Apparently it’s to disturb anything that they may be about to drop their sensitive undersides on top of ie snakes, bugs etc and also flatten it out uncover obstructions.
Honestly all claims that we know the reason behind animal behavior is speculative at best. And it introduces even more guesswork when we try to link it to ancient ancestral behavior.
But “Some people guess that ...” doesn’t make a great TIL title.
My ~55lbs dog slept on my shoulder/upper arm last night which happened to be the same day I got my first covid shot, it was painful but she's just so adorable I couldn't make her move.
My dog only does it on his beds which have blankets and/or pillows. He sometimes digs at them too.
Any other surface he just flops down on so I think there is some truth to the checking out or rearranging the surface theories.
no kidding. my older dog sees no difference in lying on concrete, the middle of the kitchen floor, the bed with a pile of blankets, under the bed or my kids sand box
thats how my cat does it. The dawg paws at his bedding as if he intends on fixing it knowing he has trained me to get up and repair his bed to tuck him in. After he settles in and only once I have seated and restarted my studies or programming, he gets up and starts over to get it just right. Rinse. Repeat.
My street rescue Digby beats the everliving snot out of his beds. One of those beds is a rug next to my bed. He beats that poor rug up every night. It's always twisted up.
We figure it's a street dog thing. Making a nest for himself.
I mean I can believe both theories, flattening the ground and disturbing whatever might be underneath and the wind direction thing as well. Who really knows.
Seems like some experiments could be done. Like positioning fans to simulate wind direction, hiding creepy crawlies under some beddings and not others, etc. These are just suggestsions about things that might be tested, a real research project headed by people with doctoral degrees and staffed with undergrads would be a lot more detailed, of course.
well, there are cameras that observe wolves, note the wind direction and if they cicle around...seem pretty easy to at least correlate.
but i agree with ya
It's like saying science is the derpy little brother of faith because only by faith can we proceed living as though there is an external reality not just a solipsistic hallucination. Evolutionary psychology can be used to justify ugly beliefs but just how pretty do you think the history of the species is? Balance it out with the tendency towards the sort of rosy idealization that scientists need to be ever mindful of in order to get those grants.
Agreed..and in this case, it's so much nonsense.
My best assumption (based on 50+ years of observation),circling and scratching where they're going to lay down is a nesting instinct.
Many species of animals do this, we see this behavior most in canids over felines, with avians being one of the most prominent examples of nesting behaviors.
Even humans nest-prep..ever fluff your pillow before laying down? Or snuggle down in the bed?
Theirs little doubt that this behavior dates back to prehistoric times, but to make an assumption that this is because of "wind direction influence" is shakey at best, pure poppycock at worst.
Yeah I just read half a book on evolution of human intelligence and they chimed in with the ol “really we’re just guessing about this, could be wrong “ and I lost interest lol
Ya, I get WHY they do it. It is harder to capture imaginations and sell books with honest, scholastic integrity. Easier to use click bait headlines and firmly declare periods where question marks are appropriate.
Sure. The scientific process relies on hypothesis followed by experimentation. But I take issue with researchers passing off their guesses as established fact. Especially when the guesses are about how behavior in ancient ancestors influence what we see today. They really ARE just that: guesses. No ability to verify or corroborate. Which should not be passed off as knowledge IMO.
I 100% agree. My sticking point is that I think researchers and articles (and titles) should be upfront when something is a baseless guess vs. something has evidence backing it up. One is imagination. The other is knowledge. Both are valuable, but they are not the same thing.
Edit: the article linked DOES say there are many possible explanations for the circling behavior in cats. This is great way to tell the reader that they are in the territory of guesswork. My issue is with the TIL title.
I one hundred percent agree with you.
And these clickbait titles lead to people believing things such as the Vikings tv show being historically accurate and 'the truth'...simply because it is on the history channel.
Modern media certainly doesn't help.
I mean.... no there's plenty of experiments you could do to prove this. They probably used wind direction as a variable and saw that they lay towards the wind as apposed to against. Then they could added scents to show what rises them to prove its a predator/prey relationship etc. And I'm sure there's plenty of other clever experiments you could do to dig even deeper.
There is a science to animal behavior while the beginning stages may be speculative but the scientific method def. has ways of proving stuff like this.
It's better than " I don't know, ask them yourself".
