Big Cat Cliff Hanger

reply to post by Jason88

Nice pics, thanks for sharing OP. Is it love? Hmmm. I don't think so. I think it is motherly instinct to protect her cubs, it's the hard wiring of a lion's brain.

Example. When these cats get older they tend to leave their family unit to start their own, they lose contact with their mothers once they're big enough. If it were love, we'd see these cats stick together in perpetuity, but that's not the case.

Actually this is not entirely accurate. Young male Lions are forced to leave their pride by the dominant male when they reach a certain age. They roam the land with their siblings as juveniles and will often return to their original pride to challenge the dominant male when they reach maturity. Female lioness's usually never leave their original pride. Only in desperate or tragic situations will they seek a new pride.

Lion reunions are common and have been filmed in detail. Lions from different prides will usually avoid each other. But will fight each other if a encounter is unavoidable. But rogue lions who once belonged to a pride and are reunited usually are recognized by their relatives and greeted with loving gestures by the females. Only the dominant male will try to assert it's position of dominance. Depending on the strength and size of the pride the dominant male will sometimes tolerate younger males it's pride as long as the younger males still submit to the leaders dominance.

reply to post by wlord

show me a video of a reptile saving it's young , not a mammal

OK, check out this video from National Geographic about Alligators.

Mother Alligator

video

When you imagine alligators in the wild, you don't generally think of a mother's tender loving care. But this video may be enough to make you think again.

See how a mother alligator in Florida's Everglades protects her newborn hatchlings by carrying them to safety in her otherwise deadly jaws—and learn what dangers the babies face, including some that Mom just can't defend them from.

edit on 3-12-2011 by MathiasAndrew because: (no reason given)

Originally posted by ken10
How do we know that was a "Big Cliff" with a certain death if they fell.....For all I know, and from what the pics show it is a small earth embankment, not some rocky cliff edge.

haha...theres always one who doesnt understand the topic

facepalm

Originally posted by Silicis n Volvo

Originally posted by ken10
How do we know that was a "Big Cliff" with a certain death if they fell.....For all I know, and from what the pics show it is a small earth embankment, not some rocky cliff edge.

haha...theres always one who doesnt understand the topic

facepalm

Well how about you enlighten me then ?

If the story had simply said "a group of lions come to the aid of a straggling cub that was struggling to climb an embankment" then fine, I can see the "aww" factor in that......But what i took issue with was the over-sensationalism by claiming they were on a cliff edge where risk of certain death could have been real, in an effort to get even more "aww's" out of it.

I apologise for not being gullible

reply to post by FissionSurplus

I remember seeing a wildlife show about leopards, and it showed a mother leopard who found her cub dead by a riverbank. That mother cat cried and wailed and refused to leave that dead cub for at least a day.

That's what I was going to say. If "feelings" were not involved, the mother cat would have just moved on. Elephants are another example. When they find another dead elephant, they fall silent, and spend long periods of time with the body, and seem disturbed by it. They do not react this way when they come across other species corpses. Yes, they do have feelings.



When I was a child, I had a German Shepard and a Cocker Spaniel, who grew up together.....they were inseparatable. They accidentally got out one day, and the Shepard was hit by a car.....right in front of the other dog. He died the next day. Inky, the cocker spaniel refused to eat, and all she would do was sit in a corner.....she was like this for days....and though eventually, she started eating again, she she was never the same. She went from being hyper and fun loving, to listless and quiet. She never went back to her old self.

reply to post by maryhinge

stealthykat what have you done ?

Gotcha! I think most people who don't like cats just don't understand them. I have had all types of pets, and cats are my favorite. I have had my big grey cat Smoochy since he was a couple of weeks old. His mother died... I would talk to him and say "MaMa" to him "Like "MaMa has some food for you" etc. (NO i am not a crazy cat lady:lol

Anyway, he actually says MaMa now....not a misinterpreted Meow....he only says it when he is looking for me or needs something. At 7 am every morning he gets on the foot of my bed and very quietly goes "mama?" Even with the questioning sound (Mama??) and if I don't respond, he gets a little louder each time until I wake up....it's SO cute. All the rest of the time he says "meOW", not MaMa. I swear I am going to catch it on video one day to prove it Here's apic of him.....and his buddy Teddy.

reply to post by FoosM
If this does not prove that these animals are "sentient" I can't imagine what would, but really the sad thought this brings to mind is that it is proof of what we are as a species because in knowing this we still go on killing these animals for SPORT!!!

