  Pretty much any small animal that is found together in large numbers may become prey, apparently.

Orcas, of course, the largest of the dolphins, kill many kinds of marine animals, including mammals, most notably pinnipeds and whales.

But most supporters of animal rights do not find it sensible to become involved in the natural predator/prey relationships, and to prefer an animal that might be killed to the animal that might kill it.

Nor does size matter.  I had never heard that suggestion before.

It may be fair to say that most supporters of animal rights ideally would prefer a rather laissez-faire attitude toward wildlife, hoping to keep intrusions of human beings into the lives of wild animals at a minimum.  Probably, though, there are some who accept a need for active conservation measures in certain circumstances.

I am not sure how that relates to ATreyger's interesting but not wholly expressed suggestion.  I hope he finds the time to write it out more fully.

It is certainly true that "traditional," pre-industrial techniques of killing animals, used by "aboriginal" peoples, do not automatically translate into a wise, balanced conservation of those animals.  What happened to the moa is a good example.  But since island ecologies are special in certain ways, I am not sure the pressures exerted by the Maori are quite analogous to the pressures exerted by Arctic and Sub-Arctic peoples on whales and other marine mammals.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

I think I understand what you mean, and appreciate it.

It should be generally understood that "animal rightists" are most certainly not a univocal group, with no disagreements or differences in emphasis -- regardless of what one may have heard from PETA, or anyone else.  Ethicists who are concerned about animal rights approach the subject in different ways.  Mostly, we seek to determine what are the responsibilities of human beings toward animals in general, and then, more discriminatingly, toward different kinds of animals.  As with any other serious philosophical subject, it is foolish to expect there to be universal agreement.

I expect there is also a variety of opinions among environmentalists who are especially concerned with preserving biodiversity.  It would not be at all surprising if many of them became passionately involved in this field as the result of a personal affection for certain individual animals or groups of animals.  And it would not be surprising if the activism of many of them is focused on the welfare of individual animals.

The term "sustainable environmentalists" I am unfamiliar with.  If it means that those environmentalists believe that in certain circumstances, it is morally acceptable, even desirable, to go out and kill animals, then they are scarcely better or more enlightened than Dick Cheney on one of his bird hunts.

A concern for animal rights does indeed separate human beings, as moral agents, from non-human animals.  But there is nothing monarchical or autocratic about that.  It is quite appropriate to our "Nature" as human beings, to be concerned about issues of justice, and the rights of those who deserve our sympathy.  We are undeniably interested in such issues regarding our fellow human beings; and according to most people, it seems safe to say, it would be wrong of us if we were not interested in those things.

Or, would you suggest that it is our "Nature" to be competitive, therefore it is disgracefully intrusive for anyone to try to stop me from murdering someone I am competing against?

All that the ethicists who defend animal rights are saying, is that there is no clear reason why we should limit our concerns about justice and rights to members of our own species, when obviously so many other animals have interests and feelings of their own.  Once we acknowledge the interests and sentience of animals, even if we cannot quite understand them, to deny those animals the consideration that they deserve is morally equivalent to believing some such rejected and obsolete idea as that Europeans may morally enslave Africans.

Human beings evolve, naturally.  And, being social beings, with memories, we have history.  We can become disappointed with a certain way of being, and leave it behind.  We have done that many times.  We are not stuck in a cruel "Nature."

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

Anyone who's interested in a full explanation of this issue should read Gary Francione's Animals, Property, and the Law.

Because it completely ignores the interests of one group of people. And when you ignore the interests of one group of people, they get angry, and bad stuff may happen.

We don't want bad stuff to happen.

We need to find "middle ground".

> That would work fine for most of us.

Unfortunately this isn't a democracy. In a democracy, if your government changes and you think they are crap, you can move overseas where the government is more to your liking. This is indeed a great luxury, and at the same time, a fine thing, because it allows people with similar ideas to gather together and live happily.

It doesn't work internationally without consensus, because if various groups disagree (and they do in this case) they can't shift off to Mars.

So what do you do?

You either persist with enforcing your views on those groups and make them angry, or you compromise by finding some common ground.

In this modern world we live in, which approach is more appropriate?

1. First off, while I strongly disagree with davidintokyo, I respect him because he is civil and backs up his case. The issues where I disagree with him are on core values that I cannot "prove"- but I know that it is people like him who I (we) eventually need to persuade. And since he is open to reason he is persuadable. Also, I have learned a lot from his responses so those who think these conversations are simply akin two intractable camps are wrong.

