This is why I think that animals are superior to humans

[Skratt]

Burning something alive for fun is pure fucking evil and I think they should also burn for what they did. That doesn't mean animals are better than humans. Just those particular humans. Please don't generalize.

 

[Almgandi]

I think your ignoring the fact that we humans have saved animals, and we didn't get to the top by being submissive minnows... Here's the thing, we're MORE INTELLIGENT. Ergo, we're superior, even in most cases if you include morals. Anyone who denies that animals also fight to be "alpha" or the last animal standing is an idiot.

Oh yeah? Tell me one good reason how polluting the planet (and I am not even necessarily talking about that weak CO2 , I'm talking about legally throwing radioactiv waste into the ocean ),having other people of our kind suffer because it actually might cost us something (le gasp!) and declaring some bimbo playing in a movie more worhty and important than the guy who builds houses or in general makes life the way we are used to possible shows any sign of inteligence?

Or how using my "inteligence " to manipulate a whole nation to do my bidding or even to trick any system that was meant to establish equality for anyone for one's personally greed makes us superior in any way shape or form.

Just because we have the physical possiblity to be in a position to control what happens in the world doesn't mean we are actually made for that position. Else there wouldn't be so much crap going on in the world and yes we are able (and often show that btw) to do good, but what good is that if some person with enough control (-----> enough money) can fuck that up in seconds.

Intelligence is a double edged sword (oh how cliche). While it does empower us with the power of being ghandi himself it can also turn us into massive pricks (I am talking BP massive )

So don't just assume that YOU>everyone else that isn't part of your species just because you have something better than they do; cause you also have something far worse.

Hmm... As I feel like nitpicking one single thing from what you said, (The BP mention) I honestly have to disagree with you. I don't know anyone, (I MEAN ANYONE) who was thinking that BP was in the right. BP got punished for their stupidity, as in two months of their worst publicity of all time. Also, Azucar Winvirog? Wtf Captcha?

By "massive BP-esque pricks" I mean: WHat do you mean safety regulations? what do you mean we have to spend money to secure that nothing happens? nonsense! we will just leave everything how it is oh; woops! looks like a couple million liter of oil went to the ocean. sorry! but hey atleast we saved a couple thousand dollars by not having to use the appropriate repairs in the first place!.

 

[Irony's Acolyte]

Animals can and will kill and torture and rape for pleasure. They have no moral code, so if they want to do it, the only way to make sure they don't is to beat them to it. All just because humans can be dicks doesn't mean that a bunch of animals are any better. Because believe me, animals really don't give a shit one way or the other.

I hate it when people think animals are so much better because humans can be dicks. Well guess what, animals are usually dicks anyway. They don't believe in right or wrong. Humans on the other hand can do some much good. I think that says alot more than a couple of kids who went to far.

Humanity, fuck yeah.

 

[Lukeje]

Please read what other people post, everione has told me about the cat thing

Then why haven't you edited the OP? Do you really expect people to go through 6 pages of posts?

 

[Dango]

Not all humans would light a dog on fire, saying they represent all of humanity would be wrong.

And plenty of animals kill for absolutely no reason at all.

 

[Rylingo]

Please read what other people post, everione has told me about the cat thing

My bad. Sorry.

 

[GLo Jones]

Being cruel for no reason is a thing only humans do

I've seen a lot of people arguing that certain animals are 'cruel for no reason too'. But what I think needs to be addressed is the thought that people don't do this for no reason. Everything people do, they do for a reason.

In this instance, I'd hazard a guess and say that these youths did that to the dog for fun.

They most likely found this fun, or funny to watch, because they lacked the empathy you or I might feel towards the dog, either due to a mental disorder, desensitisation to this kind of suffering (this could also include the kids being mistreated themselves), or (most likely) a lack of socialisation into a similar mindset as us.

You'd likely argue that the simple of reason of 'for fun' isn't enough to justify those actions, and I'd agree with you. But you have to bare in mind that there are people in the world who would feel differently to you about this. There is no 'right' answer. You think the negative aspects of that incident far outweigh the positive, those kids probably see it differently.

I have to say though, one thing animals DON'T do, that people do, is react this way to events that are nothing to do with them.

I can't see anything else besides I agree.

I was saying that people have reasons to do what they do, regardless of whether you can empathise with it or not.

 

[ruben6f]

Please read what other people post, everione has told me about the cat thing

Then why haven't you edited the OP? Do you really expect people to go through 6 pages of posts?

Not really, right in the first or second page there is cat talk.

 

[ninetails593]

Bottlenose dolphins kill baby porpoises and other bottlenose babies... All completely without reason. Listen, if you ever become an animal yourself, have fun getting eaten alive after your beating. And know that the animal tearing you apart could've easily killed you before devouring you.

 

[inFAMOUSCowZ]

Personally we are superior you also have to realize not everyone will do that thing they did. Most people would be disgusted with doing that to a dog. And I watched up untill they got the lighter to work and clicked out.

 

[KenzS]

Animals kill for just as many reasons as we humans do. Last year a moose tried to kill me just because it was rutting season and his hormones were raging. I wasn't anywhere near him, just within eyesight. I was lucky to be near a river.

Human's are definitely superior. At least we have a comprehension of savagery, that's why we're talking about it.

But what those kids did was sickening, and I hope they get some jail time and some psychiatric help.

