Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
WHALES AND DOLPHINS should be classified as “nonhuman persons” and given some of the same rights as humans, scientists have been told at a conference in Canada.
This means that the marine mammals should never be kept in captivity or used for human entertainment – and practices such as whaling should end immediately, according to experts promoting a Declaration of Rights for Cetaceans.
The declaration states that “all cetaceans [whales and dolphins] as persons have the right to life, liberty and wellbeing”.
Dolphins are “far more intellectually sophisticated than previously thought”, have “advanced cognitive abilities” and a sophisticated culture, a summary of the presentation given to the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science at the weekend says.
Academic speakers Lori Marino, Thomas White and Chris Butler-Stroud argued for the Declaration, which says cetaceans are “entitled to an international order” in which their rights can be “fully realised”.
According to the BBC, Thomas White said:
A person needs to be an individual. If individuals count, then the deliberate killing of individuals of this sort [dolphins] is ethically the equivalent of deliberately killing a human being.
The scientists are calling for a legal status for whales and dolphins, which would put their rights on a similar footing to those of humans, the Guardian reports.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
First they get your rights. Then they take your jobs
Lmao, thanks for the laugh :)
the mistreatment of all animals is wrong in the extreme but this suggestion is also wrong. animals are still animals!
The only thing that really sets us apart from animals…..is our ability for evil…animals do what they do to survive. Just like us. But humans just manage to throw our insatiable need for more stuff (power/money/gadgets) Which I think is funny, because often when someone does something wrong or evil in society we label them as “animals”
Dolphins along with many other species are self aware….which means when they look in a mirror they know it’s themselves they’re looking at and that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it’s comes to some animals intelligence. Just because their intelligence isn’t up to par with our own doesn’t mean we have the right to lock them up in a tank and make them dance for us.
Oh and Paddy, believe it or not…humans are animals too.
Humans are animals, though where you draw the line for the extension of human rights to animals is always going to be arbitrary.
There’s also been a similar campaign for some time to have certain human rights for our much closer relatives, all the other Great Apes. Great Apes Project, I think it’s called.
We are also animals, just with an over-inflated sense of self-importance. It should be illegal to house dolphins in tanks, it’s cruel and is no different than locking up a human in jail for their entire life.
They’re emphasising “non human”. All animals are different, we are animals, just really smart ones. And it’s been long known that dolphins were smart but i really believe that its only now we are learning how smart many animals are. This is an excellent suggestion imo, its just not as black and white as you suggest , it may seem that way because of looks and communication.
If anyone’s interested I really suggest you look up the TED talk on the intelligence of crowes. Shocking stuff.
I think dolphins might be smarter than some of the people who leave comments on this site.. But I don’t think those people deserve rights either!
Eh.. Hello! Scar from the lion king, clearly an evil fucker!
Yes, all humans are animals, but this doesn’t mean all animals are humans! I fully agree in any and all attempts to increase and safeguard the rights of animals, but a person is, by definition, a human being. Name one ( non-fictional ) person that is not human. You can’t refer to a non-human animal as a person, and so you can give the rights of a “person” to a non- human. Who’s been using the brain melting ray?
@John Conniffe Corporations are given the same rights as a person….last I checked corporations aint’ human..
True, I saw the documentary. But only in the US, and only because a Corporation is a group of humans with limited liability. It’s just another bit of BrainMeltingRay nonsense, and two wrongs don’t make a right.
Until a dolphin pulls me a pint, forwards me a link to a cat in a hat or has an opinion on Darren Scully, they can forget about me accepting them as human.
Whales on the other hand, well, they’re in the Six Nations, aren’t they?
We’re also animals.
Anything which further protects these fascinating mammals can only be a good thing.
I see the future…. lots of Taiwanese fishermen on dolphantocide charges!
You know, PETA are probably somewhat right. Capturing wild animals and making them perform parlour tricks for their remaining years is cruel and unusual punishment. It’s a Victorian preoccupation that can, and should, be done away with.
Japan won’t like the sound of this.
What this is essentially saying that we as humans should GIVE these animals their right to life….since when is it our place to decide what animals have the right to live……being born should be right enough, and that is, of coarse true for every human as well. Us humans have this superior complex that makes us believe we own this planet, when in reality we’re sharing it.
We don’t have equal rights for minorities , so what makes Dolphins more deserving than say the one armed LGBT Dwarf society of Ireland……
What about elephants?
Dolphins are smarter than some of the people who post comments on this site… Though I don’t think those people deserve equal rights either!
Let em organise and fight for their rights like everyone else.
This place is full of Dolphinphobes and Whaleophobes pure bigotry!!
Pretty easy to scoff at this idea when we can’t even afford the same guarantee’s to all humans.
So intelligence is the benchmark by which we allocate rights? What about pigs? They’re smart, but they’re tasty. So they get a pass? Or only intelligent animals that we don’t process?
Not just intelligence, I would also like to ensure no female dolphins and no gay dolphins get equal rights also..
