2nd December 2005, 6:09 PM
It should be noted that all things 'alive' can 'die' and by that principle yearn to live and avoid threat to its life. nothing 'alive' would ever try to 'die' or put itself in harm's way unless there was a very specific reason for it (falling in to 2 catagories: depression, protection)
An animal (human or otherwise) that has, for example, lost its offspring to a predator may find itself unable to eat or drink out of sadness and regret. This can be found in all animals to atleast some extent, the higher order of the animal, the more this can be easily seen though that is sorta thrown out the window when we see it in ants or a house cat, so then it becomes a question of societal structure which doesn't always reflect the depth of the animal's intelligence and leans more towards *ta da* emotional intelligence theories (the more social the animal, the more emotional intelligence it can percieve)
An animal may also find itself in danger when trying to protect family or territory - litteraly going up against incredible odds in order to atleast try to overcome the threat of losing something more important than its own life. All mammals are proven to behave this way with avian, fish, cold blooded animals you name it with mixed results. Some animals simply evolved to simply lay the egg or give birth and then walk away, letting it fend for itself. Seaturtles are one such example. Is this lack of emotional intelligence? Or does it do this because the seaturtle has no defenses and wouldn't be able to actually 'do' anything to a predator (which are usually birds) or maybe because the sea turtle cant find a happy medium between the need to dwell and eat in the sea and laying the eggs on land... too many theories and not enough facts.
And just so everyone knows, the desire to adapt is the same as the desire to live and so causes change in the mind and pattern of the animal which leads to mutation and evolution. You cannot have mutation unless the animal changes its habits and in doing so means that the animal (even unicell) is changing its habits in order to survive either by force or by choice to overtake new means and spread further in to a higher order.
An animal (human or otherwise) that has, for example, lost its offspring to a predator may find itself unable to eat or drink out of sadness and regret. This can be found in all animals to atleast some extent, the higher order of the animal, the more this can be easily seen though that is sorta thrown out the window when we see it in ants or a house cat, so then it becomes a question of societal structure which doesn't always reflect the depth of the animal's intelligence and leans more towards *ta da* emotional intelligence theories (the more social the animal, the more emotional intelligence it can percieve)
An animal may also find itself in danger when trying to protect family or territory - litteraly going up against incredible odds in order to atleast try to overcome the threat of losing something more important than its own life. All mammals are proven to behave this way with avian, fish, cold blooded animals you name it with mixed results. Some animals simply evolved to simply lay the egg or give birth and then walk away, letting it fend for itself. Seaturtles are one such example. Is this lack of emotional intelligence? Or does it do this because the seaturtle has no defenses and wouldn't be able to actually 'do' anything to a predator (which are usually birds) or maybe because the sea turtle cant find a happy medium between the need to dwell and eat in the sea and laying the eggs on land... too many theories and not enough facts.
And just so everyone knows, the desire to adapt is the same as the desire to live and so causes change in the mind and pattern of the animal which leads to mutation and evolution. You cannot have mutation unless the animal changes its habits and in doing so means that the animal (even unicell) is changing its habits in order to survive either by force or by choice to overtake new means and spread further in to a higher order.