2. As to property rights as the solution I strongly disagree. I am all for property rights for CO2, sulfur dioxide, even forests and fisheries, but not for individual sentient creatures if those rights give people the right to do anything they want with those animals. The whole point of my argument is that some advanced animals deserve rights that are inviolate- that can't be bought and sold- that are not subject to a cost-benefit framework.

3. atreyger- with all due respect- I think your views don't make sense- to say that we can't care about individual animals because that then makes us separate from them and then that makes us apart from nature is bizarre and circular- are you telling pet owners that they can't care about their dogs and cats? Humans have certain capacities, which include empathy, compassion, and reason- I say that we MUST employ them in thinking about our roles and responsibilities in dealing with the natural world. To argue for anything else is in my view to deny what makes us who we are.

Would compromise between abolitionists and slavers involve the abolistionists' saying, "You cannot take back 500 slaves on your ship from West Africa, but 50 are OK"?  Would compromise between Nazis and defenders of the Jews involve the defenders' saying, "You cannot transport all 5000 Jews in this town to concentration camps, but 50 are OK"?

Woops, there I go again, indulging in a Holocaust reference, when I had been pointedly advised to stay away.  My bad.

OK, so delete the last two paragraphs.  But then, what could you possibly mean by "compromise," other than letting the whalers have their way?

Tokyo Tom's apparent solution, based apparently on human beings' acquiring all wildlife, and I guess all territory, within the scheme of "property rights," is way over my head.  But it sounds quite a bit more anthropocentric and inhumane than any demand of any "animal-rightsist," so I wonder why ATreyger has not leaped up in arms to protest.

The Too Long Voiceless Sharpless Andrew initially gave us data, before he fell silent, suggesting that whaling does not make economic sense.  I suppose that is the beginning of a solution, based on strict economic considerations.

I would propose an absolute moratorium on whaling -- not yet an absolute permanent ban -- , not based at all on economic considerations, and on the question of "sustainability," but rather on ethical considerations.  That is, the decision-making process would be rather like the way judges in the US, including the Supreme Court, treat such hugely controversial and polarizing social issues as abortion and capital punishment: the typical style is to await some perception of common popular sentiment.  So let the same thing come into play for whether it is OK to murder whales (woops, there I go yet again, another no-no).

The IWC's job should not be to examine whether whales can be "harvested" (or "collected," or "taken") "sustainably."  It should be to catalogue all the environmental pressures on whale populations, including whaling, but also pollution-related matters, global-warming-related matter, etc.  And next, it should be to publicize their findings in the media of all the IWC member-states.

And next, it should be to wait.  And wait.  Till it all sinks in.  And while the moratorium abides.

Meanwhile, both the whalers and the cetivores, on the one hand, and the whale-lovers, on the other, would have plenty of time to present their cases.

You should understand that from my perspective, this is a terrific compromise.  As a strong supporter of women's reproductive rights, I am heartily impatient with the Supreme Court's patience regarding what to do about legalized abortion.  As a strong opponent of the death penalty, I am heartily impatient with their patience on that matter too.

So, when I propose a moratorium on whaling, for such ethical reasons as these, I most definitely desire that the decision will go in one direction at the end.  But, in the spirit of compromise, I should patiently await the decision of the IWC's judges, and should obediently abide by it, once it is delivered.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

I think the answers to both questions are rather straight-forward.

A careful look at the problems in that concern us most in the relatinoship between man and our environment will show they all revolve around the question of whether there is a meaningful management regime in place.  Where there is no such regime, we have what Garrett Hardin famously wrote about forty years ago: a "tragedy of the commons".  I hope all commenters here are familiar with that term and what it implies.

We, like all other forms of like on the planet, use resources and other forms of life for our own benefit.  We differ in our intelligence and ability to use technology to manipulate and exploit our environment.  The result has been a continuing race of technologies and exploitation by mankind.  That exploitation is contained, managed and sustainable only where there are clear and enforceable private or common property rights.  Otherwise, those using the resource have disincentives to husbanding the resource as they cannot prevent others from taking it.

It may seem cold, but that's just the way things are.  In days and cases where the exploitation rate is very low, the absence of a property rights regime may be fine, until the point where technology allows a higher catch or the resource is discovered by the modern market, when use of the resource becomes a frenzied free or all, resulting in a resource crash - at which point even "subsistence" use may be too much.

That is exactly the case for the human explotation of whales and other fisheries.  These problems have been avoided for various animals that humans directly manage through ownership of the animals themselves or the property on which they dwell - which is why enviromentalists focus on the species that are not owned or managed.  (We can and should care about how we treat such animals, but at least we are not worried about their extinction from the environment.)  In other words, markets work fine, but only for resources that are owned or otherwise managed.

