I've had Pepper since 1995. Angie's dog had just been stolen, so I asked my friend Randy if he would give us one of Chica's pups. He immediately brought Pepper over, a few weeks old and as fat as a little sausage, and told me "She's yours, but only if you take care of her even when it's not convenient to." I said "Well, duh," and I've taken care of her ever since, just as she's taken care of me.
Pepper at her favorite place. It's one of my favorite places too.
Pepper turns 17 this year. She is, by the standard "1 human year = 7 dog years" metric, 119 years old. I don't think that's an accurate system of measure, but regardless, she is quite old. Her hearing is almost completely gone and her eyesight is very poor and she has arthritis and hip dysplasia and she's just not doing that well physically. I expected all of that when I told Randy I'd take care of her forever no matter what, but what I didn't expect was a breakdown in her mental abilities.
These days, Pepper follows me around the house wherever I go, always interposing herself between me and my destination. Her over-riding concern, I think, is that she be with her pack mates; dogs are social animals in a similar way to how humans are, and long ago Pepper imprinted on me as her lead pack member. That's fine, it's no more than I've learned to expect from her, but lately she very often seems confused. She almost maniacally follows me wherever I go, and very often damn near causes me to fall over because she's underfoot as I'm walking from one place to another. Sometimes she walks into a wall and then just stands there as if waiting for the wall to move, and usually she stands there until I come along and gently move her away from the wall and back into pack activities.
She seems, in short, to be losing her mind.
My question is, what does that even mean?
What is a mind?
Is it a function of electrical and biochemical activities that take place in the vicinity of a brain? Are our behaviors (and dog behaviors) nothing more than expressions of physiological imperatives which are hardwired into our physical bodies?
Or do we have something above and beyond our physical being, something which for lack of a better word we call a "soul"? Is there within us a spark of existence which survives independently of our material body?
Does Pepper have a soul, or is she a purely mechanistic entity, an automaton doing no more and no less than what evoluti0n demands of her?
I wish I knew.
On good days I think we all have souls, and that Pepper does too.
On bad days I'm pretty sure that "the soul" is no more than a pattern of impulses generated by the cells that make up our brain.
Depending on my state of mind on a given day, I swerve back and forth between those two viewpoints.
One thing I do know; when I pet Pepper, when I make it a point to hold her head in my hands and put my face next to hers so I know she can see me close up...
She smiles.
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For now she smiles... a good pack girl
Pepper has a soul.
(you can add me to the "dogs have souls" column)
There must be doggy Alzheimer or dementia, just as humans have. Or she's just slowing down and having senior moments. Thanks for sharing her with us.
You should be accused of having a big heart.
I say the answer is in the smile...
I'm glad Pepper got such a nice life with you and favorite spots like that one, gorgeously shown : )
Anyway, Lucy is the Heeler and she's 15. She has all the same physical issues that Pepper has (something about herding dogs and hips...I don't know what or why, though...).
I mention this only because she takes 4 little doggy heroin (or whatever) pills every day, and the junk works on dogs the same way it does on humans. I'm pretty sure it would work on any mammal, though.
Dogs are also unique, however, in that they are the only lesser mammals (not ape or dolphin) who feel empathy. It's a huge reason why they are around in domesticated form today.
The relationship with dogs used to be a lot more practically symbiotic (we have shitty ears, eyes and noses, and we are also wasteful with our food...it was a match made in...well, somewhere), but it is no less symbiotic today. You love your dog and your dog ACTUALLY DOES love you back in almost the same way.
Loss is a bitch, man. Sorry I can't solve metaphysics in 5 minutes on a Thursday night. I've heard that all dogs go to heaven, though.
MalcolmXY is right, the studies show dogs have empathy. And we all know it's true. I've read NDE accounts where the people have seen their dogs, I can't see why, other than human arrogance, we assume they don't have souls and we do. Unless we assume only intelligent humans have souls but that's another discussion.
She's losing her mind, the brain, eyes, ears, legs, bladder, all the parts wear out. Love doesn't wear out, so you answer for yourself whether she has a soul or not. Ignore ideas others put in your brain, what does your heart tell you?
And, Alyssa Milano tells me she loves me by blinking her eyes as well. Weird. I wonder if Alyssa Milano invaded your cat's brain like she did mine. Does she tell you to kill hookers, or does she just tell me that?
Can anyone explain a dogs anticipation of their master returning home?....even if it is not part of the routine? this happens innumerable times, all over the world.
In the great scheme of things, they are a sacred gift, and we often count the blessings they bring to us, but we must consider the gifts we in turn impart to them. For the work they do, in all its forms, they earn our love a thousandfold...be well Bro...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJG698U2Mvo
Is that related to this post? I think it is.
