Wednesday, October 8, 2008

"It was just about raining penguins,"

Under the headline 'Cute, lost penguins 'fly' home' CNN ran the story of some wayward penguins today. It raises some interesting conservation questions about the extent to which we should assist animals in distress if the species is not endangered and the distress is not caused by humans. Does this make up some of the other bad things we do? Is this leading to a survival of the cutest? We don't extend this courtesy to most other birds, many of which get lost during migrations. Is there anything special about penguins apart from their cuteness? What do we even mean by cute? Why is a penguin cute when a chicken isn't?

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