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I'm embarrassed that I never thought of this, but now that you mention it, it seems obvious there would be subsets of emotions other animals feel that we do not

I'm embarrassed that I never thought of this, but now that you mention it, it seems obvious there would be subsets of emotions other animals feel that we do not. Even if our capacity for emotion is greater, it seems unlikely that the VENN diagram of our emotions and their emotions would show their circle completely contained within ours. One thing I do think about a lot is what mental capacity other animals have that we do not. An elephant's brain is way bigger than ours. Considering that other large animals have proportionately smaller brains, it must be that size for a reason. I wonder what mental things are easy for an elephant but hard for a human?

c22 10y ago
> I wonder what mental things are easy for an elephant but hard for a human? Controlling an articulated trunk with tens of thousands of muscles for one.
- crpatino 10y ago
  Yes, and probably lots of spatial-intelligence in general. Memory is also attributed to them by folk lore, but that's debatable. Due to their body size, elephants need to move around a lot for forraging and, in the African Savahna at least, find water. The survival of the pack often depends on the matriarch ability to navigate through land they have not visited in many years, and finding all the scarse watersprings without the benefit of navigation instruments.