A wise girl knows her limits.
A great girl knows she has none.

Timothy Treadwell was an environmentalist, a documentary film maker, and the star of Werner Herzog's universally praised Grizzly Man. After watching the film, I was left with two very different impressions of Treadwell. With his jumpy, bubbly, slightly narcissistic demeanor and a strangely child-like and dramatic pattern of speech, I was sure this guy was either on drugs, or simply a lunatic on a rather interesting mission.

What was his mission, anyway? To protect the bears. Kind of odd, if you think about it. The grizzlies are probably as safe as they'll ever be in the Katmai National Park and Preserve. By spending so much time with the bears at such a close distance, Treadwell was putting not only himself in danger, but also other visitors and the bears themselves. The rangers in the park do their best to keep the bears away from any human influence, and so when people approach the bears, they are usually calm and uninterested. Treadwell's constant "interactions" with the bears could very well have upset that conditioned immunity to the human presence. In a place where they're trying to preserve species in their natural habitats, it's probably unwise to have a human (who I'm convinced has some issues up in the noggin) roaming around.

I found it extremely amusing how Treadwell liked to befriend every animal, but I'm not sure if that's a good thing. He had trapped himself in a delusion that the bears had almost accepted him as a companion, a protector, when in fact his affections were unrequited. I believe that this idea played a crucial role in his death. He thought the bears recognized him and needed him, and he let himself be too defenseless. It's true that the season was bad for fishing when Treadwell was eaten, but I wouldn't be surprised if the cause was something else (like the bears had lost interest in this weird little blond creature that stalked them all the time with a freaky voice and an oddly shaped rock that sometimes had three legs).

Few people would willingly give up everything and risk their lives out in the wild among creatures that could easily take down a well-built man, but I think this was Treadwell's salvation; his only escape. After his dreams of being a Hollywood actor were shattered, he turned to drugs and his life was a chaos. Perhaps he sought for a simpler life, and he found that kind of comfort in the wild with the bears, which coincidentally he had a tremendous fascination with.

Despite the harm and troubles he brought to the animals and the Alaskan park's authorities, Treadwell had good intentions and he did do some pretty darn good things. His breathtaking footage of nature and the animals is proof enough, and he also taught kids in school about his experiences in the wild. He was brave and determined, and I respect and admire him for that, but there comes a time when under such circumstances, too much bravery and determination can be reckless.

This film tracing the life cycle of polar bears and walruses is amazing. It let me see so many things in their lives up close. Compared to their life-and-death struggles for survival, our problems seem so petty, and we're not doing much good contributing to global warming either.

There were so many signs of emotions throughout the documentary, and at some points I could clearly imagine a human being experiencing the same emotions as the bears and walruses. In fact, they seem to be able to express themselves better than us.

When Nanu's brother was too weak to walk any further and quietly died, his mother and sister snuggled by him for hours long after he had passed away. I guess they were mourning in their own way. The other scene that struck me as a very painful one for both mother and daughter was the parting, when the mother polar bear suddenly became distant from her cub, realizing that they would have to go separate ways if they were to survive in the harsh conditions.

The walruses are one big family and always stick together through the good and the bad. Sure, they move in groups on their instincts to survive, but they also love and take care of each other. When a predator comes, a walrus doesn't swim away alone but goes and warns the others before escaping together. Their love and devotion is best shown when the auntie sacrificed herself to save Seela, who also responded with a sad and anticipating gaze as she waited for her auntie.

I'm not sure how I'd describe this feeling, but there must have been something when Nanu approached the male polar bear's food. He threatened her at first, but he let her take what she needed in the end. He could have killed her easily if he had wanted to, but he didn't. Even if the conditions weren't so bad it would have been hard to catch a prey, so why would he have given up his? Pity? Empathy? Resignation?

I used to think that animals don't mate for love, but just to have offspring. It was interesting to see the picky Seela courted by the many young walruses. She chose her mate by his voice? I wonder if they'll grow to love one another so much that they'll sacrifice themselves for the other like auntie did.

Vending Machines... [Just random musing.]

