Robert writes:

>Clearly the pigeon fancier culture was extremely accessible for Darwin, and
>he thoroughly enjoyed the work, even to the point of feeling emotional
>attachment and so felt regret when there was the need to kill pigeons for
>the more thorough examination.

There is somewhat of a difference between being a biologist and necrologist.
One of my former doctoral students once told me, "You're the only biologist I
know," simply because I refused to kill animals. "Everyone else is a
necrologist," commenting on the stacks and stacks of specimen cabinets.

I don't think that the comment is entirely accurate. Everyone I know exhibits
some real revulsion in the act of "sacrificing" animals. While it is
occasionally necessary, almost everyone I know would prefer to gather their
samples from the elderly dead of zoos, winter mortalities, etc. rather than
kill the animals themselves.

If you're a biologist, you probably became so simply because of your  profound
fascination with the great variety of life on this planet, coupled with a deep
sense of awe at the level of complexity that grew out of a few, surprisingly
simple laws of nature. Purposefully destroying that life and intelligence is
the last thing that most people want to do.

Wirt Atmar

[moderator's note: I'll add a hearty agreement to this sentiment. I
used to get physically ill on the days I had to pith frogs for my
physiology classes (and now Rana pipiens is a threatened species in
much of its range; how ironic), though I was bigoted enough to be 
only uncomfortable with sacrificing snails in my doctoral work. - JAH]
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