“I believe hunting through sustainable use is an awesome tool in conservation that can keep these animals going forever as a species,” Knowlton said. “I look at it in a realistic way — that I understand that we can’t save one individual forever.” He stressed that he picked an old rhino to target, one that is going to “die one way or another” and that, if allowed to live out its natural life, could pose a threat to the rest of the species by attacking younger male rhinos.
Knowlton claims that his “kill a rhino to save a rhino” strategy is backed by science; he also has the support of the International Union for Conservation of Nature. ”In population terms, it’s of minor significance, as we are talking about one old bull that would have contributed genetically to the rhino population already,” explained Michael Knight, the group’s chairman. ”In monetary terms, it’s important as it generates funds that go directly into the wildlife products fund that feeds 100 percent back into rhino conservation.”
But despite all that, Knowlton’s assurance that people decrying the hunt would feel differently if they just heard him out isn’t likely to win him any supporters. The reason why black rhinos are so endangered to begin with is that they’re targeted by poachers. Knowlton’s many critics maintain that a “conservation” plan that glorifies more hunting and killing is irredeemably hypocritical. “The fact that some Americans are showing they will pay any price to kill one of the last black rhinos is not going to help the species in the long run,” Jeff Flocken, the North American regional director for the International Fund for Animal Welfare, recently told the AP, ”but only continue to put a price on its head.”
“Instead of killing it, they can be moved to a different area, be used to bring in photo tourism or eco-tourism — something that doesn’t kill the animal,” flocken suggested to CNN. “People pay good money to go to Africa to see species like rhinos, and instead of just killing one for a quick monetary gain for a vainglorious American, it can be moved around to a different area if it is a problem with the herd.”
And while Knowlton played up the good his money would do, he confirmed to CNN that he’s in it for the trophy — while he won the auction over a year ago, he was waiting to schedule his hunt until he was assured that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service would grant him an import permit. Because being able to bring his prize back to the U.S., he told CNN, was “the entire point.”
Should social media be understood as a public utility? All too often, in a political landscape where good teachers are stars and heroes, and bad teachers are villains (“Waiting for Superman” is one vivid example of the zeitgeist), we tend to think that nice teachers encourage curiosity, and the mean, derelict ones do not. However, the range of adult responses when a child is in the presence of intriguing or alluring objects cannot be boiled down to friendly or unfriendly.
Tessa van Schijndel and her colleagues (2010) brought preschool children to an interactive science museum to participate in two different exhibits, one involving rolling cylinders down a ramp, and the other in which the child sits on a chair that spins, holding blocks of varying weights to find out what factors influence the speed of the spin. As children went through these two exhibits, a coach used one of three styles to interact with them: a minimal but encouraging response; a kind of scaffolding in which the coach elaborated what the child did or said; and an explanatory style in which the coach offered the child information about the inner workings of the experience (why the cylinders rolled at different rates, and why the weight of the block interacts with where the child held her arms while spinning).
How actively each child explored the exhibit depended on what the coach said to her. Children explored the rolling cylinder exhibit much more thoroughly when the coach simply smiled and nodded, and said little. The children who heard explanations from the coaches were the least likely to try out different things with the cylinders. A somewhat different picture emerged when it came to the spinning-chair exhibit. Children investigated the blocks and their own gestures (holding their arms close to the torso, or spreading them out like wings) with more gusto when the coach scaffolded the child’s behavior, making small suggestions for further experimentation or otherwise leading the child to slightly more complex interactions. Though the two exhibits seemed to call for slightly different behavior from the adults, explanation never seemed like the best way to get children to investigate.
Studies show that one adult can influence a single child’s expression of curiosity. But a lot of the time children are not alone in a room with one adult. Often they are one of many children, and a lot is going on. Certainly this is the case in day care centers, where there may be one adult for every seven children, or schools, where there is often one adult for every twenty-three children. Are children influenced by an adult when things are noisier, messier, and more interpersonally diluted? Interested in finding out whether the adult’s smiles or frowns would affect children’s curiosity in a classroom setting, my student Hilary Hackmann and I built our own curiosity box based on the one used by Henderson and Moore (1980).
The box had eighteen little drawers in it, and in each drawer was a small, novel object. We placed the box in kindergarten and third-grade classrooms and watched to see who came up to it, how many drawers each child opened, and how long the child spent examining the objects inside the drawers. Though we had shared the common assumption that children tended to be less inquisitive about the environment as they get older, our data provided a different picture. We found that, on the whole, the nine-year-old children were as curious as the five- and six-year-old children. Just as many third graders as kindergarteners came up to the box, opened the drawers, and examined the objects. However, not all classrooms invited the same levels of curiosity. In some rooms, many children approached the box, and did so quickly, taking their time to examine several objects. Upon walking into their classroom and seeing the odd box, children said things like, “What is that?” “Whoa, where did that come from?” “It says OK to touch, so I’m going to touch it” (in response to a small sign on it that said “OK to touch”). In other rooms, regardless of grade, few children investigated the box.
This suggests that the classroom environment is as important an ingredient in a child’s curiosity as his or her age. But what is it in a classroom that serves to encourage or discourage investigation? We found that there was a direct link between how much the teacher smiled and talked in an encouraging manner and the level of curiosity the children in the room expressed. Teacher, rather than grade, explained the difference between the classrooms where children examined the box and classrooms where it was left relatively untouched. We found a clear link between the number of smiles and encouraging words the teacher said about the box, and the level of curiosity the children expressed. Teachers in classrooms where we saw lots of box examination said things like, “What do you have there? “Wow, I think you really like that thing. That’s cool. Look at that.” On the other hand, in the classrooms where we saw relatively little box exploration, teachers said things like, “Rachel, turn your body around and do your work” (when Rachel had turned to look at the box), or “I saw some of you up there by the box, and you owe me Friday’s English.”