Autumn

[Rhiannon]

That's certainly true of dogs - they generally don't last long without human help. Cats though are quite different. My cat could fend for herself no problem - she finds a soft bed preferable to under a bush in the winter but in the summer we hardly see her except if she wants food. I've known cats to revert to feral even if handled well as kittens and well treated as adults because it is a preference within them.

What I think is undeniable is the mental well- being that comes with pet ownership. I believe it's been shown that stroking a pet reduces stress hormones and blood pressure.

[Shaker]

Having said that I feel there is an element of utility in the person-pet relationship. It certainly isn't a relationship of equality is it?

No, but then neither is a parent-child relationship, hence my remark about babies and toddlers earning their keep. Michael Faraday famously asked "What use is a newborn baby?" to make the same point: babies especially are totally dependent (far more so than any pet) and require a huge outlay of money, time, effort and attention just about every single minute of every day. They take, take, take, take, take and give nothing of direct practical utility back - but people still do it.

If these animals were coming to us from the wild of their own volition and staying while remaining free to leave... Perhaps that would be equal.

According to what I've read that was most likely the case with cats and dogs. Cats demonstrated themselves to be useful at catching the mice and rats that ate valuable stores of grain, for example, and were kept around - rewarded with food - for that reason.

As it is they exist and live entirely at our behest. We sterilise them for our convenience and subject them to various other medical procedures, including euthanasia. It would be disingenuous to deny that on some level pets serve a purpose of our making, nor of theirs. Just like any other other possesion. All the same they can live very happy lives and enjoy genuine love and affection from their owners. I have no objection to owning a pet.

Given the colossal amounts of money spent on them the purpose is surely companionship and the love and affection they provide - but as I said yesterday, that works both ways, so the relationship (at best, anyway) is symbiotic. It's a little more difficult to see what's given back in the case of something like a snake or an iguana, but with a cat or a dog - the animal species closest to humans and their everyday lives - it couldn't be more obvious.

[Rhiannon]

And most animal welfare charities sterilise animals for their welfare - sterilised females get less tumours, both makes and females are safer if they aren't trying to escape to breed and neutering reduces the number of unwanted animals, especially cats.

The alternative to domestic dogs is no dogs.

[floo]

And most animal welfare charities sterilise animals for their welfare - sterilised females get less tumours, both makes and females are safer if they aren't trying to escape to breed and neutering reduces the number of unwanted animals, especially cats.

The alternative to domestic dogs is no dogs.

What about guard dogs?

[Rhiannon]

And most animal welfare charities sterilise animals for their welfare - sterilised females get less tumours, both makes and females are safer if they aren't trying to escape to breed and neutering reduces the number of unwanted animals, especially cats.

The alternative to domestic dogs is no dogs.

What about guard dogs?

They are still domestic (ie not wild) and are owned to do a job. Ditto police dogs, SAR dogs, guide dogs, sheepdogs etc.

[Samuel]

Having said that I feel there is an element of utility in the person-pet relationship. It certainly isn't a relationship of equality is it?

No, but then neither is a parent-child relationship, hence my remark about babies and toddlers earning their keep. Michael Faraday famously asked "What use is a newborn baby?" to make the same point: babies especially are totally dependent (far more so than any pet) and require a huge outlay of money, time, effort and attention just about every single minute of every day. They take, take, take, take, take and give nothing of direct practical utility back - but people still do it.

But like all animals we have a biological imperative to reproduce. There is no such imperative for keeping individuals of another species as possesions. It's unreasonable to draw a parallel between the two.

The rest I agree with. Personally I see it simply as a matter of principle that we aknowledge that the balance of the relationship between people and pets is in favour of the human. circumstances exist that make pet ownership a possibility only because humanity has conspired to make it so. Whilst different pet animals will exhibit various degrees of independence they all of them subject to our will.

[Shaker]

They are still domestic (ie not wild) and are owned to do a job. Ditto police dogs, SAR dogs, guide dogs, sheepdogs etc.

And they exist in vastly smaller numbers than pet dogs which are part of people's families.

[Rhiannon]

I don't wish to be flippant - I am both a mother and a pet owner and I know the difference - but I have relations who can't have their own kids and they have cats instead. I think it undeniable that pets appeal to something within us that isn't a million miles from the urge we have to hold and protect small children - we've even selectively bred animals that have the same wide-eyed look that babies have.
 

[Shaker]

I don't wish to be flippant - I am both a mother and a pet owner and I know the difference - but I have relations who can't have their own kids and they have cats instead. I think it undeniable that pets appeal to something within us that isn't a million miles from the urge we have to hold and protect small children - we've even selectively bred animals that have the same wide-eyed look that babies have.

It's called Kinderschema 

Moreover, it's an example of what E. O. Wilson calls biophilia - the automatic, inherent, instinctive affinity humans have (well ... some of them, not all of them) for other forms of life.

