Tuesday September 9 2014
WBUR's Here and Now just ran a piece, "Do Animals Have Emotions?"
I've seen similar studies before, and the more I hear these, the more I wonder if researchers who take the time and money and thought to do these studies have ever spent any time around animals. If so, I don't see how they would even come up with these questions.
Being around dogs, it is blatantly obvious that dogs can be happy, sad, jealous, in love, have best pals. Our dog Austin who recently passed on to the next rabbit-chasin' world *knew* his time was up. One look in his eyes, and anyone (or, perhaps anyone who is not a scientist researching if animals have emotions) could see he knew it, and he was sad about it.
Not everybody is lucky enough to be around horses, but if you are, it's so obvious that horses have emotions. If there are researchers reading this who are considering undertaking more of these amusing studies, let me save you some time and money with these examples:
Finneas, Grandson of the Black Stallion, is conceited and he can get embarrassed, if he's humiliated in front of his subordinates.
Stormy is very possessive of me, and when I'm loving on him, he gets jealous when other horses get too close, even if he's risking a thrashing by another more dominant horse.
Horses can get mad, as Finneas did when I left for the winter; he thought I'd up and abandoned him, and when I came back he wouldn't let me near him.
Horses can have fun; some of them love to play. Just ask Jose, the Owyhee Social Director, who gets the entire Chapter 22 in my book.
I guess this all might be news to some people, or, perhaps I'm missing something here, but, Do animals have emotions? Uh - hello!?
