I have no idea how these people got their cats wedged into their filters

November 19, 2019 11:39 AM

Uncatty valley: Cats' reactions to a cat filter on their humans.
posted by jocelmeow (41 comments total)

Most of the cats see the filter and then look up to confirm on the human. Are the cats understanding that they're seeing (effectively) a reflection of themselves?
posted by codacorolla at 11:45 AM on November 19, 2019 [25 favorites]

Great reactions on the cats, but...
That music is so familiar and I can't place it! It's going to bug me until I figure it out!
posted by Anonymous Function at 11:47 AM on November 19, 2019

wow, there's a whole doctorate on theory of mind and consciousness lurking here.
posted by jenkinsEar at 11:51 AM on November 19, 2019 [32 favorites]

You don't need a fancy phone to scare your cat, plain old cat ears will do just fine.
posted by Pendragon at 11:55 AM on November 19, 2019 [18 favorites]

Uhhh...

Wasn't it like a massively huge deal when chimps and dolphins passed the mirror test? Are these the cats of NIMH?
posted by Don Pepino at 11:58 AM on November 19, 2019 [23 favorites]

Great reactions on the cats, but...
That music is so familiar and I can't place it! It's going to bug me until I figure it out!

I recognize the music from Trolden compilation videos of Hearthstone clips. I have heard it used a few other times in other videos, but given the regular output of trolden videos, plus the frequent application of this tune, I would assume that is where you've heard it.
posted by GoblinHoney at 12:00 PM on November 19, 2019

Are the cats understanding that they're seeing (effectively) a reflection of themselves?

I guess you could hypothesize that the cats are like, "Whoa that's a weird thing in environment ahead of me, lemme make sure there's no other weird thing in the environment behind me." In other words, parsing the double-take in a way that doesn't involve any inference about the mirror being a reflection, and hence doesn't involve self-recognition.

But yeah, I'd be interested in breaking out the red dye and mirrors.
posted by Beardman at 12:07 PM on November 19, 2019 [4 favorites]

I’ve long held that cats can pass the mirror test they just don’t care.
posted by The Whelk at 12:17 PM on November 19, 2019 [59 favorites]

I'm not 100% sure aren't doing exactly what they would do if there were no cat filter involved. Cats often look startled and look up at their owners.
posted by argybarg at 12:29 PM on November 19, 2019 [13 favorites]

Also skeptical the cat understands that the thing on the phone screen is themself and their human. I wonder how much of this video is just cueing the cat in other ways (sounds, squeezes) and clever editing.
posted by Nelson at 12:33 PM on November 19, 2019 [5 favorites]

Are we seeing a string of clips selected because the featured cat happened to display behavior that could be anthropomorphized as recognizing themselves in a scene with cat-filtered owners, or are we seeing a string of clips where such recognition happened?
posted by wildblueyonder at 12:34 PM on November 19, 2019 [6 favorites]

That cat ears video is now second only to the video of the cat pushing an aggressive dog into a swimming pool in my arsenal of cute cat videos, Pendragon.
posted by jamjam at 12:40 PM on November 19, 2019 [2 favorites]

But what happens when you show them the new Cats trailer?
posted by nubs at 12:50 PM on November 19, 2019 [2 favorites]

Yeah, my vote is that we're not seeing the 100 other clips where the cat didn't accidentally have a funny reaction.
posted by polecat at 12:58 PM on November 19, 2019 [7 favorites]

Actual Cats React to the Cats Trailer! seems to have more fair-and-balancing reporting of actual cat reactions, which is probably why it hasn't gone viral.
posted by clawsoon at 1:04 PM on November 19, 2019

That music is so familiar and I can't place it! It's going to bug me until I figure it out!

The reason it's so familiar is that literally millions of youtube videos use it, since it's one of the tracks Kevin Macleod made available as CC-licensed royalty-free music. If I'm not mistaken, it's even a part of the Youtube Audio Library.
posted by Aleyn at 1:08 PM on November 19, 2019 [4 favorites]

move over turing test, here comes the uh... purring test
posted by joshuaconner at 1:11 PM on November 19, 2019 [10 favorites]

Most of the cats see the filter and then look up to confirm on the human. Are the cats understanding that they're seeing (effectively) a reflection of themselves?

I kind of call shenanigans. Cats will absolutely react to images on screens or TV, but most don't understand mirrors, for example. Some can, but realization that that's them in the mirror and not some other cat isn't universal or all that common, ime.

So shenanigans in that the cat is reacting to the human suddenly looking like a cat, More likely, in my view, is the cat simply reacting to an image that's an uncanny-valley catlike horrible thing.
posted by bonehead at 1:12 PM on November 19, 2019 [1 favorite]

One thing cats definitely do is turn to their owners for reassurance and cues about whether things are dangerous. So if they're seeing something weird on a screen close up, they might conceivably check to make sure their owner isn't freaking out.
posted by Frowner at 1:31 PM on November 19, 2019 [14 favorites]

Turns out if you record a cat it'll probably do something weird or stupid
posted by echo target at 2:00 PM on November 19, 2019 [17 favorites]

