LIfe - Existence in the Physical World

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Cruelty to animals

What does it mean to be cruel to animals? Does it necessarily mean to have to be cruel to such extent that for example, you dip a dog into a pot of boiling water? Or can it just mean that you squash ants under your feet for fun?
The former is obviously taking cruelty to a obviously overly serious extent. But will the latter be considered serious?
Sometimes, I wish that words be defined more clearly in the dictionary. For example, the word “animal” means “living organisms with independent movement”, which can mean anything from a single-celled organism to a fellow human being. Does that mean that a scientist poking around an amoeba under a microscope is committing a deed worthy of his being sent off to the SPCA? I’m pretty sure the answer is an obvious “Yes”. Of course. We all know and believe that.
Just today, in my class 2A, which is located on the 4th floor, a swarm of ants crawled out of their nest behind the electric socket, and swiftly dismembered an innocent dead fly. And obviously, a gigantic swarm of black ants will draw attention. A couple of overreacting people drowned the ants a little unnecessarily with an overdose of water. To put it more simply, we needed to mop up the floor after we were done. Did you know how fast ants could move when their safety is threatened? I know now – 3 metres a second.
If you want to call the SPCA now, I’ll gladly give you their hotline number, but I don’t have it memorised. Darn.

somebody wrote this at [8:21 PM]

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