I like your comments about the difference between all encompassing and homogenous “cows” and unique and personalized “our dog Rover.” I think it’s a function of how close we are to something, be it animal or person. We’re very close to pets, so we automatically assume other people’s dogs (or cats, though come on… dogs > cats) are as unique as ours and usually attribute them a specific name rather than just a bland mark of “dog.” Do you think that could be a factor in interactions between people (like racism)? For instance: I know nothing about this person other than the fact he/she is black/yellow/red/white/brown. Because I’m not close to them, they mean nothing to me and can thus be described by the color of their skin. As soon as we interact with people on a more individual and meaningful level, we realize a broad stroke can’t describe them and assign them a “higher status” in our order of thinking?

That comment makes a lot of sense in my head but if you don’t understand it please forgive me, it’s been a long weekend and my brain is fried on Biochemistry…

Ah okay that makes more sense to me now. Thanks for clarifying that up!

I think that the example of who got hit by a car isn’t the best in terms of intelligence. It could have had nothing to do with intelligence, and instead to do with Inyo being first, and as a result the car swerved to avoid her and hit Panzer. I agree that there are different types of intelligence though.

Regarding the opposite trails of evolution, once the animals that were unsociable and aggressive did not seek out humans and stayed away from them, they’re interactions with humans would have ended and they’d no longer be selected upon for aggressiveness. Evolution persists over a period of time in response to continual selection pressure. Remove that pressure and the driving force for a particular trait disappears. The animals that would avoid human contact would by default be removed from the evolutionary pressures (both sociable and unsociable) of humans.