Out of Pod Experience

I like HumBugs.

I asked my dog Odin what it's all about, and here's the summary:
-A backyard to defend against any damn thing
-Approaching, orbiting, verbally intimidating, tackling, and exterminating evil invader varmints
-A flying tennis ball to do try to catch mid-air with Olympic leaps. Also to chew on all evening.
-Tasty treats from the family's plates, when you can get them. Man, who knows what they'll on there next?
-The prissy cat to chase, if you can get her to run
-Testing the lungs and the vocals, barking at suspicious sounds out there in the dark. Present or past sounds, that is.
-Greeting the human pack members with infinite licky face
-Bonus: Occasional visitors to jump on, deep smell analysis of crotches and butts. Oh man, the infinite variations! Each one has so many tales to tell!

Sure, we can learn a lot from our pets. As creatures, they're not so different from us. (Well, it depends on the type of pet. A snake or a fish is pretty different than a mammal dog or cat. But they still have personalities and behaviors that we as humans can relate to and enjoy). There's a French neuroscientist* who says that we and animals share the same brain structures, and therefore the same motivations. Here's the rough theory, as I remember it:

-Cortex (deepest part of the human brain) controls the rhythms of the heart and lungs, basic control of the body. Kind of the motherboard of the system. Another layer of it controls observing the world, reflexes and reactions, survival decision making, impressions and learning processes about environment, "seeking"/curiosity behaviors, etc. Fish and reptiles have this. It's a pretty advanced system-- way better than any AI we have.

-The layer over that core, processing emotions. Mammals have this. And in dogs, cats, horses, cows, etc., it's as developed as a human's. In other words, those animals feel happiness, sadness, grief, pride, frustration, and every other emotion as deeply as humans.

-The reasoning layer/node. Most developed in humans and primates. Allows logical analysis.

-The language center. Kind of unique to humans. Maybe birds have a smaller one too(?)

That's a simplistic summary. What is known is that certain areas of the human brain become more electromagnetically charged, according to the situation (survival, emotions, logical analysis, language). And what is more easily known is the physical structures of fish, reptiles, birds, and mammals-- which corresponding structures their brains have and do not have.

So, the point is, you and your pets may have a lot of shared ways of thinking. If your oscar cichlid seems too have incredibly too much personality for a mere fish, maybe it's because, at the core, you and him have the same basic interests? Maybe watching him and hanging with him let's you cut all the way to the deep core, unfiltered and 100% honest and true? Maybe you and your dog, cat, or horse communicate with your emotions center way good, without the clutter and confusion of language?

*Source: One of Temple Grandin's books about advanced livestock handling or animal behavior.

As someone who is raising a couple of dogs, I found this to be both hilarious and so very true.

Yes, I have a thread and everything.
This thread is for pet questions asked to pets.