Animals don't have FEELINGS!

robnewbold · #11 23rd December 2003, 01:47 PM

Thanks a lot.. I went there instead. Sorry to bother you all!

Perk · #12 23rd December 2003, 01:47 PM

Hey all,

Animals certainly have feelings. If your asking if they have a soul, that would be a different question.

I think the most common misperception about animals is that they have an understanding and a fear of death like humans do. This would require a level or reason that animals do not posses. Many believe that it is the ability to reason that makes man "in the image of God."

Too often we anthropomorphize the human ability to feel terror or anguish over the prospect of death. Our fascination with Disney movies does nothing to help this view either, lol! While an animal will instinctively avoid or flee from danger, it does have the reasoning capacities to fear the "great unknown" (as those humans who don't KNOW often seem to).

I've had many pets and their ability to "feel", their instinctive reaction to my own emotions, and the obvious displays of their own, has never failed to amaze me.

Thanks,

Perk

Perry Perkins
Author
JUST PAST OYSTERVILLE

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robnewbold · #13 23rd December 2003, 01:49 PM

I guess what I should have said was emotions, not feelings. Feelings can also be instincts, too. I am talking about self-realization.

jbarcher · #14 23rd December 2003, 01:51 PM

Originally Posted by Mylinkay Asdara

Pretty sure that they do have feelings actually.... observing animals I find it hard to come to any other conclusion.

Yup.

Mylinkay Asdara · #15 23rd December 2003, 01:51 PM

I think animals are self aware. The animals I've encountered in my life certianly seem to be. As for a fear of death I doubt that they have it, but I fail to see how a lack of fear of death indicates a lack of soul. I have always simply thought that animals are not concearned with death due to their smaller brain size and inability to 'think ahead' very far.

ForeRunner · #16 23rd December 2003, 01:57 PM

I have seen experiments done with Dolphins where they look at themselves in a mirror and decorate themselves with various trinkets put in the tank.

There have also been documented cases of apes dying of grief. I remember one such incident where an older chimpanzee had a child, and they were very attached to eachother. When the mother died the rest of the tribe moved on, but the ape that was so attached to his mother saw her and then saty in a tree alone until he died. It is postulated that he was bascially so grief stricken that he fell into a depressioon and died of thirst/starvation.