Don’t tell Jerry Coyne. I am disturbed to see that cats are intruding on the cephalopod domain.
Although…if I were a squid, I think I’d just see this as snack delivery.
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Do squid like furry lunch?
Phph! At least cats, unlike cephalopods, actually have uses!
If your house is on fire while you sleep, a dog will wake you up and save your life out of loyalty…a cat may save your life to preserve his meal ticket. What can a pet cephalopod in an aquarium do? Provide some free calimari for the firemen when they arrive??
Would they see this as a snack delivery?
argh…
[Shatner]
Must…not…make…obvious…damp…feline…double…entendre…
argh..
[/Shatner]
The unnatural shenanigans here are the youtube community: “This content may contain material flagged by YouTube’s user community that may be inappropriate for some users.” And there’s even no squid attack, just a human, so I believe the problem here is that the cat actually swims which might disturb the world view of some people.
My daughter has a black cat named Gizmo who has loved to swim in the bathtub since he was a small kitten. He will happily chase toys all around the tub.
I describe my cat as “bath-curious”.
He’ll prowl around on the edge of the bath, maybe dip a paw, but so far has not built up the courage to actually hop in yet.
And I haven’t gathered the courage to push him in yet, either :)
One of these days, PZ, I’m going to send you a vid of a cute fluffy kitty dining on some delicious squid just for that… mark my words…
In Soviet Russia… oh nevermind
Hm, you clearly don’t speak cat. What this one is saying is: “I know that cats can swim, but we sure as fuck don’t have to like it.”
Anyway, she’s probably chasing an alligator… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiyWXQyAJ44
@Charlie Foxtrot
Go on. You know you want to…. Just a little nudge. Could be accidental!
Just catch it on video & share!
vvv73 @5:
I believe such people would go through 5 stages:
1) Shock and Denial:
*gripping hair with both hands, while watching video* “THATS… JUST… NOT… POSSIBLE!!!”
2) Bargaining:
*clasping hands together* “I will stop posting negative comments, if you’ll just pull down this video!!”
3) Rationalisation:
*rubbing temples with fingers* “Computers… Yes, this must have been made using COMPUTERS!!”
4) Anger:
*pressing flag button* “Now, no children will be subjected to this fake assault on our precious worldview!”
5) Acceptance:
*sipping tea* “I’m positive… people really are too smart to be fooled into thinking that cats really can swim!”
Would the snack be the cat, or the human?
Maybe it’s a Jelly-cle Cat.
Some cats like water *shrug*
Our older (and normal sized cat) Oreo likes to get into the shower with us and lick the water off the shower curtain. And she has no problem at all with the water cascading off her back.
When we had to bathe and shampoo her to get rid of fleas, she stood in the tub and, as we poured warm water over her, and rubbed the shampoo into her fur, she purred louder than I have ever heard her purr before.
Dust, however, was not amused. And keeping a 2 stone housecat in the tub ain’t easy.
Like Zyaama says, cats are naturally good swimmers; it’s just that, with a few exceptions, they don’t like to swim. When the cat in the video was in the ocean, its tail looked rather puffed out to me, which is a sign of fear. The woman in the video was cuddling it post-swim to reassure it as well as to praise it.
Zyaama, the people who made the video you linked and are heard laughing in the background are fucking morons. The gator could have easily torn that cat’s head right off. Bonus moron points to the person who walked up close to the gator in the middle of the video and to whoever put what looked like raw meat right on the riverbank.
@Charlie Foxtrot: give your cat time, and you may not have to tip him in to see the results. My beast was bath-curious too, until an ill-considered attempt to explore the tub’s far corner resulted in a very wet, very unhappy kitty.
I suspect the “flagged as inappropriate” thing has more to do with the woman’s swimsuit bottom than with the cat.
We had a cat who absolutely loved playing in the sprinkler. Or in a stream of water from the hose. He’d get completely soaked and it didn’t bother him a bit.
I took my cat out for a walk on the beach a few times (he didn’t mind being on leash).
Pity I can’t swim. This might be just the thing for my arthritic cat. He seems quite fond of water as it is, so it might have been doable.
@reynoldhall (#2)
With a pet ceph you don’t have to wait for the firemen. He will put out the fire himself, see http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/11/uppity_octopus.php.