Tsunami news. More than 120,000 people killed... Those kind of numbers are just hard to wrap your head around. Stalin said "A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic." It must be in reference to this phenomenon (although was glimly referring to deaths he, ultimately, had caused).
The last line of the article:
Animals seem to have escaped the disaster, adding weight to notions they possess a "sixth sense" for disasters, experts said.
So what have they got and when did we lose it? (Or why did we not develop it?) My bet is on the extremely low-frequency vibrations that earthquakes cause. Animals (and some people) are able to sense them -- heck, elephants can communicate over very long ranges by stomping on the ground and creating them.
Animals also don't crowd on the beach sightseeing when something unusual is happening to the ocean. They have instincts which override any sort of curiosity they might harbor. While inquisitiveness is a hallmark trait of humanity it does have its downsides.
Posted by eric at December 30, 2004 11:15 AM