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Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

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Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#71

Post by npsimons »

objclxt wrote: post #48
ohhoe wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah so your cat can go to someone elses house, or get run over by a car, or get attacked by animals. Great suggestion.

Having lived in both the U.S. and the U.K. it's interesting to see the two different attitudes to cats. In the UK, letting your cat outside is the norm. The shelter I adopted from wouldn't give you a cat unless you were able to let it out (or the cat had feline AIDS and needed to be kept indoors for protection). But it's the complete opposite in the U.S, and although that makes sense in some places (a lot more predat…

Where I live, if you let your cat(s) outside, sooner or later they will be eaten by coyote or mountain lion. I am not exaggerating. There's also the issue of cats decimating the local bird population: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/cats_actually_kill

Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#72

Post by puzzlingcaptcha »

Sharlin wrote: post #61
puzzlingcaptcha wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Domestic cats have been domesticated for a long time. That sounds like lamarckism. Or do you suggest that cats were selectively bred for their social behaviour? I find it dubious.

How do you think domestic cats came into existence? Prosocial behavior and tolerance of humans are traits that are equal parts nature and nurture in cats. Obviously current housecats are descended from those wild cats that were more accepting of human presence and had traits that made them accepted by humans as well. Still, individual cats must learn to interact with humans, and if they aren't habituated to human pre…

I questioned artificial selection (breeding), you replied with natural selection (increased reproductive success by adopting to living near humans). Briefly skimming some sources, we are both correct http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2702791/#__sec6t...

Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#73

Post by duckingtest »

Want to tell a cat to follow you? Stare him in the eyes, then drag your eyes slowly, turn back and start going. The reverse is true too - that's how a cat tells you to follow you. For a "no" or "get away" I found hissing to be the most effective.

>“Cats don’t understand glass, but they do understand height,” Buffington says

This statement is false, my cat definitely understands what glass is.

Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#74

Post by puzzlingcaptcha »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #62
puzzlingcaptcha wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Domestic cats have been domesticated for a long time. That sounds like lamarckism. Or do you suggest that cats were selectively bred for their social behaviour? I find it dubious.

Do you suggest that cats are immune to evolutionary pressure?

Do you suggest the presence of humans reduces the reproductive success of non-domesticated cats? Otherwise, how do you understand evolutionary pressure?

Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#75

Post by randallsquared »

ssebastianj wrote: post #57
huehue wrote: post #13

"Exposing her belly is not a trap the cat is setting" Nobody buys this.

Something I've learned over the years ( and five cats) is: Never touch a cat when he/she is taking a sunbath. It's a trap!

I live with two cats who both think that you rubbing their bellies while they're sleeping is only their natural due, and they often protest when you stop.

Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#76

Post by warfangle »

Sharlin wrote: post #61
puzzlingcaptcha wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Domestic cats have been domesticated for a long time. That sounds like lamarckism. Or do you suggest that cats were selectively bred for their social behaviour? I find it dubious.

How do you think domestic cats came into existence? Prosocial behavior and tolerance of humans are traits that are equal parts nature and nurture in cats. Obviously current housecats are descended from those wild cats that were more accepting of human presence and had traits that made them accepted by humans as well. Still, individual cats must learn to interact with humans, and if they aren't habituated to human pre…

The domestication of dogs happened a lot longer ago, and probably a lot more organically (more like what you're thinking). The wolves would follow us around while we hunted (or, alternatively, we'd happen on one of their meals and chase them off), and the less human averse among them got more food.

Cats happened about the same time agriculture did. They were attracted to the rodents, and less rodents meant we were happier - and they were happier with a reliable food source. At the beginning it might have helped to not be afraid of humans, but we probably didn't mess with them too much because they were helping us out with all the mice in our grains.

So the difference in behavior is clear, not just from a social species standpoint, but from the domestication path:

The European Wolf was domesticated to dogs as a hunting partner; the African Wildcat was domesticated to kill the rodents that devoured our foodstuffs. For the few few thousand years that was probably enough - they didn't have to make friends with us, just keep our food safe.

Earliest cat domestication evidence is 9,500 years old; earliest dog domestication evidence is about 36,000 years old.

They've still got quite a ways to go ;) Now if we could just start breeding them for social/intelligence instead of how weird and fluffy we can make them. Hard to morally advocate for breeding when the shelter/feral population is so damn high, though. (I feel the same way about dogs, though, tbh).

Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#77

Post by gknoy »

gadders wrote: post #30
metafex wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So that the cat can go outside to play and come back to shit? :) (happenes from time to time)

Mine have never done that, to be fair. They crap somewhere outside. Occasionally in a vegetable bed, but who knows where the rest of the time?

I'm pretty sure they all use my side yard.

Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#78

Post by click170 »

The BBC just did a 3 part special called Cat Watch where they follow the lives of several cats in a small town in the UK, attaching small cameras to the cats to see what they get up to, and demonstrating things like how cats use their whiskers to "see" things right in front of them because their vision is poor at close range and how they communicate with us. I recommend it if you're a cat person.

Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#79

Post by angersock »

rbehrends wrote: post #31
jchendy wrote: post #9

"This is because cats evolved as solitary hunters with little need for reading social cues, especially those for behavior modification." [...] “How the hell is your cat supposed to know that you’re yelling at him because you want him to stop scratching the couch?” [...] "When your cat does the thing you want her do to, reward her with a treat, or affection." If we accept that cats can't learn from negative reinforcem…

That's not negative reinforcement. Negative reinforcement is when behavior is reinforced by removing an aversive stimulus . Yelling at a cat because it's scratching the couch is positive punishment [1]. And punishment works quite differently from reinforcement to begin with; it is typically less effective for far better socialized species such as humans and dogs, too. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operant_conditio…

Thank you!

People mix this up all the time, and it gives me an eye twitch. Psych 101 people, cmon.

Re: Why Your Cat Thinks You’re a Huge, Unpredictable Ape

#80

Post by dominotw »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #68
dominotw wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get litter robot ( http://www.litter-robot.com/litter-robot.aspx?id=13 ). It changed my life.

Wow. You can even buy 'reconditioned' units. Not sure about that one.

I think a certain percentage of cats never get used to pooping in the robot. Those are probably units returned by those pet owners.
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