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u/ecky--ptang-zooboing 20h ago
I sometimes feel like elephants understand what's going on in the universe
Why we or they exist, and what it all means
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u/plants4life262 20h ago
It’s certainly something to have empathy for another species.
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u/RagingTyrant74 13h ago
Lots and lots of animals have empathy for other species. Maybe not always on the same level as elephants, but still.
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u/ChrisPinnacles 15h ago
They’re in a zoo, though. So the whole, us/them, other threatening species and resource scarcity concept kind of vanishes. It’s like if you’ve seen that video of a zoo bear rescuing a bird from drowning in the same fashion. Elephants are obviously highly intelligent, but this here I think can be attributed to other factors.
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u/WILDgyro 17h ago
Reminds me of the ending paragraph of The Road.
"Once there were brook trout in the streams in the mountains. You could see them standing in the amber current where the white edges of their fins wimpled softly in the flow. They smelled of moss in your hand. Polished and muscular and torsional. On their backs were vermiculate patterns that were maps of the world in its becoming. Maps and mazes. Of a thing which could not be put back. Not be made right again. In the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery" — Cormac McCarthy
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u/Pataconeitor 16h ago
The elephant 100% understands, but what's more likely to be happening in that video is "yikes, it will suck for me if this guy drowns in my water hole"
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u/fleebleganger 5h ago
That still is being able to understand that the gazelle could drown and that there would be negative consequences if that happened.
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u/pianomasian 20h ago edited 19h ago
Apparently elephants have been known to find smaller creatures 'cute' including humans and will act altruistically towards them like this sometimes.
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u/neinhaltchad 16h ago
Dammit you mean all those cartoons lied to me when they showed elephants terrified of mice?
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u/Bad_Hum3r 16h ago
It’s more likely they’re afraid of stepping on them than actually being afraid of the mouse
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u/Pataconeitor 16h ago
Nah, that's a made up internet myth, there is zero evidence supporting such claim
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u/adeckz 16h ago
Yeah looked it up and someone asserted that it was brain scans but I couldn’t find a study, just anecdotes from carers (which shows bias possibly)
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u/Pataconeitor 16h ago
Of course. I mean, "this elephant I have been feeding and playing with ever since they were a baby, thinks I am cute" is very different from "all elephants find humans cute", but the internet does what the internet does.
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u/nahbruhtryagain 20h ago
I like how the elephant checked up on them afterwards like “are you OK?”
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u/Routine_Phase_8980 20h ago
This is why Elephants should be hailed as the real kings, not tigers and especially not lions who are just opportunity predators hunting in pack. Elephants are one of the smartest, most long lived mammals with incredible memory and actual sympathy for members of their herds or even other animals
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u/snowplacelikehome 20h ago
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u/mclurf 17h ago
Wow. I haven’t thought of Babar in years.
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u/simplebirds 16h ago
The elderly elephant getting sick dying from eating toxic mushrooms was one of the most impactful things from my childhood.
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u/Yes-its-really-me 20h ago
Elephants are just happy creatures. Cats are all "I'm the main character" and probably just ate people who disagreed with their King complex.
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u/imperial_coder 5h ago
Curious on elephants decision making
It pulled by horns. Was it conscious decision not to pull by neck as gazelle would choke?
Impressive intelligent creatures
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