I'm starting to suspect that they're deliberately made so they'll eat some of your money every few coins. You leave it there for a few hours, and it's fine again. How does that work?

Last semester when I watched "Meet Your Meat", I couldn't eat meat for nearly a month. Even the faintest smell of beef, pork, or chicken would make me lose my appetite. When I watched Fast Food Nation, I got that same feeling again. It's probably one of the most convincing films I've watched, one that sticks to me for a long time and actually has an effect on my life. My first reaction to all this was... "disgusting". The two realities that bother me the most are the treatment of animals and the Mexican workers. I seriously don't know which one of them have it the worst.

I hate to think that every time I'm at a restaurant eating a beef burger or a chicken breast, having the most wonderful time with not a care in the world, on the other side there are poor animals who never had a chance to live a real life, were tortured, and killed mercilessly. There are also the workers who have no choice but to endure slaying, skinning, cutting, and cleaning. As if dealing with raw meat, guts and gore wasn't enough, these workers have to be worried about their safety every second. It must be horrible knowing that one clumsy slip could lead to a missing finger, arm, or leg.

Although I can't deny that I don't eat meat, I really want to do something for their cause after watching this film. I don't want to live in a world where people are treated like worthless machines, and an animal's fate is to suffer from the day they're born.

a) Do we have an ethical responsibility toward animals? b) Do animals have emotions? Give examples if possible.

If this was thousands of years ago, we would have no more responsibility toward animals than a dog would toward a cat. I'm not saying we should be responsible because we are superior beings, but simply because we have done them harm, and we have to take responsibility and fix that. We have caused many species to go extinct, many to move out of their natural habitats, and many were killed for human benefits. I personally feel that we "owe" them in some way.

I believe animals have as much emotions as humans do; maybe not so many in variety, but they still have feelings. I'm not sure about all animals, but the ones I'm more familiar with definitely display their emotions. The most common example would be the dog, man's closest friend. Dogs can be jealous when you have too much attention for something else, they are lonely when they are left alone in the house, and they will "mourn" when their owner dies. I think animals and humans have more or less the same kind of emotion; it's just that humans know how to express themselves so other humans can understand. Like dogs understand other dogs, even if they speak to each other.

I think this film relates mostly to the point Ishmael makes about the Taker’s views on the Leaver culture. We see here that civilization and advancement in technology is not as good as we think. Xi in this film represents the bushmen and the Leavers, and they are a happy family, without the restrictions of laws, punishment, or crime. They don’t even have a word to express “guilty”. They are a peaceful little community. The adults share everything, their tools and resources, and the children play cute and inventive games (whereas in Taker culture the children tend to have a more violent nature towards playing and the adults cling to their possessions with greed).

These people live an almost carefree life and have no sense of time (there are no Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and so on) and contrary to Taker belief, they don’t live in fear of being preyed on (in fact, there are scenes where they are perfectly content walking amongst other animals). To find food of their own is no hard task either. They have tools such as anesthetic arrows of some kind that paralyses the animal. And to reinforce the fact that they are such a peaceful people, there’s even one part where the bushman apologizes to his unconscious prey and tells it that he had to kill it or his family would starve. The bushmen don’t worry or fear because they live in the hands of gods. Everything that happens, good or bad, is a result of gods’ works; when the Coca Cola bottle appears, they say it’s something the gods gave them.

Back to the Takers’ world—the movie makes a huge contrast on the two different lifestyles. Everything is rushed and there is an exact time for everything. As for killing, the people kill others of their own kind (the Leavers only kill their prey). If you look at these two cases, you would much rather live in the bushmen’s gentle and peaceful family rather than the chaotic Taker society. From Xi’s point of view, the Takers must be a stupid people because they have so much technology, but they would not be able to survive without them, and that is why the Takers cling on to it so tightly. They wouldn’t be able to survive because they are no longer living in the gods’ hands and therefore the gods don’t provide for the Takers.

The bottle that the bushman finds appears as an embodiment of the evil that comes from civilization. With it comes anger, jealousy, and hate. The bushmen may seem naïve to us, but they are pure and can see something that we are blind to; chaos. And yet we choose to live in this box of chaos; even if we had a choice to live otherwise, we would still cling to our culture.