 

[Lukeje]

Please read what other people post, everione has told me about the cat thing

Then why haven't you edited the OP? Do you really expect people to go through 6 pages of posts?

Not really, right in the first or second page there is cat talk.

So you can't even be bothered going through to see where the cat talk is?

 

[Jaime_Wolf]

...he asked for a citation and you gave him Purina.

Well, to be frank I wouldn't cite a cat food manufacturer for your scientific facts but anyway.

Little lesson I learnt through this forum. I don't link people to scientific studies if I can help it because most people on here can't actually interpret scientific studies, I link to something they can comfortably understand instead but make sure it's backed up with studies if they care to look for them. Honestly, when you're arguing with a stranger would you prefer the hundred page study or the elevator pitch?

Except it leads to the problems I mentioned, which would be fine if you weren't taking it as gospel, but your post clearly assumes that everything it says is true.

Namely, while those results can be "backed up" with studies, so can the opposite conclusions. The results you mention completely misrepresent the scientific consensus (or lack thereof) on these issues. If anything, most animal psychologists would be exceedingly skeptical of a small number of hypothesized emotions like that and no one is even sure how one should go about testing for something like self awareness or empathy. Most claims about self awareness in particular involve mirror tests, which there are very, very good reasons to remain skeptical of. Mirror tests haven't been commonly accepted in quite a while.

Also, one hundred pages for a scientific paper would be very abnormal, excluding theses and commissioned reports (and one should always be wary of commissioned reports).

And if I were arguing with a stranger who specifically asked me for a legitimate source, I would give them a legitimate source even if I weren't sure they could understand it. It's certainly better than giving a completely useless source. But truly the problem here isn't the brevity or approachability, it's the fact that the article is a completely inaccurate summary of the research literature.

 

[Jaime_Wolf]

Except it leads to the problems I mentioned, which would be fine if you weren't taking it as gospel, but your post clearly assumes that everything it says is true.

Actually no, I worked the other way round, namely I knew about the idea beforehand and since people don't ever look up their own sources to confirm things for themselves I then included that. I didn't leap into a conversation without a clue what I was talking about and research points ad-hoc.

Honestly, when I'm citing sources (no matter how basic the example I provide is) and the other person is arguing from a position of 'nuh huh' I am not actually required to provide sources at all. I would have won that debate de facto.

Even ignoring your intentions and the specific article you posted, none of the points you've posted are remotely representative of prevailing beliefs in the field. They are, however, very representative of the popular understanding of these questions, which was why I assumed what I did.

Edit: To be clear, I never asked for sources. Nor do I ever ask for them. I really don't particularly care and I've never taken the time to try to point people to sources unless there happens to be a nice popular-science-style article that's pretty representative of current thinking on the issues. It seems especially futile to direct people to actual scientific articles since most people can't be expected to have subscriptions to relevant journals. Also, it's not like researchers have many reasons to keep too many articles that support the overwhelming majority opinion on hand, which is what most posts on forums are necessarily talking about (it's rare that people care about what the fringe theories are, they want to know what the consensus is). And regarding this particular issue, while it's closely related to my field and I work with alongside a lot of animal psychologists, I don't ever expect to publish in any sort of animal psychology journal, so it's not like I have a list of relevant sources to cite even if I thought it would be reasonable to do so.

 

[Jaime_Wolf]

The real problem is that there has been little to no real research into cats

This is simply untrue. There is plenty of research into feline psychology and cat intelligence. They're not as common as research animals as, say, monkeys (since they're closer models of humans), but there has definitely been quite a bit of real research into them. There are a lot of things that you can't legally do to monkeys in most major research countries, so there are good reasons to run tests on other easily-obtained complex animals like cats and dogs.

, about all I could really find is that they're reckoned to be significantly simpler than dogs.

The quantifications of intelligence required to even come to such a conclusion are already incredibly controversial (think about how much argument there is over quantifying human intelligence - animal intelligence is just as bad if not worse). At the very least, the consesus is not that they are significantly less intelligent.

However, given that and given what we know about dogs, a species we have a lot of knowledge about, it seems fair to infer that generally if a dog can't do something emotionally a cat can't either.

Intelligence isn't a simple progression like this where a species that has some capability necessarily has every other capability that a species without that capability possesses. Such an idea isn't just imperfect, it's very easily tested and can be immediately disproved.

Of course that's not perfect but it's a fair enough start, dogs are pack animals whereas cats are solitary or live in ad hoc groups.

Popular notions of pack behaviour, while still very common in most media and folk theory, are a great example of a thoroughly discredited piece of antiquated animal psychology. And as you mention, cats often organise into social groups as well, just like dogs. Theories of animal social behaviour have progressed significantly since discussion of pack psychology was common.

Now dogs have been demonstrated to have no self awareness

What I'm trying to get across is that the results leading to this conclusion are very, very debatable and most animal psychologists are completely unwilling to accept the previous conclusions, to the extent that they ever represented a consensus (popular science media latched onto the results, but many if not most were skeptical when the tests were first run too). Most either settle on uncertainty (for lack of any real way to test the question) or belief in animal self-awareness (mostly for reasons of theoretical consistency, though sometimes in response to newer tests that are likewise very controversial).

Edit: I'm not just trying to be contrary of mean, there's just a vast gulf between popular understanding and representation of research into animal congition and the consensus of the actual field (as there usually is).