[CastlesInTheAir]

Do you think animals suffer from mental problems? Do they ever hallucinate? Have imaginary friends? Etc?

-Trish
"Don't curse the rain, without it things don't grow. Instead find the beauty in it."

[~Christina]

I dont know for sure but my dog is the biggest scardey cat ,,,I got him from the pound so im thinking something happened to him and he has ptsd ,, really ,, its sad and im hoping my care of love for him will help him ,,its better than it was but he gets terrified at times when i cant find a reason for him to react this way . when im having a bad day and my bipolar monster is in a rage he is glued to my side ... I love this mutt hes given me a reason to get out of bed daily ,, but he has his own problems ,,poor lil guy

[LiteraryLark]

Yes!!!!! Military dogs suffer from PTSD much like soldiers do. i just read an article about that. i wouldn't be surprised that abused animals who are afraid of being touched are also suffering from some form of PTSD

Hallucinate? I don't think we'll ever know, but I think that if they did, we would notice right away that our animal wasn't right.

I think imaginary friends are more of a human element. Animals are more survival of the fittest, and I think they can adapt to being alone. When my dog died, my cat, who was best friends with my dog, seemed to have no reaction to him being missing. He acted like there was nothing wrong, and it's been two years.

[lynn P.]

Animals also can suffer from anxiety and OCD type behavior like excessive chewing etc. They also get sad. My dog loves chew sticks, so when we left the other day I gave her one as we left - she didn't touch it until we came back. I've tried this a few times with the same results. Abused dogs are nervous, reactive and cowering.

[yellowted]

all animals have emotions, that is why so many people are against keeping animals in zoos , circuses etc. They show their emotions in much the same way as humans do
stressed animals often pace or rock back and forth or round in circles, scared animals cower, apes and monkeys will pull out their hair as a form of comfort when stressed or bored much like troccithingamybob. have you never seen an animal get spooked when there is nothing there??
If you get to know an animal group, you can easily see the way they show love, anger, fright etc.

[di meliora]

Can god make a rock so large she cannot carry it?

[CastlesInTheAir]

Originally Posted by Elan Vital

Can god make a rock so large she cannot carry it?

Ummmm earth?

-Trish
"Don't curse the rain, without it things don't grow. Instead find the beauty in it."

[LiteraryLark]

There was Charles Atlas, but he had dynamic tension.

[Tomjones]

Atlas was forced to carry the heavens on his shoulders

I think animals show basic emotions, but I doubt that they have the language capabilities to conciously think abstracts like "What's the point in it all?"

[LiteraryLark]

Yes, in Rocky Horror Picture Show Rocky gets chained to a bed and he is forced to look at a man carrying the world on his shoulders, I thought that was Charles Atlas.

but no, lookup charlesatlas.com and it's a body builder. Makes much more sense, since Rocky was created to be super strong and a body builder.

But I don't like men with too many muscles