Anybody got any suggestions of remakes that WERE better than the originals?

Dambusters. 😮

I suppose it depends how far back you go to find an ‘original’.

Some of the more well known stories have many versions; Titanic, The Three Musketeers, Gunfight at OK Coral, Dracula, Frankenstein…

Human beings are hunters, we have exactly the same ‘right’ to hunt whales as Lions do to hunt Zebra, its exactly the same principle.

We can all cherry-pick the behaviour of some other creature to justify the behaviour of man when it suits us.

To take your example, it is common for the dominant male lion to be driven from his pride by a rival. The rival will then kill any lion-cubs before mating with the females in the pride.

Does this give humans the ‘right’ to behave in this way?

Are you advocating that we should look to nature for guidance on the treatment of the elderly, the disabled or those with learning difficulties?

Racism, murder, cannibalism, and slavery all occur in nature too, are these also ‘rights’ that human beings to take as given?

The de Havilland ‘Gipsy Major’ (1932-1948) piston had a diameter of 118mm (all Merlin pistons have a diameter of 137mm).

Rolls-Royce did produce some smaller air-cooled six-cylinder ‘boxer’ aero-engines post war but I can’t remember what they were called (or even if they were an original Rolls-Royce design or just produced under licence).

As far as I know de Havilland aero-engines was never absorbed into Rolls-Royce.

There is a pub not far from here with a whalebone arch over the door…

Does that count as ‘Scrimshaw’?

Scrimshaw is one of my favourite specific names for things and a great quiz question…wouldn’t have any in the house though.

Those Blue Whale feeding filters are called ’baleen plates’ by the way.

According to Wikipedia Sperm whale oil (spermaceti) is used for:

“watch oil, automatic transmission fluid, lubricant for photographic lenses and delicate high-altitude instruments, cosmetics, additives in motor oils, glycerin, rust-proofing compounds, detergent, chemical fibres, vitamins”

No mention of lamp-oil so I was probably wrong about that but ‘automatic transmission fluid’ and ‘additives in motor oils’ surprised me. Shows how recently the whaling industry ended.

Fascinating history…..and sailing ships of course…..pity it’s all such a tragedy really.

(Doesn’t seem to be my day today…was just about to post this the first time and the power went off!)

…weren’t Sperm whales plankton filters used for hair brushes, anyone know anymore…

I think the Sperm whale was hunted mainly for their oil which was used for fuel in domestic oil-burning lamps…..apparently it doesn’t smoke when it burns.

The ‘plankton filters’ (I forget what they are called) were used as the frames in ‘whalebone’ skirts…

…another early, ridiculously shameful, contribution by fashion to conservation! 😡

At least back then they had the decency to admit what had died for the sake of their frock!

The whole ‘industry’ of whaling is fascinating…..abhorrent, yes…..but still fascinating. I’m very glad it is now all but history, and that no species of whale is extinct…..so far!

Considering we are the dominant species on Earth with the potential to hunt to extinction whatever we want…they all owe us their lives.

I can’t agree with that. Just because man has the capacity to destroy every living thing on the planet doesn’t give us the right to.

What I actually meant was that these domestic animals reared today are solely for human consumption…..if man didn’t want to eat them they wouldn’t exist (wool, milk and eggs excepted of course).

Killing a whale is no different to sending a Chicken to slaughter, if you really want to be moral about it you could make the point that the Whale lives a far more pleasant life up until its death than any Animal produced through an agricultural system.

Agreed, but my objection to killing whales isn’t based on morals. It is based solely on an utterly hypocritical, illogical and sentimental ‘gut reaction’ to this practice hence the abhorrence!

On moral grounds I’ve always found the argument that many ‘vegetarians’ use to justify eating fish strange. Yes, the fish have led a natural life of freedom up until the point they were caught but does that give us the right to kill them?

At least with domestic animals man has fed them, sheltered them, cured them of disease, protected them from (other) predators and so in exchange for all this, and giving them life in the first place, don’t we have more right to eat them than a wild animal.

(Why did this post vanish the first time I put it up? :confused:)

Why is Japanese people wanting to eat whale meat any different to you, I or anybody else wanting to eat Cod, Haddock, Crab, Beef, Chicken, Rabbit, Goose, Turkey, Duck, Lamb, Pork etc etc etc?:confused:

Only that in the case of Beef, Chicken, Goose, Turkey, Lamb and Pork these animals do, literally, owe us their lives.

Thats the only real issue here, is it being done sustainably?

No, personally I don’t give a tinker’s toss if it is sustainable or not. I find the killing of these beautiful creatures utterly abhorrent under almost any circumstances.

…the appropriate regulation and enforcement needs to be in place.

I thought there was no regulation, only a voluntary moratorium. Basically Japan (or anybody else) could kill as many whales as they liked without any ‘legal’ consequences.

If international agreement allowed limited whaling for research but prohibited the eating of any meat from whales killed in the process would Japan continue to carry out such research?