It looks like foxhunting is about to be banned in Britain. Drag hunting is not the same, they say. One objection to it is that it causes suffering and death to foxes. Also, the dogs are euthanatised before reaching old age.Maybe the answer would be to build a high velocity robot fox and chase it with robot dogs. No animals would then be harmed in the pursuit of the hunt. That way, fox hunters could go on hunting and those employed in the care of the hounds could then be paid to maintain the robot dogs. I don't know about robot horses though.-- nineteenthly, Nov 21 2004 Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics http://www.auburn.e...stmon/robotics.htmlYou can reacquaint yourself with the laws prior to your next posting. [bristolz, Nov 21 2004] Robot Fox http://digilander.l...rayama/srobo020.jpg [bristolz, Nov 22 2004] Mike the Headless Chicken http://home.nycap.r...s/headless_chicken/ [spacemoggy, Nov 23 2004] Robot fox ver 2.0 http://tinyurl.com/6of5h [calum, Feb 24 2005] Ethical query along these lines. If you were to surgically remove (under anaesthetic) the parts of a fox's brain that deal with pain, would hunting it be ethical?-- wagster, Nov 21 2004 How would one be breaking "A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm"?-- FarmerJohn, Nov 21 2004 Maybe because this fox has been programmed to chase the hunters...?-- DrCurry, Nov 21 2004 I'm fairly sure greyhound racing tracks could be modified for this purpose. Switch the electric rabbit with an electric fox, swop the greyhounds for hunting beagles, and have a lot of aristocratic types in silly red jackets on horseback bringing up the rear.-- lostdog, Nov 21 2004 The Laws of Robotics don't necessarily only cover humans. In one of the Asimov's novels, i think 'Lucky Starr and the Big Sun of Mercury', a robot does not harm a human even though it has been constructed by a different species, so it is feasible to imagine that a robot might not harm another species. However, that's one for alt. books. isaac-asimov.[Wagster], it would not be ethical to do that i think, because it would harm the fox in itself to do that, and it would also render it incapable of feeling pain from its immediate environment. It might be more acceptable to breed a brainless fox and provide it with a cranial computer, but the best idea would probably be to breed a giant and extremely fast slug, capable of gliding at sixty kilometres per hour, or better still a terrestrial sea anemone.-- nineteenthly, Nov 22 2004 Slug/bat/elephant crossbreeding programme required methinks.-- wagster, Nov 22 2004 Fox hunting has already been banned in Scotland.-- calum, Nov 22 2004 I thought it had but i wasn't sure, which is why i said Britain.-- nineteenthly, Nov 22 2004 The solution here is to have dogs hunt other, different dogs. One would keep a pack of each kind. They would dislike each other, but according to established dog rules of combat, if the pursued dog is caught and roughed up, it has only to submit and all will be well. One could alternate which was hunting and which was hunted. If a dog declined to come out of the kennel to participate, that would be allowed: the dogs have a choice. Dogs would be kept until they dropped in the field of old age. I suspect this is how most hounds would prefer to die anyway.-- bungston, Nov 22 2004 I don't know about in Britain, but in the US dog fighting is illegal.
Wasn't there a scene in the movie AI where a robot was used as a fox?-- Worldgineer, Nov 22 2004 The robot fox (and indeed dogs) would be a significant technological marvel and I think it unlikely that such a machine would be regarded by its creators as disposable.
Hey, isn't this just "Free Range Robot Wars"?-- calum, Nov 22 2004 Yes, it did also remind me of Robot Wars when i thought of it. [Bungston]. i once had a dog which had been confiscated from an owner who had fought it and had been trained and bred for fighting. She was a complete psychological mess, was very hard to handle, and she was not at all happy as a dog, partly because she couldn't interact normally with either humans or other dogs. It would've been better if she had never been born.[Calum], i think you answer the question of whether such an advanced robot would be regarded as disposable yourself when you think about the amount of time and effort people put into building machines for Robot Wars only to have them smashed to bits by others'. There could be competition between the robot dogs' and the robot fox's designers that would lead to ever more effective devices.-- nineteenthly, Nov 22 2004 On a similar topic, did anyone ever hear about Mike the Headless Chicken (see linky)? Apparently this chicken survived (and grew) for years after its head was chopped off. Now what I'm thinking is, if this could be replicated, wouldn't it be better for all battery chickens to be headless? After all, chickens probably suffer from being confined in those tiny cages, but chickens without brains wouldn't experience the suffering. I know it's quite a grotesque idea, and I'm probably going to get shouted at by animal lovers. But isn't the really grotesque practice the battery farming itself? Having headless chickens would just make it a little more humane. OK, go ahead and shout at me.-- spacemoggy, Nov 23 2004 You all misunderstand my intent! Dog vs dog would not be a dog fight. It would be a dog chase! In nature, dogs rough each other up until one rolls over and admits defeat. This normal impulse must be trained out of dogfighting dogs.-- bungston, Nov 23 2004 I think the most humane form of animal farming would be the culturing of human tissue for food, which actually i think is in here somewhere.-- nineteenthly, Nov 23 2004 [Scout] - I've just spent twenty minutes writing a reply to your last post. Having re-read the post just now I realise that I did not understand what you were saying in the first place and my argument was therefore futile.
Carry on.-- wagster, Nov 23 2004 Just outlaw fox-hunting everywhere and be done with it.
Hi! :)-- DesertFox, Nov 24 2004 In other news: A panel of robot lawyers is preparing to enact legislation that will outlaw robot humans on robot horses chasing robot foxes. More news at 11.-- not_only_but_also, Nov 24 2004 Will these robot foxes be programmed to toss my bin and throw my rubbish everywhere?-- etherman, Nov 24 2004 Brilliant... perhaps the riders can jump from their horses and claim the positronic fox brain as a prize!-- madness, Nov 25 2004 This will get the SPCR after you! (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Robots)-- DesertFox, Nov 25 2004 How about GeoFoxing instead? The robo-fox could broadcast its GPS coordinates, and the 'hunters' would only have to find it. This way, the robo-fox could be rented out for the next weekend.-- squirrelecule, Nov 26 2004 //the dogs are euthanatised before reaching old age//
Actually [nineteenthly] that's a very gentle way of describing it. The Hound Masters' usual method is a pistol shot to the head, though many simply use a garotte. Few Hounds are allowed to live even half a normal life span. Just another barbaric aspect to a barbaric bloodlust indulgence by pretentious, right-wing, killing for their own entertainment, barbarians.-- ConsulFlaminicus, Nov 26 2004 I'm aware of that, i'm just trying to be even-handed. I think that's how pro-hunt people would describe it, as i understand we're supposed to avoid advocacy here.-- nineteenthly, Nov 26 2004 I don't know about what's _legal_ in the UK but i've been shot at by foxhunters using a rifle.-- nineteenthly, Nov 26 2004 This is the first time I have voted one way half way through the annos, and changed my vote at the end of the annos..-- afrocelt, Nov 26 2004 [Tabs], apparently the Lower Orders. And i thought peasant hunting had been banned in 1929.-- nineteenthly, Nov 26 2004 New HB idea: "Poisonous Foxes"The dogs will soon learn - or die.
Genetically enhance foxes with poison-arrow frog dna in such a fashion that the hunting dogs will be poisoned if they bite or even touch the fox (failing that the foxes can always hop away!).-- Jinbish, Nov 29 2004 random, halfbakery