Animals dream

[John Larkin]

I do believe they dream. My cats will lay under a lamp and be dead to the world. Then they start twiching and grimacing, moving their paws. The trouble is when they wake up I'm not sure they can tell the difference between the dream and reality. The girl cat will wake up, go into the hall and start crying like she's looking for her kittens or she thinks we've left home. The boy cat gets up and starts running around like crazy up and down the hall, behind furniture, wherever. Just kind of odd. Once they've done this for a while, they calm down and come hang out with us.

 

[BoostKillsStres]

Just let'em snort a little catnip to ease their troubles

 

[bruce]

Originally posted by John Larkin
I do believe they dream. My cats will lay under a lamp and be dead to the world. Then they start twiching and grimacing, moving their paws. The trouble is when they wake up I'm not sure they can tell the difference between the dream and reality. The girl cat will wake up, go into the hall and start crying like she's looking for her kittens or she thinks we've left home. The boy cat gets up and starts running around like crazy up and down the hall, behind furniture, wherever. Just kind of odd. Once they've done this for a while, they calm down and come hang out with us.

Much of the odd behaviour of cats is actually due to siezures. The darting around for no apparent reason is the most common feature.
The siezures are typically of the Gran Mal (sp) level. They used to use cats for testing of anti-seizure medications. Most all the current meds to control the most serious of seizures were originated from that early research.
If I rearrange a room or leave a cabinet open, mine will meow at whatever's *out of place*.

Was talking to a friend of mine on the phone the other day, and from time to time there was an odd voice in the background. So I asked him what the noise was. His answer, *My parrot's sleep talking*. I said *what?*. Turns out his parrot talks in it's sleep. They have a surround on the cage, and in the middle of the night you can open it up to see the parrot, eyes closed, on one foot, just talking *nonsense*. Just human words, in no particular pattern.

 

[salvageV6]

Dogs do it too.

Got a Fox Terrier and a Husky who's feet move more at night than in the daytime.

I bet they both could do 5mph if I could stand them up without waking them.

 

[TylerDurden]

i dont doubt animals dream, seen my dogs do a lot over the years...

but here's a good one for ya...when YOU think, your brain, your mind....your thoughts, you use words in your head, kind of like you are talking to yourself, but just in your head, sure you can have other thoughts such as objects and smells, and touch, but you still think to your self by thinking of the words...ok...

so americans think in english, chinese in chinese, etc

what do animals think in???? they have no known language in most cases (dophins, whales, who knows) but a dog, cat, bird...monkey even...how does an animal think to itself?

even more bizaar a thought...how do deaf and blind think????
its pretty much impossible for a normal person to imagine not knowing words but still knowing "your hungry" or cold for instance, but have no language or sight recollection to even be able to think to yourself those very thoughts....all you have is memories of touch, smell, and taste

rack your brain on that!

 

[Drac0nic]

I would assume that they make chains of things (say you associate your car with gasoline and the gas station) You know what gasoline is, you know what a car is, you know what a gas station is and that they all have a relationship. Lets just say you're mute, you still know what gas, a gas station and a car is and their relationship. I guess what I'm saying is that just because something can't be communicated redily doesn't mean that it's not a chain of associated events. Afterall, our dog comes running out when it hears the door open, or it comes out and harasses us when dinner's on the table. Our dog has a problem with seizures every so often. I guess it has something to do with genetics. Kinda reminds me of Opossums. You know that when they play dead, they don't have any choice in the matter. It's essentially Narcilepsy or whatever that one diseases is.

 

[GNeric]

""Originally posted by Bruce: If I rearrange a room or leave a cabinet open, mine will meow at whatever's *out of place*.""

One of our cats does this, but she also sits by the electrical outlet in the hallway and talks to the outlet like she's "ordering fries with that." The other cats don't do this and non of the other outlets offer this service I guess.

 

[Mac in SD]

IMO, dogs dream just like we do. Not only do their feet twitch and move, but you can see behind their eyelids that they're going through REM, which is concurrent with human dreaming. I'm also of the opinion that dogs (don't know about cats) experience just about all the emotions that humans do: love, hate, joy, fear, sadness, jealousy, etc.

When you get right down to it, except for opposing thumbs and the ability to speak words...

 

[topfuel]

Originally posted by Mac in SD
IMO, dogs dream just like we do. Not only do their feet twitch and move, but you can see behind their eyelids that they're going through REM, which is concurrent with human dreaming.

I thought my dog was having a seizure while sleeping, she was
twitching and breathing erraticly but the thing that scared
me was her eyes were moving around and rolling back.
I still don't know if it was just a dream or not.

 

[disco stu]

My dog dreams like crazy. When we take our Sunday snooze on the couch, her paws will start "doggy paddlin'", she'll occasionally sound a low, quiet grumbly growl, and sometimes she'll whisper a little "woof". She will twitch and jerk. It is no doubt a dream. It always happens when she konks out after about 30 minutes, and there are different sleep cycles. I get a kick out of it. I would love to know what she is dreaming about. Chasing cats and squirrels probably. Squirrels really get her going.

 

[TylerDurden]

Drac0nic, I have no doubt animals can associate one thing with another....pavlov proved all that....

also, sure all animals have instincts that probably rule most of thier lives...

but my question dealt more with what an animal is thinking at any given time...since they dont have language to use for thoughts, what is the consiousness of animal thinking to itself...picturing the food, when its hungry maybe, but then what? or when it needs to go outside, what happens in the mind when the physical feeling of a full bladder occurs?

i dunno, its all kinda rhetorical as know can answer that, just something that i "thought" about while reading this thread