New Boa Questions...

[Invictus]

Originally posted by Jeff_Favelle
I'm sorry that I don't believe that your snakes are your buddies and they come crawling to you because they like to play and be handled and that they miss you when you're gone and that some are mean because they hate you, and others are nice because they love you...etc etc etc.

Jeff, it is sarcasm like this that draws agression from people (namely me) and lands us with open mudslinging debates like the last one that we had, and makes you look completely pompous. You want to have an intelligent discussion? Then let's have one. Please, for once, let's have one. Leave these sarcastic and frankly petty remarks out of it. I'm sorry that you can't refute my position directly, so you need to nitpick on small details of the debate instead of looking at the big picture of what I'm trying to convey, and I'm sorry that you have to resort to remarks such as the above to try and dominate a discussion.

It has become quite obvious to me over the last 8 months that I've been on this site that your opinion would NEVER change on ANY subject, despite any proof to the contrary, so long as the proof was coming from someone with less experience than you - even if said person was working on a PhD in behavioral evolution, and has offered up scientific proof thereof. So, once again, because you can't prove me wrong, and you need to resort to sarcasm, there is no debating with you.

For the rest of you who do know how to debate without cheap shots, I would like to re-emphasize that I don't believe my snakes like *me*, because I don't believe that they have an ability to identify with humans as individuals, save for an individual scent perhaps. However, until someone can explain to me why some snakes go out of their way to be handled, I have to believe based on my observations of my own and other peoples' herp collections that some snakes do seem to enjoy the stumuli of human interaction. It could be because of the plethora of scents, the movement responding to their movement, a curiosity, etc. But though I do believe many, maybe even most snakes only have "tolerance", it seems to me rather futile to say that this is true of ALL snakes, especially when the behavior is contrary to any indications of mere tolerance.

[Invictus]

Still looking for the whole research paper, but here's a clip:

Emotion and Phylogeny

Michel Cabanac, Département de Physiologie, Université Laval, Québec, Canada, G1K 7P4 Email: michel.cabanac@phs.ulaval.ca

Gentle handling of mammals (rats, mice), and lizards (Iguana), but not of frogs (Rana) and fish (Carassius) elevated the set-point for body temperature, i.e., produced an emotional fever, achieved only behaviourally in lizards. Heart rate, another detector of emotion in mammals, was also accelerated by gentle handling, from ca. 70 b/min to ca. 110 b/min in lizards. This tachycardia faded in about 10 min. The same handling did not significantly modify the frogs’ heart rates. The absence of emotional tachycardia in frogs and its presence in lizards (as well as in mammals), together with the emotional fever exhibited by mammals and reptiles, but not by frogs or fish, would suggest that emotion emerged in the evolutionary lineage between amphibians and reptiles. Such a conclusion would imply that reptiles possess consciousness with its characteristic hedonic dimension, pleasure. The role of sensory pleasure in decision making was therefore verified in iguanas placed in a motivational conflict. To be able to reach a bait (lettuce), the iguanas had to leave a warm refuge, provided with standard food, and had to venture into a cold environment. The results showed that lettuce was not necessary to the iguanas and that they traded off the palatability of the bait against the disadvantage of the cold. Thus, the behaviour of the iguanas was possibly produced, as it is in humans, through the maximization of sensory pleasure. Altogether, these results may indicate that the first elements of mental experience emerged between amphibians and reptiles.

[Invictus]

For those of you who though that reptiles lacked the areas of the brain responsible for emotions or pleasure, I'm afraid you're grossly mistaken.

The limbic system is a group of brain structures that are involved in various emotions such as aggression, fear, pleasure and also in the formation of memory. The limbic system also affects the endocrine system and the autonomic nervous system. It consists of several structures located around the thalamus, just under the cerebrum:

(Skip ahead a little):

The limbic system is among the oldest parts of the brain in evolutionary terms: it can be found in fish, amphibians, reptiles and mammals.

Source:

http://mind-brain.com/limbic.php

So as you see, reptiles DO have a limbic system, and thus ARE capable of certain primitive emotions.

[Derrick]

Man I love these LePage-Favelle showdowns(debates ). There is always some good info and points to ponder. That and the fact that there is some entertaining rhetoric

[foman]

I'm with ya Derrick they're great, your aviator is sweet it just needs a police hat.LOL.

Invictus i don't believe your snakes come to u wanting to be held, I think they see u as a way out of the cage and then when they climb onto you they think why not chill out here for a while, it's warm and comfy. just my 2 cents.

[nicola_boulton]

great debates every1s always got such good opions, i just wish i had the patients and time 2 read every1s really long threads, would be nice if snakes reallly did love u though so much they'd bring you sandwiches etc.

[Jeff_Favelle]

LOL. I wish I was being sarcastic. That's the scary thing.....

