Long story short, I think they can.

They definitely do feel emotions. I once had a guinea pig, and she had two babies, and their dad. She died, and at first the dad got all happy to see her and started purring, but almost right away he noticed that she wasn't with us anymore. He was completely silent, and unlike how he usually would be. You could see the sorrow in his eyes. The babies were also sad about it. And they do feel love towards others. If you could see my pets, you would know for sure they really do love and care about each other.

I believe they can. My bird, Dosey, is an example. She pecks at some people, (always the same,) but races over to snuggle with others. Also, when my cat passed, my dog wasn't acting hersef. Wasn't eating, always slept. (She's better now though!)

Hatred is prejudiced hostility towards someone or something. I don't believe a dog can rationalize something like that. I believe that a dog can be fearful of an old abuser or something and show aggression because he remembers that person, but I don't believe a dog can sit around and say "man, I really hate ____"<br /> <br /> Idk, that's just the way I think<br /> <br /> <i>"Gordon Allport defined prejudice as a "feeling, favorable or unfavorable, toward a person or thing, prior to, or not based on, actual experience."</i>

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Uh It would be wise to define hatred first.<br /> I think that animals (even 'lesser' animals as long as they are either mamal, reptile, bird and maybe even fish) can and do feel hatred. <br /> I define hate as a stronger emotion than anger. Anger is just a moment - a few weeks at most. Hatred is someting that can become a constant. It is there for many years. <br /> I couldn't otherwise explain the sudden agression many animals show to an old tormentor they see again after years of beeing out of their tormentors clutches.<br /> <br /> I don't know about love. But really... why not? It still is the same biochemical reaction we have. Why shouldn't feel an animal the same? <br /> <br /> I think most people that say animals have no emotions are either highly religious and can't stand the thought that anything other that mankind could be blessed with emotions from their god OR do it to calm their conscience in face of animals that are obviously hurting emotionally or physicaly. <br /> The same way as it was believed that animals wouldn't feel pain when hurt in earlier centuries.

I know that this mostly applies to humans, but I feel that it would be a good example for what I think animals feel.<br /> <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/60/Maslow%27s_Hierarchy_of_Needs.svg/800px-Maslow%27s_Hierarchy_of_Needs.svg.png">[LINK]</a><br /> <br /> The way Maslow's Hierarchy works is that we start at the bottom. Once a human has those very basic needs met, it may work up and up. The most important, basic needs for survival are at the bottom, we can survive on those (not thrive, but survive).<br /> I believe that a dog's cap is about at the red level. Dogs are made for survival, they're made to hunt their own food, they are not as intelligent as us humans (we don't need to rely on our very primitive instincts just to survive, we thrive every day of our lives) so I feel that a dog really only feels scared, angry (security), stressed, happy. It doesn't need anything beyond that, because the dog's entire life (and IQ, that sorta thing) is revolved purely around "how do I survive, how do I please this bigger dog so that he doesn't rip my throat out"<br /> Because that's what the pack is, the pack is not about "yayyy I'm popular!", it's about realizing that hey, more of us means a better chance at catching that deer (yellow level). I'd better not piss off the top dog or my life will be at stake (red level).

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I definitely have to agree that yes, they experience emotion. Besides just dogs, my 5 betta fish all exhibit basic emotions.<br /> <br /> They get stressed, happy, sad, etc. <br /> <br /> Feeding time is the best time because they become much more active. It's the same reaction as if you go up to a puppy with a bacon treat. They also become stressed out, which is one of the main causes of betta deaths unfortuntely. <br /> <br /> Bettas also do experience a kind of sadness. Despite the whole "betttas are solitary animals," if you put one with a certain fish for a extended amount of time, there is an attachment, and I see it with my one betta and the oto cat. There have been times where I separated the two for a few days because of treatments, and the betta exhibits different behavior without her (he looks for her around the tank, especially where she normally is) <br /> So yea, I do believe that it is possible. While my examples aren't complete evidence, they're enough for me.

I believe that animals (aside from the more intelligent ones like apes) can feel very basic emotions: fear, excitement, happiness, anger, sad, that's about it. Animals rely on one of two things when confronted with situations: fight or flight. A less-intelligent animal (again, compared to humans, apes, etc) does not need to feel love, it doesn't need to feel confident with its appearance, it needs to know "do I fight this thing? or do I run from this thing?"<br /> I believe that an animal can feel happy about being around someone and want to be around that person a lot, but I don't believe that an animal can feel love.. for an animal to be capable of feeling love, it must be capable of feeling hatred, and I don't believe less-intelligent animals are capable of feeling hatred.<br /> <br /> Also, "curious" is more of a personality trait and not an emotion.

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