In knowing this and seeing this kind of proof all the time we still don't have the "will" to accept it and stop feeding our greed for personal satisfaction by killing these animals or any animals for that matter............how the hell we ever going to stop killing each other.

Sorry for the rant,this is a heart felt passion for me where animals are concerned, I mean where else can a human feel the warmth of unconditional love then from an animal that accepts you and looks to you as a friend or part of there herd.....................damn sure not from another human,end of rant............sorry.
Great post, thank you !!

reply to post by Battleline


Well said! **applause applause applause**

This is an interesting article everyone should read.....from a scientific approach.

Animal Emotions and Beastly Passions: We're Not the Only Emotional Beings

www.psychologytoday.com...

reply to post by FoosM


what do you mean by love? It's a mammal. It has to care for its child. This is what it's programmed to do. And btw, they also sometimes reject them for whatever reason.


Humans are above that. Not love of course. We love. But we have deeper love. Humanity. We're not programmed to love and care. Every time society collapses and we forget our culture and ways, care has to be relearned as a society. A lion knows care from birth. Because it's programmed to. A human forgets it past the smile of a child, and has to learn it. And most amazingly, will hold onto it out of choice, not program.

reply to post by Gorman91

Humans are above that. Not love of course. We love. But we have deeper love. Humanity. We're not programmed to love and care. Every time society collapses and we forget our culture and ways, care has to be relearned as a society. A lion knows care from birth. Because it's programmed to. A human forgets it past the smile of a child, and has to learn it. And most amazingly, will hold onto it out of choice, not program.

Ridiculous theory, do you have any sources that support this idea? I have a feeling this is just another misguided opinion based only on your own personal experience. It's my opinion that there is very little difference between the way other mammals and humans are "programmed".

They make choices and decisions just like we humans do. There are mothers and fathers in the animal kingdom who would give their life to protect their offspring and there are some parents who wouldn't. Just as there are some human parents who would do the same and some who would not.

Environment, nature and instincts are factors of behavior but so are the unique circumstances of every situation, the childhood experiences of each individual, nurture and personality of the individual animal.

Nature vs Nurture IMO it is actually both but I tend to think that in most circumstances besides flight or fight nurture overcomes nature. In a life or death situation nature and instinct take over. But in other cases it depends on what and how that animal has been taught and treated that is the prevailing factors.

reply to post by MathiasAndrew

Ridiculous theory, do you have any sources that support this idea? I have a feeling this is just another misguided opinion based only on your own personal experience. It's my opinion that there is very little difference between the way other mammals and humans are "programmed".

The correct way to view it is that there is an increasing differentiation down the primate line of thinking compared to other mammals. Not just humans. Humans are simply the only ones left. We killed or out competed everything like us, if you forget.

See if you hurt a lion, it will hurt you. If you respect a lion, it will respect you (unless its hungry). If you raise a lion to love you, it will love you (I am unaware if there is any other way to make a lion love you). These are simple programs that work 99.9% of the time.

Meanwhile, if you hurt a human, not all humans will hurt you. If you respect a human, not all humans will respect you. If you love a human, not all humans will love you. There is no consistency to humanity. We don't have a pre programmed set of responses. Our responses are all dependent on who we are, our experiences, and our culture and technology.

They make choices and decisions just like we humans do.

Choice is a concept that really, very few animals have shown any ability to do. If I recall, the only animals we ave observed being able to choose something beyond what nature demands, are crows, some primates, whales, and dolphins. I think elephants, but I Forget. For most other animals, you have to train it to make a different decision through reward and punishment. And while you could make an argument that humans are the same, fact is not all humans obey the rewards and punishments. Most lower animals, including lions, do obey with training.

Environment, nature and instincts are factors of behavior but so are the unique circumstances of every situation, the childhood experiences of each individual, nurture and personality of the individual animal.

