Shark Week

7 Aug 2013

Quote by slipperywhenwet2012

I'm a marine biologist and I approve this message.

Not really.

obviously, my understanding of sharks outweighs yours due to my credentials. smile

You can’t truly call yourself peaceful unless you are capable of violence. If you’re not capable of violence, you’re not peaceful. You’re harmless.

7 Aug 2013

Quote by sprite

obviously, my understanding of sharks outweighs yours due to my credentials.

In all actuality, sharks are quite misunderstood. They're predatory, but not ALWAYS aggressive. They attack when they're hungry or when they feel threatened. Of course sometimes it's just because they're sharks and they can do whatever the fuck they want. But they generally don't go around looking to fuck shit up.

Actually, dolphins are bigger assholes than sharks. They often practice gang-like behavior. And can be extremely territorial. They're so smart, and they fuck shit up purely for amusement.

"What is the quality of your intent?" - Thurgood Marshall

7 Aug 2013

Quote by slipperywhenwet2012

Dude I saw that. It was pretty fucking intense. I know it's important to conquer your fears, but fuck swimming in open water after attacks like that. Even if the odds of an attack are slim with the odds of a second attack even slimmer, I just wouldn't.

Its like the guys who get struck by lightening multiple times and live through it. There is just something about their bodies that attracts it and you are seriously pressing your luck!

7 Aug 2013

Quote by slipperywhenwet2012

Actually, dolphins are bigger assholes than sharks. They often practice gang-like behavior. And can be extremely territorial. They're so smart, and they fuck shit up purely for amusement.

I remember reading that - about this bizarre dolphin gang- phenomenon or something along those lines. I was shocked because I've always seen them as playful and sweet. Or at least that's the media told me to believe. And about a million girls with fading dolphin tattoos on their ankles from the '80's and '90s' can't be wrong, right? geek

Most shark attacks can be explained away as something less than monstrous, but I do think they got a terribly bad rap from Jaws. Peter Benchley was actually devastated that his fictional novel had possibly been an underlying cause of the terror and miseducation fuelling the shark hunts over the past few decades and has always advocated their conservation.

Attacks are often due to mistaken identity of their favourite prey, younger sharks still learning what to eat and taking exploratory bites, or older/sick animals that are going for broke and trying to pick off a meal wherever they can get it as a last ditch effort to survive.

Having said that - I'll never swim at dawn or dusk in the ocean, and admittedly it does cross my mind at certain points when I'm in open water.

7 Aug 2013

Quote by Dancing_Doll

Most shark attacks can be explained away as something less than monstrous

I like to think of it this way...

7 Aug 2013

I don't think he enjoyed Shark Week, but at least he's not being an asshole about it...

He does have good taste in footwear though

Nothing to see here...

7 Aug 2013

Quote by Dancing_Doll

I remember reading that - about this bizarre dolphin gang- phenomenon or something along those lines. I was shocked because I've always seen them as playful and sweet. Or at least that's the media told me to believe. And about a million girls with fading dolphin tattoos on their ankles from the '80's and '90s' can't be wrong, right?

Most shark attacks can be explained away as something less than monstrous, but I do think they got a terribly bad rap from Jaws. Peter Benchley was actually devastated that his fictional novel had possibly been an underlying cause of the terror and miseducation fuelling the shark hunts over the past few decades and has always advocated their conservation.

Attacks are often due to mistaken identity of their favourite prey, younger sharks still learning what to eat and taking exploratory bites, or older/sick animals that are going for broke and trying to pick off a meal wherever they can get it as a last ditch effort to survive.

Having said that - I'll never swim at dawn or dusk in the ocean, and admittedly it does cross my mind at certain points when I'm in open water.

This is very true. Sharks aren't the heartless man-eating killers Hollywood made them out to be. Since 2006, there has averaged less than 1 death as a result of shark attack in the US each year. This is far less than the number of deaths each year as a result of attacks from Bears, Snakes and Alligators to name a few. Even animals considered very docile like Dogs, Deer, Horses and Cows (Yes,Cows) are responsible for more attack related deaths than sharks!

I do agree that they are potentially very dangerous creatures and care must be taken when in their domain. But they do not go out of there way to attack humans. And they do take things personal like the shark in Jaws either, HAHA!

7 Aug 2013

Quote by Dancing_Doll

I remember reading that - about this bizarre dolphin gang- phenomenon or something along those lines. I was shocked because I've always seen them as playful and sweet. Or at least that's the media told me to believe.

