You could ask this question in another way that actually demonstrates evolution. Why do newborn chimpanzees fear snakes? Not just living, moving snakes, but plastic, toy snakes?
Also, some people do seem to predict earthquakes.

Originally posted by jimmiec
While i am not 100% sure what to believe, i do have one question that has never been answered to my satisfaction. We all know animals have instincts that humans do not possess. Like if a Tsunami is coming animals will head to high ground. Humans will just stand there dumbfounded as to the cause until the wave is in sight. Animals sense earthquakes, etc, before they happen. Humans still have their base instincts but do not have, nor it appears ever did have the instincts inherent in animals. If we evolved from animals, why do we not possess those same abilities? I am not talking about enhanced sense of smell. etc. Is this instinct that animals possess essentially the enlightenment man seeks? It is an extremely valuable instinct that animals possess. I can see no scenario that would cause man to lose such a valuable instinct, if man ever possessed it to start with. This is a sticking point in the theory of evolution in my mind. Anybody have an answer that makes sense?

This is not an attack on the Theory of Evolution. It is a sincere question that i would like to get a sincere answer to.

We did not so much evolve from animals so much as we ARE animals - we are mammals, just like lions, tigers, elephants, dogs - humans ARE APES. We are one of the 5 great apes and that is a fact.

We are brainwashed and dumbed down and have been programmed to work from a logical left brain stance, neglecting our right brain - which is why we ignore our instincts.

Originally posted by jimmiec
We all know animals have instincts that humans do not possess. Like if a Tsunami is coming animals will head to high ground.

Post proof please.

Originally posted by rhinoceros

Originally posted by jimmiec
We all know animals have instincts that humans do not possess. Like if a Tsunami is coming animals will head to high ground.

Post proof please.

Proof ? It is all over the news reports of the time that the elephants and animals ran before the tsunami hit.
You can look it up yourself ?

Originally posted by HelenConway

Originally posted by rhinoceros

Originally posted by jimmiec
We all know animals have instincts that humans do not possess. Like if a Tsunami is coming animals will head to high ground.

Post proof please.

Proof ? It is all over the news reports of the time that the elephants and animals ran before the tsunami hit.
You can look it up yourself ?

The tsunami? You mean the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami? Please post the news reports.

Senses we are all aware of differ in intensity from species to species. The average dogs sense of smell and hearing coupled with a higher 'flicker rate' means the dog see's the world differently than we do.

The flicker rate means visually he gathers more visual data per second than we do. His hearing means he can detect many more movements over a larger area and most interesting of all. His sense of smell means he in effect builds a picture of what is in front and behind him but out of sight and quite a distance out of sight at that.

We have all seen animals that spook and run spook other animals that also run even though they have not seen anything to run from.

Given that the Tsunami is noisy and pushes everything including air in front of it the reaction of the animals in the zoo can I believe, be explained.

Humans are not the pinnacle of evolution. We are not special. Like other animals we are just specialised.

I do think that calling something instinct without being able to explain what that is meant to mean is lazy and too often used.

How a newly hatched bird knows to raise its rear to allow his parent to take the waste sack away from the nest has never been explained with anything other than ‘its instinct’ or ‘its genetic’ and does not explain the mechanics as I attempted above with the zoo animals.

The OP's claim that we do not have these 'instincts' yet all other animals do is plainly incorrect and is an egocentric view that we are somehow different and not part of the world we live in and somehow separate from all other life. We are not.

So if the thread is about what is instinctive behaviour and how does it work I am interested. If it is to make uninformed claims to try to link us with some creationist ideal that somehow proves we are special and made by god I am not

If my post is a little blunt it is not meant to be but I know how attempts to give beliefs credibility at the expense of reality goes

Originally posted by Barcs
First, not all animals have these traits, and second humans ARE animals. They are just more intelligent than the rest. Asking about why humans don't have the same disaster instincts as various animals is the same as asking why humans have hands while most animals have paws. Why don't we have fins and gills, since we originally came from the sea? Things change over time and humans prime survival traits are intelligence and the ability to manipulate things with our hands. We don't just sit there dumbfounded when a Tsunami is coming. We have technology that detects them ahead of time and the communication systems to warn the people that the Tsunami is coming. In the past before technology we had to be innovative and use problem solving skills to survive a disaster like that. We don't need those instincts to survive, so those traits were phased out over millions of years, just like excess body hair, sharp claws, sharp teeth, tails, tough skin, etc etc. We make tools, and technology to survive, we don't need all that other hoopla. It's also possible that we do still have those skills, but since we aren't really connected with nature anymore for survival, we don't realize it or it isn't as prevalent or strong anymore. It's really just a connection to the electromagnet field around the earth. I think there are plenty of humans out there that still have it. One good example is how the ionosphere can mess with human emotions and change people's moods.

This was my original post.

Originally posted by jimmiec
While i am not 100% sure what to believe, i do have one question that has never been answered to my satisfaction. We all know animals have instincts that humans do not possess. Like if a Tsunami is coming animals will head to high ground. Humans will just stand there dumbfounded as to the cause until the wave is in sight. Animals sense earthquakes, etc, before they happen. Humans still have their base instincts but do not have, nor it appears ever did have the instincts inherent in animals. If we evolved from animals, why do we not possess those same abilities? I am not talking about enhanced sense of smell. etc. Is this instinct that animals possess essentially the enlightenment man seeks? It is an extremely valuable instinct that animals possess. I can see no scenario that would cause man to lose such a valuable instinct, if man ever possessed it to start with. This is a sticking point in the theory of evolution in my mind. Anybody have an answer that makes sense?

This is not an attack on the Theory of Evolution. It is a sincere question that i would like to get a sincere answer to.

According to most recent research, sensing earthquakes and weather changes, along with migration and such things, is the result of an animal's ability to pick up vibrations and variations in the earth's electromagnetic field. We each have our own individual magnetic fields which interact with other fields, as well as particles in our brain called magnetite which are sensitive to electromagnetic waves.

In the past, anecdotes of old people who could sense a coming electrical storm were very common. You hear much less stories about those sort of things nowadays. In my opinion, the absolutely overwhelming amount of electromagnetic noise in the environment is what keeps humans from experiencing this sense more acutely.

I think that this electromagnetic noise has a detrimental effect on the senses of animals and insects as well, which is one of the causes of such things as the massive bee deaths (also known as colony collapse disorder).