A dog notes that you provide it food, shelter and bellyrubs, and concludes, ‘‘Wow. He must be a god!’’
A cat notes that you provide it food, shelter and bellyrubs, and concludes, ‘‘Wow. I must be a god!’’
When I come home from work my dog is in the window announcing to all my triumphant return to the pack.
She greets me at the door and won’t leave me alone until I sit down and she can jump up in my lap and lick me on the lips a few times, whining and tail wagging the whole time. If this isn’t love, what is?
This I would agree with. My cat does that ‘‘kitty paws’’ thing all the time. My Aunt says when cats do that they’re reproducing behavior from their kittenhood. Apparently the kitty paws on the Mommy cat serve to stimulate the breast to produce milk, or something. She says it’s a sign of a really happy cat.
Simone the dog was almost feral when we took her in; socializing her became my special project.
She follows me around when I’m home. If I am not doing anything fun with her, she will set her head down on her paws and sigh mightily and make big moon eyes at me. She constantly touches me – any kind of contact will do, even if it makes little sense…for example, just walking into my calf nose-first at times. When I tell her we’re going to play, she vibrates with barely-controlled excitement. When she’s tired, she will press up against me and sleep.
These are all typical behaviors of a lovestruck human teenager, at least. So I’d say she loves me as much as any human teenager is capable of. As an added bonus, she doesn’t think I’m uncool.
I don’t have pets - I have an entourage! There are 4 people in this household, and the critters seem to prefer being around me. In fact, when I have to go out of town for work, my husband tells me the little dog, my constant shadow, sits looking out the window or staring at the door for hours on end. I don’t know if it’s love or she just views me as the head bitch…
One of our cats is an attention whore, and he’ll snuggle with anyone, but the other is definitely mine. I’m the only one she’ll come to willingly, and I’m the only one she walks on in bed. If that’s not love… 
Anyway, I voted for tiny brains.
I can’t think of anything my cats would do if they loved me (given their feline limitations) that they don’t already do, so I had no hesitation selecting the “My pets love me as much as their tiny brains allow” answer.
We have a six-month old Westie (West Highland Terrier) that we have had since she was 8 weeks old.
I was torn between the “tiny brains” option and the “as deeply, if not more, than any human could” and finally settled on the latter. By all appearances, our Westie loves us more than a person could because her emotions and ability to reason are less complex. Unlike a human, she loves us unconditionally. Humans are more complicated, and have more complex emotional needs.
Our Westie goes into paroxysms of joy merely by us walking in the room, and even more so if she gets her neck scratched or her belly rubbed.
My wife, on the other hand… 
…wants curtains hung, walls painted, and I still don’t get that kind of reaction.
My kitties love me just as much as a human ever could. I set them up on automatic feeders months ago so I am not the food giver any longer but that doesn’t stop them from running to the door when I get home from work. They come and play with me of their own accord and after I get settled into bed for the night they come up and one of them sleeps next to me and the other sleeps on top of me. The one who sleeps on top of me has developed an adorable new habit of lying on top of me until I start moving around in my sleep at which point he lays next to me and snuggles under my arm so I am essentially hugging him while I sleep. They both want to be petted and loved all the time (especially when I am in the bathroom…for some reason they view the toilet as the petting throne) and they can tell when I’m sad or upset and are extra affectionate when I need cheering up.
This brave boy loves me insofar as any cat is capable of it. The boyfriend and I have pretty evenly split the feeding and litterbox duties, so I doubt it’s that. He will snuggle and play with the boyfriend, but I’m the one he follows around like he’s on a leash.
This grey moggy, on the other hand, is only mildly fond of me. When he deigns to notice people at all, it’s primarily as cushions.
(bolding added)
How well do you wash your face after lunch?
Oh, wait, I thought the question was ‘If this isn’t love what is it?’
.
Ha. So true.
My cat sleeps on my thigh every night. I know she is just sucking up my heat and softness. She isn’t showing affection.
I never wanted a dog because they seem so goofy, needy and they have no damn pride. I just want to tell them, “Listen here, Fido, pull yourself together, and be cool. You’re embarrassing yourself.”
Our dog enjoys our presence, wants to be around us, and cares about our moods.
My parrot is strongly pair-bonded to me, to the point of being more fanatical than loving.
