Cross posted from https://lemmy.ca/post/70299144

In 1906, Lewis Nixon invented the first sonar-type listening device to detect icebergs. Years later, Sound Navigation and Ranging (SONAR) became a staple in naval military warfare for its ability to detect submarines. With the ocean bed holding critical oil and communication lines, submarines are key to surveillance practices necessary for threat assessment and protection. However, there are a lot of unique challenges with submarines, including navigation.

With so much of the ocean bed still unmapped, sonar technology is used to detect geological structures underwater. Sonar is critical for people to find their way around the ocean, search for objects, and make sure threats are detected before they cause any harm. However, humans aren't the only ones to use sound waves to make sense of their surroundings. Many animals rely on echolocation or biological sonar to live, especially in the ocean. Here's why the military's use of sonar is terrible for our friends underwater.

China managed to secure Taiwan’s exclusion from a Track 2 platform designed to address maritime ecology. It’s a worrying escalation of China’s political warfare.

Archived

Taiwan is an indispensable stakeholder in ocean governance. It has transformed from a historical trouble-maker accused of laundering fish into a vanguard against IUU fishing, directly advancing the Mombasa Declaration. Globally, IUU fishing inflicts an astronomical economic toll of up to $50 billion annually, devastating coastal livelihoods and fueling severe human rights abuses through forced labor. Catherine Chabaud, France’s minister delegate for the sea and fishery, noted that transparency must become the universal norm in the fisheries sector, as international cooperation is paralyzed without it.

Through the Fisheries Agency’s aggressive digitization, Taiwan can offer the international community robust verification of catch data. By aligning with the Mombasa Declaration’s core mandates – modernizing vessel registries, publishing fishing authorizations, and strengthening information-sharing – Taiwan can deploy cutting-edge artificial intelligence into its Vessel Monitoring Systems to provide predictive AI tracking that detects anomalous vessel behavior and unauthorized transshipments in real-time. This tech capability is vital for conserving marine genetic resources under the BBNJ framework.

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If the international community tolerates Beijing’s expansion of its geopolitical veto [...], the future of the rules-based maritime order is bleak. It signals to authoritarian regimes that political leverage can buy the censorship of key scientific actors. To safeguard the oceans, like-minded partners – including the United States, Japan, and Australia – must look beyond standard diplomatic condemnations and actively counter this form of bullying in the multilateral scientific sphere. When both formal and secondary tracks are compromised by bilateral coercion, these nations should integrate Taiwan’s research capabilities directly into robust, decentralized scientific coalitions.

We cannot allow political exclusion to dictate the terms of ecological survival. The ocean knows no borders, and ocean science must no longer tolerate geopolitical blackmail.

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🌊 We must stop eating wild ocean animals, including open‑pen "farmed" saltwater fish such as salmon. https://environment.yale.edu/news/article/exploring-underbelly-chiles-salmon-farming-industry

If you’re not urgently dependent on seafood for survival, simply switch to other options such as land / closed‑system aquaculture or plant based solutions.

I'm not saying everybody needs to become a vegan/vegetarian right now, that is up to each individual, but we should avoid the worst of the worst.

That is, if we want to at least keep a few of the giants of the seas alive. 🦈🐳🦑🐠🐟🐡🐬🦑🪸🦐