Motionless Claws (Most current version)
Motionless Claws: What the Cheetah Is, and How It Relates to My Psychology
If one were to distill the essence of the cheetah down into one word, I think it would be this: Running. The cheetah does not only run towards its food, it runs away from danger. Significant morphological changes have developed in cheetahs over the eons, for one overriding purpose: Speed. The changes are not just external; they reshaped the very internal organs and skeleton making up a cheetah.
I freely admit that I am no champion sprinter. I can run well enough to remain a reasonable distance behind a terrified wild rabbit for maybe five seconds, and can put on a burst of speed when necessary. I haven’t timed my maximum speed, but I don’t believe I would be able to hold it for long; it’s a simple fact of my physiology that I am not built for long-distance running like some people are. I suppose I could train to make myself like that, but I don’t bother.
But, ultimately, cheetahs are not built for speed so they can run around chasing their own tails. They’re built for speed so that they can catch prey and survive. Oh, I’m as playful as any other cat; I enjoy play-fighting (both cat-style and human-style), batting at objects that move in a manner I find enticing enough while ignoring them at all other opportunities, and navigating complex obstacle courses like a steep pile of boulders. I just don’t feel any desire to go sprinting on a treadmill. But neither does a cheetah, I would suspect. Cheetahs can die from overexertion; they lack the ability to deal with heat buildup as effectively as, say, canines and so stop running to avoid overheating. If they do overheat, the proteins in the brains can denature1, and that’s very very bad.
If a cheetah did not need to run to catch its food, I think that the cheetah would be a relatively slow one.
The fact that I don’t train is a definite spanner in the works of some of the only real athletic fun I can get for much of the year. Chasing rabbits, pigeons, and squirrels is fun. I greatly enjoy it, and if you’ve seen some of those spoiled suburban squirrels, then you’ve probably noticed that they could use the exercise. I am the squirrel and rabbit Weight Watcher program. Zipping after them is practically second nature. I never catch them, naturally. I’m not sure what I would do if I did catch one. The once time I was close I ended up purposely trying not to get to close in case the squirrel in question bit me. I’m sure that the mighty hunter of the savannah shouldn’t be afraid of a stupid squirrel, but rodent bites hurt.
I don’t have much of a drive to kill things. I do have a drive to chase things. Mostly those are the aforementioned rabbits and squirrels, but on the few occasions when I’ve been close to gazelles and impala, I’ve found that they make appealing targets2. I won’t kill for ethical reasons, but that doesn’t mean that some part of me doesn’t long to. I certainly do. I just choose not to act on it.
Cheetahs are rather unusual in their social structure as well. They are one of the relatively few mammal species to have a coalition-type social structure. Among carnivores it is even more unusual: an estimated 85-90% of carnivore species will not gather together except to mate. Cheetahs, however, will gather together in tight-knit groups of up to twelve.
The exact reasons male cheetahs form coalitions is up to some debate-theories include better success hunting, reproductive benefits, and the simple fact that survival is easier against nomadic males when there are three of you and one of him. Whatever the cause, it is probably due to many factors rather than a single factor, but reproductive benefits (which are pretty closely tied to defending territory3) seem to have the most empirical support. I have no urges going that way (though I truthfully don’t know if male cheetahs do have instinctual or conscious urges to seek companions for the purpose of gaining reproductive benefits). No, the part where I and the cheetah share traits is in the social dynamics of a coalition.
Cheetahs in coalitions are incredibly close. They spend over 90% of their time within visual sight of each other, are usually less than one meter away from each other during the midday rest period, and exhibit distress when separated. Obviously, such level of closeness isn’t possible in human society. Humans have work, they have to do errands, and other things intervene. But while I’m asocial towards most people, I do idealize living in a group with other people, my chosen family. Oh, I love my biological family, but the bond doesn’t seem to be quite as intense4.