Only if the animal in question has the mental capacity to be subject to such things.

Nature vs Nurture IMO it is actually both but I tend to think that in most circumstances besides flight or fight nurture overcomes nature. In a life or death situation nature and instinct take over. But in other cases it depends on what and how that animal has been taught and treated that is the prevailing factors.

Not true. Why is it when some humans are attacked, they will curl up into a ball. This goes totally against flight or fight. It's because we long now have no longer needed fight or flight. Granted some humans do have it. But there exists humans who either have no response, or have a totally controlled response, like a monk or a ninja. In these situations, we prove ourselves abnormal.

The fact that we come from mammals does not mean we are like them, inasmuch as the fact that mammals come from reptiles does not mean they are bound by the same nature.

reply to post by StealthyKat


now if i were to get a cat it would most definitely be a smoochy
hes so cute.

reply to post by maryhinge


Thanks....you can just see that personality in his face....he's so debonair

reply to post by Gorman91

Originally posted by Gorman91
The correct way to view it is that there is an increasing differentiation down the primate line of thinking compared to other mammals. Not just humans. Humans are simply the only ones left. We killed or out competed everything like us, if you forget.

Not entirely. Geneticists have identified DNA from homo neanderthalis that is also in homo sapiens, so there was some "mixing" no doubt involved too.

Originally posted by Gorman91
See if you hurt a lion, it will hurt you. If you respect a lion, it will respect you (unless its hungry). If you raise a lion to love you, it will love you (I am unaware if there is any other way to make a lion love you). These are simple programs that work 99.9% of the time.

If I'm not mistaken, most people (far more than the .01% you subscribe to) who have interacted (lovingly) with any big cats over prolonged periods of time have been mauled or attacked. Even Siegfried and Roy.

Originally posted by Gorman91
Meanwhile, if you hurt a human, not all humans will hurt you. If you respect a human, not all humans will respect you. If you love a human, not all humans will love you. There is no consistency to humanity. We don't have a pre programmed set of responses. Our responses are all dependent on who we are, our experiences, and our culture and technology.

Sorry, this is also incorrect since you're implying animals have preprogrammed responses. Replace "human" with "nonhuman animal" and you will see it works just as well. There's many cases where people hurt a dog but the dog doesn't hurt them back (aka animal abuse), and of course respecting a wild animal is not always mutual.

Originally posted by Gorman91
Choice is a concept that really, very few animals have shown any ability to do. If I recall, the only animals we ave observed being able to choose something beyond what nature demands, are crows, some primates, whales, and dolphins. I think elephants, but I Forget. For most other animals, you have to train it to make a different decision through reward and punishment. And while you could make an argument that humans are the same, fact is not all humans obey the rewards and punishments. Most lower animals, including lions, do obey with training.

Do you even know the definition of the word "choice"? "An act of selecting or making a decision when faced with two or more possibilities."
Even snakes (which are far more primitive than any animal you mentioned) CHOOSE to coil up beside heat retaining objects when they are available. I suggest you read this article. www.anapsid.org...

Originally posted by Gorman91
Not true. Why is it when some humans are attacked, they will curl up into a ball. This goes totally against flight or fight. It's because we long now have no longer needed fight or flight. Granted some humans do have it. But there exists humans who either have no response, or have a totally controlled response, like a monk or a ninja. In these situations, we prove ourselves abnormal.

A human would only curl up if fight or flight is not an available option. Animals have greater survival instincts than humans, they know fighting or fleeing are the only two options when there's danger (in this case you can even say nonhuman animals > humans).
Having a totally controlled response is not unique to humans either. My dog controls himself from jumping out of a moving vehicle even though he'd like to run around outside of it.

Originally posted by Gorman91
The fact that we come from mammals does not mean we are like them

I'm wondering if you're even serious anymore. Show me one characteristic humans exhibit that's 100% unique from any other mammal. Did you know there's wild baboons that raise feral dogs completely on their own (google it)? And untrained Savannah Chimps who forge spears to kill bushbabies?

And sorry, but even masturbation isn't unique. www.youtube.com...