A scientist's decision to kill a bird he'd been searching for for two decades | Hacker News Reader

A scientist's decision to kill a bird he'd been searching for for two decades

thestar.com

33 pointsrpledge23 comments

Because of Cecil, the Lion I know that my feelings regarding this story are shared by others - 'collecting' this male specimen of the species was the wrong thing to do. He 'collected' it because it was perfectly healthy, therefore there would be others.

In the UK 'egg collectors' that collect rare birds eggs get given short shrift, actual birds in far off places aren't afford Cecil the Lion levels of outrage yet the sentiment is the same, at least for me.

I, on the other hand, am baffled by the outrage in any case. I do not understand why some animals have greater value than others. Be it rarity or not, from an evolutionary perspective there's no ranking. One cannot say that a worm is worth less than a human.

So, this value ownership that has been put on the animal species is entirely subjective and irrational, and points out a little bit of hypocrisy in all of us.

"Flagship species" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flagship_species) is the answer to your baffling.

Do you understand why some paintings have greater value than others?

The same reason diamonds are expensive?

I think this whole thing is kind of ironic, e.g. consider John James Audubon:

"He shot and killed every bird he painted. Audubon was a noted hunter and taxidermist, and much of the money he made during his lifetime was from selling animal skins, a practice that in part helped to fund the printing of "Birds of America." But don't assume that he took pleasure from killing the birds he painted: "The moment a bird was dead," he said, "no matter how beautiful it had been in life, the pleasure of possession became blunted for me."

Kill one bird, get targeted by the internet rage mob - kill a few thousand and you get a Google Doodle.

> Kill one bird, get targeted by the internet rage mob - kill a few thousand and you get a Google Doodle.

That's much too glib. Audobon lived two centuries ago.

And yet, no difference today - nothing wrong with killing an inconsequential specimen for the sake of science. The front plate glass window on my house kills more birds than that researcher, every week. Thump. Thump. Thump. I don't have angry mobs calling for my head over it. I go out, pick them off the porch, and throw them in the trash. And no, I don't take time to sketch them.

> The front plate glass window on my house kills more birds than that researcher, every week. Thump. Thump. Thump.

Wtf? What kind of terrible bird-trap of a house do you have? I've never had a bird die by flying against one of my windows, ever, in my whole life.

We have berry trees in our front yard, so every year when they ripen up we get hordes of finches and other little birds swooping the buffet. In the fall, we get about one dead bird every other day until the trees have been stripped clean.

Here's a link to the referenced Audubon story, along with a picture of the bird and the odd editor's note (at the bottom).

http://www.audubon.org/news/moustached-kingfisher-photograph...

The article's headline states, "Why a scientist killed a bird that hadn’t been seen in 50 years" and waits until well into the article to mention, "Filardi stressed that, among Guadalcanal locals, the bird is known to be 'unremarkably common.'"

In this way, this article, which is trying to explain why the bird was killed, seems to recreate the problems that led to people being mad in the first place: giving the impression that this is a rare bird that no one had seen in 50 years and burying the fact that this isn't true. The majority of this article makes it seem like this was a bird that no one had seen in years when that simply isn't the case. It is just that no scientist had seen it in years. Big difference.

We switched to the subtitle, which doesn't have this problem.

Edit: ok you guys, it isn't sporting to only complain about titles—that's shooting birds in a barrel. Let's hear a better one!

Even with the subtitle, the comment still holds true. The article makes the bird out to be very rare so that we'll be upset about it when it's killed. And then much later in the article the writer reveals that it's not actually certain how rare this bird is. In fact, apparently it's seen all the time by the locals. So now that we emotionally invested in this bird on false pretenses, we are now supposed to decide whether or not we care that it was murdered.

Programmer destroys unique software configuration

On Tuesday in Redomond, VA, a programmer uncovered a unique software configuration that was being activated under very specific circumstances. This specific software configuration had never been seen before. The programmer then proceeded to simply erase the unique configuration from existence, removing any trace of it from the master codebase.

Locals in Redmond say that such configurations are rather common and call them "bugs".

I was puzzled for a while, but then found out Xtreme Consulting have offices in Redmond -- guess you're talking about them.

I believe the company he was referring to have their offices at : One Microsoft Way, Redmond, WA

And yet, during the next demo, there it was once again

However, it has a different problem. It says he was searching the bird for two decades. I doubt one could get a bird to hold still for that long to be searched.

It should, of course, read "A scientist's decision to kill a bird he'd been searching for for two decades". (I see the problem is in the original.) Alternatively, one could say "... seeking for two decades".

I would argue that "two decades" can stand alone with the meaning "for two decades". However, your criticism's still justified because it's a garden-path construction.

Happy to increment the fors, but that doesn't solve your ambiguity objection. It merely turns "searching" back into the intransitive verb it should be.

Thanks — but I don't get your comment. How is it still ambiguous?

Argh I misread you the first time. Sorry! Good one.

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