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Oil Exploration Leads To Video of a Mysterious Elbowed Squid
eldavojohn writes "A rare glimpse from Shell Oil of a giant squid brings to light the strange relationships some deep sea marine biologists have with drilling companies. The video of the squid (Magnapinna) is very rare as this creature remains largely a mystery to science. While some are concerned of a conflict of interest, biologists and big oil sure make for strange bedfellows. The video is from 200 miles off the coast of Houston, TX and about 4,000 feet down." Looking at this creature gives me the willies, frankly.
The data doesn't care, but oil drillers are unlikely to give information that harms their potential to drill, and can afford to be "selective" on what they provide. They also have more than enough technical equipment and expertise to "improve" the data, if it is in their interests to do so. That is why it is generally bad science to get information from those who have a vested interest in your conclusions being what they want them to be. It has nothing to do with the camera and everything to do with the eyes far behind it.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Seriously. Environmentalists need to set the jihad switch to off and try rational discussion with the deep sea outfits for a change.
I'm fairly sure they'd be quite happy to load all of their deep sea platforms up with tethered, submersible, camera-wielding drones and drastically increase the amount of deep water footage and readings scientists are able to gather.
Violence is like duct tape. If it doesn't solve the problem, you didn't use enough.