Hmm. My cats definitely use the mirrors in our house to check if anyone is behind them, or to look at each other or at humans. I don't know how this relates to mirror awareness of the self, tho.
posted by PandaMomentum at 2:15 PM on November 19, 2019 [8 favorites]

I'm pretty sure cats can pass the mirror test since I saw this video of a cat touching their own ears after seeing them in the mirror.
posted by floomp at 2:33 PM on November 19, 2019 [17 favorites]

Three out of the four cats in the video pass the mirror test. The last one doesn't seem to really get it.
posted by seanmpuckett at 2:50 PM on November 19, 2019

My cat would purposely not react out of spite.
posted by Serene Empress Dork at 2:58 PM on November 19, 2019 [2 favorites]

It seems likely the cats recognize their owner in the image and their surprise has to do with their owner's face changing. Is that the same as passing the mirror test?
posted by simra at 3:43 PM on November 19, 2019 [3 favorites]

I call shenanigans on the calling of shenanigans! Not only do these cats do double takes between the screen and their owners, they then staaaaaare at their owners warily. They're not seeking reassurance from Mom, they're waiting to see if Mom turns into a monster were-cat.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 4:10 PM on November 19, 2019 [10 favorites]

YOU'RE ALL KILLJOYS
posted by Anonymous at 4:46 PM on November 19, 2019

chat surpris par le visage
cat surprised by face
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 5:17 PM on November 19, 2019 [2 favorites]

so by now surely someone has made a filter that does this but with the laughing man logo ala GiTS: Stand Alone Complex, right? Wonder what the cat would think of that. Actually I'd put it on his face too, what the heck.

please?
posted by some loser at 8:14 PM on November 19, 2019

I LOVE THIS SO MUCH
posted by Going To Maine at 9:58 PM on November 19, 2019

You don't need a fancy phone to scare your cat, plain old cat ears will do just fine.
Some time ago my daughter started petting a cat in the street. The cat was completely fine with it. Then she put on her headband with cat ears... and the cat completely freaked out and ran away. We didn't repeat the experiment with other headgears, so we don't know if the cat reacted to cat ears specifically (the cat version of the uncanny valley), or to an unexpected change in the human's appearance. This shouldn't be too difficult to test experimentally.
posted by elgilito at 4:17 AM on November 20, 2019 [1 favorite]

My cats appear to pass the mirror test, and in fact at least one seems to understand pointing - I point in the direction of the dry food I've hidden and he follows the line of my finger to see where it is.

Then I go to see my spouse like "Eamon understands pointing!!"
"Yeah, I know" "
What do you mean you know, cats aren't supposed to be able to do that! Only dogs,! Our big stupid cat is crazy smart!"
"Huh. I thought that was normal"
"No!"
posted by stillnocturnal at 4:27 AM on November 20, 2019 [2 favorites]

Also my cats dont react to screens at all. Couldn't give a fuck. I can fuck right off with my fake goldfish and cat videos, they know it's some not-real bullshit.
posted by stillnocturnal at 4:33 AM on November 20, 2019 [1 favorite]

Yeah my last cat definitely watched me in the mirror and would e.g. not be startled if she saw me reaching to pet her. She was dumb as a brick in general and I really don't understand how mirrors fit into her concept of the world, but I could absolutely see her reacting this way.
posted by restless_nomad at 5:11 AM on November 20, 2019 [2 favorites]

I've had cats that passed the mirror test, cats that did not pass the mirror test, and one freakish mutant who understood statements like, "Meet me around the corner, OK?"
posted by kyrademon at 5:59 AM on November 20, 2019 [4 favorites]

Cats will absolutely react to images on screens or TV,

Our cat in days past would intently watch hockey games on TV. That is to say, when a player skated off the edge of the screen, Leroy would race around the corner to see where he had gone. It’s not like he was following the playoffs.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:44 AM on November 20, 2019 [3 favorites]

I'm not 100% sure aren't doing exactly what they would do if there were no cat filter involved. Cats often look startled and look up at their owners.
posted by argybarg at 12:29 PM on November 19 [11 favorites +] [!]

I agree here. Happens all the time when they're driving.
posted by Lipstick Thespian at 8:57 AM on November 20, 2019

You don't need a fancy phone to scare your cat, plain old cat ears yt will do just fine.

Can confirm. When I tried on a pussyhat, my cats were very much on team DO NOT WANT.
posted by BrashTech at 11:54 AM on November 20, 2019 [2 favorites]

Cats may or may not think of us as giant hairless cats, but they reeeeally don’t like it when we try to look like actual cats, as evidenced by this experiment with a cat mask.
posted by Meghamora at 11:56 AM on November 20, 2019 [4 favorites]

Cats will absolutely react to images on screens or TV…

One of our cats is very smell-focused, and ignores screens. (I think her vision might not be too great.) But our other cat will definitely watch TV shows with us. Before we got her, we'd often have the Tiny Kittens rescue feed up on the TV, but Harley would keep trying to get to the kittens—through the screen, looking around behind it to see if they were there, …—and it seemed cruel to taunt her with kittens that she couldn't go mother.
posted by JiBB at 1:53 PM on November 20, 2019 [1 favorite]

I tried to show Gidgette the Cats trailer. She wasn't impressed and went back to watching Chopped.
posted by kathrynm at 6:28 PM on November 20, 2019