Posts tagged 1981

The Ecological Benefits Of Pablo Escobar’s Hippos

ecology, crime, hippos, Pablo-Escobar, 1981, 1993

The year was 1981, and the man in question was international drug czar, Pablo Escobar. The location was his private zoo in Antioquia, Colombia. Located on eight square miles of land, the estate’s zoo included antelope, giraffes, elephants, and ponies. Now, he wanted hippos. So, in 1981, he acquired four of the animals from America. It was said he enjoyed his zoo immensely for years. But by 1993, Escobar had been shot and killed, and his drug business was over. The national government was running his property, but the zoo became too much to manage. The animals were sent off to refuges and sanctuaries. Hippos, however, are difficult to handle. They are herbivores, or plant-eaters, that happen to weigh an average of 3,000 pounds. And they’re some of the most unpredictable, temperamental creatures on the planet.

via https://www.ripleys.com/weird-news/pablo-escobar-hippos/

A critique is not a matter of saying that things are not right as they are. It is a matter of pointing out on what kinds of…

Foucault, critique, thinking, assumptions, philosophy, 1981

“A critique is not a matter of saying that things are not right as they are. It is a matter of pointing out on what kinds of assumptions, what kinds of familiar, unchallenged, unconsidered modes of thought the practices that we accept rest… We must free ourselves from the sacralization of the social as the only reality and stop regarding as superfluous something so essential in human life and human relations as thought.”

–Michel Foucault, “Practicing Criticism,” or “Is it really important to think?” May 30–31, 1981. Didier Eribon interview. In Lawrence Kritzman, Foucault, Politics, Philosophy, Culture. New York and London: Routledge, 1988. p. 155.

The Ray Cat Solution

Long-Now, 10000, nuclear, radioactivity, genetic-engineering, bioart, 1981

Philosophers Françoise Bastide and Paolo Fabbri were part of the Human Interference Task Force, employed by the US Department of Energy and Bechtel Corp at the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository in 1981. Their solution consisted of two steps. The first step is to engineer a cat that changes colours in response to radioactivity. The second is to establish a culture around these cats, in which the theme is: If your cat changes colour, you should move somewhere else.

via http://www.theraycatsolution.com/#10000