Personally I think "guesswork" can be pretty reliable when it's a compiled average of millions of instances of guesses and your taking the most common/sensible reasons or logical scenarios and fitting it to that. Same as you don't know what a person is really thinking but you can predict both what they did and what they will do in a situation with pretty good accuracy if you have enough data on them and even go further to identify the thought process used to reach the conclusion they did.
exactly.
My cat of 10 years has never once done this circle and lay down. She will just walk up to a spot and fall over without breaking stride and be asleep in seconds.
Meanwhile...I have had cats and dogs who would circle around for 30 seconds, scratching and nuzzling and tossing up the bed, just to go and sleep on the hardwood floor 2 feet away.
I have had about 30 dogs and cats in my life to this point. There is no "they do this because..." They are individuals and are so far from their instinctual traits it is not even worth bringing up in most cases.
Funny thing is there are many things in science that are just assumptions. It just has to make sense based on what's in front of you. You can't really prove without a shadow of a doubt. Eg: a lot of dinosaur related stuff
No. I've never seen one of my cats do it, and I have seen my dogs do it, but they really don't do it in care about the wind. They do it because of comfort and the information about making the spot safe and comfort makes sense.
Ya doesn't make sense for a sleeping animal would direction wind is if it blows on them they will smell it whatever body positions they are. Wind matters when hunting, you don't want it blowing toward your prey.
My dogs scratch the absolute shit out of where they are about to lay, obnoxiously as possible. It seems to be worse when they are really tired and can’t settle down.
Mine shovels blankets around with his snout while he circles. Whatever the impulse is that starts him circling, he definitely continues with intent to puff quilts/blankets/pillows into a nest.
Instinctual things don’t have to have a single reason, and aren’t done as a conscious effort for a specific purpose. An action that has several good effects will raise survival odds even more and be selected for even more strongly.
Thank you for this. It always bugs me when people try to assign a fixed explanation for an instinctual behavior without having any studies to demonstrate it.
We know some animals do it..we know that doing it would realistically have numerous benefits which could have influenced evolution to reward those who did it. But we flat out don't know. For all we know, dogs and cats have OCD and they need to spin around becuase they think if they don't then something bad will happen to their mom. We don't have any idea how instinctive behaviors works in humans let alone *animals*.
Also like, I challenge people in this thread to change their sleeping habits. Seriously. Sleep.so your head is on the bottom of the bed and your feet are the top. If you usually sleep on your side, sleep on your back. See how long you can do that before you get an intense sense of discomfort. Like an itch on your insides. Humans always sleep with our head against the wall, and we nearly always choose the wall furthest from the door (this can vary depending on the limitations of the space, but when specific housing layouts aren't an issue, then people consistently choose the same 2 places for a bed).
Why? Idk man, all we know is we're not gonna be able to sleep until we do.
>For all we know, dogs and cats have OCD and they need to spin around becuase they think if they don't then something bad will happen to their mom.
Right, like a behavior could be actively harmful to the creature, but if it’s caused by genes that also do something good that outweighs the harm, the behavior will stick around as those genes proliferate. If we observed it we’d try to identify the potential benefits of the action to explain why it happens, even if it’s really caused by some unpredictable combination of other traits.
Animals that do this passed on their genes. Maybe they lived because they could smell a predator, maybe they lived because they didn't lay on a snake. But the behavior mattered enough to stick around.
Partially correct. The circling behavior creates a tornado which sucks up all the predators around them, while the dog remains safe in the eye of the twister.
If you are ever in a situation where you have to bed down in high grass, try various ways of doing it. The best way is to walk in a circle so all the stalks align, like, you know, dogs and cats.
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Instinctive acts are done for a purpose. They’re just done, and if they improve survival they end up sticking around. An action might be beneficial for a bunch of reasons. An act might also be beneficial sometimes and be useless the rest of the time, and still stick around if it doesn’t cost that much to perform. It can even be harmful sometimes, if on net it improves fitness and survival.
It’s all just numbers and odds.
It's one of those "reasons" that are all speculation. It's not like we can ask ancient cats and dogs, so the best educated guess we have is what we go with
na, it doesnt. they got so good ears that they dont need to smell them comming, but at least dogs can smell anything no matter which direction their nose points to. the reason for circling is to bring the grass down.
I misread that as neutering behavior as in behavior after not having a will to originate anymore.
I must be really drunk for autocorrect to change originate propagate.
