Life/Death of Animals

Hi all,

Questions about Life and Death in Animals.

I wonder if animals have any idea that they are born, then they die?

Do animals just think they will live forever during their life?

Do animals have any idea of what's happened when their loved ones die?

I know first hand of some amazing stuff with animals, such as a family I knew had a Golden retriever and a Cat. These animals grew up together and were like brother and sister.

When the dog died. The cat lay in the dead dogs bed for days. then the cat died only 4 days later. Co-incedence?

It happens with humans a lot.

Just how much do animals know about this kind of thing?

Do animals experience the same things as humans when they die?

Another experience I had was when I left Scotland for New Zealand, I left behind my cat whom i'd had since I was a young kid. A year or two after I lived in New Zealand I went to bed one night as was awoken in the early hours with the moon casting a cats shadow on my bedroom door. I just knew inside it was my cat back home and this put a big smile on my face.

I then went to sleep again and dreamt of my cat being at the Vet getting an injection. I woke up in the morning with a text from my brother saying the cat had been put down the day before.

Co-incedence?

Thoughts?

G.



[edit on 28-3-2010 by grantbeed]

Awww, I have wondered about this stuff before. Guess I came to come general conclusions though, and let it go.

Like.... Animals may not understand death or birth. Most don't comprehend the future. Only the now.

When an animal loses it's mate/best friend/family, it simply misses their company. Just like we feel loss.

I also found it interesting that animals cannot count their young. So when one of their offspring is missing, they have no idea. Lol. Unless it is their ONLY offspring.

Also I figure.... Just like young kids, animals think they have just always existed. Like kids, they cannot comprehend that there was existence without them. lol

I doubt an animal goes through life thinking that it will get old and die.

Interesting thoughts.

[edit on 28-3-2010 by LostNemesis]

I don't think animals think like we do
we humans are creatures of habit whereas
animals are creatures of instinct. I don't believe
animals have souls and as such are not on the same
plain as humans when it comes to brain development
and cognition.

Even though some animals have very large brains
about 85% of it is non-functional. Animals do have
advantages over humans in some ways. They have
better hearing, eye-sight, responses, reflexes, and
adaptability.

And humans and animals share some traits as well.
Both can be trained and have memories and share
common bonding rituals and can feel love.

Hope it helps

reply to post by boondock-saint


I totally disagree with you about animals lacking "souls" while we supposedly "have souls".

There is simply no difference between the love that we feel for a family member, and the love of a dog for his master.
Animals have devoted every waking moment to being an understanding, loving companion to those they are bonded with. They have understood when their human was in danger, and saved them.

Most pet owners feel empathy from their companion animals when they are down.

If WE have "souls", then so do our companion animals. And the animals in the wild that feel unconditional love for their mates/herds/pack members.

It's funny you can recognize that animals feel "bonding rituals" and love, and yet would somehow lack anything we have.

No offense, I just doubt that we are any different from them.

OK, back to bonding with my loving pet rats.

reply to post by grantbeed


Years back I worked with the humane society in my town, it was a bad time out there, the county had contracted the society to take on all the animals that were taken in, sometimes up to 50 a day, the facility could not take on this many, resulting in far too many being euthanized. On each monday a veternarian would volunteer a few hours time, he would give our best looking and healthiest animals their shots, those were spared and allowed to await adoption a few more weeks, all the others were put to sleep. Every monday morning the animals would cry out, pace, I saw real tears in the eyes of many a dog, they knew, I have no doubt they knew. The big dogs would hang there heads down as they entered the room with the vet, some would fight it and try to get away. The cats, they were so strange, they would kill all the kittens during the week, you had to wonder if this was there way of sparing the little ones of a human hand.

I had a poodle that I saved from there, I had her for 21 years. The morning she passed away, my younger poodle woke me up, he was up on my headboard of my bed, howling away! It startled me and I made him get down, I got up to go the the bathroom and my older poodle came in the room with me, I picked her up, and she began to shake, let a single yelp out and passed away. I think he knew she was not only dying, but that she needed me to hold her.

reply to post by space cadet


Thats amazing and very sad at the same time.

I wonder what its like from the perspective of an animal.

I like what "LostNemesis" said about animals and children being similar. I get this totally. They are kind of living in the now, although I'm sure they do have a soul, even if different from the human soul.

