From the heroic Flipper to the charismatic Willy, dolphins and whales have made some splashy supporting actors. And since they often seem almost as smart and interesting as their human costars, perhaps it's not surprising that a new movement is afoot to grant these animals "human rights." Research on everything from whale communication to “trans-species psychology” hints that the glowing portrayals of these fictional animal friends have some basis in reality. If cetaceans—marine mammals including whales, dolphins, and porpoises—can act like humans, even using tools and recognizing themselves in a mirror, shouldn’t they have the same basic rights as people? That’s what attendees of a meeting organized by the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS) said yesterday, where a multidisciplinary panel agreed on a “Declaration of Rights for Cetaceans: Whales and Dolphins.” “We affirm that all cetaceans as persons have the right to life, liberty and well being,” says the Declaration, meant in part to stop current whaling practices. Thomas White, director of the Center for Ethics and Business at Loyola Marymount University in California, told Reuters:
"Whaling is ethically unacceptable.... They have a sense of self that we used to think that only human beings have."
This declaration conflicts with ongoing negotiations within the International Whaling ...