In this age of google, there are still too many myths that I have failed to question

[Quercus]

@Treppenwitz

Perhaps as an aside we could compile a handy list of future suggestions for gulling the naive (likely in a pub). I have half a memory that this has been done before, but what the hell, it can be done again. I will ponder on this.

Well, you could just go to Snopes. Pretty good list of things gullible people believe.

[RTFirefly]

@wevets

the Viennese defeat of the Turks (not hte Truks, as my earlier post would have you believe)

I figured you really meant the Moops.

[CalMeacham]

@flatlined

I was outraged when I learned that cats really have no purpose. I had always thought they came to humans because they were attracted by the rats in the grain, so earned a place in our homes. While I knew that cats are lazy jerks who are very good at taking advantage of us stupid humans, I always assumed that somewhere along the line, cats had a real purpose. I still am slightly outraged, but now I know its not my fault I am a sucker, its society’s fault!

(By the time cats arrived, humans had bred small, fierce dogs to deal with vermin. While some cats are amazing killers of rodents, most don’t want to spend the energy. They were attracted to us for the tasty garbage they could find, much easier than risking being hurt by a rodent who is fighting for its life.)

Where did you get the idea that the existence of small dogs in some human communities disproves the “purpose” of cats?

1.) Not all communities might have had such dogs
2.) The existence of one rodent-killer doesn’t mean that you can’t have another. There’s evidence that some peoples tolerated the existence of snake in their house for the same purpose.
3.) the Egyptians certainly seem to have venerated cats for their utility, and I don’t recall artwork depicting dogs in Egypt.
4.) even the laziest cat will every now and then be attracted to stalk small things (or substitutes for them). If the cats kill anything, it’s a net win.
5.) Cats definitely were kept on American farms in the 19th century as vermin-killers, and weren’t fed by the farmers, to keep them hungry for the task. If 19th century American farmers were doing this, why would we think they weren’t used thus elsewhere?

[Hari_Seldon]

Dogs are disliked in the fertile crescent where cats were domesticated. And that is where grain storage would have attracted mice and then cats. Sure they might have also eaten from garbage piles, but that doesn’t prove they didn’t eat mice. After all, all species of cat are hunters (and obligate carnivores).