A certain episode of the Simpsons springs to mind.
I saw a dolphin show once, they appeared to me to be very happy. Jumping, dancing, clapping, doing tricks.
If they were unhappy I’m sure they would let us know – being the ‘non human persons’ that they are.
I hear dolphin tears are a great cure for hangovers..I say farm them for the harvest of their tears to stop this morning crippling ailment!! People need good hangover cures for gods sake!
Lord lantern Jaysus I’ve heard it all now “non human People”…were doomed
Flipper will be looking to have his marriage recognised in a few years.
So will they start paying income taxes?
Killing very intelligent animals is wrong. The point made above is that Dolphins are “persons” unlike say chickens. They are probably self aware like many humans.
A “Person” is by definition a human being. A dolphin cannot be a person. Many animals are self-aware, it seems a little bit arbitrary to anthropomorphise only the animals we find cute or do not farm. Octopi are more intelligent then dolphins, but they’re never the heroes in movies. It’s all or nothing, we don’t get to choose..
@ John while I agree with “it’s all or nothing” and that animals shouldn’t be given rights just based on their level of intelligence and maybe classing them as non human persons might just be going a bit far.
Just thought I’d point out that although Octopi are very intelligent they are not more intelligent then the dolphin, like the dolphin they do things that has seemingly has no other purpose then fun, they’re self aware and have shown cultural intelligence, which means they learn from each other.
Unlike the dolphin (whose intelligence is second only to our own) Octopi have never saved a human from drowning/shark attack nor have they saved other whales from beaching….which dolphins have done.
on the other hand dolphins have been known to gang rape and bully other dolphins just for the craic.
@MsPoppie – I agree with the intentions of anyone who wants to safeguards the wellbeing of Dolphins, I just think calling them ” persons” ( shoul be ” people “, we’re not differentiating between individual Dolphins ) is such sloppy thinking that it does their argument more harm than good. A bit like dressing animals up in clothes and saying “ahh, bless”. It shows we’re not thinking about Dolphins, we’re just thinking about ourselves.
As for Octopi, not liking people enough to save them is not necessarily a sign of low intelligence. If I were Squidward and lived beside Spongebob and Patrick, the intelligent choice would be to stand aside and let the fatal accident happen :-)
John, I put the word person in quotes as a shorthand in keeping with the definition in the article. Would say Mr Spock be a “person”? There is a very large difference between many creatures and those with intelligence. In fact the genetic difference between our intelligence and Donphins is probably very small.
@William – Apologies in advance for soindlung like a smartarse, but ( ah, there’s always a but )
1. Mr Spock is not real.
Within ST, he is if course a person, but he’s also a representation of the “inscrutable Asian” just as the Klingons are a representation of the “brutal Russians”. All very human.
2. While we share a hell of a lot of DNA with Dolphins, we share more with both primates and pigs. We also share about 50% of our DNA with bananas. Where do we draw the line?
3. “nonhuman person” is an oxymoron.
I think it’s arbitrary to say that dolphins should be people but chickens not. And anyway, if dolphins are highly intelligent, maybe they would be highly offended to be called “people” and to be “as good as” us. Yes, safeguard their rights as mammals, there’s no need to make them ersatz humans.
John, it doesn’t matter that Mr Spock isn’t real. The point is the same. If we came across an intelligent space travelling alien then we would regard them as a “person”, i.e. an individual with an individual’s rights. Science Fiction often exposes our parochial attitudes.
When writing these posts we have to use shorthand. Dolphins brains are probably 99% as sophisticated as ours and they share with us a high percentage of the genes that build brains. If they had hands with thumbs and could speak they might be seen to be as intelligent. Many people are locked into the notion that there is one species of intelligent creatures on Earth. The scientists are saying this is wrong, there are several and we should change our laws to accommodate this more intelligent and scientifically based perspective. It does, like most scientific discoveries, run contrary to most religious beliefs which see man as god like and the animals there as our food & slaves.
It’s not long since Ancient Greeks and whites in the US didn’t think slaves were conscious people who were entitled to the same rights.
This is now a stale thread, but it’s just too hard to ignore the gaping holes in your argument:
1. It doesn’t matter that Mr. Spock isn’t real.
No comment, but I’ve a 100% genuine tachyon accelerator that I know you want to buy. Documents of authenticity from the Galactic Federation themselves.
It is very likely that Earth is not the only planet capable of supporting life. It is very unlikely that the life forms would be anything to what we’d define as ” like a person”. You’re being ridiculously human centric when you assume “evolved” is “like use”. I very much doubt you’d consider plant-based or bacterial life to be “persons”.
1. It was not long ago that the ancient Greeks…? It was a long time ago. That’s why we use the word ancient.
You are confusing humanity and citizenship. Of course the ancient Greek and Roman cultures believed their slaves were people. They just weren’t citizens. The Romans had an established system where slaves could earn citizenship via military service. It was a matter of legal status, not of intelligence or self-awareness.