I've let this thread get too far ahead of me, but thanks, friends, for reading and for sharing your thoughts. Let the record state, the voices in my head tell me a lot of things but they rarely tell me to murder hookers...
I think you could ask 20 people what a soul is and, if they were drunk or honest enough to be real, get 20 different answers.
I have lots to say about this topic, but here is an excerpt from a vet's perspective about this idea:
"Let me tell you what I have seen. I have seen my own cats sleep next to me so they may keep me a little warmer while I was ill. I've seen my dogs play games with me just to force a smile to my face. I have seen a cat rush into a burning home not once, not twice, but six times to save her kittens, nearly losing her own life in the process. I have seen a ferret pull a frightened kitten out of a deep hole in the ground. I have seen a coyote fetch another dog so that it may get the proper medical care that it needs. I've seen a dog, who loves to jump on people, avoid jumping on me when I injured my back. I've seen elephants cry. I've seen monkeys scream in empathy when one of their own were injured. I've seen puppies whine all night long when they were separated from their mothers. I've seen a dog pull a child away from a fire.
These are only a few of the things that I've seen. To list them all would take a lifetime, and I think you get my point. As for the soul thing? Well, it is my humble opinion that if you have emotions, any kind of emotions, then you have a soul."
▄▀▄▀▄
▀▄─▄▀
──▀ ♡❀Լ♡Ɣخ❀Լ♡Ɣخ❀Լ♡Ɣخ❀
hyblaiean Julie (sp) cats,
and stroll down Lane . . .
smiles.
Good read. I had a dog.
It's name was D.O.G.
as in dog`eee. say slow.
Speak with a draw-lisp.
It's last name` Dogen.
He spoke of the `Soul.
D.O.G is in cat haven.
He cuddles and naps.
He went into woods.
Hunters shoot dogs.
He went in packs.
I found his corpse.
It made me sad.
Lea Lane made me recall ref her trip to Israel. I'll read her yesterday Post. I get busy.
I was a odd misfit in Israel post-war. I spent time on a kibbutz. I had no idea ref Zionism.
I planned to study.
Hebrew - Yiddish.
That was in`1973.
Yom Kippur War.
I flea damn wars.
I remember this:
`
Nepesh meant:
Soul. I'll ponder.
I'm happy to see:
`
Pepper is alive!
Pepper sneeze!
a G.O.DD.O.G!
Bless Pepper!
You have a mind, and that is a disembodied entity, and while it may be at the direct control of your brain, it is, in fact, not only your brain, but the embodiment of all that you are.
Will you remember your dog, pepper, after she passes? If so, then your dog will live on through you.
(smiles at me when it blinks its eyes? are you kidding me? crazy much, Berkowitz???)
You loved your dog and your dog loved you back. That love lasted for 17 years, and could last another couple, depending on luck. That's not a soul, that's 6500+ Sols and counting.
That's a metric fuckton of soul. If I could get that much sol time with someone I loved, I'd be pretty stoked.
I know you're playing rhetoric man, but come on...the folks who stuff their pets and keep them under glass are starting to creep me out, man.
I asked some Amish friends to stuff me post-conk.
I wish to be lightweight stuffed as a smiling crow.
I'll be a life sized human who can be hauled `bout.
If someone will take me for a joyride we can sip beer.
If someone wants to cuddle in bed they can carry me.
I'll have a one/half smile so that I don't appear loony.
If some nut wants to sit on the porch I'll rock in rocker.
You made me think of a great IDEA. I'll have inner tapes.
If someone wants to bellybutton POKE? I'll yodel tunes.
Do dogs smile?? Yes. My cat smiles by blinking her eyes, like Lea's cat does.
Do I love dog and cat stories?? Yes much.
Do I need coffee?? oh gawd yes..it's my new day...and this is my first read of anything...geez
I personally believe that every living being has a soul. I don't know what that means for us after we die, but I believe there's something more to all of us than just functioning like robots because of chemical reactions, electrical impulses, or whatever else animates our physical bodies.
Our family dog, Jack, is also very old, and also has vision problems and behavior like what you describe in your post. My mom, a former vet tech, says that he's probably gone senile, although some of his actions may also be related to the fact that he just can't see very well anymore.
The thing to remember is that both Pepper and Jack have had good lives, with owners who love them. They don't seem to be in too much pain, and hopefully when their time comes, they'll exit gracefully and easily. I believe that they'll always know that they are loved, and will always be proud and happy to have been a part of their pack.
