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This is a small world.

While surfing the net, seeking infos about cat asthma on various  pet boards and veterinarian sites (I'm going to buy the cat inhaler for Loukoum for there are less side-effects than oral medication and the coughing is back now that he takes  a pill every two days only) I came across Sharkey's story, watched the video and recognized the voice...


Turned out that Sharkey's "mom" is Eric Stoltz's sister, Susan, hence his narrating the story she wrote about her poor dog.

Hearing this, I couldn't help thinking of Daniel Graystone's chilling speech to the Graystone board in "There is another Sky", about the sentient beings that the race of Cylons would be.

Same voice and precise delivery, but a very different speech.

"we will wait and see who stands up to do what is fair, decent and morally right", Eric says, using his sister's words (and it's likely that he agrees with her).

In Pantagruel, Rabelais could write in 1532: 

" Sapience n’entre point en âme malivole, et science sans conscience n’est que ruine de l’âme. "

Animal welfare doesn't only question what science does. It is also about greed and the search for profit. It questions our capitalist societies based on ownership and the growth of capital. Like the cylons on Caprica/BSG. What was disturbing and fascinating on Caprica wasn't the technology itself, the fact of creating life through digital imprints and artificial intelligence, but the fact that Graystone was a scientist genius and a ruthless buisnessman very aware of the market laws at once, and also a human being with flaws, cracks and weaknesses.

Philosophizing on ethics is necessary––that's how individuals morally grow up–– but so is doing" what is fair, decent and morally right", which, in our societies, implies rules and regulations. In other words, it's a matter of Politics; from the Greek politeia that is "how a city (State) is run".

On Caprica some young people, eager for rules and regulations, turned to the STO religion, waiting for One True God to tell them what is right and wrong. It looked like the failure of colonial polytheism, but I rather see it as the failure of Politics.

I hope, for animal welfare, and human welfare as well, that we aren't going that way.