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One was filled with hundreds of migrants, majorly from Pakistan who went there in search of a better life. People who are suffering due to Pakistan’s worst economic crisis in decades from rampant corruption.

The Titan had one of Pakistan’s richest men Shahzada Dawood onboard along with his son. They each paid 250,000 US dollars for a ticket. That money is equivalent to 71 million Pakistani rupees converted.

The people on the Titan risked their lives for fun. They were warned multiple times on the front page alone of the contract that this could risk death and yet they did it anyway, and they paid the price.

The migrants onboard risked their lives not for fun, but for a better future. They saw no other option, no better way and they risked their lives to provide a better future for themselves and their family.

They were risking their lives because of the rampant corruption and economic crisis in Pakistan. Corruption caused by its richest men. Men like Shahzada Dawood, who was named on the Panama Papers along with his father. Who’s legacy came from helping a Pakistani dictator in the 70s, one who helped murder labour activists.

GULLS WILL DECIDE WHAT TO EAT BY WATCHING PEOPLE 

Herring gulls (Larus argentatus) can perfectly thrive in coastal  and urban landscapes, however, these birds will steal your food as soon as you are distracted. Urban gulls pay attention to human behaviour in food-related contexts, and will mimic what humans almost all the time, a new study shown.

In a simple test, researchers studied how herring gulls behave in front person eating snacks on Brighton beachfront, UK. They gave the gulls the choice between two differently coloured potato chips,  and when the human were eating potatos chips from one color, seagulls approached the food, and chose the same colour that the experimenter was eating, the 95 per cent of the time.

Seagulls were able to use human cues for stimulus enhancement and foraging decisions. Given the relatively recent history of urbanization in herring gulls, this cross-species social information transfer could be a by-product of the cognitive flexibility inherent in species who steal food, called kleptoparasitic species. This success in urban environments is suggested to result from behavioural flexibility, which is likely to require specific cognitive adaptations. In food-stealing birds, success is said to reflect an ability to integrate and use information about both the environment and other individuals, and kleptoparasites generally have usually larger relative brain sizes than their hosts.  

Photo by Jon J. Laysel