And why do we have fruitless fights over whales and other unowned animals?  Because when a management regime that clearly states each parties rights and responsibilities is not in place, parties have no way of acting on their preferences except through exploitation or in-your-face, political means.

David is right that it should be possible to agree to a management regime for whales.  The former whaling nations that agreed to the whaling moratorium have been unable to agree on a management scheme because of moral grandstanding by environmentalists have convinced the public in many nations that whaling is simply immoral, and politicians in those nations are unwilling to take the time to understand the issue or to explain to voters.  

This is more than sad, not only because there is plenty of room for both whaling and whale-watching, but also because we desperately need to move ahead to protect global fisheries, and solving the whale issue would be a good example.  If there was a sustainable regime agreed, the whalers themselves would be conservationists, with a vested interest in ensuring the survival of whales.  If this was in the form of a transferrable property rights regime, then environmentalists would also be able to directly express their preferences, by acquiring interests in particular whales or whaling companies, and by reaching deals with whalers over when and where whales would be harvested.  Instead, we simply have a useless and overheated war of words, of the type exemplified here: http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/001114.html

On whales and other issues, we should recognize the common interests that resource users and conservationist have, and use the levers of governments to halt resource abuse and to accelerate the creation of meaningful managment regimes.

We are already moving in this direction in the case of domestic fisheries, by creating individual transferrable quotas (ITQs) in fisheries following the example of New Zealand and other countries.  More on fisheries is here:  http://www.reason.com/news/show/36839.html
http://www.reason.com/news/show/34998.html.

More on "property rights" analysis of resource management generally is here: http://encyclo.findlaw.com/2000book.pdf.

David, the case of moas is a classic case of the introduction of exotic species (us) to island ecosystems.  They were vulnerable, as well as extremely difficult to establish property rights in.  Did you hear of the reports of sightings in the 90s?  http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/VA-news/VA-Pilot/issues/1995/vp....  An interesting connection here is that the same David Inwood seems to be the David Inwood who is quoted on the blog post linked above and who is the chief PR representative of Japan's pro-whaling fisheries ministry!

Regards,

Tom

Well, I care about animal abuse too, but prefer to focus my enegies on making sure that we don't wipe out the world's wildlife first.  To avoid doing that, we need to focus on creating management regimes, i.e., private or common property rights.

Any such animals in the US or Japan are protected because someone owns them and is willing to defend them; in open-access regimes, NOBODY owns or protects them, and a unilateral grant by you or anyone else to such animals of "rights" are only as meaningful as the ability of you or the other lawgiver to actually defend the animals you speak of - at which point you will essentially have created meaningful property rights.

We are starting to see successful conservation of wildlife in Africa and other places where communities that otherwise would simply kill wild resources are acknowledged to have protectable rights in such resources, at which point local communities have started to protect and defend (and harvest) such resources.

Personally, I am basically with atreyger, but see alot of room to agree with caniscandida.  Humans evolved as scavengers and carnivores, not as strict vegetarians.  But as atreyger says:  "What we need to do as a species is to attempt to reconnect with 'Nature', not as a hiker, or a supporter of organic agriculture, or what have you; but in a way that would make us understand that we have it within us, Nature as an intrinsic part of our own animality."  One of the real problems with modern, industrialized animal husbandry is that it has further separated and alienated us from nature, a nature of which we are a part.

But I also agree with what cc says here:  "A concern for animal rights does indeed separate human beings, as moral agents, from non-human animals.  ...  It is quite appropriate to our "Nature" as human beings, to be concerned about issues of justice, and the rights of those who deserve our sympathy."  I agree that it is part of our nature to be considerate of other life, of all kinds, including of course the ones that resemble us the most.  (However, cc speaks too broadly, since this seems to be a trait shared by other sentient animals in their dealings with us.)  It is for this reason that the abuses in modern animal husbandry bother many of us.

I recognize that a focus on property rights seems to do damage to our already imbalanced view of our role in nature.  But it does not inherently do so.  We can have state and national parks, international biosphere reserves as well as private conservancies that protect natural resources and wildlife; these are all areas that are protected by property rights.  We also have to recognize that the sheer size of the human population and our advancing technologies continue to put pressure on wildlife and natural ecosystems.  We have to recognize that they only way we control our onslaught on nature is by trying to create clear rights and enforcement mechanisms with respect to that which remains.  Only then will it be protected.  My leaning would be to try to put property rights into the hands of those who most rely on the respective resource for their livelihood.

