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May 27, 2025 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
04:34
Do Pets Need Mutual Attachment?
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Not nice.
And so, it's the same thing with the ducks, right?
The ducks were our pets, right?
We have had dozens of ducks, and we've taken them from, you know, ducklings all the way to flying around.
And if the ducks would be limping, oh, I have this, and I think it's common, right?
And it's a bit of a white thing, right?
That this is the real care for animals and so on.
So pets, we bond with them very deeply and powerfully because they're essential for our survival.
Like, we could not survive without pets.
At least, not very well.
I mean, you need cats, you need dogs, your livestock is essential, and you have to have that attachment and that connection to your pets.
So, please understand, you're programmed that way.
And that's not to say don't feel it, right?
that's fine.
That doesn't mean I can't enjoy a meal.
But please understand, you're programmed that way.
You're programmed to have devotion to your pets.
Because if you have devotion to your pets, your pets will have loyalty to you and will be much more likely to protect you, to help you.
You needed dogs for protection and warning.
Herding sheep and so on, right?
So we have a very strong attachment.
And listen, the intellectual understanding of this, I don't mean this to diminish the passion and connection that you have with your pets.
I don't mean that at all.
At all.
Like, enjoy it.
Relish it.
My daughter and I, was it yesterday?
My God, the days are blurring.
I have to ask my wife.
The days are blurring.
Yes, yesterday we go, we went to a shelter.
You know, I give my donation and we go in and we play with the cats.
And she loves cats.
Loves cats.
And they're great.
They're wonderful, wonderful creatures.
And we, you know, blood pressure goes down when you pet cats.
And they just love dogs.
They're wonderful.
And, you know, to have something so excited when you come home is beautiful.
And so to love your cat?
Beautiful.
Beautiful.
But, you know, would you feel the same about an armadillo?
Probably not, right?
So, I mean, you have this connection to these creatures.
I mean, what was it?
I saw a video of somebody in Thailand flicking a cockroach off somebody's head.
It turns out the cockroach was his pet or something like that.
Like there are people who have pets that are completely incomprehensible to me.
Every now and then there's some lunatic in Florida who has a freaking alligator in the bathtub or something, or people have...
He always played some creepy guy, right?
The comedian?
And he was playing a creepy roommate who would feed dead rats to a snake.
The fact that people have these pets, it's weird to me.
It's weird to me when it evolved to have snakes as pets, at least not in Europe.
So there's nothing wrong with your attachment and your affection and your...
It's programmed in by our ancestors.
In other words, those with greater affections.
I mean, it's, again, Aristotelian mean, right?
So those with no affection for their pets did not gain the protection and loyalty and survival bonus of having pets.
Those who had too much attachment to their pets ended up not getting married and become the eponymous cat ladies, right?
Like I was talking to this woman at the cat shelter and she said, oh yeah, sometimes we'll come across.
Crazy old women who've got like 100 cats.
And then we've got a huge problem, right?
Because where do you put them, right?
So think of it as...
It's kind of like a codependence or symbiosis or...
I'm having a brain fight.
I think it's symbiosis.
Oh, embarrassing.
Every now and then.
That may but does not necessarily benefit each other.
Symbiotic relationships, mutual benefit to mutual harm.
Okay, but what is the one, I should know this, what is the one that is mutually beneficial, right?
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