Why they are here...

[Seer/Sucker]

[bsvalley]

Very very funny. I love it

[Aaron LeClair]

Pffft. throw a human in the pic. Chickens are decent people! My avatar is appropriate eh? Carlin fans will get it I hope.

[skunkape]

Cow anuses are delicacy on their planet.

[mike]

funny stuff,

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=KxmvRpnVXJQ

enculturation, now theres a word

out of interest, if we could "give" this species the genes for speech artificially should we do it ?.

is there a difference between that and the "enculturation" these subjects were "given" ?

[Kevin Daly]

Originally Posted by mike

enculturation, now theres a word

out of interest, if we could "give" this species the genes for speech artificially should we do it ?.

is there a difference between that and the "enculturation" these subjects were "given" ?

Interesting question.
I think we should avoid interfering with their evolution, for a number of reasons:
1) Modifying another species implies that we "own" them in some way, since we're assuming the right to change their nature to suit our purposes and perceptions.
2) We would stuff it up the way we usually do when we modify a complex system that we don't really understand. Genetics is actually a lot like knitting, except to the extent that it isn't (but you know what happens when you pull on one bit of wool...)

I do believe that "enculturation" differs from this, at least in degree: of necessity it is based on abilities and propensities that they already have, or it wouldn't work. There are also examples of higher primates imitating human behaviour that they find interesting or useful, without any prompting from us - the most striking example is the recently reported case of the spear-fishing orang-utan...so learning from us (as opposed to being modified by us) arguably falls withing the bounds of normal behaviour for these species.