Phil O'Keefe Posted July 27, 2012 Share Posted July 27, 2012 They aren't an introduced species though. They have expanded their habitat naturally due to numerous causes, such as the conversion of land into farmland and the elimination of predators such as wolves. Whereas domesticated felines are an introduced species. To try to say that introduction and expansion are equivalent is silly.Saying that their expansion is directly attributable to human actions (the extermination of the region's wolves, conversion of forests to farmland, human introduction of food supplies via garbage and livestock, etc.) and then saying they expanded their range and habitat "naturally" is contradictory. I do understand and agree with your point about the problems from a highly adaptable and efficient introduced predatory species - cats can be devastating to not only the local rodent population, but also to desirable animals and birds too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Danhedonia Posted July 27, 2012 Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 Here's some simple advice: grieve, don't go shooting or poisoning. You will not solve a single thing - not a single thing - by harming a coyote. You will not eliminate the risk to other animals. This is not the act of "one rogue coyote." It is natural predator behavior. A class of predator that is NOT going to be eliminated by ANY action you take. You will not feel better. As a pet owner, you care about animals; and deep down, you will feel badly because you realize that the coyote you harm may or may not have been "the one." And you will also realize it is an animal doing what it is genetically programmed to do. Then, you'll need to rationalize your response to yourself, and you'll feel like {censored}, knowing you took the pain of your loss and turned into something destructive. Here's what you can do, that will absolutely work: keep your cats inside. No moralizing, just think about it as a decision-tree matter of practicality; if you keep them inside, you eliminate the danger. Period. ******I live on a dirt road at the very fringe of a community in New Mexico. On my property are western coachwhip snakes, honest to god jumbo tarantulas, black widows, and scorpions. We also have a red tail hawk and a cooper's hawk, and two dens of coyotes; sometimes the coyotes come up to the house (we have had one big nose smudge on our sliding door). Much as I see their threat, I try to also appreciate that they are living according to their needs. We also have four cats. Most of the time, they stay inside; once or twice a day, they are taken out for "recess," and run around a walled courtyard or in an area where they know damn well how far they can go (not tough to teach them, and I never strike an animal). They're quite content; they can chase lizards and/or less harmful insects, and the occasional pocket mouse to get their ya ya's out. And they can loll in the sun, as cats love to do. Our road has a mail dropbox about a half mile away. About every other month, we see sad fliers for missing pets; I feel for all involved. But there is really only one solution: keep them inside. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members crohny Posted July 27, 2012 Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 Saying that their expansion is directly attributable to human actions (the extermination of the region's wolves, conversion of forests to farmland, human introduction of food supplies via garbage and livestock, etc.) and then saying they expanded their range and habitat "naturally" is contradictory. I do understand and agree with your point about the problems from a highly adaptable and efficient introduced predatory species - cats can be devastating to not only the local rodent population, but also to desirable animals and birds too. Is it not natural though? They had to adapt to our bull{censored}. If they didn't adapt then that would be unnatural. Just saying. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members crohny Posted July 27, 2012 Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 I don't think that matters since it's 2012 and the city isn't a void. You must be unaware of your surroundings. Humans still rip down wooded areas to build new housing developments and {censored}. It matters big time. Time doesn't heal all wounds specially when we continue to do the same {censored} over and over. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members hecticone Posted July 27, 2012 Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 Up here in Wis. most bird hunters will shoot ferell cats or cats that are out on their own. I dig cats but they should be kept inside they are one of the few animals that will kill just for fun and not eat what they kill. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members OMTerria Posted July 27, 2012 Author Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 Is it not natural though? They had to adapt to our bull{censored}. If they didn't adapt then that would be unnatural. Just saying. Could you not argue though that it was natural for man to become the dominate species and take over the land as other territorial predators do? Maybe it's unnatural to give a naturally inferior species preference over our own? If the animal can naturally move to unnatural habitats, why is it unnatural for humans do do so? Would it not be more natural for a wild animal to make itself a new habitat in an area similar to where it would traditionally live? