[Magdalen] Neuroscience fact of the day - elephants

[Roger Stokes]

On 24/09/2015 14:17, Jay Weigel wrote:
> I know I'm probably going to get some flak for this, but I've often thought
> that elephants, along with whales and the great apes, are not exactly
> "animals" but are some other class similar to humans and should be treated
> as such. Certainly if we found them on other worlds we would treat them
> with greater respect and try to learn to communicate with them, one hopes, rather than killing them.

What is particularly scandalous about killing them is that is is done to 
take they tusks for decoration or some other raltively trivial purpose 
rather than to provide food.  The other week I was watching a programme 
in which there was a segment with the presenter visiting an area with a 
number of orphan elephants who were being fed milk until they are mature 
enough to cope on their own.  The contact with humans is minimal, 
basically golding the bottles of milk, which the adolescents would grab 
with their trunks.  They and the younger ones knew when and where to 
appear, and then disappeared back into the bush.

Another factoid is what happens to elephants when they eat rotting 
fruit.  They get drunk.  Some flap their ears (display behaviours), some 
fall asleep and some start fighting - just like humans.

Roger