They are for the most part. But like I said, they're smart. The sweet ones are sweet, and the assholes are assholes. And they form cliques and fuck shit up. The dolphin thing is sort of a myth as far as humans go. But dolphin gangs have been known to isolate a female dolphin and lead her to a remote area of the sea and gang her. These are the 'gangs' that just go around to fuck shit up.

But it doesn't take away from the sweet and playful ones. Dolphins are naturally curious and are generally benevolent and amicable unless they don't feel like being that way. In which case, they'll either ignore you or pester you in non-friendly ways.

Sharks are different in that they don't become aggressive unless they feel a need to be. A non-hungry, non-threatened shark will swim right past you. It may circle you just to check you out, but if you pose no threat, it moves on. A non-threatened dolphin will pick on you if it feels like being a dick...like I said, they do it for amusement if nothing else.

"What is the quality of your intent?" - Thurgood Marshall

7 Aug 2013

to sum it all up, Dolphins are more like people. smile

You can’t truly call yourself peaceful unless you are capable of violence. If you’re not capable of violence, you’re not peaceful. You’re harmless.

7 Aug 2013

Quote by sprite
to sum it all up, Dolphins are more like people.

They're all like people, when you think about it. All animals have their unique personality traits that they may share with people.

"What is the quality of your intent?" - Thurgood Marshall

7 Aug 2013

Quote by sprite
i saw an ad for Sharknado the other day, and a mention that they are doing a sequel. it's not anything i'd watch, but you have to admit, the idea is interesting - a tornado of sharks. has anyone else seen it? is it worth watching for the cheese factor?

So, we actually managed to "watch" some of this. I was flipping through, looking for something not to watch so that I could go make dinner. I ended up on Syfy and it was on. OMG, it's sooooo bad. So bad that it's good, and then BAAAAD.

I seriously recommend *everyone* watch this movie as a drinking game. Drink every time a shark gets chainsawed.

Nutbag

Edit: Oh, the other thing I wanted to say is that I heard Discovery is getting lots of shit for their special on Megalodon, since it was pretty much all cgi'd fiction. My question is, how is this any different from the cgi fiction special on the dragon they found up in the Himalayas? Great fictitious documentary. Key word: FICTION.

7 Aug 2013

Quote by slipperywhenwet2012

They're all like people, when you think about it. All animals have their unique personality traits that they may share with people.

what about seaweed, tho? is it like people too? (for the record, i once got into an argument with seaweed, more of a debate, really, and it kicked my ass with logic... silly

)

You can’t truly call yourself peaceful unless you are capable of violence. If you’re not capable of violence, you’re not peaceful. You’re harmless.

7 Aug 2013

Quote by slipperywhenwet2012

They are for the most part. But like I said, they're smart. The sweet ones are sweet, and the assholes are assholes. And they form cliques and fuck shit up. The dolphin thing is sort of a myth as far as humans go. But dolphin gangs have been known to isolate a female dolphin and lead her to a remote area of the sea and gang her. These are the 'gangs' that just go around to fuck shit up.

But it doesn't take away from the sweet and playful ones. Dolphins are naturally curious and are generally benevolent and amicable unless they don't feel like being that way. In which case, they'll either ignore you or pester you in non-friendly ways.

Sharks are different in that they don't become aggressive unless they feel a need to be. A non-hungry, non-threatened shark will swim right past you. It may circle you just to check you out, but if you pose no threat, it moves on. A non-threatened dolphin will pick on you if it feels like being a dick...like I said, they do it for amusement if nothing else.

Can I ask - based on your profession - what is your opinion of the 'Swimming with the Dolphins' programs and even 'Shark Feeding' in the open ocean programs that are popular with tourists. Is captivity worth the educational component of getting people interested in ocean life and conservation or should it all be banned?

And - has anyone seen Blackfish or do they plan to see it?
http://blackfishmovie.com/about

7 Aug 2013

Quote by Dancing_Doll

Can I ask - based on your profession - what is your opinion of the 'Swimming with the Dolphins' programs and even 'Shark Feeding' in the open ocean programs that are popular with tourists. Is captivity worth the educational component of getting people interested in ocean life and conservation or should it all be banned?

And - has anyone seen Blackfish or do they plan to see it?
http://blackfishmovie.com/about

This is a bit difficult for me. I like anything that engages people with marine life because it helps them understand it. And people don't normally fear what they understand. With that being said, I don't like captivity unless it's a means of preservation in most cases. What I mean by that is there are ways to study marine animal behavior (well any animal behavior for that matter) without completely disrupting and invading their environments and sometimes without removing them from their environments. Hands down, the end always has to justify the means. Sometimes it does animals more harm than good to raise them in captivity and then release them into the wild, but I digress.