Putting property right in the hands of those who rely on it for their livelihood...let's see, that gave us the overgrazed ranchland of the American West (at least the part of it that is privately owned--and even the publicly-owned lands are leased for a fee, albeit nominal), untold numbers of Superfund sites (because apparently ownership isn't enough to keep companies from walking away when they can't clean up the mess they've made of their private property), factory farming, etc.  Yes, there are problems with shared responsibility becoming no responsibility, but I'm not a big believer in the property owner as a source of proper property management.

I still find it amazing that people look to human evolution as somehow some arbiter of what we should and shouldn't do- we also evolved to butcher each other, rape each other, and enslave each other- and also to think- these "naturalistic" justifications for barbarity need to be forever thrown into the dustbin of history where they belong.

Finally, your view that my moral arguments carry no weight is not only wrong but misguided. There are many laws on the books in many countries that stem directly from moral reasoning governing our obligation to advanced mammals- animal cruelty statutes etc.- and it will be these type of arguments that ultimately prevail in the long-run. Remember, I am an economist who spends most of his days working on all of the "practical"/"real-world" issues you mention- but they are not enough nor are they mutually exclusive.

We could have sustainability and still have a despicable and cruel world.

J.S.

J.S. htt://voicesofreason.info

From the Libertarian Party platform (and who could be a stronger advocate of property rights) ...

Only individuals and private entities have the full right to control, use, dispose of, or in any manner enjoy their property without interference, until and unless the exercise of their control infringes on the valid rights of others. Resource management and planning are the responsibility and right of the legitimate owners of land, water and other natural resources. Individuals have the right to homestead unowned resources, both within the jurisdictions of governments and within such unclaimed territory as the ocean, Antarctica and extraterrestrial bodies.

From Wikipedia (I do not have time to track down the original research)...

Whale fall is the term used for a whale carcass that has fallen to the ocean floor. When a whale dies in shallow water, its carcass is typically devoured by scavengers over a relatively short period of time - within several months. However, in deeper water (depths of 2000m or greater), fewer scavenger species exist, and the carcass can provide sustenance for a complex localized ecosystem over periods of decades or even centuries.
Some of the organisms that have been observed at whale falls are lobsters, Osedax, crabs, sea cucumbers, octopuses, clams, and even deep-sea sleeper sharks. Whale falls are often inhabited by large colonies of tubeworms. Over 15 previously unknown species have been discovered at whale falls.

A whale fall was first observed by marine biologists in 1987, discovered by chance by the submersible Alvin. Whale falls have since been found by other scientists, and by military submarines. They can be found by using side-scan sonar to examine the ocean floor for large aggregations of matter.

Marine biologists sometimes transport dead whales that have washed up on coastlines, towing them offshore to create a whale fall at a known location that can then be studied over a long period of time.

Some scientists speculate that certain deep-sea species may use whale falls as stepping-stones to extend their range and colonize other ecosystems, such as hydrothermal vents and cold seeps. Given that whale deaths occur at locations that are largely random, carcasses are believed to exist at many locations on the seabed, with average spacings estimated at 25 km.

Similar ecosystems exist when other large volumes of nutrient-rich material fall to the sea floor. Sunken beds of kelp create kelp falls, and large trees can sink to create wood falls.

My conclusion...

Exercising full property rights over whales, which would include the right to harvest them to the point of extinction if the owner considered economically useful, would severely infringe on the valid rights of others.

I cannot see how property rights can extend to the point of being able to destroy the foundation of ecosystem that supports other people's interests. The commons... in my opinion, resources that move or migrate across physical property boundaries.. must be subject to governance by the community. Otherwise the entire natural world goes to the person who can harvest and consume it the fastest. And this is not a long-term survival advantage for that individual's descendents or the community.

Some property right advocates might argue that the science is still fuzzy so we cannot consider whale part of the commons. But given that so many people might be affected, I think the CONSERVATIVE approach would be to not harvest whales, act to increase their numbers to pre-industrial levels, and further research their roles in ecosystems, especially fisheries biology. When information suggests it is okay to harvest whales, we can then debate the morality of it. I, of course, hope we will recognize their intelligence and the vast majority of people will protect them from human predation.

