WHAT DOES THE FUTURE HOLD?
An imaginary Q&A in my head during a recent visit to a zoo.
Q: We can ask the question today regarding any subject, “What does the future hold?” I understand you’re obsessed with time and how the past and future converge into the present moment where we can look in both directions. Perhaps, uniquely homosapien. In looking back, how can we have an expanded vision for our future?
A: My answer today is prompted by a recent visit to a zoo in Syracuse, New York with my nine year old grandson and his close friend. As an interpretive designer, my career is about bringing context to experience: a historic battlefield, a national park or monument, cities, rivers, artifacts and lost civilizations, historical eras, religion and ethnicity, geological features—anything under the sun. But I digress.
Q: So you’re at a zoo, standing on a concrete path with a map in hand that highlights the wildlife held captive behind fences and glass for our entertainment. This very place you stand shares a legacy with the zoo that dates back to the early “menageries” where exotic animals were held captive for amusement, symbolizing our dominion over wild nature. Add to this the expansion of menageries into zoological parks from the late 19th century into the mid 20th century, along with what followed: the advent of education, growing concern for wildlife conservation and scientific research. This represents an evolving cultural trajectory from animal exploitation to protection. How can you make sense of this today?
A: I’m not sure I can. But let me share with you what I’m experiencing today. With two nine year old boys moving with crowds of other visitors sweeping in force by exhibits, I ask this question at each of the venues in the zoo. In the indoor “tropical forest” with segregated specimens, I occasionally spot a live animal in a near sunless, dimly lit room. Each exhibit appears like a diorama in a museum, with a simple interpretive plague identifying the animal on display.
Outside the tropical forest building are more expansive exhibits, ranging from large cage like structure for wild cats, to fenced-in areas behind the artificial rocks with intermittent rails for bears, camels and elephants. The most exotic exhibit of artificial rocks and water contain penguins from the southern hemisphere. Small caves with thick acrylic reveal the underwater world of swimming penguins. Today, on a cool, sun drenched spring day, only one penguin is visible on a large expanse of artificial concrete rocks. To see this one lone penguin positioned on this artificial rock gives me a sense that we have arrived at a place in the history of wild animals on the planet that invites a very different approach to their protection.
Q: As the glaciers melt, tropical forest cleared, large swaths of wild lands over run by humans, and public lands given over to oil and mineral extraction, I stand in the middle of this zoo and ask you if there is a “corrective path“ to a planet in crisis. Can the modest zoos of exotic creatures serve as an “ark” to threatened and endangered species? After the flood (humans not water receding), where will the animals return without the diverse habitats they need to survive?
A: I understand the need for conservation education and applaud the work that’s being done, yet I cannot gauge the impact that this mission will have on generations of humans and wildlife in the future. Perhaps the almost human like stare of a lemur will somehow penetrate the soul of a 21th century species of humans. Who knows, maybe the animals will figure prominently into AI that will curtail human expansion on the planet. But this is farfetched. Apart from zoos, I think that Born Free Foundation provides an interesting alternative to zoos that might spawn a new environmental awareness in years to come.
Q: What would you consider the most touching part of your visit here?
A: I suppose the medical care unit that’s open to the public. At the entrance is the ICU where the animals of the zoo are brought for life-sustaining procedures. And next to the ICU are two well-equipped rooms where surgeries are viewable to the public. The entire zoo viewing to me feels much like an invasion of privacy; but this seems to surpass any sense of propriety.
Animals in wildness have a very different set of responses for dealing with disease and death than do humans. I think that we might have something to learn from wild animals. Yet, it seems that because we hold them in captivity against their will, we have no choice but to apply the same medical practices to wild animals that we do to humans.
Q: As a person interested in systems thinking, do you wonder what might be on the minds of the people in charge of keeping the zoos going? What will happen to the funding of their conservation and research efforts if the next generations of the public, philanthropists and government agencies no longer value the efforts that zoos are making to keep exotic animals alive?
A: We are witness to a radical transformation of our planet. Add to this how people in power aim to control the funds from government to vulnerable cultural and environmental institutions. My real dream would be to constrain the activity of humans who pilfer the earth’s resources for profit. Yet, we all know this is unrealistic. For now, entertainment and sport (hunting) might be the last vestige of wildlife engagement. For the time being, we may have to return to the menagerie of caged animals that delight (educate) the public without thinking beyond to the dire consequences of our beautiful planet without these diverse, wild and exotic creatures.