Meow Mix - Music for Cats, my column on NatGeo
Sometimes in our indentured servitude to work, adults forget a lot of the simple-but-luxurious freedoms that make being an adult worthwhile. No one is ever going to stand in front of your TV and turn it off without your being within your rights to throw an ashtray at them. No one can make you stand up in front of the class and tell everyone what iyou find so funny, while your face burns with embarrassment and your stomach tries to escape out of your throat. Never again do you have to see anyone to whom you are related.
You also can chose your own music, which is an under-appreciated power, especially if you remember not being able to do so as a kid. I recall endless, suffocating rides to the beach in our tun-air-conditioned Volkswagon Bug, being subjected to the tiresome nuthouse din of Ted Nugent because my brother liked it. Even Noriega didn’t have to listen to that.
Domestic pets, like children, have little choice about what they eat, where they go or what they listen to. It’s hard to tell what animals think of human music but because a lot of them are stuck with it all day long - in homes, in pet shelters, in barns, in pet stores - it’s in there welfare interests to find out, if we can, what kind of music they like.
Some scientists have done just that and if you are sensitive to the type of music you listen to you'll appreciate Meow Mix - Why Scientists Have Created Music For Cats. Click on the story and you can hear music made specifically for cats and tamarins (tiny monkeys) learn about how a psychologist and a composer figured out the pitches and tempos they prefer. It will also have you considering the notion that having a bonobo on the drums is not an impossibility for bands in the future.
So I really hope you'll click on the story, though if you don't I'll see it as you exercising your human adult power over your entertainment. Bad choices are our human adult right, too.
So I really hope you'll click on the story, though if you don't I'll see it as you exercising your human adult power over your entertainment. Bad choices are our human adult right, too.
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