Marilyn's Photos - May 29 2026 - Animal Sentience Yes or No

 

Continuing on the theme of being middle old (70 to 80 years old) and what it means in terms of progress:  here's something that is known now.  As a child I thought this was the case: animals possess sentience.  We figured this out through our dogs and cats and birds.  Over the decades the scientific community has also figured this out.  And yes - crabs, lobsters, and fish feel pain, and need to be treated properly.  Surprise!  Throwing lobsters alive into steaming pots does cause an excruciatingly painful death that they fully experience. So here we are this many decades later accepting that mammals and birds have clear emotions, social bonding and complex cognitive behaviours.  It took quite a while, though. Charles Darwin's The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals in 1872 was a key milestone and that seems like a long time ago to me.  It was in the last 60 years that conclusive research into animal emotions came about. We have progressed in our scientific and behavioural research methods. With the acknowledgement of pain, comes an increase in Veterinarian bills.  We prescribe pain medication for cats and dogs after medical procedures.  What about this information that before the late 1980s - many doctors believed babies could not feel pain or would not remember it.  They performed major surgeries with only muscle relaxants or paralytics instead of true anesthesia.  I can't imagine being a  parent having my baby operated on without anesthesia - some sort of barbaric throw-back in the medical mindset is how I consider this.  It took research in the late 1980s to prove that babies experienced pain, and things changed quickly for human babies.  The veterinary professional began recognizing and treating animals for pain starting in the 1980s.   In this area of sentience, Millie spends an hour or so on Thursday afternoons visiting residents in one of the long-term care homes in the area. Isn't it ironic that dogs don't have human language and visits don't involve conversations, yet  eyes light up when they see Millie each week.     Look at little Millie as a puppy compared to Millie now.

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Mar 24 2025 - And the word of the day!

 

Is this a feature of the Globe and Mail's Editorial each day?  A word that is so novel and uncommon that it requires research.   I hope it is a feature of the paper - that somewhere, each day, I will find a word that compels me to look it up and find out more.   What is this word?  "Ron DeSantis tried to mock the idea of the maple-leaf tourism boycott earlier this month, saying that 3.3 million Canadians had visited his state.  "That's not much of a boycott in my book," he said." "We agree, Governor - because the number you cite was from 2024, before a US President launched a trade war against his country's biggest trading partner and closest ally.  Mr De Santis's misplaced braggadocio actually served to underscore the vulnerability of his state to a Canuck exodus"  "Braggadocio," originated from the name of a boastful character, Braggadocchio, in Edmund Spenser's epic poem The Faerie Queene (1590).  a. : empty boasting. b. : arrogant pretension : cockiness. the air of swaggering braggadocio that all important men are expected to show in fighting C. W. M. Hart. originates from brag or braggart + the Italian suffix -occio, denoting something large of its kind. Doesn't that make us wonder about  more words - flibbertigibbet?  And cattywampus, gardyloo, collywobbles, gubbins, and malarkey?   OK, I've got a few days worth of words to start the game myself. It would be great if this would be a regular Globe and Mail feature.

I went on a crocus hunt yesterday.  Not in the garden as the squirrels, mice, voles, and chipmunks have eaten the hundreds I planted, or replanted them next door.  I went through the database of pictures and found the wonderful crocuses that I had in the Toronto garden where there probably were more predators and fewer rodents.  Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Jan 27 2025 - Modesty Ablaze

 

This might seem straight-forward or it might seem strange.  I have noticed a woman in the shower/changing room at the Y on the Tuesday/Thursday aquafit days.  She showers facing out with the shower curtain open.  It is a bit of a shock. And then she spends a long time showering. If one is waiting for her to finish it seems like a long time in your own shower stall. She seems to walk around the changing area nude before she gets dressed. I have figured out her routine timing and so can now avoid being in the area when she's there.  It seems like some form of mild "indecency."  I don't know.  It just seems a bit on the creepy side to me.  Would this be the case for others?  I haven't been involved in sports or other gyms to have a sense of what is common practice.   In general, Canada does not like nudity in public. The Criminal Code tells me that public nudity in Canada is illegal unless there is a lawful excuse.  What an expression:  "a lawful excuse."  Some big reason to not wear clothes must be present where the context is "in public."   So where and how does modesty come into play?  Clothing is a significant part of human culture - protection, social and cultural norms, and personal expression. And clothing has been around since somewhere between 93,000 years ago and 170,000 years ago. The origin of clothing has been described as a primitive modesty instinct by a number of scholars.   Who knows?  So perhaps having a slightly better understanding of modesty and social norms is a good thing, and doing too much investigation not so much fun.

What an interesting picture - looks like nudes walking, don't you think?  It was a glass sculpture with blue sky reflections.

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