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I'm pretty sure they think of the person taking care of them as some analogous of a mother. We should be careful not to anthropomorphism their emotions as they are probably not quite as complex as we would like. They certainly have some degree of emotions though.
But they have no concept of "human" or "mother" so I would guess it is more like "thing stops hunger, thing warm, thing safe". Thus they bother you when they are hungry, sit on you when they are cold and come to you when they are afraid.
To support your theory: Wild cats don't meow when they're grown up. They usually only do this as kittens. When they grow up around humans they keep this trait to communicate with humans. So yeah, we're like moms or something to them.
In addition to this they also learned to meow in the frequency of a crying baby to get our attention much easier IIRC
Love this. I’ve also read they can learn and adjust how much they meow based on some of the feedback they get from the owner, ie if you actually respond to each meow with your own voice or similar. Really neat stuff
Long ago, I adopted a cat from a deaf girl. Weirdest thing, going to her house to pick one out, she had several, and none of them meowed. It was months before the one I picked out started meowing.
my cat came from a hoarder and the shelter said she might not be very well socialized because there were so many cats that they wouldn't have gotten much human attention, but she literally never stops meowing
My cat guards me while I’m on the toilet, ready to take on any predators while I’m in a vulnerable state. You can’t convince me they have less than complex emotions.
They are inexorably drawn to the comfort of the pants-cavern you create around your ankles
You feed them, if you die while pooping, they don't get fed.
Eh, my cats would be gnawing on my carcass before I was cold...
Likewise, one of my cats wants me to guard him while he's on the shitter.
How did you realize that, exactly?
The cat was meowing at me leading me around the house, how he does. One day he led me out to the litter box and dropped a big old fat turd. Then he stopped meowing. Apparently that's what he wanted to show me? Well this has become a habit and I haven't been able to break it. He's really proud of them too.
We have so many litter boxes we've tried. He's just a proud little pooper
I thought only my weirdo cat did this. He’s my little poop buddy.
Actually, they do. Maybe not in the words we use for it, but a cat can recognize their mother and can determine humans apart from other species. It may not be an complex psychological process of ranking them, but they recognize.
also humans apart from each other. Our cat chose us (my husband and I) to be her humans, so she's super affectionate with us. Other humans? She does not give a crap about anyone else. She will never come snuggle with a guest for example, but she will snuggle with me all day.
Feral cats I've been feeding daily for 3 years still won't let me get close or pet them. They do not see me as a mother or warm and safe. I think they see me as a slot machine.
I don't necessarily disagree that cats don't have as much emotional depth as humans, but I also think you're selling them a bit short on their ability to think abstractly or emotionally. And it of course varies from cat to cat. They can express fear, affection, curiosity, frustration, satisfaction, anxiety, depression, caution, anger, overstimulation, desire, boredom, jealousy and plenty of other emotions. If you pay attention to body language and their vocalizations/ lack of vocalization, you can interpret much of what's going on in their heads. They're very expressive creatures much of the time. I'm not really anthropomorphizing either. I do that, cause they're cute little goofballs, but it's a voluntary effort I put in when I want to fawn over them a little. It's easy to notice when I'm anthropomorphizing them and when I'm observing their emotional state, as they're usually separate from one another
Probably all mammals have a concept of “mother” even if it’s just a nonverbal instinct
Yeah, they're pattern recognition machines like pretty much every animal and definitely every predator
As far as the think, humans feed them at certain times or when they complain loud enough. That's all the "why" they need.
Basic cause and effect, nothing deeper.
Just like us
True cats don't have family bonds way humans do. We took in a cat from my ex who is the sister of one of ours and the mother to other and both my cats hate her even though related.
You never met anyone who hated part of their family?
I know some Thanksgiving dinners you could go to...
Had they every met before? If cats grow up together of course they'll be nicer/more familiar.
Kittens typically aren't given away before they are a couple months old, so they most probably met each other.
Either way: I've seen this in action. We had a cat that had kittens, and we were unable to give away one of them. When the kitten started growing up the mother started harassing it, eventually to the point of chasing it off. Luckily we found out that it moved in with some people a couple streets over that were very happy to have it. The point is: Cats aren't pack animals, and typically don't like sharing their territory with other cats, even if they are related.
I think it varies from cat to cat. There's a mother-daughter team here who hang around and even gang up on other cats. Also, siblings almost always get along.
Could also be that the similar genetics but long separation have them thinking of her as not part of the household yet somehow "smells" too similar and it bugs your cats out. Cats, dogs and even fish have Major Histocompatibility Complex genes just like we do.