Shark Water - The Truth will Surface
 

Did anyone see this when it came out? I guess it's been released for about 2-3 years now... Looks like a great documentary from the trailer.

http://www.sharkwater.com/

This movie is unbelievable.....I've watched it a few times(i love my PVR). 1 of those movies that make you laugh, smile, cry, and angry all in an hour and a half.

Nice! I'm getting it right on in HD... hopefully have it to watch later tonight.. :mrgreen:

Great movie if you want an eye opener on whats really happening in our oceans. :Banane30:.
Levi

Its great. I've watched it anytime its been on.

Ya its a great watch, i picked it up on Blu-ray, as well as Galapagos on Blu-ray which is also a pretty good watch in high def.

i watched it in blu-ray. the gf bought it for my for christmas. it's an unreal movie. my favourite part is at the beginning when he is holding a 6ft long shark like a tame pet dog... it just looked powerful.

great
 

This was an awesome doc. I watched it several times. The special features have an old navy training video that is hilarious!!! The video has alot of great footage.

Check it out. Some footage is disturbing, but thats the point. Awareness.

I was absolutely moved by this film. Seeing them cut the fins off those sharks and toss them back into the ocean is very emotional. We have a lot of really sad and pathetic parts of our society don't we? Many of us think that we can just continue to rape this planet and not have any consequences. I sincerely hope I am dead when the earth bites back, because we all know she will.

When the earth bites back. Ya. See the movie The Happening. Sure, a horror flick, but makes y thing what Mom nature could do, if she really gets ****ed

I'm going to keep an eye out for this flick for sure

Don't give away spoilers... I haven't seen it yet! :lol:

:eek: poor sharks! I haven't seen this yet but I have my pvr set up to tape it.

Sorry I will have to disagree with the save the earth crowd.

Any animal that wants to eat me, I have no pity for. That goes for sharks, grizzlies, or any other carnivores that view me as their dinner.

Any person that gets eaten by something bigger (or not) than them just learned a valuable lesson... survival of the fittest.

It generally goes like, man catches shark, man cuts off shark's fins and makes soup. I mean, what about the rest of the shark?

When a shark eats a man, he eats the man whole. No waste. I think the shark is smarter :biggrin:

WOW!! I cant believe you said that. You should be watching this movie before you make a statement like that. When they throw up stats like "in the last 10 years humans have reduced the shark population by 90%" or "we kill 2,000,000 sharks a year for soup" or "sharks only kill 5 people a year, elephants kill 100....." of thoes 5 people that they kill they dont eat them they die of blood loss after the shark figures out that they dont really want to eat us. The impact on killing sharks is way bigger than "oh well we killed them all because they want to eat me". Need I say more?

Clearly besides the cruelty issue there are effects on many other species when you remove a predator/scavenger like sharks from the ecosystem. So finning or otherwise killing sharks which do not endanger humans cannot be justified.

I do feel that for those few species known to attack humans with any frequency (Tiger Sharks, Great Whites and Bull Sharks) we should mount an aggressive cull program. Of course this is not the popularly accepted view, I have never cared much for going along with the crowd. For me, if something kills people, we shouldn't tolerate it. There is only room for one apex predator on this planet and that is us.

Oh boy. Sorry but do some research my friend as your position is just not a viable one given the actual statistics. In 2007 there were 71 unprovoked shark attacks in the entire world with only 1 fatality. The mean number of annual fatalities due to shark attacks is 5. Yes, 5; five; cinq; cinco; cinque. What's the population in the world right now? More than 6.7 billion. So sharks kill about 0.000000074% of the world's population each year. How many people die of car crashes? Somewhere around 1.2 million. Are we going to take all cars off the roads? How many people die of diseases due to cigarette smoke? Something like 6 million every year. Why do we still allow cigarettes to be sold?

Really, why don't you find some cause that is an actual problem instead of going around spouting this nonsense. Sorry if that sounds insulting but the idea of culling sharks because a very small number of people are hurt by them each year is ridiculous.

No it doesn't sound insulting, just not well-reasoned.

You are saying that there is an acceptable number of people that can be killed by sharks.

The same sort of reasoning is used by the pit bull people. Eg. the occasional four year old gets his face ripped off by a pit bull, we should accept that because most pit bulls are peaceful and poodles bite people too.

Just wondering how you set your cutoff number.

Five people a year is OK.

