Who Said Cats Don't Have Emotions?

Here's a video of two cats who I would say are closely related. They have similar coloration and they are clearly very close emotionally. The larger and perhaps senior cat is, on the face of it, comforting the other cat.

They are both in a stressful situation. It is a time when at an emotional level they need some comforting and it is being provided. It is impossible not to believe that these cats are feeling emotions, particularly the emotion that goes with being caged in a cat shelter with noises and strange things happening; anxiety.

The reaction is an emotional one, a desire to comfort and a desire to receive comfort. It is a charming video which I believe supports the view that domestic cats have emotions.

Little by little there is a gradual awakening to the fact that domestic animals feel emotions and indeed a very substantial proportion, well over 50%, of concerned cat owners believe that their cat can feel compassion and a similar percentage although slightly lower believe that they can feel jealousy. These people have a closer bond than usual with their cat.

I'm not sure that this depth of emotion is true or whether the cat owners are projecting their emotions upon their cat but anecdotally it could be argued that domestic cats have the ability to feel what are described as secondary emotions.

The other day I was out for a walk with my neighbor. She has a cat. We discussed cat emotions. She was adamant that cats do not feel emotions. She said that domestic cats behave instinctively. Yes, domestic cats do behave instinctively but that does not preclude the possibility that they feel emotions.

The point that I'm making is that a lot of cat owners are unaware that it is likely that domestic cats feel emotions. The real debate is how deep and how complex they are. It is obvious that domestic cats feel contentment and can feel depressed (often through chronic illness) although pretty well all of us now realize that domestic cats instinctively hide their vulnerabilities in the interests of survival.

There is another argument concerning how over the 10,000 years of the domestication of the cat that they have evolved into possessing a strong ability to learn from their human companions. They observe and learn. This, for example is where we see some domestic cats opening doors by turning the door handle. The point I'm making here is that it may be the case that the domestic cat has developed his or her emotions during domestication. Their behavior is less instinctive than that of their wildcat ancestor. It is more learned in a highly domesticated humanized environment. This should encourage the development and refinement of emotions.

You Can't Pretend to Your Cat That You Are Dead

This is an amusing video on YouTube in which the tabby cat's owner fakes his death on the floor of his home to discover how his cat would respond. Would his cat respond in a way consistent with believing that he had died? We have seen, on the Internet, cats grieving for the loss of a fellow cat companion. I remember clearly a very well-known video of a street cat pawing at the lifeless body of another cat who must've been his best friend. He was trying to revive his buddy. It was a heartbreaking video. Most enlightened cat owners and non-cat owners believe that cats grieve and feel the loss of a companion. But what happened in this case?

Well you can see readily from the video that this man's cat is 100% certain that her human companion has not died but has simply decided to have a snooze in an unusual place. As a consequence, she sniffs him and rubs her cheek against his hand as it is at a convenient height and then plonks herself down next to him, in a way almost copying his behavior and then rolling over on her back in the most relaxed of manners in the complete certainty that her human companion is alive and well.

Don't take this video as an example that cats don't grieve or care if their owner dies. It is a difficult subject, there is no doubt about it because we can't read the minds of cats. However, where there is a close bond between cat and human companion and the human dies there is no question in my mind that the cat will feel that loss. He or she may initially feel confused and uncertain and then settle in to her change in fortunes and lifestyle. Associated with that will be a feeling of loss (and grieving) to a lesser or greater extent. We can't be specific.

But you can't fool your cat by faking your death. It makes me think of a cat called Oscar who "worked" in a hospice. He could tell whether one of the patients was dying or not. If the patient was dying he'd jump on his bed and stay with him. Can domestic cats sense when a human is dying? We can't be sure is the answer but there is a lot of anecdotal evidence that cats are very sensitive to illnesses in their owners. I'm convinced that your cat will know if you genuinely are dead and lying on the hall floor. In which case her behavior will be different to that which you see in the video!

I can also recall the story of a cat who lay on her owner's grave for a long time after his death. And indeed in another story I recall a cat hanging around the grave of her deceased human companion who had died sometime before. She kept coming back to the graveyard. We are only learning now about some of the specialist skills that domestic cats possess based upon their extreme sensitivity.

One of these, on a different subject, is their ability to track their way home if they have been displaced sometimes by many miles. It is believed that cats can sense the Earth's magnetic field which guides them home but also, in my opinion, they are able to map the geography of the area using landmarks such as major roads to find their way home through those landmarks. This indicates that domestic cats have good memories.

It has been found conclusively using GPS radio transmitters that pigeons find their way home using a variety of tools one of which is the position of the sun, the other is the Earth's magnetic field and the third is the ability to map the geography of the landscape between where they were taken and their home roost. People should not decry and criticize the humble homing pigeon because they are incredibly skilled animals. And they can fly at 60 miles per hour.

Student Emma Gonzalez is Brilliant

Nothing to do with cats except that I'd bet some cats are missing their human companions today because they have been needlessly shot at school by a mentally disturbed former fellow student who should not have been allowed to own firearms.

Student Emma Gonzalez is brilliant. They are going to march on Washington. The students are going to teach the mealy-mouthed politicians (the adults) a damn lesson in integrity. As for Trump, the NRA bought him and his morality if he had any in the first place.

If your cat has fleas he is also likely to have a tapeworm

The cat flea is part of the tapeworm life-cycle. When a cat ingests a flea while grooming, he might also ingest a tapeworm egg which is inside the flea.

The egg got inside the flea because larval fleas hatching in the area consume tapeworm eggs. These eggs have been deposited on the ground from a segment of tapeworm which has exited a host such as a cat via the anus.

And so you can see how the lives of the two organisms are connected to each other. It probably pays to both de-worm a cat and use a spot-on treatment to de-flea the cat at the same time.

Do cats shed tears?

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