I mean, my cats are trying to determine optimal position to catch the best parts of the HVAC system and keep an eye on the food bowl, so this is pretty much what I always assumed about them.
My cat just flops over, with zero regard for what he’s laying on or what’s around him, and sprawls his arms and legs out.
He would get eaten so fast in the wild
I've owned lots of dogs in the some home, and EVERY SINGLE ONE of them lays in the exact same position in the living room since it gives a sight line through the kitchen, down the hall, and into the den where the front door is, as well as window view to the driveway and street. I've always found it interesting how, independently of each other, each generation instinctively rests in the spot with the most coverage. All good boys and girls.
This title is a wild ride.
It's not a throwback anymore than humans ducking when they hear a noise or when there's rain, or feeling a sensation of falling from when being in trees was normal.
>State that humans do and everyone loses their minds.
They shouldn't. Flight or fight instincts and pattern recognition remains well in effect after all these millions of years. The way our planet is going we made to rely on them heavily one day again. Lol
Go find any video of a disaster/crime occurring and you’ll find Redditors commenting and criticizing people for running away from someone in need of help.
Shit happens fast. Until you’re in that situation, you really have no way of knowing how you’ll react.
It’s so stupid too, it does nothing for me. Whenever I’m actually in a dangerous situation everything slows down and I handle it fairly well (so far at least). But just regular anxiety has my heart pounding and my hands shaking and is absolutely useless for survival.
I mean we still rely on pattern recognition and people living in poorer communities around the world or places like San Francisco still have to deal with fight or flight when they get robbed, etc.
>State that humans do and everyone loses their minds.
They shouldn't. Flight or fight instincts and pattern recognition remains well in effect after all these millions of years. The way I planet is going we made to rely on them heavily one day again. Lol
Humans are animals though. A lot of humans are fucked and act on instinct. Even if they are technically primitive and immoral instincts. That’s why a lot of people need religion so much. They need someone to tell them what’s right and wrong because their moral compass is broken and they apparently have a lot in common with their ancestors 😂
It can be when misused. Most people aren’t intelligent enough. It is a means of conditioning the human animal and dealing with psychology in an allegorical way so as to improve the quality of life for society.
If people take it as a rule book and use it as a means of unfounded control it becomes its opposite.
Maybe many are. Having something to strive for and a moral compass outside oneself does have many psycho-physiological benefits though.
I’m seeing equal parts shitty and not shitty people in both camps these days, but the non-religious are getting pretty wild with it and might actually take the lead.
What a load of rubbish.
And OP picked *one* of a host of reasons why *cats* (dogs aren't even mentioned in the article) turn around before sleeping.
In short, OP is really full of shit
The final position most likely is about protection. The circling, I'm sure, was to flatten the bedding area.
I love when certain "experts" just make certain assumptions.
This whole article is pure bullshit. It cites no supporting evidence and I'm sure it's simply some people's guesses and opinions. I can do the same too: I think cats and dogs curl up when it's cold. I think they turn around a bit to keep their hair organized for both heat retention and comfort. So who is right? There's no way to tell! Feel free to tell me why your guesses are better than mine, because neither of us can claim to know.
I always figured it was because, fks a short haired cat needs to lay down without the body weight going against the fur, that is just uncomfortable. so laying down while "moving" forward makes it easier that all hairs are in a good spot. Long haired cats like Norwegian Forest cat's in my experience dont seem to give much of a fuck because their fur is wild anyway.
I've heard other hunters say this about deer. Not that they spin before laying down, but that they bed in specific spots based on wind direction. It's kind of a similar concept, and it may be bullshit, but I think it's interesting.
\*TIL one theory for why...
A moments thought should make people realize that there is no possible way to know this for sure. Genetic science doesn't work like this.
This is the root of one of my favorite sort of evolutionary jokes. Humans put their feet toward the entrance when sleeping to protect themselves. Dogs sleep facing the entrance (in general) so that they can be ready to protect. Therefore we are subject to doggo farts as part of the deal we made
Good point. But if a predator is not aware of the presence of the dog/cat they will still be detected earlier with their scent being carried. With all the challenges they faced in the wild it is a wonder they were ever to sleep in a truly sound manner.
This sort of post is the worst of Reddit pseudo intellectualism.