I think one of the points that I was trying to make regarding our 'Nature' is not so much that we should go out and kill as many animals as we can, rather it is in our evolutionary and cultural heritage to eat meat as well as plant materials. If we try to get away from that Nature through technological advances by using fermentation to achieve receiving the necessary B vitamins, then maybe that is a part of our evolutionary saga. But, the question remains: is that a prudent direction? One way to 'end' this is to look at the REALIZED reproductive and survival potential of both groups of humans: whether the vegans or the meat-eaters have more babies and how many of them survive. It is irrelevant if the vegans choose not to have as many children, it only matters whether or not they do. That is the ultimate evolutionary 'solution' to this question. Of course it may very well change with different food availabilities, but that's not something we can model. I do have a strong suspicion that when there is a pressure for food, vegans will convert to eating meat, or risk dying (and if they choose that path; well, they will be moronic and an evolutionary dead-end).

Anyhow, one of the fallacies of economics and most other current social trends is that they have only been shaped to the way they are now in the past hundred years or less. It boggles my mind when people dismiss our evolutionary and cultural history just because we are 'modern'. Our modern selves exist because of our past selves, and while we will have an important impact on future generations, our current state is mired in thousands upon millions years of our own evolution. Another factor that I find curious is the attempt by a culture that is in no way its own (American) to impose its beliefs and systems on cultures that are... That's exactly why the Iraqis met us as liberators and love us to death. Hah! Get it? An attempt to impose a vegan belief system on meat-eaters is tantamount to an invasion of a cultural system and will not work.

I actually was vegetarian for a number of years, close to four or so. Eventually I caved... No, I changed my mind, because it stopped making sense to me. We cannot eat grass or tree leaves, therefore we should eat something that can convert it to something we can eat. That is the basic reason for why we could and should eat grass-fed beef. I know I said that before, but it hasn't changed.

Getting back to whales: they are not human, they eat zooplankton, krill, and small fish fry. We could eat those minus the plankters, but we are already overharvesting those, so by going straight to the source we would be outcompeting whales anyhow. To suggest that we should not eat those is to transfer that pressure onto some other 'resource'. Further krill and fish fry are more diffuse and more costly to retrieve energetically. I do believe that's why humans started killing whales way before they got to the krill. I'm running out of steam for the wise use part of the discussion, because it has been eloquently covered by many others in this thread (TokyoTom, davidintokyo, etc.) By the way, do you guys know each other?

1. whale meat is barely eaten for survival- it's eaten out of luxury by some of the richest nations on the planet so i don't get your point

2. whales are tortured when they are killed- after they are shot with grenade-tipped harpoons they are dragged by the harpoon and drowned.

3. vegetarians not only live longer, but are healthier, and require much less resources so i don't understand your other points either

Thanks, ATreyger, for your excellent concluding point about torture.

Before that, you wrote:
<<
It may be a good idea to have respect for them or empathy for them or not want to kill them, but not a good idea to give them the same rights, simply because they would not give us the same rights as to a member of their own species.
>>

I do not think the argument from the possibility of reprocity works here.  Superficially it sounds fair, I guess.  But in fact we do not accord people rights on the basis of presuming that they will return the favor.  However, it is generally accepted that people who are weak and vulnerable have certain rights, and can make certain demands of those who have them in their power, even if they will never be in a position of power themselves.

If I may make yet another potentially inflammatory political analogy, many observers, both in the US and around the world, think that the Bush administration is violating the rights of those held captive in Guantanamo, in a number of ways.  Now, very possibly those captives include people who could be described as "enemy combatants," or "terrorists," or "jihadists," or "Islamofascists," and who would no more respect our rights than the 9/11 hijackers respected the rights of the people at the World Trade Center.  Nevertheless, it is of terrific importance to us as moral beings that we acknowledge that they do indeed have rights, and that we respect those rights.

Willa returns us to principal, fundamental observation: Many kinds of animals are capable of suffering.  We are more powerful than they.  Therefore, we have certain responsibilities toward them regarding their welfare.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

That would easily apply to predators, but not prey. Nature does not follow human institutions; it has its own order. Attempting to assign human institutions and rules to what happens in food webs, which we are still a part of, is absolutely futile. Killing prey is not violating their rights, for the simple reason that we all die. By letting them die a natural death, we could be doing a great disservice to the ecosystem, which is dependent on continuous hunting pressure for the prey. Whales are different, and since I have no stake in the discussion outside of suggesting that by not allowing Icelanders to whale, we are doing a disservice to their cultural and evolutionary heritage.

For J.S.:
'whale meat is barely eaten for survival- it's eaten out of luxury by some of the richest nations on the planet so i don't get your point'
- Let's substitute: 'Carrots are barely eaten for survival -they're eaten out of luxury by some of the richest nations on the planet'.
Umm, that works, does that make you want to stop eating them? It is a bit of a strawman, but so is your statement, since I was not even really suggesting that whale steaks are eaten for survival. Merely, that as omnivores, we continue to survive on a ration of mixed foods.

