Post by Life on Dec 12, 2019 0:10:04 GMT 5
You have comprehension problems? This statement alone is a mix of ad hominem and strawman.
BLUE PART = Strawman
RED PART = Ad hominem
Education time for you:
www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/1/Ad-Hominem-Abusive
examples.yourdictionary.com/ad-hominem-examples.html
www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/169/Strawman-Fallacy
I have DELETED some of your posts in this thread which featured a heavy mix of ad hominem, strawman and insults (3 in total). Consider these DELETIONS as a favor from me because I would rather preserve evidence of your aggression and capitalize on it.
Refer back to this post: theworldofanimals.proboards.com/post/51760
The term "Tiger fandom" trigger you? Tiger fandom = immature Tiger fans who have rigid views about the animal and its capabilities, and not flexible enough to entertain perspectives which might challenge or contradict their perceptions about the animal. Tiger fans in this thread continue to validate my position about them. For instance, you continue to dismiss any perspective or source that does not conform to your views about Felids in general and accuse others of cherry picking in their argumentation. You are mistaking the practice of 'making use of quotes from sources to inform an argument' for cherry picking - problematic thought process. Otherwise, virtually all members of the forum are guilty of cherry picking in their argumentation at some point in time. Will you accuse other Tiger fans of cherry picking as well or is this accusation only reserved for members with whom you have potential disagreements?
Spare me your accusations of fanboyism and cherry picking - I rarely debate in favor of Lions and Tigers, and I chose Tiger in the polls of this thread.
At best, you can argue that evidence of Lions having greater endurance than Tigers is sketchy or not well-established.
Learn to debate in a civilized manner.
Yes it was a generalization. You can read it again, and it says exactly what it is trying to say: "Many extant animal species live in social groups, showing plenty of advantages in reproductive efficiency, guard for rest, territorial competition, resisting natural enemies and so on."
Such a generalization of animals who live in social groups, proves nothing when it comes to what we are trying to discuss here.
Lions being social, is a PLUS for them in numerous ways including coping with competitive pressures.
FYI:
"The importance of social relationships Living and foraging within a social group can provide a number of benefits, including breeding (shared access to mates and babysitters for offspring (Doolan and Macdonald 1999; Clutton-Brock et al. 2001)), territorial defence (e.g., Mosser and Packer 2009), obtaining food (MacDonald 1983; Packer and Ruttan 1988) and group hunting.
Many of the most well-known examples of cooperative hunters including lions, grey wolves, spotted hyenas and painted dogs live in social groups. The dynamics of the social group are likely to influence strongly the potential for cooperative behaviours. Thus, it is easy to see how cognitively advanced social skills and other social behaviour adaptations may affect species’ ability to cooperative effectively. Social tolerance does seem to favour cooperative behaviour in some species; for example, the less aggressive bonobo (Pan paniscus) performs better in cooperative tasks than the more aggressive chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes; Hare et al. 2007)." - Bailey et al (2013)
In fact:
"Of the more gregarious group hunting species, most, including the bush dog (MacDonald 1996), wolves (Mech 1999; Mech and Boitani 2003), painted dogs
(Creel and Creel 2002), hyenas (Tilson and Hamilton 1984) and lions (Schaller 1972), are extended family units, possibly including unrelated immigrants. Cheetah and lion brothers may also form lifelong coalitions and hunt together, unlike other felids (Schaller 1972; Caro 1994)." - Bailey et al (2013)
Following content:
- clearly show one male Lion saving another from a massive pack of hyenas = 'resisting natural enemies' part vis-a-vis social groups proven correct.
See Borrego (2017) below for more information.
Tigers have displaced Leopards in Indian jungles actually.
"Leopards are clearly socially dominated by tigers. and excluded from prime tiger areas as reported from Chitwan and Kanha meadows. ln Nagarahole. l have observed tigers chase leopards up trees."
"Leopards are socially subordinate to tigers and generally avoid encounters with the larger cats."
More stuff.
