Living the present learning the past

After reading Packer & Ballantyne "Zoos and Aquariums," I not only realized the importance zoos and aquariums have in educating the community in being environmentally conscious, but also how museums are perceived as more educational than the zoos and aquariums, which are perceived as a source of entertainment.  But it made sense after I thought about it because zoos and aquariums are living beings that we would rarely have the privilege to see up close, swimming, and climbing (notice the active verb tense).  Museums are artifacts of the past with meaning, a form of symbolic representation, embodied in the figure of the person that created it, inspired from the time she or he lived in.  Artifacts reflect human culture, a history of man, while animals represent life and the present moment.