[From Fred Nickols (971217.2100 EST)]
Bill Powers (971217.0428 MST)--
Bruce Abbott (971216.2115 EST)--
An edition of _Scientific American Frontiers_ shown tonight on our local
cable TV's learning channel documented a study undertaken in France to
determine what size of cage hens prefer. The idea was that happier hens
might produce more eggs; perhaps the standard cage sizes in use in French
commercial hen houses might not be the size hens like best. So the hens
were given a button to peck. Pecking the button moved one of the cage walls
outward a small amount with each peck. Meanwhile a motor drive very slowly
moved the walls inward. Turns out the chickens adjusted the wall position
to provide cage space about double the legal minimum, but much smaller than
the apparatus allowed.Amazing how clearly we can see even a chicken's intentions when the subject
is allowed to control the variable in question. I presume that the legal
minimum cage size was immediately changed.
Of course not! Chickens do not vote, nor are they capable of banding
together in an armed force. Finally, they have no money with which to buy
votes or mercenaries. In short, they don't count. The legal limits will
remain as they are until such time as legal pressures can be brought to bear
to change them. Moral and ethical considerations have no bearing. My gosh,
Bill, where have you been all your life -- off dreaming up some new theory? 
Power to the chickens! Chickens of the world, unite!
Regards,
Fred Nickols
nickols@worldnet.att.net