And I want to stay in contact with my chosen family. Regular contact through the Internet works-I can know how they’re doing, if they’re in pain, and talk to them-but that doesn’t make me stop wanting real life contact. That doesn’t stop me from wanting to cohabitate, to spend time with them. For a cheetah, my chosen family is a rather large group, but not entirely unheard of (some cheetahs have been seen in coalitions of twelve), and many of the reasons cheetahs can’t gather in such numbers, like low food concentrations, don’t apply to me.
There’s also the human part of me to consider there.
I am human and cheetah. Not-and never-one or the other. As far as I am concerned, they have fused to create something else.
1. Denaturing, for those who do not know, is the process of a protein taking a different shape than it normally has under certain conditions, and then not resuming its old shape when those conditions expire.
2. Since I’ve only seen them in zoos, I obviously haven’t gone after them.
3. Male cheetahs defend only a portion of a female’s range. A male cheetah with better territory thus has access to more females to mate with.
4. It should be noted that most (70.6%) cheetah coalition are formed of siblings. There are a variety of potential explanations for the difference. The one that, upon reflection, seems the most likely is that many of the people who are my close friends and chosen family I identify with on a greater level. Since (this is my own speculation, but it’s not much of a stretch) cheetah coalitions are formed of siblings in order to promote their own genes rather than that of a cheetah who is not related, it might be said that, in a sense, the difference is not an impassable gap, though I will admit that the metaphorical bridge is not the sturdiest of structures.
Excised:
Since feline phylogenetics are not a stable field, it’s difficult to identify where exactly cheetahs branched off, and when, but usually the applicable term is ‘early’, and in the older work I used when writing this essay1, the geological time period that is the earliest bound given is the Miocene, and the author says that cheetahs were probably a distinct species before members of the genus Panthera. An old cat, to be sure2.
1. The work in question is Cheetah Under the Sun by Nan Wrogemann, and was published in 1975. Judging from the book’s contents it was intended for a more general audience than Cheetahs of the Serengeti Plains: Group Living in an Asocial Species by T. M. Caro, which is far more expansive and up-to-date.
2. In the interests of accuracy, objectivity, truth, and spoiling evocative romantic imagery, I must admit that more recent reconstructions of cat cladistics have cats starting to branch out at about five million years ago.
Not quite done, but getting there.
If one were to distill the essence of the cheetah down into one word, I think it would be this: Running. The cheetah does not only run towards its food, it runs away from danger. Significant morphological changes have developed in cheetahs over the eons, for one overriding purpose: Speed. The changes are not just external; they reshaped the very internal organs and skeleton making up a cheetah.
I freely admit that I am no champion sprinter. I can run well enough to remain a reasonable distance behind a terrified wild rabbit for maybe five seconds, and can put on a burst of speed when necessary. I haven’t timed my maximum speed, but I don’t believe I would be able to hold it for long; it’s a simple fact of my physiology that I am not built for long-distance running like some people are. I suppose I could train to make myself like that, but I don’t bother.
But, ultimately, cheetahs are not built for speed so they can run around chasing their own tails. They’re built for speed so that they can catch prey and survive. Oh, I’m as playful as any other cat; I enjoy play-fighting (both cat-style and human-style), batting at objects that move in a manner I find enticing enough while ignoring them at all other opportunities, and navigating complex obstacle courses like a steep pile of boulders. I just don’t feel any desire to go sprinting on a treadmill. But neither does a cheetah, I would suspect. Cheetahs can die from overexertion; they lack the ability to deal with heat buildup as effectively as, say, canines and so stop running to avoid overheating. If they do overheat, the proteins in the brains can denature1, and that’s very very bad.
If a cheetah did not need to run to catch its food, I think that the cheetah would be a relatively slow one.
The fact that I don’t train is a definite spanner in the works of some of the only real athletic fun I can get for much of the year. Chasing rabbits, pigeons, and squirrels is fun. I greatly enjoy it, and if you’ve seen some of those spoiled suburban squirrels, then you’ve probably noticed that they could use the exercise. I am the squirrel and rabbit Weight Watcher program. Zipping after them is practically second nature. I never catch them, naturally. I’m not sure what I would do if I did catch one. The once time I was close I ended up purposely trying not to get to close in case the squirrel in question bit me. I’m sure that the mighty hunter of the savannah shouldn’t be afraid of a stupid squirrel, but rodent bites hurt.