Also, masterful poster, I posit that it is the proximity of *another heart beat* tis Y our companions are so ever loving. Mutuality of bond (and so forth, omi)
I am sometimes sorry for the age. But you know, carefree.
Plenty of light, they say.
TY for this, dude!
JIM
What?
You asked!!!
:D
Lovely dog!!!!
And we'll see how good you are going at 100andsomething!! Probably be following the ice cream truck thinking it's your pack leader!!! :D
RATED!!!!
Rated, innit.
Salt...
Take care of your Pepper, you are the center of her world.
Dogs rule!
If we humans have a soul, then dogs have one,too. No question.
R./
R.
a
blogger`
@ Open`
Closed `
sexy pant
lingerie by
yo yo huh
&
J.B. Hart's
llamas bog
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are closed
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There another blog
'silver bar' same, ay
`
silver bar closed too
`
again late for work . . .
helping editor @ O.S.
drunk sop get washed
`
He needs to be dressed
Maybe John Walsh wash,
and ask Kerry to behave.
`
Just annoy back - okay.
Kerry give refunds yet?
No. He at gin bathtub.
`
kosher deli . . .
a Kansas Jew ordering
pastrami on white
`
run down diner ... (kerry)
requesting tap water
with his frosted flakes
`
psychotic editor
arguing with his pet broomstick
Woody Laurman
Going through something similar here with a 14-year-old cat. We think she may be having a series of small strokes. There are times when I look in her eyes, and I can't see anything. But sometimes she comes back to us for awhile, and when it's there, it's really there.
Lezlie
She smiles."
All of your heart is here ... and ... all of your soul.
Lovely you are ... as you help us all ... to be with your and Pepper's soul.
Regarding souls or the lack thereof, I need to say: I used to be an atheist, but the more I learned about things, the less I knew, and at the same I began realizing that by categorically ruling out the existence of souls I was being as undeservedly certain (and arrogant) as people who categorically state that souls DO exist, so at some point along the way I backslid into agnosticism. Science can't prove the existence of God or of whatever it is we mean when we say "soul," but neither can science disprove those things. Ask any honest scientist and she/he will tell you the same thing. I can't say I know if I have a soul, let alone if Pepper does, but I do know we severely underestimate the ability of our fellow creatures to experience the same basic range of emotions we do, including the most important one of all, love.
And now a story (author unknown)
A man and his dog were walking along a road. The man was enjoying the scenery, when it suddenly occurred to him that he was dead. He remembered dying, and that the dog had been dead for years. He wondered where the road was leading them. After a while, they came to a high, white stone wall along one side of the road. It looked like fine marble.
At the top of a long hill, it was broken by a tall arch that glowed in the sunlight. When he was standing before it, he saw a magnificent gate in the arch that looked like mother of pearl, and the street that led to the gate looked like pure gold. He and the dog walked toward the gate, and as he got closer, he saw a man at a desk to one side. When he was close enough, he called out, "Excuse me, where are we?"
"This is heaven, sir," the man answered.
"Wow! Would you happen to have some water?" The man asked.
"Of course, sir. Come right in, and I'll have some ice water brought right up." The man gestured, and the gate began to open.
"Can my friend," gesturing toward his dog, "come in, too?" The traveler asked.
"I'm sorry; sir, but we don't accept pets."
The man thought a moment and then turned back toward the road and continued the way he had been going.
After another long walk, and at the top of another long hill, he came to a dirt road which led through a farm gate that looked as if it had never been closed. There was no fence. As he approached the gate, he saw a man inside, leaning against a tree and reading a book.
"Excuse me!" He called to the reader. "Do you have any water?"
"Yeah, sure, there's a pump over there" The man pointed to a place that couldn't be seen from outside the gate. "Come on in."
"How about my friend here?" The traveler gestured to the dog.
"There should be a bowl by the pump."
They went through the gate, and sure enough, there was an old fashioned hand pump with a bowl beside it. The traveler filled the bowl and took a long drink himself, then he gave some to the dog. When they were full, he and the dog walked back toward the man who was standing by the tree waiting for them.
"What do you call this place?" The traveler asked.
"This is heaven," was the answer.
"Well, that's confusing," the traveler said. "The man down the road said that was heaven, too."
"Oh, you mean the place with the Gold Street and pearly gates? Nope. That's hell."
"Doesn't it make you mad for them to use your name like that?"
"No. I can see how you might think so, but we're just happy that they screen out the folks who'll leave their best friends behind."
