Friday, March 6, 2009
Talking Gorillas
I think what was done to koko was unethical on many grounds. first of all Koko was raised to be a human and not a gorilla. Koko wasnt allowed to live as her nature intended. Instead she was forced into a very closed world of which she couldnt possibly understand. Koko's contact with her own kind was also minimal and her whole life became an incessant school lesson. Koko's life was dominated by experiments. Whether you believe in animal experimentation or not, to make an animal's life one long and frustrating experiment is unethical. Even if there might have been a connection between Penny Paterson and Koko, she nevertheless, did not have the life of a gorialla. Also the researchers were unethical on legal grounds. It is debatably whether or not someone can own an animal, nevertheless, you can definately decided that someone has the ability to make decisions for an animal. In this case the Zoo had the privilage of deciding what was best for Koko, not the researchers who kept Koko against the Zoo's will.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
The whole idea of wownership of another life does always seem problematic in a democratic society -even if it is animals that are concerned. We have no concept of what it must be like to own another human life. Even when children are considered, parents are designated their legal guardians, responsible for their care and their actions, not as theor owners. Of course, the Native Americans were also perplexed by the prospect of owning any part of nature and were absolutely befuddled when Europeans came and began talking about land ownsership. How does that work anyway? When you own land, do you own the sky above it? Do you own the earth below it, and if so how far down? Do you own all the life on it, plants and animals included? And what about water running through it? Who does that belong to? It's a very interesting problem when you think about it. Chief Seattle really summed up the Native American idea about it when he quoted the Iriqois Constitution as stating "The earth does not belong to us. We belong to the earth."
ReplyDeleteI can see how Richard can take the view that the whole Koko experiment was wrong. May have been wrong to take Koko out of her natural environment and teach her human ways, such as sign language, but there were many benefits to this as well. I feel like teaching koko sign language and other human behaviors brings more respect toward animals. Through this experiment, it demonstrated the dignity of animals. It expressed that animals to have meaning on this earth. Although, animals do not have a sense to reason, through the documentary their was evidence that animals have feelings and should be respected.
ReplyDeleteI agree that there are both pros and cons to keeping Koko in captivity. While it probably has brought more respect for animals but it has also placed an animal in a world it does not understand. I'm not sure that Koko understood why Penny was yelling at when she did things wrong. I also don't believe that Koko fully understand the language she was being taught. She sort of just signed stuff and when she hit on the right word the researchers praised her. It almost seemed as if Penny was associating human characteristics to Koko much like we (or at least I do) give human characteristics to our dogs. They don't actually have them, we just like to believe they do.
ReplyDeleteWhile I believe that the Koko "experiments" do help humans understand that there is a link a between humans and animals, I agree with Richard that Koko was raised to mimic human life. There are numerous examples of this in the film. For example, the narrator mentions how koko eats hamburgers and takes vitamins like normal children. His statement is followed by the statement how gorillas in the wild are Vegeterians. Also, the scene where Koko is pulling her first tooth with pliers indicates that the experiment is raising Koko to be a human not a Gorilla. I also found the scene of Koko putting on "make up" disturbing. I believe that while it is the language shows a valid connection between animal and man, the idea that Penny is raising Koko has human child seriously puts some doubt in the experiment of animal and human linkage.
ReplyDelete