Fast-forwarding to the Imperial Age ( Historical, not Star Wars, pay attention ), the myth that African slaves were not human was simply a loophole established by the Church to.profit from the slave trade. A loophole similar to the selling if indulgences. Slavery was a sin, say Christian teachings, as only God can claim ownership of a human soul. But there was money to be had, so the Church claimed that Africans had no soul, so no conflict with church teachings.
To state clearly, this issue of the soul has nothing to do with intelligence and self-awareness, and very few people took this at face value. Saying they did is like saying that all Christians are Creationists.
From your posts you’re showing that you view self-awareness and intelligence as something that can only be judged from a human benchmark, and in doing so, you’re defeating the position you originally stood for.
John, for the purpose of argument it doesn’t matter that Mr Spock is fiction. There are Mr Spocks out there and whether or not they have hands with thumbs (likely), binocular vision (likely), arms & legs (likely), brains, not plants etc… they are persons, individuals, people. We are just human people.
It is actually unknown whether intelligent life will look like us BUT it probably will or at least like some mammal type creature. The laws of physics etc are the same everywhere. Even on Earth you get what’s called “convergence”. Evolution finds the same design layout again and again.
“Ancient” Greece isn’t long ago in terms of human and other species evolution or even human society. Slaves were treated as animals without “personhood” rights, dolphins are today.
Is Fungi who lives in Dingle a person – yes. Has he rights – yes. Should he be arbitrarily killed – no.
That’s what the scientists are saying. It’s logical. If you have enough intelligence and self awareness you get new rights, otherwise we can’t complain if Mr Spock wants to kill us for food because he has an IQ of 2000.
Dolphins are people too!
It’s a start…hopefully a declaration for the rights of all animals can eventually be realised, as all deserve life, liberty and wellbeing.
But how is it determined that the Dolphins are unhappy? Like I said I saw a Dolphin show once and they seemed more than willing participants, they seemed to enjoy the attention.
Tax them!
People say Dolphins are clever, I’ve never seen a dolphin do anything that clever????
Riiiiight. So how long before we see “dolphin quotas” in the dail then?
There’s enough whales in there already sure!
@Stephen you can safely assume that any animal held in captivity, given none of the freedoms and enrichments it would otherwise have in the wild and is trained to perform day in and day out is an unhappy one. A dolphins smile is natures great deception. When you see a dolphin in the wild nod or shake it’s head at you it’s normally a warning, yet…they always look so happy doing it…
No I can’t ‘safely assume’ anything. Cats and dogs are animals that can live in the wild. They can, and do, however also live quite happily in ‘captivity’.
You can’t compare dolphins with domesticated pets, dolphins in the wild swim many miles a day with often very large pods they ride the waves, males give seaweed to females to impress them (like flowers)…..they are very complex social animals that need space and lots of other dolphins around them…they don’t get any of that in a small tank with a few other dolphins for companionship.
Domesticated dogs yes, can survive on their own depending on the breed and circumstances, if the dog can form a pack with other strays then yes survival is possible on the other hand, a pack of shih tzus probably wouldn’t have a chance. The majority of lone stray dogs come into shelters emaciated because they can’t find food for themselves. Then again…most dogs aren’t stray by choice, they crave human companionship and security it’s bred into them, If they are walked fed and in a warm loving home the dog is happy.
Most cats are left to roam freely by their owners and they come and go as they please……..there a big difference between that and a life lived in a tank.
I would like to say that some of my best friends are dolphins. Some of those are gay dolphins and some are black. I have another dolphin friend who is a traveller. However I know some dolphins that discriminate against belugas because they look weird. Maybe they should have a support group too.
I was sailing recently in the sea and about 50 dolphins surrounded the boat and spent 15 minutes swimming and diving around the boat. They were obviously playing with us and enjoying our company. I was struck very forcibly that they were intelligent individuals. Under no circumstances should they be arbitrarily killed. Neither should whales, dogs or cats. My dog even puts on the same puzzled sideways face a human does. They say a dog can learn 200 words. If I speak to my wife and anywhere in the conversation say something like “….will we go for a walk tomorrow….”, the dog, who might even appear to be sleeping, pops up and stares at us. If it can pick out it’s favourite words from a conversation then it’s too intelligent to be treated as other than an individual. In fact people with dogs will always claim they have distinct personalities.
PS What about Mr Data in Star Trek? We will have to face that situation some day.
Some people are saying that it’s wrong to kill intelligent animals. Why should intelligent animals get better treatment than stupid ones? Should we treat stupid humans worse than we treat smart ones?
Surely it should be equal rights for all, regardless of IQ.
Not that I think animals should have any rights. Or a lot of stupid people too for that matter.
Now that is a whopper. Their only dolphins!
If the requirement for not killing things is that they be “intellectually sophisticated” and that they have “advanced cognitive abilities”, then some human people are screwed.
Dinner at 8 then?
have your say