Enhance Your Knowledge
Christian Lion Make You Cry Video
The sad part of this video is the death of one of the man by poachers in Africa years later…
Intelligence in Apes
Watch this. These beautiful creatures certainly deserve the right not to be tortured. It’s the very least. So I applaud Spain for their recent move.
Spain is set on granting Human Rights to Apes
Extraordinary! The Spanish parliament has affirmed its commitment on granting Great Apes, such as Chimpanzees, with limited Human Rights, including the freedom from torture. This is the first time in recorded history when non-humans are given juridical agency.
For more information, visit these resources:
* Fox News
The Lion Sleeps Tonight – Part B
Last week I described how the patterns of our brain waves control different states of consciousness. By altering these patters, we can induce many mental and emotional states, such as sleep, anxiety, calmness, and concentration. Several technological applications already try to take advantage of this mechanism for the treatment of humans.
As of today, we are able to transmit magnetic waves over a short distance that can manipulate a person’s state of consciousness. But as technology advances, we could one day broadcast a certain frequency over a broad area of space. When this becomes finally practical, it will certainly have many uses in the animal kingdom…
Agriculture
First of all, farmers could use this technique to ward off pesticides off their fields. Imagine a grasshopper that falls asleep when he’s nearing the edge of the broadcast-protected zone, or a bird that becomes anxious in the vicinity of her favourite fruit garden and therefore flies away.
Another possible application would be the improvement of dairy production. Cows could be excited during a certain time of day to make more milk, while enjoying a “good night sleep” at other times due to relaxing patterns, thus recuperating faster and better in time for the next milking.
Domestic Uses
Flies in the summer pose a major annoyance. But what if we could make them fall asleep when zooming past the garden fence. We will feel confident to sleep with the window wide open! Same thing goes for dogs that tend to bark excessively during the night.
Photo by Jay Torborg
Entertainment and Recreation
Have you ever fantasized about entering the tigers’ cage in the zoo and petting their beautiful fur? Doing it nowadays would mean becoming a tiger’s lunchtime dessert. But in the future, we could neutralize their aggressive behavior and killer instincts without putting them to sleep. They’d be awake and gentle at the same time.
And what about the monkey in the cage next door? He knows a few tricks, but it takes weeks and months to teach him those tricks. However, beta waves are known to be activated in humans when we concentrate. If we can induce beta waves (or their equivalent) in monkeys, elephants and dolphins — their training will progress much more easily and much faster.
Don’t mess with Tom Brokaw
The Discovery Channel has taken upon itself to collect all the facts about Global Warming. I think it’s a great initiative, and I recommend checking it out…
The Lion Sleeps Tonight – Part A
— Prologue —
Life is circular. There is always a start — Birth, and there is always an end — Death. In between there are other circular activities, such as breathing for example, which is common to all life forms, from bacteria to palm trees, and from tiny worms to human beings. Finally, there is sleep, which is unique to a certain group of multicellular eukaryotic organisms — i.e. Animals.
Sleep is a recurring activity, usually occurring within a circadian (“of 24 hours”) rhythm. As humans, we know we get tired at night, lie down, close our eyes, stop moving, relax… and sleep. When asleep, we all enter alternating states of consciousness. We lose track of time and become rather indifferent to outer stimuli. Dreams may appear and go. And we may or may not remember them in the morning. Whatever the experience is for each individual, each night, our brain is a primary player in this phenomenon. By altering its own electrical patterns — what is known as Brain Waves — it controls behavior, alertness, and memory.
Simple observations tell us that animals sleep as well. We see our dogs and cats lie down, stationary, while their shut eyelids are rapidly twitching from side to side as they dream (about us perhaps). However, scientific research provides the evidence that simpler forms of animals, such as flies and worms, sleep as well — even if “sleep” is manifested differently with these species.
As technology advances more and more, we now have methods of controlling human brain waves, as a way to induce hypnosis-like states in patients or to facilitate concentration in people suffering from ADD. These machines work primarily via sound and light, although future versions could operate on the premise of magnetic waves. There is already an experimental method used in psychiatric hospitals, called Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS), which remotely affects a person’s brain patterns.
On the exciting applications of TMS (and other futuristic methods of brain-wave manipulation) on animals, come back for next week’s issue of… Future Nature.
TMS Picture by Revolution Health
Komodo Dragon Attacks European Divers
Five divers in Indonesia got carried away and ended up staying a couple of nights at Mantaolan, on the island of Rinca off the Komodo National Park. The group went missing last Thursday and were found Saturday. During their brief stay at the home of the Large Komodo Dragon, Rinca island, they were apparently “checked out” by one of the local inhabitants. Which makes sense but never the less must have been a little nerve racking.
Frenchman Laurent Pinel, 31, said the group had to fight off one dragon with rocks and scavenged for shellfish as they waited to be rescued, Britain’s Daily Telegraph newspaper reported.
“On the beach a Komodo dragon came amongst us [Friday] afternoon,” Pinel said, describing how the group had to pelt the dangerous reptile with rocks to scare it away.
“We had nothing to eat. We ate some kind of mussels scraped from the rocks,” Pinel told the newspaper.
Here’s hoping the Komodo Dragon is okay..
Environmental Promises – Kiki’s Turn
We at Natural Buy have decided to sponsor our very own candidate for presidency. His name is Kiki, and he’s very environmentally-aware. The picture below was taken during a photo op, in which Kiki restated his commitment to reduce carbon emissions by 60% before 2015!
Another major theme in Kiki’s political platform is his firm stance on the promotion of organic lifestyle throughout America. Kiki makes sure to set a personal example, consuming only naturally-grown Bananas, and using no plastic bags at all. He is an avid user of perishable clothes, and aims to legalize the consumption of hemp — believing it would foster World Peace.
I urge you to vote Kiki this November. Together we can make a change. Yes, we can change!
Dr. Dolittle’s Science
We are not alone in the universe. And no, I’m not talking X-Files.
Mankind always had to share this Earth with countless species of animals. From cockroaches to dogs and giant squids, we had to learn how to get along with, and how to use them for our own needs. For many millennia, humans raised cattle, domesticated cats, and mounted horses with saddles. We were godlike, and they were our servants, expandable and brainless. Then, one day a man named Darwin got up and claimed that humans are but animals themselves!
By now, we all know that animals have intelligence; animals feel pain and joy; animals have social structures and personal identities; and animals even communicate with each other via complex linguistic methods. Animals such as ants communicate via their sense of smell, while squids change their skin color to communicate with their fellow molluscs. But the most fascinating research, in my opinion, is the one focusing on the auditory patterns of such species as whales and elephants.
Both marine mammals and elephants are highly social creatures. Elephants bury and mourn their dead, while dolphins procreate for the sake of pure enjoyment. Communication-wise, elephants can broadcast low-frequency vibrations to a great distance, while whales and dolphins use sonar waves to broadcast unique whistles beneath the water. For many years, science has been trying to decipher their languages.
However, we have been able to communicate directly with certain primates. Chimpanzees in captivity were taught the American Sign Language, and were even able to exchange this knowledge with their offsprings. These delicate and furry creatures proved themselves to be intelligent sentient beings.
As scientific research marches forward, and technological breakthroughs are a common sight, it wouldn’t be long before we could ask our dog “where it hurts”. In fact, many animal psychologists claim to do this sort of thing on a daily basis — Although I’m talking about something much more fundamental here. Imagine having a Canine Dictionary, or a miniature device that translates a cat’s meows into meaningful units of information.
These developments, yet to come, would raise serious ethical issues. Will we see the day when a dog is given legal representation, or circus gorillas form a labour union?