Is a Turtle an Animal or a Fish?

https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/turtle-animal-or-fish

by Petiver • 6 years ago

49 46 6 years ago

laphamsquarterly.org

jeffnv• 6 years ago

Are fish not animals? Thanks a lot American Public School System.

tyingq• 6 years ago

Extending animal rights laws to fish would be a pretty impactful decision.

Falling3• 6 years ago

So would extending them to farm animals. (I'm aware there are ostensible protections for farm animals, but they offer very little protection even if they were consistently enforced. Animals raised for food are often explicitly exempted from animal protections.)

cies• 6 years ago

Impact meaning, good for the environment? I hear again and again that some parts of the sea are nearly empty.

ribosometronome2• 6 years ago

If you read through the entire article, that is part of the point. It's an interesting take on how the judicial system was used in the 1800s with animal cruelty.

protomyth• 6 years ago

Well, I thought it was just the crappy reservation school that miseducated me, but I guess we both get to blame government classification for tradition and economics. A scarier subject you will not find. One of my favorite threads on HN has government classifications run to the absurd [edit] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12781157 [/edit]

hamaluik• 6 years ago

Fish don’t actually exist ;)

Wonderful book on the topic: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/50887097-why-fish-don-t-...

stan_rogers• 6 years ago

...or "fish" is synonymous with "chordata". I'm happy to call myself a fish.

dan-robertson• 6 years ago

Fish are actually made from soil. When it slips from the riverbank into the water it, becomes a fish. At least, this theory plus history is the reason catholics may eat fish on their no-meat Fridays.

ada1981• 6 years ago

I thought the fish eating was economic policy to support the fisherman.

jibal2• 6 years ago

As the article that you didn't read notes, the title comes from a newspaper piece of the time that reflected "confusion about some basic biological concepts".

throwaway889900• 6 years ago

Obviously turtles are partially insects because they have exoskeletons. /s

bioinformatics• 6 years ago

Insects are animals too.

ribosometronome2• 6 years ago

Or are they fish?

isp• 6 years ago

Quote attributed to Freeman Dyson (of "Dyson sphere" fame):

When I was a boy in England long ago, people who traveled on trains with dogs had to pay for a dog ticket. The question arose whether I needed to buy a dog ticket when I was traveling with a tortoise. The conductor on the train gave me the answer: "Cats is dogs and rabbits is dogs but tortoises is insects and travel free according."

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7236984-when-i-was-a-boy-in...

throwaway_pdp092• 6 years ago

Why /s?

Anyway, turtles float. Spaceship re-entry vehicles float. Coincidence? There are no sharp edges on turtle shells, showing they've evolved to produce a detached shock front. I think that makes a convincing case that turtles are from space. Nothing else looks like them[0] on this planet, further buttressing my argument.

[0] Tortoises don't count.

mr_toad• 6 years ago

That’s nothing

How many people know what Kingdom a barnacle, a sponge, coral, or kelp belongs to.

z3phyr• 6 years ago

Barnacles obviously came from Xen after the Resonance Cascade

Const-me• 6 years ago

No one ever will if people will continue to invent new kingdoms: the answer for the kelp changed a few years ago.

carlob• 6 years ago

Goose barnacles are a fun example, because they were used to claim that the goose was fish rather than fowl and hence it was the only meat to be allowed during lent.

stillbourne• 6 years ago

The catholic church also classified beaver as a fish for the same reason.

atulatul2• 6 years ago

I like this clip from a QI episode where they discuss if there is such a thing called as fish (as per Stephen Jay Gould)

Particularly like David Mitchell and Sean Lock (or as a comment spells his last name Locke)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhwcEvMJz1Y

dodoc• 6 years ago

Yes! This is where the No Such Thing as a Fish podcast derives it’s name. Interesting, fun facts/discussion.

sunstone• 6 years ago

I'm sure taxonomists would agree that a turtle on land is an animal whereas a turtle in the sea with fin type legs is a fish.

jobigoud• 6 years ago

Fish are animals.

jibal2• 6 years ago

No taxonomist agrees with that.

As the article notes, the title comes from a newspaper piece of the time that reflected "confusion about some basic biological concepts".

ipsum2• 6 years ago

turtles had the misfortune in the nineteenth century of pleasing the palates of wealthy Europeans and Americans, who found the gelatinous “green fat” under the turtle’s shell a particular delicacy [...] Wealthy men in New York expressed their passion for turtle meat by joining “turtle clubs,” convening each season for meals in which the reptile’s flesh formed the center of every course—soups, steaks, chowders, and salads

Wow, what an interesting fad. I'm curious about what turtle tastes like, and if it has any comparisons with fatty tuna (otoro) or wagyu.

Edit: Like veal, apparently: https://reason.com/2010/03/09/sea-turtle-tastes-like-veal/. Also, according to the article, farming may be a sustainable source of sea turtle meat.

tasogare• 6 years ago

Same story in China, where turtles disappeared millenia ago after being hunted for making dishes. Interestingly, they were also used as a writing support.

throwaway_pdp092• 6 years ago

If you post something intriguing, such as about being a "writing support", please provide a link! It's sounds so interesting.

fouc• 6 years ago

Green sea turtles have a relatively slow growth rate because of the low nutritional value of their diet. Body fat turns green because of the consumed vegetation.[61] This diet shift has an effect on the green turtle's skull morphology.[63] Their serrated jaw helps them chew algae and sea grasses.[64] Most adult sea turtles are strictly herbivorous.[61]

They might not be very efficient for farming for food without some breeding perhaps.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_sea_turtle

sradman• 6 years ago

During the Age of Discovery, live sea turtles were captured and stored in the hulls of ships as a source of fresh protein. Because of their slow metabolism, turtles can live a long time while tightly packed in the hull.

Sailors would gather female turtles when they nested on shore. It is my understanding that some coral fringed islands that served as turtle nesting sites had a channel blown out of the reef using explosives. These channels are still used for the main pier and modern boat traffic.

atulatul2• 6 years ago

How The Giant Tortoise Got Its Name... not turtle but you know Another BBC QI clip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPggB4MfPnk

YeGoblynQueenne3• 6 years ago

The article is an excerpt from a new book. However, this is only made clear at the very end of the article.

So, once more, I'm led to read an advertisement for somebody's book under the guise of well, something that's not an advertisement.

lioeters• 6 years ago

..It gives me an idea for a film script, where the protagonist has a chance encounter with an attractive person, goes through a series of mishaps and life-changing adventures that bond them together, then at the end finds out that it's all been sponsored by ACME Corps to sell him toothpaste.

YeGoblynQueenne3• 6 years ago

Well, now you're doing it... (advertising your next movie) :P

riffraff• 6 years ago

not a film script, and no advertising, but you may enjoy "if on a winter's night a traveler"[0].

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If_on_a_winter%27s_night_a_tra...

simion314• 6 years ago

The title reminds me about myself in first grade in school , I asked the teacher if a bat is a bird or animal and she responded "it is a mammal" but she failed to explain what it mean and in my mind I thought that mammal is something that is half bird half animal.

Is a Turtle an Animal or a Fish?

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