For the rest of you who do know how to debate without cheap shots, I would like to re-emphasize that I don't believe my snakes like *me*, because I don't believe that they have an ability to identify with humans as individuals, save for an individual scent perhaps. However, until someone can explain to me why some snakes go out of their way to be handled, I have to believe based on my observations of my own and other peoples' herp collections that some snakes do seem to enjoy the stumuli of human interaction.

After the snake "comes to you", quickly put it on the floor in the living room, and see if it gravitates towards being picked up. I mean, if it WANTS to be handled...........

[Invictus]

Odd that you should mention that Jeff because I experimented with this with my 7' male boa on several occasions, and guess what... he did gravitate directly towards me.

[marisa]

So if snakes love their owners then why do they escape? Or is it only some snakes that love their owners?

I am not saying the hate being handled or don't enjoy a specific person holding them. Human interaction is 100% not needed to have a healthy snake in captivity and its not needed by wild snakes. So why does it even matter? Is it going to stop someone from trading a herp in fear it will miss its owner? Or?? I am just not sure what the implications of this are, for either side.

Personally my snakes have no personal attachment to me and I will not assume they do until I can train them to follow me donw the street or "stay" LOL

Marisa

[daver676]

Originally posted by marisa
So if snakes love their owners then why do they escape? Or is it only some snakes that love their owners?

Marisa

But you could say the same thing about dogs. Some dogs run away while others are perfectly happy to stay put.

[marisa]

A dog also shows emotions clearly though. Vocally, using body language, and its a proven fact dogs can be trained to noy only do tricks, but be used in many many occupational and theraputic ways. I highly doubt we will ever see a snake missing an owner if the snake has been sold, sniffing out drugs or anything else.

Not trying to argue I just don't see the point. If snakes do in fact have emotions, it seems we all agree they are obvioulsly minimal and put to little if any use during the course of their lives in regards to achieving food, heat and breeding. So what implacations would there be for captive snakes? I can't really see any for people who are already using educated husbandry etc because the simple fact is they do NOT need to he handled to be healthy. So even if they liked it, I don't see how this changes much. Just a thought. Personally I don't believe EITHER side knows enough yet about these animals to say for sure "They hate it or dont like it" OR "They love me"

Marisa

[Invictus]

Ok people... please quit putting words in my mouth, despite the fact that I have been PERFECTLY clear throughout this whole debate. I NEVER ONCE said that snakes love their owners. Love is a complex emotion that involves individual identity and characteristic knowledge, which snakes do not possess. So I have been perfectly clear that what they experience IS NOT LOVE, and they do not like *us* as individuals. I was merely pointing out the scientific evidence that snakes (and all other reptiles) can experience pleasure.

Got it? Should I go over this again?

Such being the case, studies have shown that certain lizards do experience pleasure from gentle handling. (Read up on Michel Cabarnac's paper if you can find it. I was actually looking for sources other than him.) Since snakes evolved at the same time, or pehaps even later than lizards, and their brain also has a limbic system, which means they are also capable of experiencing pleasure from human interaction. I've given several examples of why this could possibly be - and offered up examples such as the exercise, the different scents they experience, the movement of the handler reflecting their movement, the warmth... MANY things. Do you see "love" anywhere in that statement, Marisa?

Bottom Line: The previously accepted notion that ANIMALS (not just reptiles) do not feel emotions has been proven to have evolved between the evolutionary time periods of amphibians and reptiles. Thus, reptiles do have the limbic areas of the brain which are responsible for primitive emotions such as pleasure, fear, agression, etc. "Tolerance", though more common, is not the ONLY thing a reptile can possibly experience with a human handler.

[Linds]

I wasn't going to reply to this thread, as it looks like it's going the same way as that heating pythons thread, but since I started I felt I should follow up with another response.

I have never seen any evidence that supports the arguement that snakes enjoy our companionship, enjoy handling, or have "feelings" or "thoughts" towards us, only instinctual or (within reason) conditioned responses. Everything I have experienced supports the belief that snakes are not sentient. I always welcome someone to prove me wrong, but so far nobody has been able to provide any evidence without anthromorphic explanations. Yes, I have snakes that crawl out on to me as well, but I don't dismiss that as a sign that they are "friendly" or enjoy being handled. Despite those motions, they still display many subtle (and sometimes very obvious) signs that they do not enjoy being handled. Furthermore, it doesn't even begin to make sense that these animals would ever care for humans. For arguements sake, even if they -were- capable of feeling those type of feelings: They do not even enjoy the company of their own kind, why would they develop those kind of feeling towards a natural predator/threat? Snakes do not have friends, so why would that change with us?

[Jeff_Favelle]

Exactly Linds. I agree. I mean, what's the evolutionary advantage towards it? How does the characteristic help the animal on a day-to-day basis?

Snakes don't have time for crap. Their lives revolve around seeking out heat, avoiding heat, avoiding water loss, gaining calories, and breeding. That's it. I don't see any hard evidence of anything otherwise. I'm glad for it. If they were sentient, I don't think I'd feel right keeping them as pets. Not at all.

[joshm]

I do believe the people have spoken.