It's maybe like, when we become humans we get to have a greater soul, compared to being an animal who get a scaled down model.

Wonder what we get in our next stage of living!!

reply to post by grantbeed


I think animals know more about whats going on than we give them credit for. I have had many animals growing up and they do have souls. There are plenty stories you hear about animals doing extra odinary things also.

I had a pet chihuahua that lived to a ver nice age of 21. She was my best friend and when I was down she always knew. Gave me the reassurement I needed. I used to live quite close to school and she used to sneak out to wait for me at the edge of the school field where i walked home. When I wasn't at school she used to go everywhere with me. You know she never had any sort of real training either but she did anything you asked (including tricks) and she didnt need to walk on a lead either.

That little dog would do anything for me and I the same for her. She had a soul for sure and she may have been tiny but her soul would match that of giants.

Peace

[edit on 28-3-2010 by tempest501]

No i don't think they understand life and death the same way we do, but im sure when something changes in their environment such as loss of an old mate etc they recognize that...but imposing a human mindset on how pets view these events or the emotions that come with them is something alot of pet owners seem to do, it's quite silly and has no basis in reality. Other great apes such as ourselves i think may have a higher understanding of life and death.

[edit on 28-3-2010 by Solomons]

Animals(suchs as mammals and birds) may not understand the life process as we do, but they grown and learn lessons as we do. They are not clueless... they do grieve. Some dogs may show it in the form of Seperation Anxiety(ASPCA.org). They may not have the higher understanding of where their mate or offspring went(but what do we really know besides our faith), but when no longer there and they feel the loss.

Animals are very in tune and can feel even when a person is sick, emotionally upset and even about to pass away.

I am a believer in that animals have souls to.

I had a bad dream once about a cat getting hit by a car and very hurt, thinking it was my cat who ran off, but it was the brother cat-who looked very like him- that was homed to a friend who was hit.



One of the best examples in the Animal Kingdom would be how elephants grieve.
Elephants Mourning-National Geographic YouTubeVideo
Elephants Grieving-BBC WIlflife YouTube
Elephants Trying to Revive Dead Elephant-YouTube


[edit on 28-3-2010 by dreamingawake]

[edit on 28-3-2010 by dreamingawake]

christianity.about.com...

But does animal intelligence constitute a soul? Does a pet’s emotions and ability to relate to human beings mean that animals possess an immortal spirit that will survive after death? Theologians say no. They point out that man was created superior to animals and that animals can’t be equal with him. Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground." (Genesis 1:26, NIV) Most interpreters of the Bible assume that man’s likeness to God and animals’ subservience to man implies that animals may have the "breath of life," nephesh in Hebrew, but not an immortal soul in the same sense as man’s.

reply to post by grantbeed
I suspect that some higher thinking animals are aware of death and by extension...life. To what degree is open to speculation. It's a widely held assumption that animals are instinctual and have no forward-planning skills. Such skills, if found, would indicate self-awareness...sentience.

A male chimpanzee in a Swedish zoo planned hundreds of stone-throwing attacks on zoo visitors, according to researchers. Keepers at Furuvik Zoo found that the chimp collected and stored stones that he would later use as missiles. Further, the chimp learned to recognise how and when parts of his concrete enclosure could be pulled apart to fashion further projectiles.

Zoo chimp 'planned' stone attacks

The team said some chimps would also use a "toolkit" of different wooden implements in a bid to access the honey and satisfy their sweet tooth. The study is published in the International Journal of Primatology. Crickette Sanz, from the Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, said: "The nutritional returns don't seem to be that great. "But their excitement when they've succeeded is incredible, you can see how much they are enjoying tasting the honey."

'Armed' chimps go wild for honey

The team says the study shows rooks are innovative tool-users, even though they do not use tools in the wild. Another paper, published in the journal Plos One, shows that New Caledonian crows - which like rooks, are a member of the corvid group, along with ravens, jackdaws, magpies and jays - can use three tools in succession to reach a treat.

Clever rooks repeat ancient fable

In 1997 the concept of animal sentience was written into the basic law of the European Union. The legally-binding Protocol annexed to the Treaty of Amsterdam recognises that animals are ‘sentient beings’, and requires the EU and its Member States to ‘pay full regard to the welfare requirements of animals.’ The laws of several states include certain invertebrates such as cephalopods (octopuses, squids) and decapod crustaceans (lobsters, crabs) in the scope of animal protection laws, implying that these animals are also judged to be capable of experiencing pain and suffering.