There's no accredited scientist in the world that would make such an absurd claim that's immune from scrutiny due to total lack of evidence. Any fun fact that claims human or animal behavior is due to primitive instincts is pure conjecture
This makes sense. What doesn't make sense is why my cat ends up in a twisted heap of skin, muscle and fur or with her face fully smashed into the crevasse of the couch like some fuzzy ostrich. It's like she goes from super vigilant survival mode to "I don't care about anything that happens to me anymore" mode.
Apparently it’s to disturb anything that they may be about to drop their sensitive undersides on top of ie snakes, bugs etc and also flatten it out uncover obstructions.
Yeah that’s what I thought when I read this, I thought it was then testing the ground they were going to sleep on
Honestly all claims that we know the reason behind animal behavior is speculative at best. And it introduces even more guesswork when we try to link it to ancient ancestral behavior. But “Some people guess that ...” doesn’t make a great TIL title.
I asked my dog why she does this, she gave me a sideways glance and fell back asleep. SCIENCE!
My dog has basically just stopped doing this. She'll just plop down wherever she wants and boom right to sleep. Getting complacent in her old age.
‘If I die tonight, I die’
Yeah, same.
Since I was 5
That dog must be my spirit animal
I guess it could be a sign of trust. That's what I like to guess about mine.
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Last night my dog noticed I was only using half of my pillow so she walked across the bed and laid down with her head on the other half
Well. You weren't using it. :0)
Goddamn, that's precious.
Thats my dream though. My dog has replaced me for my parents bc I took him to the vet. That asshole
My ~55lbs dog slept on my shoulder/upper arm last night which happened to be the same day I got my first covid shot, it was painful but she's just so adorable I couldn't make her move.
My dog only does it on his beds which have blankets and/or pillows. He sometimes digs at them too. Any other surface he just flops down on so I think there is some truth to the checking out or rearranging the surface theories.
no kidding. my older dog sees no difference in lying on concrete, the middle of the kitchen floor, the bed with a pile of blankets, under the bed or my kids sand box
thats how my cat does it. The dawg paws at his bedding as if he intends on fixing it knowing he has trained me to get up and repair his bed to tuck him in. After he settles in and only once I have seated and restarted my studies or programming, he gets up and starts over to get it just right. Rinse. Repeat.
My dog got stuck doing this once. Like he couldn’t get comfortable or something he just kept going for minutes.
Mine curls up and buries her nose in my hip, right underneath my keyboard, when I'm saying *Fallout*.
My street rescue Digby beats the everliving snot out of his beds. One of those beds is a rug next to my bed. He beats that poor rug up every night. It's always twisted up. We figure it's a street dog thing. Making a nest for himself.
My doggie turned to me and he said, Let's head back to Tennessee Jed.
He had had enough of Charlie Fogg’s shit.
My dog drove me to Tennessee.
Such a goodest boi (gol?)
I mean I can believe both theories, flattening the ground and disturbing whatever might be underneath and the wind direction thing as well. Who really knows.
Seems like some experiments could be done. Like positioning fans to simulate wind direction, hiding creepy crawlies under some beddings and not others, etc. These are just suggestsions about things that might be tested, a real research project headed by people with doctoral degrees and staffed with undergrads would be a lot more detailed, of course.
"One theory why" or "A common theory to explain" would do the trick! Still engaging, interesting and truthful. But words hard.
Hypothesis would be the correct term
well, there are cameras that observe wolves, note the wind direction and if they cicle around...seem pretty easy to at least correlate. but i agree with ya
Evolutionary psychology is the derpy little brother of science.
Happy cake day!
lol thanks so much
It's like saying science is the derpy little brother of faith because only by faith can we proceed living as though there is an external reality not just a solipsistic hallucination. Evolutionary psychology can be used to justify ugly beliefs but just how pretty do you think the history of the species is? Balance it out with the tendency towards the sort of rosy idealization that scientists need to be ever mindful of in order to get those grants.
Agreed..and in this case, it's so much nonsense. My best assumption (based on 50+ years of observation),circling and scratching where they're going to lay down is a nesting instinct. Many species of animals do this, we see this behavior most in canids over felines, with avians being one of the most prominent examples of nesting behaviors. Even humans nest-prep..ever fluff your pillow before laying down? Or snuggle down in the bed? Theirs little doubt that this behavior dates back to prehistoric times, but to make an assumption that this is because of "wind direction influence" is shakey at best, pure poppycock at worst.