I think programs like this get to show people that sharks and dolphins aren't always what the media claims they are. For example, you mentioned that the media has always portrayed dolphins as these sweet, playful things, which they are for the most part. That's the image you've been fed since you've known about dolphins. That's the image I was fed about dolphins. I didn't know more until I experienced it.

Captivity is a double-edged sword. When used as a means of preservation, I'm all for it. The open ocean programs have my full support. As far as captivity goes, it depends on the facility. It also depends on how long they're held in captivity and when they're released. It depends on how they're treated. When you think about it, it's really no different than owning a pet. You take something out of its natural environment (the wild) and you take it into your home and you feed it and shelter it and may even clothe it if you're into that. But these programs go a bit further because you're learning the animals, and you're able to relay this information...and it keeps the conversation going. As long as the animals are treated humanely and handled properly, then it's fine, I think.

Also, programs like this can bring about awareness and engage people. When people hear of sharks being poached, they don't gasp as hard as they would if it were, say, a whale, because people have been fed the image of these vicious beings, when really they can be just as benevolent as well as dangerous as any other sea creature. The rows of teeth and the carnivorous appetite gives them the bad rep that they have. But on the other hand, people don't live in fear of killer whales because of movies like Free Willy and Sea World, where they see them jump through hoops.

As far as banning it goes, I would never want that. Not in cases where the ends justify the means. That stifles progress. Lack of understanding breeds fear. And fear leads to other things that we don't want. Re sharks. People don't feel as bad about unnecessary shark deaths because they're seen as vicious. Suppose we never discovered how smart dolphins and seals and penguins etc. could be? They could easily be seen the same way. So even in understanding animal behavior, we're protecting them.

"What is the quality of your intent?" - Thurgood Marshall

7 Aug 2013

That's good to hear - I don't feel so guilty now about swimming with the dolphins on vacation now. Embarassed

In this case it was a pretty spacious ocean-pen though and not one of those giant salt-water swimming pools. But still - thinking about it outside the 'wow, that was an amazing experience' factor, I had some doubts due to the idea of them living in captivity and having to play with starry-eyed humans all day and perform tricks.

What goes on at Sea World does bother me - not going to lie. I've heard and read about some rather upsetting stories, mostly involving the whales, which I think are far too large to be kept in the Sea World sized tanks. I'll be interested in seeing the movie Blackwater.

Re the sharks. There was an interesting show I watched a while ago about this rash of attacks in the Red Sea, just off Egypt. I think there was a week or two where they were averaging sometimes several a day within minutes apart along this resort strip. Most of the victims had chunks of their asses torn off (no, I'm not making that up. lol). Anyway - they narrowed down a possible culprit with some timely underwater pics from tourists to this one oceanic whitetip shark (they noticed it was the same one due to a fin anomaly) and there was concern that this shark was purposely attacking humans. As it turns out, one of the resorts had begun this daily tourist package that year to "feed the fishes and sharks" not too far away and the dive master's routine was that he would reach around and grab a fish from his fannypack and the shark would take it from his hand. So there was this theory that this shark that one of his regulars, who had begun attacking the tourists, had associated that area of the body with food. So it had begun chomping on the tourists' butts along the coast line. It was an interesting example of how our desire to interact with them can have negative consequences with learned behaviour - I guess not that different from the 'don't feed the bears or they'll stop being afraid of humans' rule.

7 Aug 2013

I should not have laughed at that as hard as I did.

Just goes to show how important it is to be careful in these situations. A safe environment needs to be created for all involved parties. Animals pick up on routine rather quickly. Changing it up would probably would have helped. Poor shark was just doing what he thought was right. kekekegay

"What is the quality of your intent?" - Thurgood Marshall

7 Aug 2013

Shark: Hey, Dolphins, can you please get off my lawn?

Dolphin 1: Fuck you puto!

Shark: I asked you nicely, please guys, this is a nice neighborhood.

Dolphin 2: What'choo tryin' to say homes? That we ain't nice? We can be real nice ey...

Dolphin 3: Yeah, real nice vato, we loving. You gon' get some love from all the homies.

Shark: Come on guys, that's not what I meant.

Dolphin 1: What did you mean ey?

Dolphin 3: Ey cabrones! Get over here ey, I tink da Shark got some ting to say... ey.

Shark: Look, you are real nice fellas. How about I let you hang out, chill, is that what the kids say now? I'll go back into my house?

Dolphin 5: Chill? Did dis puto say chill?