Secondly, the choice is not between being a mechanistic entity on the one hand or something ethereal and undefined like having a 'soul.' There is a fundamental scientific reality everybody should be taught: that 'physical' reality is NOT physical, at bottom, in the old sense of being mechanistic. As Richard Feynman, the Nobel Prize winning physicist once said, and every scientist agrees: 'Physical reality, at the sub-microscopic level IS NOT CAUSAL. THERE IS NO MECHANISM, NO CAUSALITY, NO DETERMINISM working in the context of a PHYSICAL MODEL, as traditionally understood, that can explain something as simple as how light partially reflects from glass, which is one example of a multitude of so-called quantum effects. All these physical phenomena, from how light and radiation work, to the creation and function of complex organic molecules can be predicted according to certain formulas, but the formulas are completely arbitrary and not explainable in terms of mechanical models. The further elaboration of these molecules in tissues and organs that then, in their totality, comprise an integrated, living creature, is even not predictable by the arcane, non-mechanical arbitrary formulas underlying the simplest so-called physical phenomena. And finally, the upshot of all this, the consciousness of living beings, from the lowly earthworm or caterpillar up to humans, which is intimately based on these quantum effects operating within the living nervous system, is even less amenable to being reduced to some kind of 'mechanism.'
Your dog has a consciousness, not a soul, that gives it a subjective experience in the world. That consciousness is intimately dependent on the healthy functioning of its nervous system of course, but at the base of that nervous system there are no mechanisms at work as traditionally understood. That gives dogs freedom to choose, when healthy, to chase a ball or be distracted by something else, to ponder how to get through a fence, or to throw a tantrum when getting too frustrated or jump up and chase its tail to have some fun instead. To a certain extent they are irreducibly free. As you are, to be a konservative or liberal...wink
the primitive ones such as fear, rage, strong positive emotional concern for offspring.
But not pride, or shame or guilt, or pity, etc.
?
Says our friend Jejune.
Our Father says,
“
I remember this:
`
Nepesh meant:
Soul. I'll ponder.
I'm happy to see:
`
Pepper is alive!”
I kinda thought this =about the beatles’ ‘sgt pepper’ but I mistaken.
//////////////////////////
Ah. Aha meat I can chew on from you;
‘Is it a function of electrical and biochemical activities that take place in the vicinity of a brain? Are our behaviors (and dog behaviors) nothing more than expressions of physiological imperatives which are hardwired into our physical bodies? “
(Yes and no. the ‘yes ‘ part is kinda akin to the concept of…forgive me…’sin..’ ..t o take the road well travelled,the path easily understandable..th way of th flesh, which if ya read yer bible religiousy, st paul warned us against. Tho I have…….exceptions to st paul’s epistles…….
I shall publish them under my nomde plume ‘CHRISTALMIGHTY GAWD’…
AS FOR:
Or do we have something above and beyond our physical being, something which for lack of a better word we call a "soul"? Is there within us a spark of existence which survives independently of our material body?
Does Pepper have a soul, or is she a purely mechanistic entity…
Descartes the philosopher said, animals=machines. Luckily a lot of savvy philosophers who had their heads out of their asses came along. It is settled.
Soul can be evolving, like anything. A cat or dog’s soul? Up for grabs. They trust us, god help us.
(arguable, podiatrist. What is what?)
that gives it a subjective experience in the world.
(all creatures, even electrons, have that…….)
To a certain extent they are irreducibly free. As you are, to be a konservative or liberal...wink..
Ah but then biological habits . pursuit of them, like fucking and eating and whatnot..makes a slave of a man. Reduces his choice……………………yes?
I wonder if Pepper is pondering these same questions as she stares at the wall. . .
Nana, you brought it with this one.
I saw this Pepper Soul blog on the Top Most Read Feed. I feared that Peeper sneezed,
or sadder`died.
`
No ever tease sensitive folk.
I burned some potato soup.
`
I read Scarlet and forgot about it.
The stove was hot and I burned it.
The fire alarm went off. I stub toe!
`
Seriously
I ran to see
and ay, stinky
cooked soup
do offend me
`
I's hungry
I go to heat
more soup
`
My toe ache
O, behaves
no be nasty
`
No stub a nose
if we do that?
wear close pin
`
silly true story
no cook and blog
no burn pot pan
`
Enough of my own whining. As to your question about dogs and souls, if dogs don't have souls, then I can't believe we do, either, so my vote is on the side of souls in everyone. Hence my preference for peanut butter over burgers, although for all I know, peanuts have souls, too. I think this universe is one screwy place, and if there is a god, which I increasingly doubt, I have more than one bone to pick with him/her/it.
My best wishes to Pepper, and you.
Seventeen is a wonderful long life.. I will hope for the both of you that she dreams herself peacefully onward when the time comes..
Rated for the questing mind is a healthy mind.