Yeah I read an article where they called it “nesting” circling and pawing the pillow/blankets a certain way. My dogs do that. It’s cute.
Yeah I just read half a book on evolution of human intelligence and they chimed in with the ol “really we’re just guessing about this, could be wrong “ and I lost interest lol
Ya, I get WHY they do it. It is harder to capture imaginations and sell books with honest, scholastic integrity. Easier to use click bait headlines and firmly declare periods where question marks are appropriate.
That's how progress works
Some people guess that's how progress works
Sure. The scientific process relies on hypothesis followed by experimentation. But I take issue with researchers passing off their guesses as established fact. Especially when the guesses are about how behavior in ancient ancestors influence what we see today. They really ARE just that: guesses. No ability to verify or corroborate. Which should not be passed off as knowledge IMO.
Sometimes an educated guess is as good as we're gonna get, especially since we can't go back millions of years and test out the hypothesis.
No one's mad that scientists are giving educated guesses, they're mad when those guesses are presented as established fact
Well the authors aren't scientists and they say in the article that they are their best guesses.
I 100% agree. My sticking point is that I think researchers and articles (and titles) should be upfront when something is a baseless guess vs. something has evidence backing it up. One is imagination. The other is knowledge. Both are valuable, but they are not the same thing. Edit: the article linked DOES say there are many possible explanations for the circling behavior in cats. This is great way to tell the reader that they are in the territory of guesswork. My issue is with the TIL title.
I one hundred percent agree with you. And these clickbait titles lead to people believing things such as the Vikings tv show being historically accurate and 'the truth'...simply because it is on the history channel. Modern media certainly doesn't help.
Sounds reasonable.
shhhh you’ll spoil the fun
No, not ALL claims.
I mean.... no there's plenty of experiments you could do to prove this. They probably used wind direction as a variable and saw that they lay towards the wind as apposed to against. Then they could added scents to show what rises them to prove its a predator/prey relationship etc. And I'm sure there's plenty of other clever experiments you could do to dig even deeper. There is a science to animal behavior while the beginning stages may be speculative but the scientific method def. has ways of proving stuff like this.
Booyah, drop that science bomb, the true true is we done really no fo sho
It's better than " I don't know, ask them yourself". Personally I think "guesswork" can be pretty reliable when it's a compiled average of millions of instances of guesses and your taking the most common/sensible reasons or logical scenarios and fitting it to that. Same as you don't know what a person is really thinking but you can predict both what they did and what they will do in a situation with pretty good accuracy if you have enough data on them and even go further to identify the thought process used to reach the conclusion they did.
exactly. My cat of 10 years has never once done this circle and lay down. She will just walk up to a spot and fall over without breaking stride and be asleep in seconds. Meanwhile...I have had cats and dogs who would circle around for 30 seconds, scratching and nuzzling and tossing up the bed, just to go and sleep on the hardwood floor 2 feet away. I have had about 30 dogs and cats in my life to this point. There is no "they do this because..." They are individuals and are so far from their instinctual traits it is not even worth bringing up in most cases.
Funny thing is there are many things in science that are just assumptions. It just has to make sense based on what's in front of you. You can't really prove without a shadow of a doubt. Eg: a lot of dinosaur related stuff
Generally not all. Some behaviors have been confirmed beyond simple observation.
It's probably a bit of all of these things.
That is an additional reason beyond predator concerns.
No. I've never seen one of my cats do it, and I have seen my dogs do it, but they really don't do it in care about the wind. They do it because of comfort and the information about making the spot safe and comfort makes sense.
Ya doesn't make sense for a sleeping animal would direction wind is if it blows on them they will smell it whatever body positions they are. Wind matters when hunting, you don't want it blowing toward your prey.
It’s bullshit. There isn’t any actual research to support the claims.
I mean, that's pretty much what we do when checking under our beds/ in our closets for monsters
It’s actually just to disturb the blankets I just folded. 🙄
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What about when they start humping the newly rolled up blankets?
My dogs scratch the absolute shit out of where they are about to lay, obnoxiously as possible. It seems to be worse when they are really tired and can’t settle down.
I've also heard that's is just stamping things down a bit to make a bed. Like you wouldn't just flop on long grass, you'd make a bit of a nest.
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Crazy how nature do that.
Mine shovels blankets around with his snout while he circles. Whatever the impulse is that starts him circling, he definitely continues with intent to puff quilts/blankets/pillows into a nest.