Dolphin 10: Relax ey, he don' mean nutting by it. Right pinche shark pendejo?

Dolphin 5: Fuck dat! Chill? Chill like some chicken of the sea chit, some tuna bull-chit!

Dolphin 6: My moms gots caught up in one of those nets ey!

Dolphin 1: Ey, calm down guay... Da shark is going back inside. It's cool.

Shark: Sorry fellas. Carry on.

Dolphin 5: Das right chark. You go fucking chill.

...

Shark: I'm so tired of these dang Dolphins. When did this reef become... this?

Shark Wife: I don't know honey. Just let them get drunk and they'll be on their way.

7 Aug 2013

I am loving these post - LOL!

I'll write the screenplay to "Killer Zombie Sharks from Planet X Destroy New York" or "Killer Zombie Sharks from Planet X vs Godzilla" if someone will produce it, shouldn't cost anymore then 20 to 30 bucks.

7 Aug 2013

Quote by Dancing_Doll
That's good to hear - I don't feel so guilty now about swimming with the dolphins on vacation now.
In this case it was a pretty spacious ocean-pen though and not one of those giant salt-water swimming pools. But still - thinking about it outside the 'wow, that was an amazing experience' factor, I had some doubts due to the idea of them living in captivity and having to play with starry-eyed humans all day and perform tricks.

What goes on at Sea World does bother me - not going to lie. I've heard and read about some rather upsetting stories, mostly involving the whales, which I think are far too large to be kept in the Sea World sized tanks. I'll be interested in seeing the movie Blackwater.

Re the sharks. There was an interesting show I watched a while ago about this rash of attacks in the Red Sea, just off Egypt. I think there was a week or two where they were averaging sometimes several a day within minutes apart along this resort strip. Most of the victims had chunks of their asses torn off (no, I'm not making that up. lol). Anyway - they narrowed down a possible culprit with some timely underwater pics from tourists to this one oceanic whitetip shark (they noticed it was the same one due to a fin anomaly) and there was concern that this shark was purposely attacking humans. As it turns out, one of the resorts had begun this daily tourist package that year to "feed the fishes and sharks" not too far away and the dive master's routine was that he would reach around and grab a fish from his fannypack and the shark would take it from his hand. So there was this theory that this shark that one of his regulars, who had begun attacking the tourists, had associated that area of the body with food. So it had begun chomping on the tourists' butts along the coast line. It was an interesting example of how our desire to interact with them can have negative consequences with learned behaviour - I guess not that different from the 'don't feed the bears or they'll stop being afraid of humans' rule.

That is very interesting about that Red Sea incident. Seems like there have been other similar incidents where sharks seem to go on a rampage in a certain area then it just stops. And many of the times it is in areas where you wouldn't expect it Unlike this one, most of the times no one has really pinpointed a reason for what triggered it. On famous one was in NJ in 1916. Sharks actually swam up a few rivers and attacked some local swimmers. I believe these attacks were Peter Benchley's inspiration for Jaws. Think there was another off the coast of Russia a few years ago

They are fascinating creatures!!

7 Aug 2013

Quote by Nikki703

That is very interesting about that Red Sea incident. Seems like there have been other similar incidents where sharks seem to go on a rampage in a certain area then it just stops. And many of the times it is in areas where you wouldn't expect it Unlike this one, most of the times no one has really pinpointed a reason for what triggered it. On famous one was in NJ in 1916. Sharks actually swam up a few rivers and attacked some local swimmers. I believe these attacks were Peter Benchley's inspiration for Jaws. Think there was another off the coast of Russia a few years ago

They are fascinating creatures!!

Some of these situations have been associated with ships nearby dumping waste cargo (like animal carcasses) into the ocean. I believe the 1916 situation was tied to this. As well - once people freaked out about consecutive attacks, every dumbass got on his boat or stood on the pier and started shooting sharks and tossing dynamite into the water. "Yeah, we'll get dem sharks, de bastards!" Except what these idiots didn't realize is that tossing dynamite into the ocean merely made a shitload of chum from all these random fish that were in the vicinity that were getting blown up and then even more sharks showed up along the shoreline. I think pretty much if you ring the dinner-bell by tossing dead animals into the ocean and chum up the waters with sticks of dynamite, lots of sharks show up and then it's just a matter of the risk factor going up when it comes to an attack.

It's similar to why one wouldn't want to go swimming where there's a lot of of sea lions. Chances are good that that swimmer will have a much higher risk of attack than the average swimmer or surfer along a coastline that's away from the seal snackfood bar, so I think the real risk-ratios can vary a bit.