At the end of the film, after Xi has helped Andrew, Kate and the others, you get a sense that it is possible for the Leavers and civilization to co-exist (if the Takers didn’t have the nature to wipe them out first), but they will never understand each other save for some few people whose careers are out here in the Leavers’ homeland. One of the most important things here I think was the bottle. The bottle brought all these bad things to Xi’s family, and in a way I see it as a metaphor that the Takers are corrupted, therefore the things they make are also corrupted, and not only are they confined to corrupt themselves but they also corrupt other peoples. If it hadn’t been for Xi’s decision to get rid of the bottle, the friendly and peaceful family of the bushmen might have been ruined. On a larger scale, the Takers are on a path to destruction as well. We might not see it, but it was shown very effectively in the film because of a large contrast with the Leavers. The bushmen had time to turn back, but we might not be so lucky. If we don’t get rid of our “evil thing” soon, it might be too late to save ourselves from being ruined.

It still amazes me how the narrator managed to figure out the laws in merely four days (although the first one wouldn't really count as he spent the entire day telling himself he couldn't do it, and I don't blame him). I thought it was pretty hard when Mr. Loken asked us to guess what the laws were. Some people obviously read ahead and re-phrased what was in the book, but for those who didn't, it must have been a difficult exercise; there are so many things you wouldn't know where to start.

I thought it was very clever of the author to use the laws of gravity and aerodynamics as a parallel to the Taker culture. One of the things that is sending us hurling fast into the previous fallen "aircrafts" is the fact that we're fighting a natural law, and believing in that decision so blindly that we don't even know we're heading towards our own doom. I seriously believe that all the leaders in the world should read Ishmael. One of the worst mistakes we're making is encouraging more population growth. Like we discussed in one of our classes, when an area is struck with poverty the first thing we do is send them food, yet we pay no attention to their frighteningly high birth rates. Because we take so much for ourselves, there is no balance like in the Leaver world where competition is actually a good thing and a crucial and necessary part to make the laws work.

However, it's one of those things about being in our current society that makes us feel that if we don't feed people, it's like "killing", it's morally wrong. Another thing that I wanted to point out is that in our society, food is not only a necessity but a kind of pleasure. For those who can afford it, eating excessively isn't a problem. In the wild, they just eat enough so they can survive.

Something interesting that I had been thinking about when the narrator and Ishmael were discussing about the laws is that generally we give animals almost human characteristics. We think that competitors are enemies, and so are the predators with their prey. Many of these misunderstandings are shown in fiction and just usual conversation.

While reading Ishmael, I'm always thinking to myself why if we know what we're doing wrong already, why don't people do something about it? The book puts things out simply, but in reality it's much more complicated. It's not easy to change. With the mentality we have, living like the Leavers would be like a taboo; we'd be "regressing". After centuries of inventions, discoveries, and an incredibly large amount of time dedicated to gathering knowledge-- I don't think we're ready to do that.

"Life is unfair."

I've often heard people say that, but what would be more accurate would be "The kind of society we live in is unfair." A place where the rich become richer and the poor become poorer will never be a peaceful place to live in. It's a sad day when politicians and big companies work together as one, destroying all the other small things in its path to economic glory.

This whole documentary tied in to one big idea also discussed in Ishmael; it's the fact that the Takers will strive for growth indefinitely, even if it means sacrificing everything else that will aid them in that selfish quest. I'm going to make a parallel here; big companies like Wal-Mart are the Takers, and the small businesses are like the Leavers. Those small businesses are following the rules (paying enough wages, treating workers right, etc) but when Wal-Mart (Takers) invades an area, all the small businesses are forced to retire. Isn't that we as a species are doing? We're forcing everything else out of our "territory" in order to grow more (and in Wal-Mart's case, make more [money]).

