This Is How Cats Think

Trying to explain how cats think is not an easy task. Without questioning the intelligence of the kittens, and perhaps because of their personality and independence, it is very difficult to convince them to accept experiments that reveal the structure of their thought.

Intelligent, affectionate and independent: this is how kittens are

Anyone who had or has cats can attest that they are extremely intelligent and loving animals, even if they are not constantly trying to please us, as dogs do.

And it is that the kittens do not consider us their masters or identify us as the leaders of a herd to which they never belonged. Some point out that they see us as their peers, although of a “little” larger size.

Others – like Winston Churchill – dare to say that even their subjects believe us. And the anthropologist and sociologist Marcel Mauss once declared: “The cat is the only animal that has managed to domesticate man.”

Some facts about the cat brain

An objective fact is that the brain of cats and humans are 90 percent similar in structure.

It is separated into areas designated for specific tasks but that can easily transmit information from one space to another. This allows the kitten to quickly recognize the environment around him and adapt smoothly.

In addition, it has about 300 million neurons that allow it not to forget what it once learned, such as what its mother taught it when it was a baby. Or remember places where you were a long time ago, or people you met in different circumstances.

However, the cat brain needs to be constantly stimulated. The felines that have shown greater intelligence are the ones that had the most contact from a young age with the people who raised them.

Human attempts to reveal how cats think

But while the news about various investigations carried out on the dog’s mind often surprise us, the same does not happen with our meowing friends. So, in this area, we are still in the infancy of how cats think.

It is that the few experiences carried out with kittens were not encouraging. For example, Christian Agrillo – a comparative psychologist at the University of Padua, Italy – who carried out several studies of numerical competence with monkeys, birds and even fish – was frustrated when it was the cats’ turn: many were irritated and others directly they refused to cooperate.

And, with the few animals that collaborated, he could hardly conclude that they are not interested in counting and that more than the number they care about size.

Signs that cats think … a lot

However, that humans cannot fully understand the way cats think does not mean that they do not. It is enough to observe them carefully to realize their intelligence. Namely:

• They are cautious. And they realize when they may be in danger.
• They are curious. They like to know and explore beyond situations linked to their survival.
• They are capable of finding solutions to different problems and situations that arise. For example: how to open a door or how to access food that is inside a closed container.

And while they may learn tricks, they will only do so if they get something in return. And they refuse to cooperate if something is not of interest. Hard to imagine “a Pavlov’s cat” at this point, right?

The kittens don’t want to reveal their secrets to us

Science journalist David Grimm points out that dogs seem to tune human radio frequency like no other animal. And that maybe that is the only station they listen to.

On the other hand, the kittens tune in to us only when they want to do so, but there is no doubt that they are also on other channels on the dial. This would explain why they are so difficult to study.

Although we could also conclude that cats are too intelligent beings to cooperate with our clumsy experiments. And that, in addition, they do not intend to reveal any of their secrets to us.