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An autistic look at animals
May. 13th, 2005 03:02 pmMarian Stamp Dawkins1
BOOK REVIEWED - Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behaviour
by Temple Grandin & Catherine Johnson
Scribner/Bloomsbury: 2005. 368 pp. $25/£16.99
There are two remarkable things about Temple Grandin. The first is that she has arguably done more than anyone else in the world to improve the welfare of animals in a practical way. Her major contribution has been to go into places that most of us would probably prefer not to think about — slaughterhouses — and imagine what it would be like to be an animal on its way to being killed. She has dramatically improved the welfare of these animals, not by making any expensive modifications to the slaughter plants but by suggesting simple changes that cost nothing, such as removing a yellow coat hanging over a grey fence, or altering the lighting to eliminate shiny reflections from a puddle. By removing stimuli that frighten cattle and cause them to stop and pile up on one another, the cattle move more easily, they don't slip and fall, and the use of electric goads is almost unnecessary. These things are all very simple and effective. It's just that no one had thought of them before.
( Read more... )
BOOK REVIEWED - Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behaviour
by Temple Grandin & Catherine Johnson
Scribner/Bloomsbury: 2005. 368 pp. $25/£16.99
There are two remarkable things about Temple Grandin. The first is that she has arguably done more than anyone else in the world to improve the welfare of animals in a practical way. Her major contribution has been to go into places that most of us would probably prefer not to think about — slaughterhouses — and imagine what it would be like to be an animal on its way to being killed. She has dramatically improved the welfare of these animals, not by making any expensive modifications to the slaughter plants but by suggesting simple changes that cost nothing, such as removing a yellow coat hanging over a grey fence, or altering the lighting to eliminate shiny reflections from a puddle. By removing stimuli that frighten cattle and cause them to stop and pile up on one another, the cattle move more easily, they don't slip and fall, and the use of electric goads is almost unnecessary. These things are all very simple and effective. It's just that no one had thought of them before.
( Read more... )
