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To: Salamander

I didn’t say “everybody else does it”. I said animals, at least some of them, do know about alcohol and seek it out deliberately. Birds get “drunk” off slightly-overripe berries, many jungle animals including monkeys will deliberately eat fermenting fruit. And, as I mentioned earlier, right in my general neighborhood there are at least two elephant herds that I am aware of that like to go on palm-wine benders. Obviously it’s not right to force an animal to become drunk as was described in OP, but saying “animals don’t know better” is ignorant.


41 posted on 03/10/2014 10:17:00 PM PDT by Little Pig (Vi Veri Veniversum Vivus Vici.)
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To: Little Pig

Are domesticated animals, i.e. the dog in question, *not* under our stewardship?
Are we not responsible for preventing them from doing things harmful to them, whenever humanly possible?

Bringing wild animals into the discussion is a red herring, at best.

The topic is giving a pet dog alcohol.

*Not* what animals in “nature” do, apparently to their great detriment.

And animals do not and can not “know better”.

They are animals.

Until animals are capable of moral decisions, they are also incapable of “knowing better”.

Lemmings run off cliffs.

Should this be an acceptable behavioral norm for all small mammals, then?

[and sorry, that was a red herring retort]


44 posted on 03/10/2014 10:24:17 PM PDT by Salamander (Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?)
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