When you become this corrupted, you become really cold because your heart is set firmly on your goal, and on that goal only. It doesn't matter if children starve, if families don't have decent wages to pay their bills, if their working conditions are inhumane, or if there isn't safety in the parking lots. That's not their business; the only thing that matters is the profit. And it's outrageous that knowing this, the governments work on their side! Subsidies are given to them to build more and more Wal-Marts but funding can't be offered to schools and small family businesses in need of some money. Working overtime, no financial aid-- it seems like the company takes a lot more than it actually gives.

Does this sound familiar? If you think about it and look at the picture, the Takers are big Wal-Marts. But looking on the brighter side, there are many people rebelling against Wal-Mart's principles and fighting for change. As Takers, we should learn from this experience.

"These are the kind of things which traditionally have been thought of as human prerogatives. But this teaches us a new respect, and it's a new respect not only for the chimpanzees, I suggest, but some of the other amazing animals with whom we share this planet. Once we're prepared to admit that after all we're not the only beings with personalities, minds, and above all feelings, we'll then start to think about ways we use and abuse so many other sentient, sapient creatures on this planet. It really gives cause for deep shame; at least for me."

This part of her speech is one of my favorites. It's true that in some ways we are more advanced than other beings, but that doesn't give us the right to treat them as we do now. For ages there have been disputes about respect among humans, but why can't we respect nature and its inhabitants? They aren't inferior; like Jane pointed out, the line that separates humans from animals is very thin. It's a huge disaster when the place you live in is your enemy; without humans, Earth would be one big, peaceful community. When Takers appeared, we were more like intruders that disrupted the planet's natural system and balance rather than the saviors and rulers that we believe we are.

The next thing she talks about really angers me. Hunters used to kill just enough to support himself and his family, but now with technology, weaponry and roads, they are killing more than they need for profits, thus destroying their culture and "the wonderful way of living for hundreds of years". This is exactly what we're talking about in Ishmael. The Takers' roots started when agriculture began, when we grew more than what was needed. It's a real pity, and we should stop our own expansion over the Leavers before it's too late and these amazing people with incredible knowledge disappear altogether.

Jane tells us that mostly in the developed areas people are being stupid because of their advancements. We are contaminating our world, and knowing that this will also affect ourselves in a negative way (i.e health), we still continue to do it. This ties in to something she said earlier that we are abusing our power and privileges that come from our knowledge. I remember I said something similar in my second podcast on the summary of Ishmael and it was one of the major points of our "captivity". Is it Mother Culture's fault that we're like this? But then again, even she was born from man's mind. Do we blame our ancestors then? But the fault is also on us because we have chosen continue to live on the principles of Mother Culture. However, this mindset and tradition has been practiced for ages and it's not easy to change.

What humans have that is distinctively ours is the ability to communicate with sophisticated language, and that is what has brought us so far. We should use that gift wisely and not abuse it at the expense of our planet and everything living in it. Hopefully, like Jane Goodall said at the end of her speech, we can put together our great minds and start making the right decisions.

This is quite hard. There's a lot of freedom in "anything", and that's what makes it difficult really. Ishmael has opened my eyes to a lot of things, and not only in Global Ethics, but in my other classes we're also discussing more about issues that are happening at present, whereas in my previous courses we focused more on "textbook material" and history which had little relevance to the dangers our world is facing at the moment. I like the way we're approaching this novel; we watch videos related to the subject, we discuss every chapter in a large group, and the previous exercises we did the first few weeks of school that prepared us for the book-- they were all very helpful.

The issues described in Ishmael are very philosophical and I would like to see them resolved, but the problem is that it's not going to be easy, and it's not going to be fast. We've come such a long way, and humans have spent ages living as Takers. It would be ideal for our environment if we returned to being Leavers like the rest of the community, but it's not very likely that we will, and having an idea about this is completely different from actually taking action. We're too comfortable with what we have right now, and humans aren't very good at adapting to new things. Maybe I'm just being pessimistic, but the fact that we don't know how to live the right way as a species might be what leads us to our own decline and ultimately extinction or the destruction of all life on our planet.

Hey there, welcome to my Global Ethics blog.

I'll be putting down my thoughts on topics discussed in this class. Feel free to look around and leave a few comments! :)