MachineMachine /stream - tagged with animals http://machinemachine.net/stream/feed en-us http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Sweetcron therourke@gmail.com Is Chernobyl a Wild Kingdom or a Radioactive Den of Decay? http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/04/ff_chernobyl//is-chernobyl-a-wild-kingdom-or-a-radioactive-den-of-decay-wired-magazine-wiredcom Is Chernobyl a Wild Kingdom or a Radioactive Den of Decay? : http://t.co/kh6tlzxk #hybrids #mutants #nature #thezone ]]> Fri, 20 Apr 2012 07:36:29 -0700 http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/04/ff_chernobyl//is-chernobyl-a-wild-kingdom-or-a-radioactive-den-of-decay-wired-magazine-wiredcom Bespoke pets: Just press “print” | The Economist http://www.economist.com/node/21551450?fsrc=scn/tw/te/ar/justpressprint/bespoke-pets-just-press-print-the-economist Thanks to 3D printing, it will soon be possible to design and build household animals to order http://t.co/gJnpIQiJ – The Economist (TheEconomist) http://twitter.com/TheEconomist/status/185881511801794560 ]]> Thu, 05 Apr 2012 03:02:41 -0700 http://www.economist.com/node/21551450?fsrc=scn/tw/te/ar/justpressprint/bespoke-pets-just-press-print-the-economist GLI.TC/H Lecture - Glitch Karaoke http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXPy0WtjfBg&feature=youtube_gdata ]]> Tue, 22 Nov 2011 16:49:05 -0700 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXPy0WtjfBg&feature=youtube_gdata Is mental time travel what makes us human? http://www.the-tls.co.uk/tls/public/article807136.ece A stonishing animals show up everywhere these days. Cooperative apes, grief-stricken elephants, empathetic cats and dogs crowd our bookshop shelves. It’s all the rage to plumb the cognitive and emotional depths of the animal world, rejecting sceptics’ sneers of “anthropomorphism” to insist that we’re finally coming to see animals for who they really are: not so different from us. Pushing against this tide of animal awe is a competing cultural trope, the relentless seeking of human superiority. It’s from this second camp that Michael C. Corballis, a professor emeritus of psychology from New Zealand, has written The Recursive Mind: The… ]]> Fri, 28 Oct 2011 10:32:53 -0700 http://www.the-tls.co.uk/tls/public/article807136.ece Being Human (Blame it on Andy) http://www.frieze.com/issue/article/blame-it-on-andy/ Being human offers homo sapiens variety, or some elasticity, in social life, though sociologists claim that people’s personalities disappear with no one else around. Imagining this evacuation, I see a person alone in a self-chosen shelter, motionless on a chair, like a houseplant with prehensile thumbs. ]]> Thu, 29 Sep 2011 03:55:48 -0700 http://www.frieze.com/issue/article/blame-it-on-andy/ Implications of 'uplifting' http://t.co/cPe2LGJ/implications-of-uplifting-explored-by-thealexknapp-is-it-ethical-to-make-animals-as-smart-as-people-httptcocpe2lgj-forbes-x Implications of 'uplifting' explored by @TheAlexKnapp: Is it Ethical to Make Animals as Smart as People? http://t.co/cPe2LGJ @Forbes #x ]]> Tue, 30 Aug 2011 05:52:00 -0700 http://t.co/cPe2LGJ/implications-of-uplifting-explored-by-thealexknapp-is-it-ethical-to-make-animals-as-smart-as-people-httptcocpe2lgj-forbes-x A Home Before the End of the World http://places.designobserver.com/feature/a-home-before-the-end-of-the-world/26568/ Our ignorance is truly staggering. According to some estimates, 95 percent of organisms in the soil alone are unknown to science. Many of them labor unseen, in the dark, serving as the churning stomachs of our planet, digesting dead plants and animals and, in the process, enriching the earth we depend upon for food and fiber. Other organisms expel their gaseous waste — a precious resource known as oxygen —to create the atmosphere that supports and sweetens the earth with such glorious creatures as toucans and manta rays and blue morpho butterflies, not to mention writers and academics. Some bacteria… ]]> Wed, 29 Jun 2011 16:11:54 -0700 http://places.designobserver.com/feature/a-home-before-the-end-of-the-world/26568/ Man Is Not Cat Food http://lareviewofbooks.org/post/6243684487/man-is-not-cat-food In the last decade, human vanity has taken a major hit. Traits once thought to be uniquely, even definingly human have turned up in the repertoire of animal behaviors: tool use, for example, is widespread among non-human primates, at least if a stick counts as a tool. We share moral qualities, such as a capacity for altruism with dolphins, elephants and others; our ability to undertake cooperative ventures, such as hunting, can also be found among lions, chimpanzees and sharks. Chimps are also capable of “culture,” in the sense of socially transmitted skills and behaviors peculiar to a particular group… ]]> Sun, 12 Jun 2011 08:12:05 -0700 http://lareviewofbooks.org/post/6243684487/man-is-not-cat-food Where Do Animals Come From? http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/science/15evolve.html The origin of animals was one of the most astonishing and important transformations in the history of life. From single-celled ancestors, they evolved into a riot of complexity and diversity. An estimated seven million species of animals live on earth today, ranging from tubeworms at the bottom of the ocean to elephants lumbering across the African savanna. Their bodies can total trillions of cells, which can develop into muscles, bones and hundreds of other kinds of tissues and cell types.
The dawn of the animal kingdom about 800 million years ago was also an ecological revolution.
Animals devoured… ]]> Sun, 20 Mar 2011 05:37:46 -0700 http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/science/15evolve.html Cordyceps: attack of the killer fungi - Planet Earth Attenborough BBC wildlife http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuKjBIBBAL8&feature=youtube_gdata ]]> Thu, 03 Mar 2011 02:11:22 -0700 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuKjBIBBAL8&feature=youtube_gdata Art for animals http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/archives/2010/11/pattern-recognition-art-for-an.php Yesterday afternoon, Matthew Fuller gave a brief but fascinating overview of artworks that make a direct address to the perceptual world of non-human animal species. As you will see quite a few amazing works have been done in this field.
Art for animals is art with animals intended as its key users or audience. Art for animals is not therefore art that uses animals as a substrate or a carrier, nor as an object of contemplation or use.