I believe one of my pets loves me. The other lives to jump on the counters, knock things over, break things, and otherwise torture me.
Two of our cats love us as much as their tiny brains, and they are tiny indeed, will allow. Louie shows his love by following you everywhere–into the kitchen, into the bathroom, up and down the stairs. He must be with His People at all times, preferably within a foot or less. Marigold brings us presents…sometimes wads of paper, sometimes paper-towel rings, once a dead mouse…and announces each gift with a loud “MEH!” She allows herself to be picked up every evening, to be placed at the foot of our little girl’s bed, where she will sleep all night. And Louie and Marigold love each other, at least as much as cats can, as they walk shoulder-to-shoulder, beg for treats together, and curl up next to each other on the couch.
India, though. She hates everything. She hates the daytime, noises, wind, fresh air, open spaces, the vet, cat toys, human food (except fish but she will not let you watch her eat it), Life cereal, and especially the Stupid Humans. She hates you, even though she hasn’t met you yet. The sight of Marigold, the orange cat from across the street, or the cat carrier causes her to go nuclear. (For some reason she tolerates Louie, but probably only because Louie is as threatening as a sack of flour.) She skulks under the bed. She cuts her eyes at the Stupid Humans. She eats their food under extreme duress, and has been known to scoop up low quality offerings in her paw and flick them across the kitchen. She is a teenager in feline form.
When nobody’s looking, though, she will sneak into our son’s bedroom and curl up next to him.
I think that love goes to far. “Prefer my presence to my absence” hits it about right. Do I love my sofa? No, but I picked it out, paid money for it, maintain it, and my life is more enjoyable because it is around. On the other hand, I could get a different sofa, and be just as happy. I believe my cats have had the same attitude towards me.
Love is really the wrong word for what an animals feels about the person that feeds it. Is our dog excited when I walk into the kitchen? Sure. Is she excited when I come home? Pretty much, but that could just as well be - “Gee, I wasn’t sure if you’d come back again - can you feed me or walk me now?”
I am of the same thinking and that is why I call it “happy paws”. Whenever one of my two cats does that they purr really loud and get that half-closed eye look of “oh that feels so good.”
I would have gone with the food option, except for one cat I had. I think she saw me as a large not-too-bright kitten whom she had to protect and care for. If that is love, then she loved me.
Once I was standing in my front yard just watching the grass grow basically. She was inside the screen door apparently watching me. It was one of those old wood screen doors without a latch but still pretty tough to get open. Suddenly a german shepard came up to me and jumped up on me. I believe it was just being friendly, but before it had even put any weight on me, Bo had butted open the screen door (something she had never done before) and flew onto the back of the full grown german shepard (a distance of about 10 feet) and was biting and clawing and screaming at the dog. The dog high-tailed it out of there, initially with the cat on its back, and then the cat jumped off the back of the dog and returned to me and circled me for the next five minutes with ears back watching for any further attackers. It was not until I went inside that she relented and came inside herself and stopped her patrol. I had never seen her attack a dog before or since.
Another time I was in bed with a young woman (she later became my wife) with the cat at my feet and unconsiously, the young woman balled up her fist and slugged me hard in the stomach. I later found out she would occasionally do this sort of thing just after she fell asleep. The micro second after the woman struck me, the cat jumped onto the womans ankle and savaged it with bites and claws. The woman woke up, then and blamed my cat for an unprovoked attack. I had just had my breath knocked out of me so I could neither defend myself nor the cat. It was only in the early morning when the bruise came out could I convince my lady the cat had been defending me.
I voted tiny brains.
It’s really my family’s bullboxer, I don’t have a dog (yet!) of my own. He follows my mom everywhere, and she’s accidentally hurt him a few times (stepped on his paw, shut his tail in the door once) and rather than jump or react viciously, he simply gives an “awwww, why’d you do that” pained look. He constantly tries to get attention (not in a Caesar aggressive way, no jumping) just in a rubbing up against you, putting his head in your lap way.
Pets are really great.
I’ve been thinking about this off and on since I responded and I’m going to go even further. I think our pets can love more deeply than humans because they don’t have the same fear of rejection as we do. Typically they hold back less and offer more without the protective shields we humans use with each other. It’s not tiny brains, it’s huge hearts.