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members OMTerria Posted July 27, 2012 Author Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 You must be unaware of your surroundings. Humans still rip down wooded areas to build new housing developments and {censored}. It matters big time. Time doesn't heal all wounds specially when we continue to do the same {censored} over and over. I am aware of my surroundings. I think you put too much faith in animals. I'm sure they don't pass down stories from one generation to the next, planning to one day take back the land that wasn't theirs by killing pets. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members OMTerria Posted July 27, 2012 Author Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 Up here in Wis. most bird hunters will shoot ferell cats or cats that are out on their own. I dig cats but they should be kept inside they are one of the few animals that will kill just for fun and not eat what they kill. I suppose they eat the cat then? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members hecticone Posted July 27, 2012 Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 Cat stew yum. Tastes just like puma. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members crohny Posted July 27, 2012 Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 I am aware of my surroundings. I think you put too much faith in animals. I'm sure they don't pass down stories from one generation to the next, planning to one day take back the land that wasn't theirs by killing pets. This post is just ridiculous. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Pedaltones Posted July 27, 2012 Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 Can you say we are the dominate species? Yes. Son we are dominate. Put ten men in the African planes. Pit them against a lion. If those men have nothing but their hands and feet, do you think they'd survive. You are postulating that we are not the dominant species here due to inferior physicality. From this assertion you disregard a species' intelligence as a factor. We are dominate out of our stupidity. Son, I am not understand this deductive leap. Sure much of mankind's achievements have been harmful to our environment. Is this an argument against shooting pests? We have "dominated"(which is hilariously un true cause this planet shows how it can wipe us out in a atter of minutes with natural disasters)because we do {censored} without thinking. This is not true. Which is true for all species - dominants and non-dominants alike. The one thing our species has over others is the ability to rationalize our behavior. We know right from wrong. It's wrong to take a mans life just because they upset you. We frown upon this. If it's done to other species it's ok. You have bleeding hearts saying life in sacred, but then are all for sport hunting and {censored}. We wipe out rain forest for banana plantations, paper, and a bunch of other {censored}. What is truly mind boggling is, those trees and plants help produce oxygen. The more we take away the more of our own pollution we breath in. Man has created companies like Monsantos that are {censored}ing with food with no care for what it may be doing to human DNA and so on. There is very little of humanity to be proud of and far more it should be ashamed of. You're trying to rationalize destroying land that is better suited for the planet as a whole than housing some more waste of space people. {censored}, look at the stuff Taylor guitars is doing. They are setting a president in industries that had little to give a {censored} about in the way they harvested wood. Imagine if more companies went and did {censored} to help benefit the planet while still making it possible for us to live our absurd materialistic lives. Environmental rant. This post is just ridiculous. Ironic Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members OMTerria Posted July 27, 2012 Author Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 I'd say you have a good point, but you don't seem to have one at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members crohny Posted July 27, 2012 Members Share Posted July 27, 2012 Yes. Son we are dominate.You are postulating that we are not the dominant species here due to inferior physicality. From this assertion you disregard a species' intelligence as a factor.Son, I am not understand this deductive leap. Sure much of mankind's achievements have been harmful to our environment. Is this an argument against shooting pests?This is not true. Which is true for all species - dominants and non-dominants alike.Environmental rant.Ironic In what intelligence are you referring to? If you are referring to humans ability to recount history, mathematics, science and so forth, do we actually need that to survive? I think the thousands of years of the species we came from surviving off the land prove that we don't need these things. We think things through? I think the repercussion that we faced after dropping the bomb on Hiroshima are pretty spot on to my point about mankind not thinking {censored} through. Deforestation being another. Sorry you feel the environment which you NEED in order to survive isn't important in regards to you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil O'Keefe Posted July 27, 2012 Share Posted July 27, 2012 I keep getting a mental picture of African air force pilots in their plains bombing and strafing lions; dominating the dominant. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members arthurdent'd Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 I reiterate, what I have learned from this thread; Crohny is an arrogant prick. The end. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members OMTerria Posted July 28, 2012 Author Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 I keep getting a mental picture of African air force pilots in their plains bombing and strafing lions; dominating the dominant. Unfortunately the law of Naturalness prevents using real world points against idealistic indulgences. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Pedaltones Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 In what intelligence are you referring to? If you are referring to humans ability to recount history, mathematics, science and so forth, do we actually need that to survive? V covered this earlier. The intelligence to dominate. I know you mention the above disciplines as an argument that they are only important for modern civilisation but some of them are necessary to survive. We need to be able to recount history to survive. The same faculty is involved whether recalling dates of historical note or if a previously encountered situation can harm/kill us. I won't go on on this point. I think the thousands of years of the species we came from surviving off the land prove that we don't need these things. We think things through? I think the repercussion that we faced after dropping the bomb on Hiroshima are pretty spot on to my point about mankind not thinking {censored} through. Deforestation being another. I know you're on a 'harmony with nature' kick here. yes we don't need these things but how was life before these things? Is returning to nature just surviving, until dying at forty, the price you are advocating we should return to so the natural world outside of humanity can exist, untampered by our machinations? Yes, technological developments have been implemented that harm the environment. Those who wield them have decided that these pollutions are outweighed by the benifits. Everybody is really just making it up as they go along. Is this all just your meta-argument against culling pests? Sorry you feel the environment which you NEED in order to survive isn't important in regards to you. Teenange-like sarcasm which has arisen from another erroneous premise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members cryptosonic Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 I keep getting a mental picture of African air force pilots in their plains bombing and strafing lions; dominating the dominant. only for revenge Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members V Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 These skills Crohny says we don't need are just the current manifestation of skills we have historically needed and found useful. Let's take a very basic development like being able to read and write. Crohny may think this is incidental and not necessary. However, without writing you literally not only have no science but you also develop systems like magical belief and lose most ability to categorize objects outside of their immediate context. Ong talks about this. If you ask a rural-living person who cannot read or write and ask them something that requires abstract categorization (the kind that's very useful for our survival) they will almost always get it wrong. The following (roughly) was asked of people like this: Here are four objects, an axe, a saw, a scythe, and a log. Which one doesn't belong? In people who had some even basic ability to read, the answer would be "the log is not a tool so it doesn't belong."The illiterate villagers tended to respond: "I would get rid of the scythe because you can't cut the log with it very easily."When asked why the log wasn't the thing that didn't belong the illiterate villagers would respond with things like, "well, what am I going to do with an axe or saw and no log?" The point is, if you can't read (and similar principals are true of many fields of inquiry) you tend to lack the ability to think of concepts outside their immediate context. Huge huge problem as your problem solving skills (and thus survival skills) go straight into the trash. What do you think happens if you have no ability to understand, say, math? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Player99 Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 Kill the {censored}ing lions. Die lions die... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members V Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 Kill the {censored}ing lions. Die lions die... Hey, man, if a lion killed my dog I'd consider it. Fair's fair. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Lou Speed Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 We're coming up on seven pages of people arguing about coyotes and habitats and animal intelligence and {censored} but we still haven't ruled out Devil worshipers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Reauchambeau Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 Up here in Wis. most bird hunters will shoot ferell cats or cats that are out on their own. I dig cats but they should be kept inside they are one of the few animals that will kill just for fun and not eat what they kill. humans being the other animal that kills for fun Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Lou Speed Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 There's a cat that's been coming round my way lately. I'm not sure if it's a stray or just a neighbor's cat or what but it's not wearing a tag. The other day it brought me a dead rat so I think it wants to be friends. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Pedaltones Posted July 28, 2012 Members Share Posted July 28, 2012 We're coming up on seven pages of people arguing with crohny but we still haven't ruled out he's a Devil worshiper. Correct'd Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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