I don’t have much of a drive to kill things. I do have a drive to chase things. Mostly those are the aforementioned rabbits and squirrels, but on the few occasions when I’ve been close to gazelles and impala, I’ve found that they make appealing targets2. I won’t kill for ethical reasons, but that doesn’t mean that some part of me doesn’t long to. I certainly do. I just choose not to act on it.
Cheetahs are rather unusual in their social structure as well. They are one of the relatively few mammal species to have a coalition-type social structure. Among carnivores it is even more unusual: an estimated 85-90% of carnivore species will not gather together except to mate. Cheetahs, however, will gather together in tight-knit groups of up to twelve.
The exact reasons male cheetahs form coalitions is up to some debate-theories include better success hunting, reproductive benefits, and the simple fact that survival is easier against nomadic males when there are three of you and one of him. Whatever the cause, it is probably due to many factors rather than a single factor, but reproductive benefits (which are pretty closely tied to defending territory3) seem to have the most empirical support. I have no urges going that way (though I truthfully don’t know if male cheetahs do have instinctual or conscious urges to seek companions for the purpose of gaining reproductive benefits). No, the part where I and the cheetah share traits is in the social dynamics of a coalition.
Cheetahs in coalitions are incredibly close. They spend over 90% of their time within visual sight of each other, are usually less than one meter away from each other during the midday rest period, and exhibit distress when separated. Obviously, such level of closeness isn’t possible in human society. Humans have work, they have to do errands, and other things intervene. But while I’m asocial towards most people, I do idealize living in a group with other people, my chosen family. Oh, I love my biological family, but the bond doesn’t seem to be quite as intense4.
And I want to stay in contact with my chosen family. Regular contact through the Internet works-I can know how they’re doing, if they’re in pain, and talk to them-but that doesn’t make me stop wanting real life contact. That doesn’t stop me from wanting to cohabitate, to spend time with them. For a cheetah, my chosen family is a rather large group, but not entirely unheard of (some cheetahs have been seen in coalitions of twelve), and many of the reasons cheetahs can’t gather in such numbers, like low food concentrations, don’t apply to me.
There’s also the human part of me to consider there.
I am human and cheetah. Not-and never-one or the other. As far as I am concerned, they have fused to create something else.
1. Denaturing, for those who do not know, is the process of a protein taking a different shape than it normally has under certain conditions, and then not resuming its old shape when those conditions expire.
2. Since I’ve only seen them in zoos, I obviously haven’t gone after them.
3. Male cheetahs defend only a portion of a female’s range. A male cheetah with better territory thus has access to more females to mate with.
4. It should be noted that most (70.6%) cheetah coalition are formed of siblings. There are a variety of potential explanations for the difference. The one that, upon reflection, seems the most likely is that many of the people who are my close friends and chosen family I identify with on a greater level. Since (this is my own speculation, but it’s not much of a stretch) cheetah coalitions are formed of siblings in order to promote their own genes rather than that of a cheetah who is not related, it might be said that, in a sense, the difference is not an impassable gap, though I will admit that the metaphorical bridge is not the sturdiest of structures.
Excised:
Since feline phylogenetics are not a stable field, it’s difficult to identify where exactly cheetahs branched off, and when, but usually the applicable term is ‘early’, and in the older work I used when writing this essay1, the geological time period that is the earliest bound given is the Miocene, and the author says that cheetahs were probably a distinct species before members of the genus Panthera. An old cat, to be sure2.
1. The work in question is Cheetah Under the Sun by Nan Wrogemann, and was published in 1975. Judging from the book’s contents it was intended for a more general audience than Cheetahs of the Serengeti Plains: Group Living in an Asocial Species by T. M. Caro, which is far more expansive and up-to-date.
2. In the interests of accuracy, objectivity, truth, and spoiling evocative romantic imagery, I must admit that more recent reconstructions of cat cladistics have cats starting to branch out at about five million years ago.
Not quite done, but getting there.