When I look into the eyes of my dog, cat or any other animal, I don’t see an “animal. “I see a living being like me, a friend, a soul who feels, understands affections and fears and deserves the same. respect like anyone else.
The power of the gaze transcends far beyond the sense of sight, incredibly our optic nerves are intimately related to the hypothalamus, that delicate and primitive structure where our emotions and memory are located, who looks at it feels it, and it also happens. animals.
- Everyone.
- At some point in our lives.
- Has already experienced the following: go adopt a dog or cat and immediately establish a very intense connection with one of them just by looking it in the eye.
- Captivate us and seduce us.
- However.
- Scientists say there is something deeper and more intriguing than all this.
Dogs and cats are two of the animals used for many years to live with humans, it is no longer surprising to anyone who are so wise and sometimes daring to interact with us, look us in the eye and are able to express desires and desires. needs through all kinds of affections, gestures, tail movements and various types of complicity.
We have harmonized behaviors and languages to understand each other, and this is not an occasional act, but is the result of a genetic evolution in which different species have become accustomed to living together for mutual benefit, which is also not surprising is what has revealed to us an interesting study by anthropologist Evan MacLean: dogs and cats are quite able to read our own emotions just by looking us in the eye.
Our pets own the feelings. They can identify basic signs that are associated with a particular emotion and rarely fail. In addition, this study also explains that people often bond with their dogs and cats as they raise with a young child.
We have created, understood and established a strong bond as if they were family members, something that, incredible as it may seem, was provided to us by our biological mechanisms after so many years of mutual interaction.
Our neurological networks and brain chemistry react in the same way that if we were taking care of a child or a person who needs attention: we free ourselves from oxytocin, the hormone of affection and care, for their part animals also act in the same way: we are their social group, their family, the human Gentiles with which they share the sofa and the seven lives of a cat.
The world is much more beautiful seen through the eyes of an animal. If everyone had the exceptional ability to connect with them in this way, would we see aspects that were once innate and that we now forget because of the turmoil of civilization?
Our society is committed to consumerism, to the overexploitation of resources, and it hurts planet Earth that our grandchildren should inherit with the beauty of the past, with their ecosystems intact, with their nature so beautiful, alive and bright, and not with so many. fractures almost impossible to recover.
Edward Osborne Wilson is an American entomologist and biologist known for coining the term “biophilia. “This word defines the love for all living beings which, in general, is something that most people who love animals have already experienced. According to the scientist, the affinity we establish with our animals has its origins in the first periods of evolution of our species.
People who managed to conquer an animal, domesticate it and build a relationship of affection and mutual respect were much more united with nature, its cycles, those secrets to find more resources to move: water, game, edible plants?
Our dogs may no longer be useful as food today. However, for many people, the closeness and companionship of a dog or cat is still essential to “survive. “
They give us love, huge doses of companionship, alleviate suffering, give joy and remind us every day why it is so comforting to look them in the eye, they do not need words, because their language is very old, very basic and even wonderfully primitive: love.
Make sure you enjoy their looks, see your reflection in them every day and you will discover all the good that there is at home.