How many people a year would need to be killed by sharks before you would object?

Just wondering.

I would have to say that it is actually your position that is not well reasoned. Bee and wasp stings kill far more people than sharks (something like 50 plus deaths in the US each year) so do you think we should go cull bees? For shark attacks to really be a problem that required human intervention and culling I think you would have to see many hundreds if not thousands of unprovoked shark attacks each year and hundreds of deaths. 5 deaths worldwide is not a problem that requires culling. I just don't see how you can rationalize that argument?

So what you are saying is there is no acceptable number of people that can be injured or killed by other animals without us intervening? According to the CDC there are over 4.7 million dog bites in the US each year. That is far more than sharks so by your reasoning we should cull dogs. Far more people die each year from hitting a deer with their car? Should we start culling deer to reduce the risk?

Your pit bull analogy is not a good one as pit bulls were bred to fight and have an aggressive nature. They must be well trained and well controlled and even then they occasionally go off. Nobody has bred sharks to attack humans. They usually do so accidentally when they mistake humans for their natural prey.

I just don't understand your position and you have provided no reasoning for it. Why do you suggest culling sharks? What facts or figures can you present to support such a a position?

I think it makes much more sense to ban tobacco products than waste time and money culling sharks. Tobacco kills millions. Sharks kill 5. Why don't the U.N form a multinational peace enforcement force to go into countries plagued by civil war and ethnic cleansing etc. to put an end to that? Far more people die due to war and famine then are killed by sharks.

Your position is not just unpopular it is illogical and unsupportable with any real facts or numbers.

So i guess what your getting at is that if we can kill 2,000,000 sharks a year then sharks killing 2,000,000 of us would be acceptable in your eyes. So they have a lot for work ahead of them to catch up to us i guess poor sharks are only at 5/year. :wink:

Please keep the personal attacks out of the discussion/argument.
Thanks

First of all there is no room on these boards for personal attacks. If you wish to make a personal attack against me, PM me, I will meet up with you face to face, we can discuss it in person.

The statistics on shark attacks are skewed by a huge reporting bias towards first world (mostly U.S.) shark attacks. Most of the reported shark attacks each year occur in the U.S. despite the fact that the U.S. only has about 5% of the world's population. There are billions of people living in African and Asian countries which have long coastlines and large local shark populations, yet despite this reported shark attacks in these countries are rare. This points to an error in the collection and reporting of shark attack data. If a five year old blond kid gets bitten by a shark in Florida it makes the news. If a brown person in India gets attacked by a shark no one notices.

The other factor in under-reporting of shark attacks is pressure from local government and tourist authorities. If a shark kills someone in a tourist area it can mean tens of millions of dollars in losses due to bad publicity. You can bet that if a swimmer is killed by a shark in a country with a tourist-dependent economy, the death will be reported as a drowning or heart attack.

Multiply the number of (U.S.) reported shark attacks by 20 (the inverse of the U.S. proportion of world population) and you will get hundreds to thousands of shark attacks, and perhaps scores to a hundred shark deaths, worldwide every year.

The question is, do animals have a right to live despite the certainty that each year some number of people will be killed by them. This is a judgment call that needs to be informed by reason, ignoring false statistics, environmentalist propaganda, and ad hominem arguments.

^^I guess that is where we differ. If I go into bear country and get eaten by a bear, I don't understand how that is the bear's fault...furthermore...If I go into the ocean, where I KNOW sharks reside, then guess what, I better be ready to face the APEX predator, that being a shark or any number of other species in the ocean that are much more evolved than humans.

Environmentalist propaganda? I don't subscribe to propaganda nor do I listen to erratic statements with the purpose of inciting fear...what I did see in that documentary was the needless killing of an animal. The sharks live for 2 days after being finned, if you're ok with the treatment of any animal in such a matter, then I digress, there is no point on further discussion.

If you're going to kill something, kill it. Don't make it suffer.

I'm not quite sure where you are getting some figure of 20x the US rate of attacks? This seems to be your opinion rather than something backed up by any information or even best estimates by experts in the field. From a quick search it looks like estimates for unreported shark attacks might be about the same number as the reported ones so you are looking at around 100 attacks a year and maybe 10 deaths. Still not a large number.

Most (reported) attacks happen in the US and around Australia/New Zealand. These are areas that have alot more recreational water activities such as surfing than the third world so it is likely that your africans and asians are rarely mistaken as seals or turtles and mistakenly attacked.

