NEWSBYMARC BEKOFF

Marc Bekoff, Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, is a columnist for Change.org.

As I've pointed out many times,  our relationships with other animals are confused, challenging, and frustrating. Recently we've learned that rhesus monkeys, called "furry couch potatoes," are being used by the Oregon Heath and Science University to study human obesity and diabetes.

About 50 of the approximately 4300 monkeys imprisoned at the Oregon National Primate Research Center (ONPRC) are being used in this study. The monkeys are fattened up by giving them lots of rich, fattening food, and kept in small cages so they can't have any exercise. Some of the monkeys will also undergo gastric surgery and be euthanized; a sanitized way of saying they're killed so that their pancreas and brain can be examined.

Marc Bekoff, Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, is a columnist for Change.org.

Some will celebrate National Hamburger Day on December 21st. Regardless of what you call it — a Big Mac, a Whopper or, more correctly, a cowburger — a hamburger is a dead cow on a bun; a platter of death served up for the more than 14 billion hamburgers eaten yearly in the United States alone.

Here are some facts associated with one's choice to eat dead cows. Cows are very intelligent, sentient mammals. They've been shown to experience "eureka" moments when they solve a puzzle such as how to open a particularly difficult gate. Cows form close and enduring social relationships and don't like to be subjected to the reprehensible conditions to which they are exposed during transport to the factory farm and their short and terrifying stay at these inhumane and filthy facilities.

Because cows and other food animals are sentient, who we eat is a serious moral question. Surely, nobody would choose to send his or her dog to a factory farm or a concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO). If people could see the animals suffering in CAFOs and slaughterhouses, could they still eat them?

Marc Bekoff, Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, is a columnist for Change.org.

I just returned from a wonderful trip to beautiful New South Wales, spending a good deal of time around Sydney and its environs. My visit was sponsored by Voiceless, an incredible group of dedicated people working to protect all sorts of nonhuman animal beings from being wantonly abused by human animal beings. While I was there, I heard horror stories from a wide variety of people about the horrific ways in which Australia's national icon — the kangaroo — is treated.

It's been estimated that about 4 million kangaroos are killed annually, often in horrific and reprehensibly inhumane ways, many of which result in much pain and suffering before the individual dies. And, as if this isn't enough, millions of additional animals die as "collateral damage," including joeys, other youngsters, and individuals who depend on adults for care. I was astonished and dismayed (and embarrassed to be a human being) when I learned that joeys could legally be intentionally clubbed to death.

A report by an organization called Thinkk shows that there's limited scientific or environmental evidence that supports the killing of kangaroos. I kept asking myself — not only as a biologist, but as a human being — how could anyone treat a kangaroo in the way they're treated, or passively allow it to happen? How could this iconic animal be subjected to such disregard and disrespect that truly is a poor reflection of this country?

Marc Bekoff, Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, is a columnist for Change.org.

This week, there will be a meeting sponsored by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to recognize improvements that have been made in animal welfare. But, are laboratory animals really better off now than in past years?

Consider that about 15-20 million rodents are used in research each year in the United States (actual numbers are not reported). Consider also that we know mice display empathy, and feel their own pain and that of other mice ... and this study was published four years ago. Furthermore, the empathic response in mice is mediated by the same brain mechanisms as it is humans.

Have these scientific facts, demonstrated by a prestigious research group at McGill University and published in a prestigious scientific journal, Science, been factored into increased protection for mice and other rodents? No. So, it's fair to ask: Why not? Why are mice and other animals still ignored by the federal Animal Welfare Act, despite the fact that they are sentient beings, just like the relatively few species and individuals who are protected?

"Come on Marc, it's time for a hike, or dinner, or a belly rub." I was constantly on call for Jethro, my companion dog, my very best friend a large German shepherd/Rottweiler mix  with whom I shared my home for 12 years. I rescued Jethro from the Humane Society in Boulder, but in many ways he rescued me.

As Jethro got older, it became clear that our lives together soon would be over. The uninhibited and exuberant wagging of his whiplike tail, which fanned me in the summer, occasionally knocked glasses off the table, and told me how happy he was, would soon stop.

What should I do? Let him live in misery or help him die peacefully, with dignity? It was my call and a hard one at that. But just as I was there for him in life, I needed to be there for him as he approached death, to put his interests before mine, to help end his suffering, to help him cross into his mysterious future with grace, dignity, and love. For sure, easier said than done. It always is.

I like to think that the bumper sticker for evolutionary continuity between humans and nonhuman animals would simply be: "If we have something they have it too."

