Re: ping Stahntii - Reply to Questions

Yes, Predator, I understand what you are pointing to. There are a few edges of your concept to be explored, however.

The killer whale is a predator. He kills to survive. The elephant seal is a predator. He kills to survive.

However, both of these predators kill for self-pleasure. There may be other animals (besides humans) that kill for this purpose, but these two I can comment on here.

National Geographic has shown a video once where a killer whale pod was hunting seals. The individuals would chase the little seals right up to the beach, stopping short before the huge whale would get beached himself. But, further on in the video, a killer whale happened to capture a seal further out from the beach. The killer whale got a bite-hold on the seal but did not kill it directly. He tossed the now injured seal into the water about 30 feet away then moments later took him in his mouth only to toss him again. This went on for about 5 minutes until the little seal stopped struggling. The whale left without eating the little seal. National Geographic made it a point to show this killing for pleasure.

One of the famous educational videos about sex had a segment on the elephant seal. The gigantic elephant seal had a harem of little adult females and often fought other males to keep his harem. But in one scene, this huge male looked about for one of his harem only to find a young female (young in that she could not procreate because she was a baby and recently born herself.) The video went on to report that often these young prepubescent females would survive the sexual encounter but if she were not lucky, the huge male would fall asleep while atop her thus suffocating her.

These are just two predators that violate your point about them killing only because it is necessary.