So nobody is putting forth "false" statistics. We go by those statistics that are available. Your number is even more false because it is an arbitrary estimate you have made yourself based on some idea about populations of the US vs. the rest of the world but it ignores important factors such as the circumstances that may have contributed to the attack. There is no reason in your argument. It is all your personal opinion and ideas.

To address your last question, the answer is emphatically yes. The sharks or other animals are not cruising around thinking "Gee, I got to find me a juicy human to kill and eat". We are entering their environment and often engaging in activities that put us at risk for attacks. It's not a judgement call, it is just logical that everything that has an ecological niche is there for a reason and should be preserved for the overall balance of the environment. I would propose that humans are perhaps the ones who should be culled as it is our gross population explosion and unthinking destruction of the environment that is putting the entire planet and our own species at risk :biggrin:

To take your argument to a more extreme position, should we let people become Catholic priests when we know a small percentage of them will abuse little boys each year? Should we let any men walk free on the streets rather than just keeping us locked up for breeding purposes when we know that a small percentage of the will abuse and possibly kill small children? Should we let anybody drink alcohol when we know that some of them will drive and get into an accident that kills people (15,000 to 16,000 each year in the US)? Should we let anybody eat hamburgers because saturated fats will lead to heart disease that will kill more than half a million people in the US this year? Sure, these are more extreme examples but they are the same sort of argument you are trying to make.

Environmentalist propaganda? And the stuff you post here is the gospel truth? :rolleyes:

The question is, do humans deserve to live if they encroach in another creatures habitat? In my opinion, when you venture into the ocean you do so at your own risk. If you go for a walk in Banff National Park and a mother grizzly sow eats you because she is protecting her cubs, tough luck!

And for the record, I am NOT a tree-hugging, David Suzuki worshipping environmentalist, but I DO believe that the human race has exploited planet earth for far too long, and somethings gotta change are we are all doomed.

Even the most dangerous of sharks pose little threat to humans, they are an essential part of the ocean eco-system, without them the oceans will be far more screwed up then they already are, you cannot expect to remove top predators from an eco-system and expect the eco-system to flourish.


[quote=trilinearmipmap;430202]The question is, do animals have a right to live despite the certainty that each year some number of people will be killed by them. QUOTE]

Yes they do, all living animals on this planet have every much right to be here as we do. Predators may see us as prey and by all intents we are possible prey, we have become too comfortable living in citys and modern society and many people seem to have forgotten that if we go into the woods or oceans, there might be something bigger that could kills us.

Might interest you that a non-predator is responsible for more human deaths in Africa, the hippo, should be cull all of them as well?

End the hippos.

I find it absolutely hilarious that you place yourself above an animal that has been around for 400 Million years, and then say we are the apex predator. :lol:

Even if you were right, people are going to go on killing sharks.

If I were a subsistence fisherman in Indonesia and someone paid me a few dollars to fin some sharks, I would do it and feed my family that day.

It is quite a luxury to be able to sit back in comfort and judge others who don't have it so good as us.

I see a lot of hypocrisy on this thread. People claiming to be holier than thou, caring about the environment. Meanwhile what brings us together is this hobby of taking fish and invertebrates out of their natural environment for our viewing enjoyment.

On the one hand you claim we are killing 10 to the 18th power sharks, then you claim we are not an apex predator. OK.

Firstly, have you watched the movie? The problem isn't a subsistence fisherman finning a few sharks. The problem are organized poachers long lining and catching huge numbers of sharks, often in protected waters such as those around the Galapagos Islands. This also kills a bunch of other aquatic wildlife that is just tossed back into the ocean. I think once you watch the scenes with millions of fins drying on warehouse rooftops you may change your tune. And all for what? For a bunch or rich folks who think some tasteless soup is a delicacy. These poachers are making craploads of money killing millions of sharks. I guarantee you they are making far more money than most of us. They certainly seem to have enough money to bribe government officials around the world to look the other way or to go after the filmakers. Perhaps you should inform yourself about the real situation before you make statements borne out of ignorance and based on your own opinion instead of the facts.