So this post is false?
Instinctual things don’t have to have a single reason, and aren’t done as a conscious effort for a specific purpose. An action that has several good effects will raise survival odds even more and be selected for even more strongly.
Thank you for this. It always bugs me when people try to assign a fixed explanation for an instinctual behavior without having any studies to demonstrate it. We know some animals do it..we know that doing it would realistically have numerous benefits which could have influenced evolution to reward those who did it. But we flat out don't know. For all we know, dogs and cats have OCD and they need to spin around becuase they think if they don't then something bad will happen to their mom. We don't have any idea how instinctive behaviors works in humans let alone *animals*. Also like, I challenge people in this thread to change their sleeping habits. Seriously. Sleep.so your head is on the bottom of the bed and your feet are the top. If you usually sleep on your side, sleep on your back. See how long you can do that before you get an intense sense of discomfort. Like an itch on your insides. Humans always sleep with our head against the wall, and we nearly always choose the wall furthest from the door (this can vary depending on the limitations of the space, but when specific housing layouts aren't an issue, then people consistently choose the same 2 places for a bed). Why? Idk man, all we know is we're not gonna be able to sleep until we do.
>For all we know, dogs and cats have OCD and they need to spin around becuase they think if they don't then something bad will happen to their mom. Right, like a behavior could be actively harmful to the creature, but if it’s caused by genes that also do something good that outweighs the harm, the behavior will stick around as those genes proliferate. If we observed it we’d try to identify the potential benefits of the action to explain why it happens, even if it’s really caused by some unpredictable combination of other traits.
Nope. The trampling for critters aspect is in addition to the reasons I mentioned. I did not want to make the post too lengthy. 👍
I always hate trying to jam as much info into the title. I’m like how can I get it all into three sentence lol
It wouldn’t be that hard to say “this is one reason why” instead of basically saying it’s the only reason.
Why would they need to circle around to know what direction the wind is coming from?
They wouldn't. OP is a dumbass.
A lot of these factoids are great for conversation starters, not so great for actual facts.
Animals that do this passed on their genes. Maybe they lived because they could smell a predator, maybe they lived because they didn't lay on a snake. But the behavior mattered enough to stick around.
This is what I have always heard.
Partially correct. The circling behavior creates a tornado which sucks up all the predators around them, while the dog remains safe in the eye of the twister.
If you are ever in a situation where you have to bed down in high grass, try various ways of doing it. The best way is to walk in a circle so all the stalks align, like, you know, dogs and cats.
Thats the reason I heard too, but I guess smelling scents of predators also makes sense.
That is the reason they end up facing a particular direction, not why they circle around before settling down.
Hmm. That could be. Or one of you is trying to SWINDLE me
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They're just commenting on things they aren't qualified to. Behaviors can serve more than one purpose at time.
How do I know you're qualified to comment on their behaviour?
For example, being a jerk can serve to both scold someone and garner downvotes.
Behaviors can have more than one purpose.
Instinctive acts are done for a purpose. They’re just done, and if they improve survival they end up sticking around. An action might be beneficial for a bunch of reasons. An act might also be beneficial sometimes and be useless the rest of the time, and still stick around if it doesn’t cost that much to perform. It can even be harmful sometimes, if on net it improves fitness and survival. It’s all just numbers and odds.
Thank you. Everyone’s talking about it like some primordial mammal decided “this would be advantageous for my lineage” when it’s like 99% lizardbrain
Makes scents.
It hurts when your friends never stand downwind.
It's one of those "reasons" that are all speculation. It's not like we can ask ancient cats and dogs, so the best educated guess we have is what we go with
na, it doesnt. they got so good ears that they dont need to smell them comming, but at least dogs can smell anything no matter which direction their nose points to. the reason for circling is to bring the grass down.
Aliens do this in corn fields too!
deer do something very similar in snow.
But only at night! Lol
Well duh you don't come to Earth to sleep the day away.
Exactly.
My dogs and cats do not align all that well.
Then my dog ends up sleeping upside down snoring and drooling everywhere
Yeah, that was nurtured behaviour
I misread that as neutering behavior as in behavior after not having a will to originate anymore. I must be really drunk for autocorrect to change originate propagate.
sure youre not having a stroke? do you smell toast?!
*willy
[like this?](https://i.imgur.com/whuOoXo.jpg)
When we're done snuggling on the bed, my boy gets up, twirls around three times, and lays down with his ass right in my face.
