Are animals self-aware?

Or this guy...

 

LOL.

He always said the bear that killed him, he had said before the didnt trust that bear, something was wrong w that bear. He knew. Poor guy

 

I think, or at least 1 theory is, that prey animals/etc, things their ancestors have seen/experienced/etc hare handed dowen the generations through DNA. Thats how a baby bunny knows to cower to a pred bird in the air, w/out having any experience w/ it etc.
All these instincts, I have seen them disapear in wild animals while they are under rehab care, not always but a LOT of times, more than not. I also seen them revert back to wild as soon as they re-released.

3 stories for You, Broome....For you <3
1-Years ago, when I would mow my parents backyard, the groundhog who lived on the edge of the yard, would run back/forth alongside of me while I mowed, and watch me w/ curiosity (excitement?). Was funny/cool...always had me smiling, that summer.

2-I would RARELY let anyone/friends see my raccoon/etc litters....I wanted them to be afraid of humans.
They LOVED me, but would scramble and hide if someone walked in the backyard w/in view of their cage. They were scared of everyone but me.
One batch, we (me and buddy) backpacked them into the deep woods to a small remote pond. We let them go, they went swimming/climbing/etc.....when the sun went down they climbed a tree and started screaming for me.....I walked off sad/scared for them.....I heard them screaming for me for a long ways.
WE backpacked in 3 months later w/ TONS of dog food for them.....was nitetime when we got to pond.
Flashlighted and found all four sets of their eyes....one was swimming. My nuero-damaged baby was across the pond, when she heard me call, I saw her eyes sway side to side, that sway was the only nuero defect that was left after i rehab'd her bashed in brain for 8 months....That was my special baby swaying/excited for my voice.
None came. They were wild now.
Me and friend were sitting in the tall grass talking in the dark, my baby boy Picasso slowly/carefully showed himself....he wasnt sure, he didnt know the guy w/ me....when I called his name he ran to me, climbed up my legs into my arms and kissing me. My friend took flashed photo in dark of it. I havethat phot somewhere. They wild, but still remembered me.
I put him down, my friend tried to pet him and got bit, haha...and then he ran and jumped in pond and circled till my friend backed off, and then came back to me again.
Last time I saw them, they gone by know. LOVED them. 1 day in the wild (better than a lifetime in a cage), you Always have to remind yourself of that sentence. When you raise babies from neonates to young adults, you are as bonded to them as your dogs.....and then to dump them in the woods, knowing of all the dangers....it will make you weep/fear for them.

3-I saw the sweetest HUGE 30lb raccoon SHRED its main caretaker, when she picked it up AFTER we had released them all an hour before in an old barn in the woods, and they were exploring their new home.
She stupidly picked it up, he made noise that said let me down, she Idiot/alchoholic/idiot, she not listen....He/She bit the shit outta her, and she would NOT drop the coon....I had to grab the coon from her (getting bit) and drop it.....once it hit the ground, all was well, you could reach down and pet it etc....it was free now, wild, no more picking me up when I not want to be picked up, LOL.
It is amazing to watch babies that grew up in orphanage, turn into WILD animals as soon as they hit the woods. Amazing.

You good dude, Chris!

 

Have you tried hand feeding them? They love oranges, if you cut the orange in half and let the cow get a sniff, they'll eat the whole damn thing. Big ass tongue will come out that mouth searching for that orange,, it's hilarious to watch.

 

YES!

 

So this is what retirement is like? ...not bad!

 

This made me laugh. The musings of @Metalhead

 

Have you met you?

 

I think pretty much all living things have some level of self-awareness. They know they exist, and they recognize "the other" (i.e. not-me).

As far as level of self awareness, we all know humans, pets, and critters with self-aware ideas that do not match what we see in them. But who is wrong there, you, or the self-aware animal?

 

Im not real sure how to take that. So ima just throw one of these out to be safe

 

I'm a dog person. I've had a lot of them.

You often extrapolate a dog's motives based on its actions.

I had one dog, a rescue, who knew who she was more than most people do.

