Well, that's one worry out of the way - I can make it to and from volunteering and my next two shifts.
I don't feel entirely good about this. Diesel is hardly environmentally friendly - and not just the fumes released by my car when I drive. Finding oil fields have a hugely detrimental impact. Apparently, they use these loud... things... to try to measure what's under the sea. And the sound fucks up everything from scallops to whales and everything in between. Seems it causes genetic malfunctions, deafness, inability to hunt and more.
The whale thing... sperm whales communicate who they are by clan, family and individual. If a whale is in distress, they will call to other sperm whales in a wide vicinity to help. But at the same time, whales preferentially socialise with some others but not all - and don't tend to interact with members of other clans. They have complex, embedded relationships and culture. When one whale dies, it is not just a case that now there are 2999 whales instead of 3000: an individual with certain knowledge and relationships has gone.
There's a story about a group of wolves in Alaska who learnt that to catch mountain sheep they had to start the chase from above the sheep because the sheep could climb better and escape if they fled upwards. This was one pack that figured this out. When the older members of the pack were killed, the young who didn't know this trick never caught another sheep.
As we decimate the families of other species, we do something similar to burning the library of Alexandria. We destroy their knowledge as well as the animals themselves.
I do think that I must focus on relationships and culture...
Comments