Oppinion Piece- Giraffe Hunting and Darwin's Fossils

Welcome (back) to Weirdbeautiful...

I have just two links-of-the-day for you today; the first being this account of hundreds of lost fossils collected by Charles Darwin and fellow workers having been found in a neglected wooden cabinet of the British Geological Survey-

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/darwins-lost-fossils-found-desk-drawer-152821335.html

The second, is this thoroughly depressing and shameful story about giraffe hunting for entertainment-

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/4065464/Giraffes-gunned-down-for-family-holiday-fun.html

Even scientists, I am told, are human beings and, therefore, subject to irrational follies and whims the same as the rest of mankind. Even the (ficticious) arch-scientist Sheldon Cooper admits to having a soft spot for koalas. Personally, I have a weakness for giraffes. There is something wonderfully appealing about their gentle and peaceble lives; their biology is pretty quirky, too, as the Animal Autopsy programme revealed a little while back - you can see details of the programme [here- WARNING!! Link contains Gory Pictures]. It seems such a shame to slaughter them for entertainment: just mindless violence that should be as far beneath our dignity as it is beneath theirs.