Charles Darwin's well-accepted ideas about evolutionary continuity remind us that the differences among species are differences in degree rather than kind; shades of gray, and not black and white differences, distinguish us from one another. We accept this continuity in anatomy and physiology, so why are we resistant to continuity when it comes to animal emotions, moral behavior, or spirituality? Really, there's little reason for skepticism, and it’s actually on the decline.

But still, some people get upset when animals are treated as if they're human. For example, when a dog was recently given communion in a church in Canada, the uproar made it all the way up to the Anglican Diocese of Toronto and the reverend ended up apologizing to her congregation. We can’t really know if dogs get anything out of attending church, but do they have spiritual lives?

Do animals marvel at their surroundings, have a sense of awe when they see a rainbow, or do they wonder where lightning comes from? What are they feeling when they perform funeral rituals? Of course much turns on how the word "spiritual" is defined, but for the moment let's simply consider nonmaterial, intangible, and introspective experiences as spiritual, of the sort that humans have.

Consider waterfall dances, which are a delight to witness. Sometimes a chimpanzee, usually an adult male, will dance at a waterfall with total abandon. Why?

Every day, we see how people are capable of loving animals, and how people are capable of harming them in a myriad of ways. We know animals have rich and deep emotional lives and some may be moral beings. We know that animal abuse and losses in biodiversity are bad for the animals and bad for us. We wonder not only why we continue to do this, but also what we can do to give animals the respect, compassion, and love they deserve.

Animal abuse is typically due to the inadequate protection of animals, and social and cultural factors, not a lack of scientific knowledge or concrete data. Therefore, we must address the important psychological and social/cultural issues that support our poor stewardship of animals (and their habitats), and learn about the psychological barriers that prevent people from facing and addressing the complex, frustrating and urgent issues that allow animal abuse to continue in laboratories, classrooms, various forms of entertainment,  slaughterhouses, the clothing industry, and in natural habitats. (Massive losses of biodiversity are a form of animal abuse, though few people cash it out this way.)

It's here that the social sciences can help us along. A relatively new and rapidly emerging field called "conservation psychology" can help us improve our relationships with other animals.

Marc Bekoff, Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, is a columnist for Change.org.

Our relationships with nonhuman animals are complicated, frustrating, ambiguous, and paradoxical. When people tell me that they love animals and then harm or kill them, I tell them I'm glad they don't love me. We observe animals, gawk at them in wonder, experiment on them, eat them, wear them, write about them, draw and paint them, move them from here to there as we "redecorate nature."

People are starting to pay attention to their carbon footprint — how their lifestyle choices tread on the earth. We need to also pay attention to our compassion footprint. Animals are constantly asking us in their own ways to treat them better or leave them alone, and they`re fully justified in making this request. If they could put that request into words, what might their manifesto look like?

We live in a troubled and wounded world that is in dire need of healing. We all should be worried and terrified by what we have done and continue to do to animals, the environment and our own species. Humans are an arrogant lot and we have made huge and horrific global messes that need to be repaired now. The overriding sense of turmoil is apparent to anyone who takes the time to pay attention.

Researchers and non-researchers alike are extremely concerned about unprecedented global losses of biodiversity and how humans suffer because of our destructive ways. We are animals and we should be proud and aware of our membership in the animal kingdom. However, our unique contribution to the wanton decimation of the planet and its many life forms is an insult to other animal beings; it demeans us.

Joel Cohen, head of the Laboratory of Populations at the Rockefeller University and Columbia University, offers the sobering fact that the difference in the population numbers between less developed areas of the world (the have-nots) and more developed regions of the world (the haves) will have increased from two-fold in the 1950s to about six-fold by 2050. In the future, there likely will be fewer people who actually have the resources to make a positive difference in our relationships with animals and ecosystems.

A forward-looking and long overdue symposium called Compassionate Conservation will be held from September 1 - 3, 2010 in Lady Margaret Hall at the University of Oxford. The meeting, sponsored by the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit (WildCRU) and the Born Free Foundation, will focus on major themes including animal welfare and the conservation of wild animals, captive animal welfare and conservation, conservation consequences of wildlife rescue, rehabilitation and release, and the international trade in live wild animals.

Compassionate conservation is no longer an oxymoron. Ethics must be firmly
implanted in conservation biology, even if difficult questions move us outside of our
professional and personal comfort zones. Ethical questions must be addressed, even if asking them means some projects might be put on hold temporarily or abandoned.

My presentation at the symposium, titled First Do No Harm: Hamsters, Fer