Do Elephants Like You?

The conversation over breakfast this morning was quite enlightening. Our youngest, William, announced,

“Elephants think we’re cute."

Admittedly, this was a continuation of a talk we were all having the night before. I was carrying on with my normal rant about why I think excessive adoration of pets, especially on social media, is a sign of mental illness while Willy was defending everyone else. What I don't understand about social media is the endless stream of pictures of people's cats and dogs, sometimes dressed up in clothes. I think that's a sign that someone needs to up their medication. Now, Willy is buoying the widespread myth that elephants actually think we’re cute like the way people regard puppies.

My older son, Aidan, pointed out that in December 2017, college student, Julia Hass, tweeted,

Her sentiments went viral because of the widespread affection people have for their pets. Hass was bombarded with comments and texts to the point that she deleted her twitter app in attempts to stem the viral response. Unfortunately, removing the app from your phone really won't do anything. Hass does volunteer work as the social media coordinator for the American Gerbil Society and describes herself as a "gerbil mom" so she's exactly the kind of person I wouldn't listen to in regards to natural science. She did clarify in a later post that she isn’t a scientist and based her findings on a Google search which yielded this,

I'm all in now that queen-poetico confirms that elephants think we’re cunning. Several commenters to Hass's original tweet expressed the desire to be an elephant's pet.


I don't think they thought this through. First off, you can't be an anti vaxxer as an elephant pet because the first thing they're going to do is get you "all your shots." That pales in comparison to your next visit to the pet doctor in which you'll be spayed or neutered, terms that hide the fact that they're forcing you to undergo a hysterectomy or gonadectomy. The reason why we castrate male pets is not just to prevent stray animals. It's because pet owners have to draw the line somewhere on cleaning up after Dinkles. It's bad enough that dogs hump your leg, eat grass that they subsequently puke on the carpet, shit all over the yard and sometimes in your shoe, and destroy furniture without you having to occasionally clean up after their spunk too.

I'm not an ivy league educated, health practitioner so it's doubtful that I can provide sound medical advice on the veracity of the claim that elephants think we're cute. Lucky for me, my good friend, Roger, is in fact, a Yale educated emergency room physician who you want on the trauma team after you decide to check up on your celebs you're following on social media while cruising down the interstate at the speed needed to get a DeLorean to time travel. I consulted Roger for answers to the following questions.

Would a PET scan be used to detect the part of the brain that is activated by external stimuli?

A Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scan is a type of imaging that shows what’s going on in your body. PET scans may be used to find out what part of the brain is activated upon stimuli.

Is there a PET scan big enough to fit an elephant?

Some zoos have equipment large enough to accommodate sizeable animals.

When detecting brain activity, does sedation affect the results?

To get accurate results of brain scans, patient undergoing a PET scan typically aren't sedated. If you did so, most likely everything would make your brain react the same as if you saw a puppy. That's why so many people want marijuana legalized. So even if you had a PET scan machine big enough to accommodate an elephant, it would have to undergo the test straight up. That will mostly lead to someone being messed up by a large, pissed off animal. (This elephant has had it's fill of cute humans.)

Nature can be cruel. In the wild animals are programmed to overproduce if conditions are right. This provides a food source for bigger predators who exploit opportunities by seeking out the sick, the old, the young or the injured. I had a horse years ago who I thought I bonded with over long trail rides. Whenever I turned my back on him, he would try to bite my ass. That was his thing. He tried to bite everyone's ass including other horses. I swear horses use farts to get back at each other. Mine would always let go whenever I brushed his hind quarters. So one day I had some beans then went out to the barn and farted in my horse's face. He never tried to bite my ass again.

Children, like puppies, appeal to us on a fundamental level because without that response we wouldn't take care of them. Look how much work kids are before they become a pain in the ass as teenagers. Lucky for humankind things don't happen the other way around. Our response to cuddly creatures is just natures way to ensure that they'll get fed, guaranteeing the survival of the species. Apparently, Mother Nature is blissfully unaware that we also force sterilize our pets. I know you think your dog is a loyal companion, but animals like whoever feeds them, gives them what they want. My friend's dog hated me until every time I saw him I gave him a dog treat. After a week, he was my best friend.

Do elephant's think we're cute? Maybe, as long as they remain unaware of whose idea it was to surgically remove their reproductive organs. If elephants do figure that out, you better have a bag of peanuts on hand.