DPtortiose
Member
- Joined
- Sep 16, 2015
- Messages
- 97
This subject recently was slightly touched discussed in another thread that was unrelated to the subject. I realize this might be a hot potato for some people, but I find interesting what people think about this issue.
I understand that I give this discussion a certain direction by referring to humanizing tortoises as an issue. But I'm pretty biased and I think it's fair to state that from the get go. I think this is an issue because thinking of animals in this fashion can lead to a number of serious husbandry problems, to name of few examples:
My tortoise/turtle is lonely. There is a fair number of people who bought two tortoise because it looked 'lonely'. This often goes all right for a couple of years if the animals are still young, but it often goes south when the animals mature. While the social 'needs' and structure of tortoises are an area we don't have too much data on. It's commonly observed that keeping pairs in small enclosure goes bad quickly and ends with an stressed tortoise at best. Or a injured or dead one at its worst. Tortoise (to my knowledge) form no lasting bounds with members of the same species, or even their own offspring for that matter.
My animal wants affection. More or less comparable to the above example, only this time the animal forms a bond with the keeper rather than another animal. Since it's unlikely that they form long-term bonds with each other, it's extremely unlikely that they form them with an human. We're a food to dispenser at best, or a large predator at worst.
My animal is happy. Perhaps the most damaging one, since it's often used to justify husbandry. People claim they do something because they can see the animal being 'happy'. Which is absolutely unfounded, since we have no way of actually measuring if an animal is 'happy'. I'm not refuting that an tortoise can be happy or not (though I've not read anything that suggests they are capable of this emotion), I am stating however that is impossible to tell. I'm not aware of any scientific study that gives certain objective indicators that an animal is 'happy'. Nor can the observations of a single keeper be called 'objective', especially when looking for an already extremely subjective emotion as 'happiness'. It’s simply untrue that suggesting your animal is happy, is meaningful in any way to support an statement. The amount of people who claim their reptile is happy while it suffers from serious health issues is staggering. I’ve seen keepers claiming that their lizard is very happy being petted while showing extreme signs of being stressed. It only cements a possible improper husbandry standard and prevents people from researching proper husbandry guidelines, articles or study's.
Do I think there is no room for emotion in our hobby? Not at all, but it should be an individual (human) experience. Not one that is projected onto an animal that stops rational and objective research. I do get why people tend to project feelings on to an animal. Humans possess a great capacity for empathy, that allows us to function properly in our society. It's natural that we form bonds with other beings, including other species and it's not bad quality to have. But anthropomorphizing an animal can be dangerous for the animal, since they simply don't have the same needs as humans. So I rather talk about healthy animal (something we do have indicators for), then 'happy' animal.
I'm very curious what other people opinions are on this subject. Are we perhaps projecting to much onto our animals and does this have negative effects?
I understand that I give this discussion a certain direction by referring to humanizing tortoises as an issue. But I'm pretty biased and I think it's fair to state that from the get go. I think this is an issue because thinking of animals in this fashion can lead to a number of serious husbandry problems, to name of few examples:
My tortoise/turtle is lonely. There is a fair number of people who bought two tortoise because it looked 'lonely'. This often goes all right for a couple of years if the animals are still young, but it often goes south when the animals mature. While the social 'needs' and structure of tortoises are an area we don't have too much data on. It's commonly observed that keeping pairs in small enclosure goes bad quickly and ends with an stressed tortoise at best. Or a injured or dead one at its worst. Tortoise (to my knowledge) form no lasting bounds with members of the same species, or even their own offspring for that matter.
My animal wants affection. More or less comparable to the above example, only this time the animal forms a bond with the keeper rather than another animal. Since it's unlikely that they form long-term bonds with each other, it's extremely unlikely that they form them with an human. We're a food to dispenser at best, or a large predator at worst.
My animal is happy. Perhaps the most damaging one, since it's often used to justify husbandry. People claim they do something because they can see the animal being 'happy'. Which is absolutely unfounded, since we have no way of actually measuring if an animal is 'happy'. I'm not refuting that an tortoise can be happy or not (though I've not read anything that suggests they are capable of this emotion), I am stating however that is impossible to tell. I'm not aware of any scientific study that gives certain objective indicators that an animal is 'happy'. Nor can the observations of a single keeper be called 'objective', especially when looking for an already extremely subjective emotion as 'happiness'. It’s simply untrue that suggesting your animal is happy, is meaningful in any way to support an statement. The amount of people who claim their reptile is happy while it suffers from serious health issues is staggering. I’ve seen keepers claiming that their lizard is very happy being petted while showing extreme signs of being stressed. It only cements a possible improper husbandry standard and prevents people from researching proper husbandry guidelines, articles or study's.
Do I think there is no room for emotion in our hobby? Not at all, but it should be an individual (human) experience. Not one that is projected onto an animal that stops rational and objective research. I do get why people tend to project feelings on to an animal. Humans possess a great capacity for empathy, that allows us to function properly in our society. It's natural that we form bonds with other beings, including other species and it's not bad quality to have. But anthropomorphizing an animal can be dangerous for the animal, since they simply don't have the same needs as humans. So I rather talk about healthy animal (something we do have indicators for), then 'happy' animal.
I'm very curious what other people opinions are on this subject. Are we perhaps projecting to much onto our animals and does this have negative effects?