> When organizations use weasel words and spaghetti logic like this, they signal that they're not interested in arguing in good faith
There are a few relevant questions in a scenario like this:
1. Was the attack intentional?
2. Was causing harm/destruction a goal of the attack?
3. Orcas are predators. Were they attempting to eat anyone?
I would interpret "not in an aggressive way" as drawing a line between questions (1) and (2), and that's certainly an important distinction to draw. It's also possible to draw a line between (2) and (3), which wouldn't match well with the ordinary use of the word "aggressive", but which is still important and is suggested by the context.
Sure, they weren't trying to eat anyone, and I don't believe orcas basically ever actually try to kill humans...but the very fact that they don't further underlines how smart they are, so yeah they knew what they were doing.
The concepts an animal understands are not particularly related to the animal's intelligence. Human property is a major part of the world of dogs, and not at all a part of the world of orcas.
> I believe they've been shown to cooperate with humans in hunting before
Case in point. Orcas in the wild are pack hunters. This is an easy adjustment for them to make.
> ...
> Conservationists urge the public not to view these incidents as malicious. "They are not attacks, they are interactions, that is, killer whales detect a foreign object that enters their lives and respond to its presence, but not in an aggressive way,” Alfredo López of Iberian Orca, a conservation group, tells Newsweek’s Robyn White.
Not that I necessarily blame the orcas here, but this framing is so bizarre and out of touch.
"Yes, they destroyed the boat and the people had to be rescued, but it's not aggressive."
When organizations use weasel words and spaghetti logic like this, they signal that they're not interested in arguing in good faith, and people start dismissing them out of hand.