'whales are tortured when they are killed- after they are shot with grenade-tipped harpoons they are dragged by the harpoon and drowned.'

- I have no specific knowledge of this, however, I would assume that natives using relatively weak guns or old-style harpoons are making these animals suffer a hell of a lot more. Plus, no death will ever be absolutely painless, but the quickest way is definitely the best.

'vegetarians not only live longer, but are healthier, and require much less resources so i don't understand your other points either'

- I am not arguing against the decreased resource use,which I am for, merely evolutionary advantages that are conferred through vegetarianism. Does the relative seclusion (cultural) from the rest of the gene pool create more opportunities for vegetarians to have more children or less? Do the vegetarians actually have more children or less? And do the children survive at higher rates or less? I do not know the answers, I am just pointing out the fallacy of assuming that just because we feel a certain way means that we are evolving in that direction. So far we have evolved as omnivores, and I do not see any particular reason for why we should stop being just that: I do see a problem with the amount of meat eaten, that's why I do not eat much meat.

I would like to point out that neither of you responded about imposing your belief system or your 'solution' on cultures and people that are not satisfied with your belief system or your solution. I would like to see some response to that.

1. You are as much imposing your beliefs (or trying to) as I am. You want your belief that it is ok to kill whales to be the norm. I want another. So yes, we are both advocating beliefs- don't fall into the trap that just because yours is the status quo it is somehow objective and not a value- I wrote a piece on this a few weeks ago. As to the specifics of imposing- I am trying to persuade people that my views are more ethical and will result in a better world- I am not imposing them on anyone. Last I checked, reasoned discussion did not pass as imposition.

2. There are some instances where I do encourage imposing beliegs on others. Human rights are inviolate and I have no problem at all imposing the view that rape if wrong, that beating women is wrong, that slavery is wrong, and I believe those who hide behind "cultural" rationalizations are unethical and cowardly. I have also written extensively about this at my website http://voiceosfreason.info. How to guarantee universal human rights is difficult, but for example, I think we have a moral obligation to overthrow the Sudanese regime and protect the people of Darfur- I have no problem saying that loud and clear.

1. Eating carrots is a luxury, true, but not one that involves torturing a sentient being, robbing it of its life, and destroying its family- that's the difference- I hope you can see that.

2. Your view that somehow vegetarians restrict their access to the gene pool is bizarre- all of my vegetarian friends are doing just fine in the social world out there- no less so than anyone else- so don't worry about us- we'll be the last ones standing I guarantee.

1. I am not trying to impose a belief, I am explaining my position in terms of our evolutionary heritage.

2. Imposing your belief will not work unless you can reach out and educate the people and change the culture rather than the symptom of it. Whales notwithstanding, you cannot change many appearances of an Islamic or Christian or cannibal culture without changing the culture.

1. Robbing it of its family is a pretty good way to think about it: but are you not robbing a kitten of its family when you take it into a home? I am not against your position, I just disagree with the assessment that we are inherently the same as whales (not better, just different). Whales eat fish who are also sentient, but there are so many of them, they're slippery and definitely not pretty, so that no animal rights activist is behind the save the individual sardine campaign. I wonder why. In the same time from a sustainability perspective, one sardine is much more sustainable than one whale.

2. Vegetarians do not 'restrict' their own gene pool. But there is an incentive to be with other vegetarians, think of all those pain in the ass moments when all your friends are going to a steakhouse. If you do not have friends that go to steakhouses, case in point. And if you do, then you become restricted socially when you cannot or do not want to go to one.

1. So people who don't like ice cream are restricting themselves because they don't like going to ice cream parlors? and people who don't like opera... and....

2. Can you tell me where I said:

I don't recall ever saying something absurd like that.

J.S.

I teach environmental economics and blog at www.voicesofreason.info.

The IWC's Scientific Commitee can today provide advice on sustainable catch limits. Over a number of years following the IWC's commercial whaling moratorium, they developed a "Revised Management Procedure". Instead of me telling you about it, I'll let members of the Committee who were involved in it's development explain:

1) American statistician Judy Zeh talking to Australia's ABC a few years ago when she was Chair of the IWC Scientific Committee:
"it's certainly true that if commercial whaling were resumed under the revised management procedure, it could be managed safely"
(http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/stories/s147657.htm)

2) Greg Donovan, Head of Science at the IWC, commenting on the RMP earlier this year:
"From a scientific perspective, the IWC Scientific Committee has developed probably the most rigorously tested way to estimate safe catch levels for any marine species."
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5103378.stm)

3) Dr Doug Butterworth (well-known fisheries management scientist) on the RMP:
"it is so risk averse that the only real scientific basis for questioning its immediate implementation is that it is so conservative that it will waste much of a potential harvest."
(http://www.highnorth.no/Library/Management_Regimes/NAMMCO...)

