Comparing Humans to Elephants (standard:Editorials, 1313 words)
Author: Lori	Added: Jun 05 2007	Views/Reads: 3419/2164	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
What do you think when you see an elephant? Do you think there goes an animal that is beyond magnificent? Or do you think, Wow I wish I had an ivory necklace made from that tusk? How would you like to know how closely they resemble us? Read on and find ou

Comparing Elephants and Humans 

By: Lori 

This started out as a blog entry. But, the more I worked on it the
better I liked it as an editorial. Now I know that some of you are 
going to call this crap and stop reading or call it crap and send me 
nasty e-mails. But, you know what, that's okay with me because I didn't 
write it for you. For once, this is my piece and I wrote it just for 
myself! So, to those that don't like it. Go jump off a cliff :-)! To 
those that do, have some compassion and read it through. 
________________________________________________ 

There is something beautiful about an elephant. Also, they are the
closest animals who resemble us, in my opinion. I'm going to compare 
the two and see what we find about the closeness of the two species. 

Elephants don't reach maturity until thirteen or fourteen years of age.
Now of course, we as humans reach it a little sooner or a little later. 
But, it's interesting to know that we are like elephants in this way. 

Elephants have babies until they're fifty years old. Now days we're
having babies at the age of sixty and above. Granted it takes a lot of 
help to have a baby at that age, and it's very dangerous. I don't know 
why someone would want a baby when they are senior citizens. Yet, to 
each his/her own. I'm not going to judge someone because they wait to 
have a baby. For to have a baby, at any age, is a gift that should be 
cherished, not ridiculed. 

Elephants produces a calf every thirty six to sixty months. They usually
have a single birth, but there have been reports of twins. In the case 
of humans, we can have children every twelve to however many months we 
decide. Most people  wait the same amount time, as elephants, to have 
children. There are a few, who like me, have babies one after another 
to get the experience over with. To these few I can understand where 
you are coming from, but it would have been nice if I could've 
stretched out the birth of my children. Being pregnant back to back can 
be detrimental to your health. 

Elephants live to be seventy years or older. This true in humans too.
Our life span is dependent on our diet and exercise with a lot of 
genetics thrown in. Being such a large beast, the elephant, you would 
think they would be consumed with medical problems as we have at that 
advanced age. But, in my research, because of the diets the elephants 
have they are fit animals even up in older ages. The occasional 
elephant will lose their sight. But, for the most part they are as 
healthy at the age of seventy as they were when they first matured. 

Their trunks, which are designed for many uses, act as their hands. The
proboscises are heavy and have over 100,000 muscles in them. The trunks 
are sensitive organs. Elephants sometimes rest  their nebs on tall tree 
branches to relieve the, understandable, pressure caused by such a huge 
organ. They also use their proboscises to get water. Most people think 
they use them to drink with. But, in fact, they suck the water up the 
trunk and then put it in their mouths to drink it. Gross I know. Who 
would want to drink out of their nose? But, since elephants can't get a 
glass to drink out of this is the next best thing. 

Granted as humans we don't have trunks. We use different parts of our
body to accomplish the tasks elephants use them for. We have a nose and 
a mouth that are separate parts, instead of being connected together. 
We have fingers to scratch our eyes with. We use our hands to throw 
things. And we use our arms to hug with. With elephants all these 
things are done with their trunks. 

Elephants can play, cry, have incredible memories, and, they can laugh.
Elephants also grieve over still born babies, losing a family member, 
or losing touch with another elephant. It is reported  one elephant 
stood beside her new born baby for two days trying to get it to respond 
to her touch. It was in denial that the baby was dead. She tried to get 
it to stand, to breath, to show some form of life. In the end she had 
to accept the fact the baby died and move on with her life. The other 
elephants could sense the animal in pain and stuck close to her side 
until she came out of her depression. 



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