Secondly, I don't think we are being hypocritical. Many of us keep reef tanks because of our interest in the ocean and the environment. Our goal is not to kill a bunch of fish for dubious reasons but to have a thriving tank with healthy livestock. It is also a great educational experience for my kids. My 4 year old knows more about fish and corals than many adults. Many of us would prefer captive bred fish if we can get them too but that is not always possible. I would also always take captive grown corals over those collected in the ocean if possible. Frag swaps and auctions are a great way to stock your tank without impacting wild corals.

Finally, let's not get into an argument about who is the apex predator. Humans do not really fit into those definitions because of our sentience and our ability to use tools and technology to affect the world around us in ways no non-human predator could or would. Animals kill to eat and there is usually a good balance between predator and prey. Humans often kill for other reasons and we can and do affect the natural balances. Finning millions of sharks for a luxury item such as shark fin soup is not a normal predator/prey relationship.

First off, I won't get into the arguement but what has been said by some(or one) is absolutely ridiculous in it's entirety. Second, how do you figure we are the apex predator? Take away our weapons and we would be squat! What animals could we kill without using weapons? Not very many. Oh, and the pitbull analogy doesn't even come close to holding water(no pun intended). People buy pitbulls knowing they can be dangerous and bring them into there homes. It is the owner that causes these animals to be vicous due to lack of training, abuse, etc. The ocean is the sharks territory and when we get attacked(in monumentally small proportions) it's their fault and we then have the right to kill them? That is thinking that I thought we got over a long time ago.

WHOA, for being a site devoted to the care and husbandry of living fish we do have some pretty diverse views on sharks! Its a little frustrating to see people argue that because humans have been killed by sharks that we should in turn kill them back. Well, take a look at the statistics;

Shark attacks on humans
^ ISAF 2005 Worldwide Shark Attack Summary

Considering that there are 6.2 billion humans on the earth and lets say that in 2000 there were 50 deaths from sharks (for "unreported cases"). This means the percentage is so small that I need to use scientific notation to represent it.

Compared to.
Human attacks on sharks
^IUCN Shark Specialist Group. "IUCN Information Paper. Shark Finning." 2003.
IUCN Shark Specialist Group. "Shark Specialist Group Finning Statement."
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society - www.seashepherd.org. "Longline Fishing."
WildAid & Co-Habitat. "Shark Finning." September 2003.

Now we don't have a total on how many sharks are actually in the ocean (estimates say that we have already lost 75-90% of ALL SHARKS), just look at the numbers. 100 million sharks to 50 humans? This isn't war my friends, this is one species completely eliminating a whole GENUS of species from the earth. So please don't come on here and tell me that its fair or a good idea to "combat the problem" because that is a very ignorant statement. You all graduated grade 5 and 6, please think back to how important those "food webs" were. You take out the apex predator of the ocean and then the oceans collapse, when the oceans collapse the billions of people who rely on the ocean go into starvation. Guess your expensive and tasteless shark fins won't help you then.
Levi

We also need to keep in mind that many species of sharks have a slow reproductive cycle, Great Whites for example are beleived to take 12-14 years for a female to reach sexual maturity, and will produce 5 to 10 pups which science beleive take over one year gestation with briths happening every 2 to 3 years.

So removing any white sharks from the ocean can have a devestating affect on this species.

Thankfully New Zealand, Australia, South Africa and California have chosen to protect this wonderful animal in their coastal waters and economic zones, who has a bad reputation not from what it has done but from a hollywood movie that makes this shark appear to be an angry man killing machine out waiting to kill the next human when in reality very few humans are killed by this shark and pose little threat to us, yet we pose a huge threat to it.

People just dont seem to realize the damage we humans are doing to the worlds oceans from over fishing to pollution and everything in between.

Remember close to 50% of our planets oxygen comes from the ocean, without a healthy ocean our very existence is also in danger.

No doubt the great white has killed and attacked humans but its generally a mistake of identity since surfers in wetsuits resemble a seal to a shark. Since 1876 (yes 1876!) there have only been 65 deaths due to great whites, and only 242 attacks. Humans have likely killed and attacked far more great whites then vice versa.

Montery Bay Aquarium keeps great whites from time to time before releasing them back into the ocean, (no aquarium has had success keeping them for longer then 16 days) Monterey Bay keeps them in a 1 million gallon outer bay exihibit. Last shark was kept for 10 days due to feeding refusal, prior sharks have been kept for 6 1/2, 4 1/2 and 5 months before being released back into the ocean. They are an amazing animal to see up close. ( I saw my first at Sea World San Diego back in the 1990's)