

Death in dolphins: do they understand they are mortal? - gsivil
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21128283.700-death-in-dolphins-do-they-understand-they-are-mortal.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news

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RobertKohr
Anything with a fear of death knows it is mortal (can be killed). I think even
the most basic creatures understand this.

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Strilanc
For loose enough definitions of 'understand'.

For example, when I hold my breath, the urge to breath increases steadily
until I am forced to start breathing again. Is this because my body explicitly
understands that not breathing eventually results in death, or is it more
appropriate to say the response is automatic?

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hackermom
It's a case of both. The diaphragm muscle in your abdomen is both controlled
manually by yourself, and automatically by your brain.

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hackermom
This has been observed with other seemingly less intelligent species as well,
for as long as man has kept pets. Anyone who has ever had f.e. dogs or cats at
home as part of the family, coupled with one pet in the "litter" dying
suddenly or accidentally, knows how notably different the other animals in the
home will react to this compared to when one dies from drawn-out illness or
old age. It is like that other side of the coin of missing someone, something
most of us know is a characteristic that animals share with us. Animals being
in mourning during sudden deaths of their kinsmen and companions is something
the pet keepers among the population knows very well - there just haven't been
much of formal or scientific studies in the topic.

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pointyhat
If they don't, that's probably why they always look so damn happy.

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lazugod
People expect their pets to be happy based on human features (shape of the
mouth and eyebrows), which don't correspond to the actual mood of the pet.

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vev
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish!