Professor Marian Dawkins of Oxford University has called the study of animal sentience "one of the most exciting and the most important in the whole of biology."

The reason for illustrating animal tool use and suggestions of forward-planning is to open the possibility that their self-awareness might extend to death itself. It's worth considering. All animals face death in their natural habitat....group members, family and other species too. I guess the question is at what point do they consider their own deaths? Can they be that self-aware? I like to think so...

A couple of videos to think about...

Animals are nicer than people.


Animals are loving and undemanding.

People are horrible and demanding.

Starting with a baby - it is demanding - always food, always everything.

Then you get an older child - always horrible and always demanding.

Then you get a teenager who hates you.

Welcome to motherhood.

reply to post by catwhoknows


Not all people are bad =D, sometimes people are nice too.

/hugs

peace

animals is always a subject that i dont care for, i know nothing about and it is not something that i see objectively interesting or nice
but i think that i m aware of the least principles points relating animals to truth

the major factor that differenciate basically human nature to animal one is its awareness freedom

a human is necessary related to a principle free awareness that saw the concept of source as else being from, showing its ability to describe its reality fact which kicked it to exist on its own

when you can know that you are because of a source positive existing, that knowledge is free awareness then and the true existing one that must seek its own positive new state again

now nature know of course existence of source as else objectively but subjectively nature love to exist of what is already existing fully, she doesnt like to live of her own existing fact

so from that point there are humans and also animals

so animals principally are not aware of else concept that is necessary firstly source of being positive as other existing

so their awareness is always as them a source of, they dont see any objective source or reality existing
they can be opportunist in nature like cats, seeing hands giving pleasures and following it for their ends
but they can also be positive in nature like dogs, like taking their existing seriously and acting as a source of something from there
here where it is funny touching, seeing a dog meaning to save or to alert

and here the point where animals can be better then human when definitevely inferior to them at conception source

the explanation of this is what truth is all and not nature or any god

seeing god as the source of your free awareness is being inferior to not seeing anyone else existing, for what god is not the source or your free awareness, so when the concept is wrong the being aware of that concept is evil which mean negative to nothing it is something that should not being existed

and here where i can justify how it is true that animals have souls too, i already noticed how a pet is from birth different then its brothers from its positive sense of being, and can explain how some animals can be true ones actually making abstractions of what is not them but meaning always being a positive source for their living realities and seeing the sense of positive as the objective to consider, so it is a far way to relate to the concept of true source as else

the problem is what gods are wrong and they are creators and powerful ones on everything, truth is of course the living truth one so it is the source of existence but truth is not the living source
the living sources are gods and they are evil to truth for what they never mean to move alone positively like in truth and always mean to use from truth objective moves to gain anything to their static existence conscious freedom fact

they are never interested about truth points to experience being true livings ones so their conceptualisations about us is always wrong, they dont see what is else for what they are never true ones

so they shematize us in groups to suit their business of creations means according to truth definition of superior existing life realities to master and rule statically as they are aware of

reply to post by tempest501


Try being a mother.

reply to post by catwhoknows


try not to be a mother and deal with anything objectively

your children since they are living with you would be the first ones that would appreciate that free life sensible reality, if god dont intervent directly to make the exception to your rights alive
with his ability to poo on heads that no justification at all of a poo can be coming out of them

if you relate others to you then there is no others so dont act as being bothered by them then or expect rewards for what you dont consider existing outside of yourself existence

I know I am a little late for this post but I am certain someone might read this and yes, animals have emotions. I have seen some strange things in my Animal Hospital days. Normally if a client has two animals and one needs to be put to sleep they will bring the healthy one for moral support. After the euthasol has been injected the healthy one would howl and not leave the side of the recently deceased. Its tragic and sad but so human. I have more respect for animals than I have ever had. Star & Flag my friend.

I hate threads... They always get my emotions all mixed up

I personally have heard stories about animals mourning other animals and showing signs of emotions and feelings when seeing the passing of one of their fellows. I'm sure they're aware of their existence and the roles they play in this life.

I think I'll go pat my dogs now...