-----

So, this is why people are talking about the morality of whaling now.

Thanks Jason - the feeling is very mutual. You are probably the most rational of all the anti-whalers I have ever discussed this with. Your reasons are consistent. I guess this is why it makes it easy for me to accept that we have to disagree for the time being.

Sure, but what is the realistic alternative?

You can't always get what you want.

The situation is that indeed as you say, whalers are going to kill whales without some people object to it or not. Damn. We can get all down and gloomy about it (well, not me, but those opposed to whaling), or we can at least try to make the best of a bad situation.

This clearly means that we should meet the whalers half way. They are going to kill whales. Let's at least try to bring this under international control via the International Whaling Commission, and make a start with these people. Once we've ensured that their whaling will at least be sustainable, then having bought ourselves this insurance, continue with the moral arguments.

> what could you possibly mean by "compromise," other than letting the whalers have their way?

Everyone wants whaling to be sustainable, at the very minimum. Why not at least get this guarantee for starters?

> suggesting that whaling does not make economic sense.

I very much disagree with Andrew. I think commercial whaling on a sustainable basis could make economic sense, especially in Japan's case.

They are interested in harvesting whales in both the southern and northern hemispheres which will keep their capital at work for most of the year. Iceland and Norwegian whalers on the other hand only catch whales in season in their coastal waters, although at least in Norway's case their whaling vessels are used in other fisheries for the rest of the year, I believe.

> I would propose an absolute moratorium on whaling

That's not a solution, because the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling allows for
a) whaling for scientific purposes
b) nations to object to decisions that they don't accept as being justified.

We need to work within the bounds of the ICRW, or otherwise work to destroy the ICRW (which seems implausible to me).

> The IWC's job should not be to examine whether whales can be "harvested" (or "collected," or "taken") "sustainably."  

The reality is that conservation and whaling regulation are the IWC's purpose, and you can't change it. If you want a whale saving organization you'll have to start a new one. The IWC's convention can't just be rewritten at will, as much as the anti-whaling nations would like to be able to do that.

   While all of the arguments against killing whales are lovely, what makes us think that a species that is willing to kill so many of it's own members will be moved by them?

patrick

That moratorium is no longer justified on a commercial basis for many whale species, which a controlled hunt would not endanger.  But resumption of any harvest is blocked because certain nations no longer wish to hunt, and the argument over what to do has become counterproductively political.  All sides bear responsibility for this deadlock, which is a big waste of our precious time, which would be better spent on finding sustainable paths forward that recognize the interests of all - both in whales and in international fisheries that are crashing everywhere.  Assigning quotas to nations in the form of ITQs is the way past.  More on ITQs is here:  http://www.ifqsforfisheries.org/index.php

Don't get me wrong; human nature and evolution don't dictate our behavior.  Rather, I simply suggest that an understanding of that nature is indispensible in making practical decisions about what policies may be desirable and feasible.

And I have no problem with "moral arguments"; in fact that is precisely what I present.  At the core of morality lie decisions about relative priorities and the recognition that one "good" may often be achieved only at the cost of another.  My own view is that some of your positions founder on this question of balance.

wiscidea:  I agree broadly with your statement that "resources that move or migrate across physical property boundaries.. must be subject to governance by the community. Otherwise the entire natural world goes to the person who can harvest and consume it the fastest. And this is not a long-term survival advantage for that individual's descendents or the community."  

This is exactly the problem that I see now underway for "open-access" resources, and for which I am seeking solutions.  Yes, we urgently need "community" governance.  