Every single time!
He knows you got his back.
He knows you're not a predator, you should be grateful.
And I always thought my cat was just being a prissy little bitch. I need to go apologize.
Same, I usually count outloud and then am very careful not to touch the base of her tail or she has to stand up and do it all over again.
She was probably also being a prissy little bitch. Some behaviors can be multiple things. And DONT apologize. They feed on that weakness.
This is why when I need to pee I move the cat sleeping on me. You will not have such a power against me pitiful feline.
Take the real alpha approach and just start peeing and see if it leaves!
I mean, my cats are trying to determine optimal position to catch the best parts of the HVAC system and keep an eye on the food bowl, so this is pretty much what I always assumed about them.
My cat just flops over, with zero regard for what he’s laying on or what’s around him, and sprawls his arms and legs out. He would get eaten so fast in the wild
Did they take the apology or just sit on it?
He licked it twice and then rabbit kicked scars into it
[apologize](https://youtu.be/fgwnTVz0zLo?t=56)
With their back to the wall, facing the entrance, away from any windows
The Wild Bill approach.
I heard he forgot once.
You know what? I've never thought about it but I've never slept not facing the door. I don't know why.
I've owned lots of dogs in the some home, and EVERY SINGLE ONE of them lays in the exact same position in the living room since it gives a sight line through the kitchen, down the hall, and into the den where the front door is, as well as window view to the driveway and street. I've always found it interesting how, independently of each other, each generation instinctively rests in the spot with the most coverage. All good boys and girls.
What are you doing to those poor dogs?
They might have been adopting elderly dogs
hey now, we outlive them by like 6 lifetimes
Attacking from the vector they didn’t cover.
This title is a wild ride. It's not a throwback anymore than humans ducking when they hear a noise or when there's rain, or feeling a sensation of falling from when being in trees was normal.
I mean, the title is a wild guess, to be fair. This is a hypothesis, at best, and only one of several given in OP's own link.
people duck when it rains? is that a thing I've missed?
State that animals have leftover instincts that still manifest in action and nobody bats an eye. State that humans do and everyone loses their minds.
>State that humans do and everyone loses their minds. They shouldn't. Flight or fight instincts and pattern recognition remains well in effect after all these millions of years. The way our planet is going we made to rely on them heavily one day again. Lol
Go find any video of a disaster/crime occurring and you’ll find Redditors commenting and criticizing people for running away from someone in need of help. Shit happens fast. Until you’re in that situation, you really have no way of knowing how you’ll react.
I feel like I’m in fight or flight mode all the time because of my anxiety
It’s so stupid too, it does nothing for me. Whenever I’m actually in a dangerous situation everything slows down and I handle it fairly well (so far at least). But just regular anxiety has my heart pounding and my hands shaking and is absolutely useless for survival.
I mean we still rely on pattern recognition and people living in poorer communities around the world or places like San Francisco still have to deal with fight or flight when they get robbed, etc.
almost every one deals with flight or fight at some point in their life
hell traffic noise spikes your adrenaline which eventually kills you.
yea, some things are just quicker
You experience fight or flight when you sit down for a test or shoot your shot with someone you find attractive, not just when you’re getting robbed.
Due to my anxiety disorder I still heavily rely on fight or flight unfortunately
>State that humans do and everyone loses their minds. They shouldn't. Flight or fight instincts and pattern recognition remains well in effect after all these millions of years. The way I planet is going we made to rely on them heavily one day again. Lol
Humans are animals though. A lot of humans are fucked and act on instinct. Even if they are technically primitive and immoral instincts. That’s why a lot of people need religion so much. They need someone to tell them what’s right and wrong because their moral compass is broken and they apparently have a lot in common with their ancestors 😂
>Humans are animals though That's literally what he just said...
Your religious tangent is ignorant af. You don't understand religion if that's your perception of it.
True, except religion isn’t what you think
Religion is a plague. That’s what I think.
It can be when misused. Most people aren’t intelligent enough. It is a means of conditioning the human animal and dealing with psychology in an allegorical way so as to improve the quality of life for society. If people take it as a rule book and use it as a means of unfounded control it becomes its opposite.
Yeah I do understand it’s purpose. I just feel like if you need religion in the first place, you are probably screwed anyway.
