Do Animals think??

Do Animals think??

Hi Guys,

Hmmmm....

Wanted to start this blog with an interesting topic…

We all see animals (all kinds of animals) in our daily life;

• ·        Do Animals think?
• ·         What do you think will be running in their mind?
• ·         How can they not get tensed in life, stay completely relaxed?
• ·         Not caring if tomorrow is going to be tough or anything.
• ·         What do they do?
• ·         How can they just live?

Well many more questions were running my mind.

What can i say...

It all started in Delhi, when I saw a mule carrying a heap of mud on its back (heavy of course), got me thinking-what was ‘it’ thinking…

I know that they think, but what do they think?

It was interesting and I started a research on it, asked few people.  Some of them gave a common answer – ‘Obviously they think, but they don’t rationalize’. Hmmm interesting answer, but not convincing enough. Must be more to it, not that easy and simple is it?

So I searched few websites and did a bit of research, websites like:

• ·         http://kottke.org/10/11/do-animals-think
• ·         http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2002/03.14/01-thinking.html
• ·         http://www.studyenglishtoday.net/can_animals_think.html

All these websites have a little more to add to our discussion. They have proof that animals do think and some of them even analyze.

Well this answers our first question… Now to break up the second one, what will be running in their mind? That would be tough… but we’ll concentrate only on the outline and not in depth, we’ll try to generalize it.

Joseph LeDoux, a neuroscientist at New York University made it a little easier to understand how animals express their thoughts. If they are happy (dogs wag tail, cats purr etc), in short he tells us that understanding or recognizing their emotions is easier. 

(Ref:-http://www.livescience.com/18750-animal-human-emotions-fears.html)

 John B Watson in his book “Studying the Minds of Animals” has explained in similar form that animals thoughts are understood by their expressions just the way Humans thoughts are understood…No one can enter another living beings mind to find out what’s in it.

(Ref: - http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Watson/Animals/index.htm)

Well let’s get back to our topic now… After reading all the above facts it’s certain that we Human beings can’t find out what is happening in the minds of animals. But let’s not drop our bags yet…we’ll try something different… a different approach perhaps.

Present = Gift

We all know Human beings are complicated and animals are simple… So if we apply assumption as a tool for our research then we can assume that animals think only about today (present), now…and nothing else..Not about tomorrow, not about yesterday but only today…

Well I got to this assumption based on some stories I had heard, like: A sheep, before getting killed by a butcher, always enjoys its final meal without thinking of what’s going to happen… (You may disagree stating that it doesn’t know it’s being killed, but they do sense danger).

Throw the stick please....

A dog loves to play fetch, gets the ball back to u, and finds happiness in the tiniest things…

Hence we can conclude our second question by stating that whatever runs in their minds they express it; they never hide it or try to process it. They live their life for the present.

Now moving on to the 3^rd & 4^th question, both of them are quite similar; how can animals not get tensed in life, stay completely relaxed? Not caring if tomorrow is going to be tough or anything.

Well it’s like a one word answer to this – It’s only because they make life SIMPLE… When life is simple then there is no tension, no worries and nothing.

Power of 99

My friend once told me a story; he called it “The 99 story”:

The story has 2 families, one a rich merchant’s family and another poor woodcutter’s family; The Merchant’s family always used to be tensed and work extra hard….once the wife of the merchant asked him, “why is it that we are always tensed, when we have more money than the woodcutter, Whereas he lives in peace with much little money?”

For this, the merchant replied, “that’s because he hasn’t fallen into the 99-trap”… Confused wife asks about 99-trap… The merchant goes in front of the woodcutters house and drops a pouch with 99rs in it, and returns home..

Next day, woodcutter’s wife finds the ‘money filled pouch’ and shows it to her husband. After a while they both decide to convert it into 100rs, once that was done then 200rs…….slowly into 500rs and so on... Hence changed their life into a tension filled one.

We all get to learn something out of the story..Animals think about today, now, this moment and act accordingly…. This makes them less selfish, caring for others, caring for our Mother Nature.

Whereas if we try to evaluate our behavior, we think a lot about future ruin it for next generation, get everything for ourselves etc etc

Well Partially answered our question din it.. Let’s finish our questions list… 2 more questions…What do they do? Simple very simple…they just live (enjoy every moment, every tiny part of life)..

Just relaaaxxx dude....

How can they just live? Well I guess that’s what differentiates them from us human beings.. We sometimes think even if we have to enjoy (what will others think, what about my status quo etc n all)

Hmmmm… I feel we have answered all our questions.. What dyu think will be the major difference if we compare us to animals… the real facts (not the ones we have made to show ourselves superior)

Evolution....

Sl.No	Human	Animal
1	We Communicate	So do they ( I don’t think there would be any miscommunication)
2	We rationalize (that’s how we are actually destroying this wonderful world)	They just live their gifted life
3	High Competition with each other	All live in Harmony (very few with low competition)
4	We Discovered and invented Selfishness	They are almost selfless
5	We Complicate Life	They don’t know the word complication
6	We work on breaking the mystery	They Enjoy the Mystery Suspense given by the holy one
7	Live one, Beat all	Live one, Live all

So here are few questions I would love to ask you..

• ·         Is Rationalizing good?
• ·         Are we really better than Animals?
• ·         Are we really Smart people? (animals are the first to know when an earthquake or tsunami occurs, they know when they have to move to summer side etc)

Think on these questions, until we meet again J

Thanks for reading…………..