The problem in the case of whales is that, besides the initial moratorium, there is no governance and the process is simply frozen.  Instead of the parties agreeing to solutions that would turn whalers into conservationists, the anti-whaling countries are being intransigent because Western leaders find it more advantageous to grandstand to an uninformed public than to invest in finding a solution.  Whaling nations such as Japan also stupidly assert very absurd arguments in favor of their case - and are actually subsidizing the killing of whales just out of a desire to save face!  There is NO private interst involved in whaling.  The result is simply a waste of emotion and energy on both sides.  If whalers AND conservationists both owned rights to whales, there would instantly be much greater mutual cooperation.

madmermaids:  Yes, whales are great to watch and Iceland has a great whale watching tourism industry.  Why can't whale-watching coexist with whaling?  Practices in Africa, US and elsewhere show that conservation and wildlife viewing both benefit when communities and individual property owners have defendable rights to hunt (and stop poaching) on their lands.

david: "Once we've ensured that their whaling will at least be sustainable, then having bought ourselves this insurance, continue with the moral arguments."  You are actually aiming far too low.  We could eliminate most of the moral arguments simply by creating transferrable "take" rights in the whales, and allocating the rights equally to the anti-whaling countries that are party to the IWC - who have just as much a claim to the whales as those who want to kill them.  Then both sides will have opportunities and reasons to make deals with each other - or even to buy each other out.  Right now, the all anyone can do is to defend one's own moral high ground and to demonize the others.

As I keep saying, we've got bigger problems to solve, and really already know the solution to this.  Dealing productively with whales would be a great way to build good will and experience to impose meaningful international regimes on open-access wildlife and resources, and stop the mad slaughter of the commons that still continues willy nilly.

And yes, I understand your point about the internationally agreed-upon purpose of the IWC, a regrettable one, in my opinion, involving the toleration of "whaling for scientific purposes."  I would indeed prefer that the IWC be reformed, or superseded.  But of course I understand that that is not likely to happen.  Indeed, inasmuch as it currently seems to have entered a period of reform, the reform is taking it in the wrong direction.

Whale-saving organizations already exist, after a fashion, such as Greenpeace and Oceana and their allies and fellow travelers.  But they are NGOs, sometimes effective, sometimes not.  Whether their memberships are growing significantly, I would not know.  On the other hand, to create an international, government-supported whale-saving organization would take some doing.

(Anyway, among supporters of animal rights, opposition to whaling is indeed considered a worthy cause, but opposition to factory farms is much more urgent, involving the suffering and death of countless more animals -- and yet we have so far failed to put together a decent movement.)

So, let us be clear, David in Tokyo.  From all evidence that I have seen, your side is winning.  Nay, you have won.  Your agenda, in contributing as you have been doing so earnestly to the various threads of Jason and Andrew, lasting weeks and months, is -- what?  Just to persuade some environmentalists that the "sustainable" killing of whales is compatible with their concern for biodiversity and the conservation of endangered species?  OK; but have you in fact persuaded anybody?  Is it not rather the case that pretty much everyone who reads Gristmill and writes to it knows where he or she stands?  Or do you think you have "educated" lurkers, and swayed them in your direction?

You write:
<<
Everyone wants whaling to be sustainable, at the very minimum. Why not at least get this guarantee for starters?
>>

That is not credible.  "Everyone" is a lot of people, including both certain types who would gobble up every bit of biomass on the planet with no reluctance or remorse, and others who think whaling is an evil and should not exist.

So is tolerating "sustainable whaling" truly "making the best of a bad situation"?

Well, as I observed before, you all have won already.  So go for it.  :(

Meanwhile, though, Andrew, Jason, Willa, and others will surely continue protesting.  And that is the way it should be.  The founding documents of the United States explicitly accept the institution of slavery.  Once they were written and promulgated, however, after many decades of bitterness and mistrust, and after a very bloody civil war, at last that evil was exorcised.  And it was in no small part thanks to the words of abolitionist writers and speakers and preachers.  Andrew, Jason, Willa and their allies are in that noble tradition.  And, David in Tokyo, you are just going to have to accept that as an inevitable reality, as much as I am having to accept your friends the Japanese whalers slaughtering whales.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

Jason has already given a good answer to the question that you posed at the end of your 8:49 PM 01 Nov message.  It is a difficult subject, to be sure.  But why does it not matter to you that my belief system is violated by the whaling regime?  And, by the way, but analogously, what do you think of "female circumcision"/genital mutilation performed on girls in many African countries?  Are we Euro-Americans unjustly imposing our belief systems if we try to condemn and prevent such activity?

On Guantanamo: Well, you did not get my point, and I do not want to spin this out into a political digression.  So, more simply: when someone is captured and imprisoned, he is rendered weak, vulnerable and powerless.  In the Anglo-American tradition, even if that person, arrested by the police on suspicion of murder, is truly a murderer, he/she has certain rights, among which are: the right to hear the charge brought against him; the right to have legal representation; the right to be confronted by his accuser.  In international law, enriched by the Hague and Geneva conventions, prisoners of war have the right to sanitary accommodations, and the interrogation of them is very restricted.  My point is, in our civilization, even people who might do us harm