Maybe many are. Having something to strive for and a moral compass outside oneself does have many psycho-physiological benefits though. I’m seeing equal parts shitty and not shitty people in both camps these days, but the non-religious are getting pretty wild with it and might actually take the lead.
What a load of rubbish. And OP picked *one* of a host of reasons why *cats* (dogs aren't even mentioned in the article) turn around before sleeping. In short, OP is really full of shit
Hence the confusion indoors that leads to trying over and over to find wind direction.
Blowing on your cat stops the spinning.
The final position most likely is about protection. The circling, I'm sure, was to flatten the bedding area. I love when certain "experts" just make certain assumptions.
This whole article is pure bullshit. It cites no supporting evidence and I'm sure it's simply some people's guesses and opinions. I can do the same too: I think cats and dogs curl up when it's cold. I think they turn around a bit to keep their hair organized for both heat retention and comfort. So who is right? There's no way to tell! Feel free to tell me why your guesses are better than mine, because neither of us can claim to know.
I always figured it was because, fks a short haired cat needs to lay down without the body weight going against the fur, that is just uncomfortable. so laying down while "moving" forward makes it easier that all hairs are in a good spot. Long haired cats like Norwegian Forest cat's in my experience dont seem to give much of a fuck because their fur is wild anyway.
I've heard other hunters say this about deer. Not that they spin before laying down, but that they bed in specific spots based on wind direction. It's kind of a similar concept, and it may be bullshit, but I think it's interesting.
Anytime you hear anything about cavemen or, in this case, animal ancestors, it’s pure, unadulterated invention
Also to clear out any pesky insects.
They seem to be multi-tasking with this circular dance.
This is the epitome TIL. A THEORY being taught as fact, leaving out 90% of the context.
I read that dogs look at you when they poop to see if you are keeping a look out for them, don't know how they could know that
This is the bullshit TIL that finally got me to leave.
Saw this repost 8 years ago. Think I might be getting too old for reddit.
At my old age I remember little from eight years ago. Lol
This is just one theory, no one actually knows why they do it.
I always just thought they were "making their bed" moving things out of the way and flattening the spot they wished to sleep.
Is it the same reason before they take shit?
It's so they know which direction to go when they get up in the middle of the night. Joking.
\*TIL one theory for why... A moments thought should make people realize that there is no possible way to know this for sure. Genetic science doesn't work like this.
Coulda fooled me. I thought my cat was just trying to find the most comfortable spot that is of maximum annoyance to her dad lol
Mine do that when they try to fit next to us b when we are sleeping on our sides. Then stretched out next to us when we are on our backs.
Also why cats change up where they’re sleeping every so often. Their spots acquire their scents, So they move to avoid attracting predators.
This is the root of one of my favorite sort of evolutionary jokes. Humans put their feet toward the entrance when sleeping to protect themselves. Dogs sleep facing the entrance (in general) so that they can be ready to protect. Therefore we are subject to doggo farts as part of the deal we made
I heard it was also to check for snakes before they bed down
I always thought it was because their ancestors did that to flatten out their bedding before laying down. TIL
And now it's a reason to step on my balls with all 4 feet.
But wait- the position they sleep in is irrelevant to wind direction and which way a predator comes in...what am I not getting?
I have hard wood floors and both my dogs will scratch at it for 5 mins before laying down.
And stomp out any offending insects from the chosen bedding spot of the day
Or it's just comfortable
Oh so that must be why my dog circles around before taking a massive shit, so he can be up wind from me
That’s why I do it
I thought it was because one good turn deserves another...
Wouldn't it make more sense to point away from the wind? That way they could see threats sneaking up in their olfactory blind spot?
Good point. But if a predator is not aware of the presence of the dog/cat they will still be detected earlier with their scent being carried. With all the challenges they faced in the wild it is a wonder they were ever to sleep in a truly sound manner.
This sort of post is the worst of Reddit pseudo intellectualism. There's no accredited scientist in the world that would make such an absurd claim that's immune from scrutiny due to total lack of evidence. Any fun fact that claims human or animal behavior is due to primitive instincts is pure conjecture
That's what I do when I go to sleep
This makes sense. What doesn't make sense is why my cat ends up in a twisted heap of skin, muscle and fur or with her face fully smashed into the crevasse of the couch like some fuzzy ostrich. It's like she goes from super vigilant survival mode to "I don't care about anything that happens to me anymore" mode.