[Rhiannon]

There y'go, there's big words for it so it must be right. 

[Samuel]

Ooooooo!!!!! Thanks Shaker!! That is really useful for something I'm working on professionally. See, it's always worth hanging around here... You never know what you might learn.

[Shaker]

Even I can be useful for something if you wait long enough 

[Rhiannon]

Alarming weather here - roads flooding and trees coming down in the high winds. Reckon there will be a power cut soon.

[Shaker]

I hope not 

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I don't wish to be flippant - I am both a mother and a pet owner and I know the difference - but I have relations who can't have their own kids and they have cats instead. I think it undeniable that pets appeal to something within us that isn't a million miles from the urge we have to hold and protect small children - we've even selectively bred animals that have the same wide-eyed look that babies have.

It's called Kinderschema 

Moreover, it's an example of what E. O. Wilson calls biophilia - the automatic, inherent, instinctive affinity humans have (well ... some of them, not all of them) for other forms of life.

........but often not so much for their own species...........

[Rhiannon]

Hardly. If people can't find compassion for animals then they aren't likely to have it for people either.

[BashfulAnthony]

Hardly. If people can't find compassion for animals then they aren't likely to have it for people either.

I totally agree.   You are either compassionate, or you aren't.  Compassion is not selective.

[Shaker]

That children who are cruel to animals go on to be adults who are cruel to humans (and animals) has been known for a long time. If the compassion bit of the brain is damaged/defective, it's damaged across the board.

[Nearly Sane]

Hardly. If people can't find compassion for animals then they aren't likely to have it for people either.

I totally agree.   You are either compassionate, or you aren't.  Compassion is not selective.

My mother is very living and compassionate about her family and people she knows. She isn't at all compassionate about non human animals.

Hitler appears to have loved his dogs.


I suggest your black and white position is a bit too black and white

[Shaker]

Hitler appears to have loved his dogs.

This I'm afraid is as big an urban myth (i.e. flatly untrue) as Hitler being a vegetarian - he was despicably cruel to his dogs, beating them brutally with a rhino hide whip.

[BashfulAnthony]

Hardly. If people can't find compassion for animals then they aren't likely to have it for people either.

I totally agree.   You are either compassionate, or you aren't.  Compassion is not selective.

My mother is very living and compassionate about her family and people she knows. She isn't at all compassionate about non human animals.

Hitler appears to have loved his dogs.


I suggest your black and white position is a bit too black and white

Black and white is the only way compassion works.  If you cannot find it in your being to show compassion to all others, then you are not truly compassionate.  As I said, it is not selective.

[Nearly Sane]

Hardly. If people can't find compassion for animals then they aren't likely to have it for people either.

I totally agree.   You are either compassionate, or you aren't.  Compassion is not selective.

My mother is very living and compassionate about her family and people she knows. She isn't at all compassionate about non human animals.

Hitler appears to have loved his dogs.


I suggest your black and white position is a bit too black and white

Black and white is the only way compassion works.  If you cannot find it in your being to show compassion to all others, then you are not truly compassionate.  As I said, it is not selective.

So my mother has no compassion, according to you.

[Rhiannon]

Hardly. If people can't find compassion for animals then they aren't likely to have it for people either.

I totally agree.   You are either compassionate, or you aren't.  Compassion is not selective.

My mother is very living and compassionate about her family and people she knows. She isn't at all compassionate about non human animals.

Hitler appears to have loved his dogs.


I suggest your black and white position is a bit too black and white

But when push comes to shove I'm sure she'd never see an animal suffer. That's compassion.

[Nearly Sane]

Hardly. If people can't find compassion for animals then they aren't likely to have it for people either.

I totally agree.   You are either compassionate, or you aren't.  Compassion is not selective.

My mother is very living and compassionate about her family and people she knows. She isn't at all compassionate about non human animals.

Hitler appears to have loved his dogs.


I suggest your black and white position is a bit too black and white

But when push comes to shove I'm sure she'd never see an animal suffer. That's compassion.

She is happy to eat meat and thinks vegetarians are foolish and animal rights activists don't understand the real world. By BA's 'logic' that is surely not compassionate? In which case she has no compassion by his 'logic'

[BashfulAnthony]

Hardly. If people can't find compassion for animals then they aren't likely to have it for people either.

I totally agree.   You are either compassionate, or you aren't.  Compassion is not selective.

My mother is very living and compassionate about her family and people she knows. She isn't at all compassionate about non human animals.

Hitler appears to have loved his dogs.


I suggest your black and white position is a bit too black and white

Black and white is the only way compassion works.  If you cannot find it in your being to show compassion to all others, then you are not truly compassionate.  As I said, it is not selective.

So my mother has no compassion, according to you.

I didn't quite say that, did I.  Perhaps it would be more polite to say that her compassion might be extended somewhat.