How Words Affect Your Access to Information

In a study reported by Bloomberg and other news services, scientists analyzed data about the predatory habits of great white sharks using a method called geographic profiling. After tracking more than 340 attacks in waters off South Africa:

We found that white shark hunting is non-random, and they have an anchor point or search base.

The analysis method, which tracked the location of the sharks as they hunted and rested, helped to reveal that the sharks position themselves near seal populations, waiting for individuals to pass by before launching a sudden vertical attack. Some sharks achieved an 80% success rate with this approach.

Unfortunately, at least in some respects, the data analysis method was borrowed from police, who use the same kind of profiling to detect and predict the behavior of human serial killers. Scientifically it makes good sense to use an already established and successful model to analyze what appears superficially to be similar behavior, especially given that, as the study points out:

The white shark hunting patterns remain very poorly understood.

The scientists themselves appear to understand the difference between their subjects and human killers. One of the study's authors, Neil Hammerschlag commented that:

Sharks differ from serial killers in that their hunting is typically for survival. The profiling technique is useful as a measure to protect sharks rather than humans.

Newspapers, on the other hand, have to sell papers (or headlines I saw regarding this study generally came to one conclusion: Bloomberg said "The Great White Sharks Hunt Like Serial Killers, Scientists Say"; the BBC said "Great whites 'plan' seal attacks"; the Boston Globe spiced it up a bit with "Great white sharks hunt just like Hannibal Lecter". Of course, to sell papers, these headlines focus on the killing aspect of the shark's behavior, while obscuring the fundamental difference between killing for pleasure and killing for food. The headlines skew not only our attention to the story, but also seeks to touch our fear of such animals, all the while condemning them for "causing" our fear.

However, I fear humans far more than sharks. Human serial killers kill members of their own species (mine too), and usually for complex deeply irrational reasons. Sharks kill members of a different species for which they have no natural empathy, and consume what they kill in nearly all cases. They put seals in the same category that we put hamburgers or apples: something edible. While that may not sound quite as titillating as comparing them to serial killers, it more accurately represents the behavior. Accurately understanding a behavior gives us a better handle on how to categorize it and how to react to it--not with fear or horror, but with interest and empathy.