FancyScientist

Asian elephants are weird because they are "tame" not domesticated. In other words, they are not bred for thousands of generations to live alongside humans. Captive elephants are still taken from the wild and the have to go through a process in order for them to be tame to humans. I am personally against this and the elephant riding industry because I think this process is too invasive and inhumane. You have to be really careful about places that call themselves "sanctuaries." A true sanctuary does not let you touch animals UNLESS they have an animal that cannot be released to the wild for some reason. But those are usually rare cases. A sanctuary where you can touch babies is likely not a real sanctuary and just a business for tourists.

Yes! It's true that they have great memories. However, it's really hard to study this and probably unlikely they remember everything (just like us). We know they have good memories because during droughts they return to water sources they haven't used for a very long time. They have greeting ceremonies with elephants they know and researchers can count the number of individuals they have these ceremonies with and how long they've seen each other in between. There are also amazing greeting ceremonies in captivity. This is an amazing story of elephants that remembered each other after being separated for 20 years: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lF8em4uPdCg

Yes, absolutely. Animals that we infer are stressed or depressed will exhibit non-natural behavior or repeated behaviors (like pacing or head bobbing). There is a lot of pressures on zoos today to either let go of their elephants and give them to sanctuaries or to expand elephant enclosures. Some scientists think it is unethical to hold elephants in captivity because of how social they are in the wild and how much area they use. Other scientists think it's important for elephants to be seen by the public to act as "animal ambassadors" for those in the wild. If people don't see elephants, they might not care if they go extinct. The good news is that elephants are not taken from the wild anymore for zoos (at least in the US). Zoos now try to captivity breed them. However, it's really difficult to breed them in captivity and no one really knows why.

In a very indirect way! I always loved animals growing up, but the only scientist I knew of was Jane Goodall. I thought what she did was so brave - move to remote Tanzania to live with chimpanzees - that I never thought I had it in me to do something like that. I also didn't know how to become a scientist. I wanted to be an actress when I was in college, but studied biology too as a major. In case acting didn't work out I thought I could go to med school and choose the "safe" career of being a medical doctor. My brother suggested I study abroad and I loved that idea. I was looking at theater programs in Europe and I came across the School for Field Studies brochure for Kenya. I thought I would never be brave enough to travel to Kenya alone and really wanted to do it. So, I did it and I learned how to go about being a wildlife biologist. I switched my major completely to biology and then did three internships after I graduated including one with the School for Field Studies in Kenya. I applied for graduate school and chose my advisor based on her research (using non-invasive genetics to study animals). I had always been fascinated by elephants and there is SO LITTLE research done on African forest elephants that I chose them as my focal species.

I've never heard that so I don't know if it's true. However, I would guess yes because domesticated animals like horses have been bred/selected for human use. Wild animals would evolve independent of this criteria.