Do pets think?

[Jon]

I often wonder, what does the cat sitting on the mat think, while looking all drowsy? Are they reminiscing on the mouse they ate earlier in the day, or are they wondering why their owners are staring at a nosy screen all day (or staring at a block of wood with pages)?

 

[The_Doc_Man]

That's a tough question. However, animals have some sort of intelligence because it has been shown that they can grieve when a companion pet or, worse, the owner has died.. There are also videos on line where a soldier returns home from a deployment and practically gets attacked and licked to death by an excited dog. And there are videos of dogs sulking and being aloof with respect to their owners after being given a bath. So there is some kind of thought process there. It is just not clear as to its exact level.

 

[Bee]

I was going to reply with something similar, Doc. One difference I suppose is how animals perceive time - I've owned dogs in the past and they get used to a routine, but I don't know if they actually perceive the passing of time in the same way that humans do.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

By that standard, my grandson approaches pet status every time he starts playing computer games. Absolutely NO sense of time passage. To the point of not eating sometimes. I love him dearly but he needs to rebalance his time management a bit and I don't know how to do that without getting unkind.

 

[Jon]

Perhaps playing too many video games turns our perception into dog years. While playing the games, you are so "in" them that you have no idea that those 7 hours have flown by. You only experienced the 1 hour, if using a non-video game playing benchmark.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

After thinking about this, I can give you a "compare-and-contrast" between men and dogs.

A scientist and his dog are out for a walk. They come upon an unusual object. Here is how they think:

Man: Wow, I've never seen this before. It's really weird. Maybe I can sell it to someone. No, better still, I'll put together a research team. I'll apply for a government grant to study this object. Maybe I can work in a field trip or two so that I determine frequency of occurrence, see if I can find another one. This might be quite a lucrative find, not to mention prestige if it turns out to be unique. Plus the possibility of adding to our body of knowledge. Heck, that's worth a couple of publications at least. Maybe more. Man, I've got a thousand questions to be resolved with this object. This is great.

Dog: <sniff><sniff>
Hmmm.... can I eat it? No, doesn't smell too good.
OK,... can I have sex with it? Nope, doesn't smell at all like a dog.
Well,... can I play with it? It's kind of just lying there. Probably not.
Okey dokey, piss on it. <hike hind leg>

Side note: People walking up to the dog fall into the "can I play with it" category.