She loved kids, and would judge people, and would tell them to fuck off without my input. That dog had more of a sense of self than I have. She knew who she was, and what she was about, for sure.

 

Some animals are most certainly self-aware. India even recognizes dolphins as non-human persons. Everything I’ve learned about dolphins seems to indicate they’re remarkably like humans. They even mirror our less savory aspects, like enjoying violence and sadism.

As we’ve learned more over the years, we’ve come to recognize that animals engage in all types of behavior we previously ascribed only to humans. As it turns out, we were just chauvinistic and too blind/ignorant to recognize that intelligence and behavior comes in many different forms. For example, for years we claimed that humans were the only animals to engage in economic behavior. There’s a lot of research showing that to be demonstrably false, as well as being just stupid on its face.

Various moral philosophies treat animals in different ways. I’m not sure where our current short-sighted chauvinistic view came from. It wasn’t always a feature of Western thought. For instance, in the Middle Ages in Western Europe this question would’ve been seen as ridiculous, as the prevailing view would’ve been yes. They believed animals have moral agency as creatures of God, and even held them accountable as such in criminal trials.

That said, I believe in eating tasty creatures. Survival of the fittest.

 

Instinct. Same reason we and all other animals know to stay away from snakes. Well, except for bad asses that feed on snakes.

 

I'm an animal lover so I appreciate your position, but this has nothing to do with IQ.

I said "very few" because it seems like some primates and marine mammals have a basic sense of their place in the world. I surf a lot and have had my share of dolphin encounters. They 100% have some kind of connection to humans and seem to be as curious about us as we are about them.

Couldn't agree more! But my guess is that your criticism of Joe Rogan is based on hunting. I've never met him, so I have no idea what kind of person he is, but I do hunt. I've braved terrifying weather, fought hypothermia, had giardia, and narrowly avoided a rattlesnake strike. Being a person doesn't make you special to the wild. You're out there surviving like everything else. Compassion for other animals, however, is a uniquely human luxury. Yes there are bad hunters, and I hate them more than you do.

Why is it okay for a pack of wolves to chase down a deer, tear out it's guts, and consume it when it's still alive, but not okay for me to make an ethical shot with an arrow that ends the animal's life with minimal suffering? I don't believe that being human makes me separate from nature, but a part of it. I spend more time in the wilderness than most people, and find it confusing when people criticize hunters but haven't slept one night in the backcountry. Usually their exposure to nature is limited to watching animal planet.

My girlfriend is a vegetarian and a hard core animal activist, and I love her for it. Like you, she just has a big heart and doesn't want to cause any harm. It was hard at first for her to reconcile my hunting, but we've talked about it for many hours and we've learned that we have more in common than not. We both love animals and care deeply about the environment. Yes, I kill animals, but it's complicated. When I put an arrow through an animal I first feel true remorse, then reconciliation, followed by pride and a deep connection to nature and wildlife. That's how we were designed to live, as you described. Living off meat harvested in the wild means incrementally less demand for factory farms, and that's the common ground that hunters and the animal rights crowd should be able to stand on.

 

I think elephants might also be in that category.

 

i think if they are able to show empathy, they know what they are doing and why they are doing it.

 

Good point. I'm also fascinated by Octopi. They're unbelievably clever so who knows?

 

I think the reason that the animals rights people abhor hunting is the same modernist chauvinism that sees us as separate from nature. So by hunting you’re inflicting harm on “innocent” nature. Rather than just behaving as all animals do We’re a part of nature. The sooner our society realizes that we’re a part of nature and recognizes our role as caretakers, not masters the better off we’ll be.

Humans aren’t somehow special just because we made farms and ICBMs. Ants make farms too, and they don’t need ICBMs.

George Carlin was probably right. The ultimate meaning of life is plastic, nature just used us an intermediary to get it.

I think that’s the dividing line. To show empathy to another creature, you have to be able to understand the way it’s feeling and see it as a separate being from oneself. Which naturally requires that you be self aware to start.

Dolphins I’m sure have this same conversation about us. The only reason they don’t have online message boards to ask the question is that pesky lack of thumbs.

 

Yes there is. Chickens love chicken, especially scrambled eggs