shereads
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- Jun 6, 2003
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Just finished reading Bill Bryce's "History of Everything." The final chapters are on the emergence of homosapiens, the hundreds of species that have become extinct at our hands, and the mystery of what motivates the most intelligent creature to be the most destructive.
Some examples: We all know the dodo became extinct in a matter of decades after its home islands became a port of call for European sailors. I had always assumed that the birds died out because they were an easy food source. Wrong. The vast majority were killed for sport: beaten or kicked to death and left to rot. An entire species of harmless, unique creatures, wiped out in a matter of years for no better reason than that their lack of fear made it easy. "If you wanted to gather all of the dodo birds in an area, the most efficient way was to grab one of their members and get it squawking." The rest of the flock would come running to see what all the noise was about. Unable to fly, and having evolved without any land predators, they were as helpless as they were unafraid of us.
A single taxidermied specimen of the dodo existed until a museum curator ordered it burned because it had become "unpleasantly musty."
The Carolina Parakeet, also extinct. The only parrot species native to North America, described by naturalists of the time as the most beautiful bird on the continent. A self-proclaimed nature lover and amateur orinthologist wrote in his journal about how easily he killed an entire flock in an afternoon:
He would fire his shotgun into a tree full of the birds. The uninjured ones would briefly scatter, but then gather around the fallen ones, "with such apparent concern for their dead that I sometimes felt conscience-stricken." He continued the experiment until all but a few were dead.
Like the dodo, there is no evidence of the Carolina Parakeet except for drawings. The last to die in captivity was stuffed but later destroyed.
Another 19th century naturalist wrote about how he felt "a sense of joy" when he realized he had killed the last mating pairs of a recently discovered species of forest bird called the black malmo.
Bryce writes, "If you were going to select one species to have dominion over all the others in this lonely cosmos - to study them, record their existence and their habits, or even mark their passing - it would not be homosapiens...But we're the best choice currently available. It's even possible that we're the only choice there is."
Considering the brutality we inflict on our own kind every day, these examples of what we've done to other species are worth pointing out, for the sake of argument, only because it can't be argued that the dodo or the black malmo were killed for any logical reason. The Carolina Parakeet was considered a crop pest, which still doesn't explain the slaughter of thousands by a "bird lover" who was just curious about their behavior.
What's your own theory about human nature? Is violence without any apparent motive really an abberrant behavior? Or is violence inherent to our nature, and something we work to overcome?
Some examples: We all know the dodo became extinct in a matter of decades after its home islands became a port of call for European sailors. I had always assumed that the birds died out because they were an easy food source. Wrong. The vast majority were killed for sport: beaten or kicked to death and left to rot. An entire species of harmless, unique creatures, wiped out in a matter of years for no better reason than that their lack of fear made it easy. "If you wanted to gather all of the dodo birds in an area, the most efficient way was to grab one of their members and get it squawking." The rest of the flock would come running to see what all the noise was about. Unable to fly, and having evolved without any land predators, they were as helpless as they were unafraid of us.
A single taxidermied specimen of the dodo existed until a museum curator ordered it burned because it had become "unpleasantly musty."
The Carolina Parakeet, also extinct. The only parrot species native to North America, described by naturalists of the time as the most beautiful bird on the continent. A self-proclaimed nature lover and amateur orinthologist wrote in his journal about how easily he killed an entire flock in an afternoon:
He would fire his shotgun into a tree full of the birds. The uninjured ones would briefly scatter, but then gather around the fallen ones, "with such apparent concern for their dead that I sometimes felt conscience-stricken." He continued the experiment until all but a few were dead.
Like the dodo, there is no evidence of the Carolina Parakeet except for drawings. The last to die in captivity was stuffed but later destroyed.
Another 19th century naturalist wrote about how he felt "a sense of joy" when he realized he had killed the last mating pairs of a recently discovered species of forest bird called the black malmo.
Bryce writes, "If you were going to select one species to have dominion over all the others in this lonely cosmos - to study them, record their existence and their habits, or even mark their passing - it would not be homosapiens...But we're the best choice currently available. It's even possible that we're the only choice there is."
Considering the brutality we inflict on our own kind every day, these examples of what we've done to other species are worth pointing out, for the sake of argument, only because it can't be argued that the dodo or the black malmo were killed for any logical reason. The Carolina Parakeet was considered a crop pest, which still doesn't explain the slaughter of thousands by a "bird lover" who was just curious about their behavior.
What's your own theory about human nature? Is violence without any apparent motive really an abberrant behavior? Or is violence inherent to our nature, and something we work to overcome?
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