You can find online the text related to his presentation which was titled Pattern Recognition - Art for… ]]> Sat, 27 Nov 2010 07:44:00 -0700 http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/archives/2010/11/pattern-recognition-art-for-an.php The beastliness of modern art http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/bff94af8-d7e0-11df-b044-00144feabdc0.html Taxidermy (and the chemistry of the morgue) has been something close to a cult obsession with our contemporary gang. We get it, we get it, you often want to howl in the presence of some of the postmodern confections, now show me something you’ve really... ]]> Sun, 17 Oct 2010 14:35:10 -0700 http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/bff94af8-d7e0-11df-b044-00144feabdc0.html The beastliness of modern art http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/bff94af8-d7e0-11df-b044-00144feabdc0.html Taxidermy (and the chemistry of the morgue) has been something close to a cult obsession with our contemporary gang. We get it, we get it, you often want to howl in the presence of some of the postmodern confections, now show me something you’ve really pondered, not just a high-school truism about the world drowning in the bloody slops of the abattoir. And back they come as if to say, no, that’s not it at all, actually; the reason we dip carcases into formaldehyde, why we (or our hirelings) are so busy stuffin’ ’n’ stitchin’, is because we’re really making… ]]> Sun, 17 Oct 2010 14:35:00 -0700 http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/bff94af8-d7e0-11df-b044-00144feabdc0.html What explains the ascendance of Homo sapiens? Start by looking at our pets http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/09/12/what_explains_the_ascendance_of_homo_sapiens_start_by_looking_at_our_pets/?page=full Who among us is invulnerable to the puppy in the pet store window? Not everyone is a dog person, of course; some people are cat people or horse people or parakeet people or albino ferret people. But human beings are a distinctly pet-loving bunch. In no other species do adults regularly and knowingly rear the young of other species and support them into old age; in our species it is commonplace. In almost every human culture, people own pets. In the United States, there are more households with pets than with children.

On the face of it,… ]]> Thu, 30 Sep 2010 16:22:00 -0700 http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/09/12/what_explains_the_ascendance_of_homo_sapiens_start_by_looking_at_our_pets/?page=full What is Posthumanism? http://www.curatormagazine.com/sorinahiggins/what-is-posthumanism/ Perhaps you have had a nightmare in which you fell through the bottom of your known universe into a vortex of mutated children, talking animals, mental illness, freakish art, and clamoring gibberish. There, you were subjected to the gaze of creatures of indeterminate nature and questionable intelligence. Your position as the subject of your own dream was called into question while voices outside your sight commented upon your tenuous identity. When you woke, you were relieved to find that it was only a dream-version of the book you were reading when you fell asleep. Maybe that book was Alice in… ]]> Mon, 13 Sep 2010 03:19:00 -0700 http://www.curatormagazine.com/sorinahiggins/what-is-posthumanism/ Tiny diver ants Vs red ants - Ant Attack - BBC wildlife http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HL3sHuK3iGE&feature=youtube_gdata ]]> Tue, 06 Jul 2010 14:46:00 -0700 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HL3sHuK3iGE&feature=youtube_gdata Animal with human head! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLXgLiwIRoQ&feature=youtube_gdata ]]> Mon, 05 Jul 2010 04:06:00 -0700 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLXgLiwIRoQ&feature=youtube_gdata Pet Penguin in Japan http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11xs9mFKObs&feature=youtube_gdata ]]> Sun, 27 Jun 2010 08:03:00 -0700 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11xs9mFKObs&feature=youtube_gdata Testing the flotation dynamics and swimming abilities of giraffes by way of computational analysis http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2010/06/giraffe_flotation_dynamics.php

1362_2b2f

The background to this research

Everybody loves giraffes, and god knows they've been covered on Tet Zoo enough times (see the links below). And something that's been mentioned many times is the alleged inability of giraffes to swim, or even to float. There are several specific comments on this in the literature (e.g., Shortridge 1934, Goodwin 1954, MacClintock 1973, Wood 1982); Crandall (1964) mentioned a case where a captive giraffe escaped from a carrying crate, fell off the end of a jetty, and immediately sank in the Hudson River (incidentally, dead giraffes have… ]]> Sat, 12 Jun 2010 09:50:00 -0700 http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2010/06/giraffe_flotation_dynamics.php Are Animals People? http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/are_animals_people/ The recent fatal attack of a SeaWorld trainer by the orca Tilikum has led to renewed questions about how humans should deal with potentially intelligent animals. Was Tilikum’s action premeditated, and how should that possibility influence decisions on the animal’s future treatment? Orcas, like their close relatives, dolphins, certainly seem smart, though researchers debate just how intelligent these cetaceans are and how similar their cognition is to humans. Should we ever treat such creatures like people?

For centuries it seemed obvious to most people what separated them from other animals: Humans have language, they use tools, they… ]]> Sat, 27 Mar 2010 17:18:00 -0700 http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/are_animals_people/