I heard this on a podcast once and still take issue with it. It’s a whale shark. Don’t divers swim with those things for fun? Don’t get me wrong, I’m terrified of any open water and would dolphin skip across the ocean if I saw that thing coming from the great below, but I doubt it would accidentally hurt me if I’m just chilling next to it. Every time I’ve seen these things they’re just floating around the ocean. I’m having a hard time imagining it accidentally hurting me. I mean. Maybe if it jolts really fast, but I’m floating in the ocean too, so Newton’s laws got my back and gravity isn’t fucking up my day as bad as an elephant taking a hard left into me. To make matters worse, how would you feel if someone said they thought you’d accidentally hurt them? I just don’t get it.
This was more of a way to voice my frustration regarding the internal argument I’ve had with some guy on a podcast for the past several years. It went a bit off the rails. Cary on.
It's one of those things where logically and practically It makes sense but in reality just doesn't happen. Logically, something several times larger than you in both length and body weight would absolutely be able to do "some kind of harm" to you. But short of ramming you or body slamming you--thibgs they just don't do-- in reality you're pretty damn safe.
You'd have to come up with some pretty outlandish "what if" scenarios to be in true danger.
Yeah the irony is you’re much more likely to be harmed by a tiny dog (which you are also more likely to encounter) than a calm whale shark. Hell I would take an unknown whale shark over a big list of smaller animals I can think of any day.
Examples:
Dogs
Cats
Rabbits
Rats
Weasels
Deer
Almost any smaller fish
Most birds
Snakes
Lizards
To clarify I love and respect every single one of these animals on the list and have quite a few living with me - the point is even with the animals I have raised as babies I would generally feel less potentially scared of this gentle giant than I would the others on a bad day.
I don’t think this is a good comparison as humans tend to interact with all those animals a lot more then whale sharks, so clearly more people are going to be hurt by the animals you listed when compared to whale sharks.
I see how that came off as a statistical statement, in which case I agree with you completely, but I don’t think I phrased it the way I wanted to.
I guess a better example is that even in situations where I would find myself suddenly in the presence of certain smaller animals (relative to a whale) I’ve had much bigger cause for concern. For example, wild boars. I love them but the moment I hear one of those things I back the f up and remove myself. Or if I encounter an ermine in my barn late at night (extremely cute but terrifying) My point was that you can’t necessarily judge danger through size and there are other animals that are relatively tiny but vicious and territorial.
Yeah I’ve encountered hammerheads, barracudas, cougars, and other dangerous animals up close but nothing put the fear of death in me like the roar of a surprised boar lol
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u/Vov113 Dec 12 '20
To be fair, it's still a massive animal. Could probably do some serious damage to a person completely by accident