Your statement: "Tigers have displaced Leopards in Indian jungles actually" = misleading
ACCOUNTS = SUBJECTIVE*
Incidents of Tiger chasing/killing Leopards do not prove Tigers outright displacing Leopards in Indian jungles. Scientific assessment is helpful in understanding this dynamic.
FYI:
"Behavioural factors that are likely to contribute to the coexistence of tiger Panthera tigris, leopard P. pardus and dhole Cuon alpinus, were investigated in the tropical forests of Nagarahole, southern India, during 1986–1992. Examination of predator scats and kills were combined with radiotracking of four tigers, three leopards, and visual observations of a pack of dhole. The three predators selectively killed different prey types in terms of species, size and age-sex classes, facilitating their coexistence through ecological separation. There was no temporal separation of predatory activities between tigers and leopards. Hunting activities of dholes were temporally separated from those of the two felids to some extent. Rate of movement per unit time was higher for leopards compared to tigers during day and night. In general, the activity patterns of predators appeared to be largely related to the activities of their principal prey, rather than to mutual avoidance. The three predator species used the same areas and hunted in similar habitats, although tigers attacked their prey in slightly denser cover than leopards. Both cats attacked their prey close to habitat features that attracted ungulates. There was no evidence for inter-specific spatial exclusion among predators, resulting either from habitat specificity or social dominance behaviours. Our results suggest that ecological factors, such as adequate availability of appropriate-sized prey, dense cover and high tree densities may be the primary factors in structuring the predator communities of tropical forests. Behavioural factors such as differential habitat selection or inter-specific social dominance, which are of crucial importance in savanna habitats, might play a relatively minor role in shaping the predator communities of tropical forests." - Karanth and Sunquist (2000)
Link: www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-zoology/article/behavioural-correlates-of-predation-by-tiger-panthera-tigris-leopard-panthera-pardus-and-dhole-cuon-alpinus-in-nagarahole-india/3B9CB00A82D9183B78D1BA1D39795607#
Another:
"We investigated predictions concerning the competitive relationships between tigers Panthera tigris and leopards Panthera pardus in Bardia National Park, Nepal, based on spatial distributions of scats and territorial markings (sign), analyses of scat content and census of wild ungulate prey. Medium‐sized ungulates, in particular chital Axis axis, was the main food of both predators, but leopards consumed significantly larger proportions of domestic animals, small mammals, and birds than tigers. Tiger sign were never found outside the park, while leopard sign occurred both inside and outside, and were significantly closer to the park border than tiger sign. Significantly higher prey densities at locations of tiger sign than that of leopards were mainly due to a preference of the latter species for the park border areas. Our results imply that interference competition––and not competition for food––was a limiting factor for the leopard population, whose distribution was restricted to the margins of the tiger territories. We suggest that the composition of the prey base is a key factor in understanding the different results and interpretations reported in studies on tiger/leopard coexistence. There are two potential mechanisms that link interference competition and prey: (1) low abundance of large ungulate prey decreases foraging efficiency of tigers, leading to increased energetic stress and aggression towards leopards; and (2) increased diet overlap due to scarcity of large prey leads to increased encounter rates and increased levels of interference competition." - Odden et al (2010)
Link: esj-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1007/s11284-010-0723-1
Composition of the prey base is an important consideration in shaping competition between co-existing predators in a particular environment. However, Tigers are not interested in subjecting Leopards to ecological exclusion for the sake of it.
A predator is likely to attack/kill/consume another (smaller) predator anyways:
---
*How many times I have to highlight this reality to you?
Once again, you have no proof for this. I have already showed how social tigers can be under pressure. Sunquist (biologist) even believed that tigers can live in groups in open habitats. Female tigers form family clusters like lionesses do, except they are not in groups. Who says they cannot easily adapt?
Don't doubt any animal's (especially a cat's) adaptability.
You have showed nothing substantial in this regard. Where is solid evidence of Tiger demonstrating 'cooperative hunting' in any part of the world?
Male Tigers are particularly territorial, and would rather dissuade/kill each other for violating their territorial markings:
"Animals may experience negative effects due to collaring [52-54], though this issue is debatable [55,56]. So far mortality during immobilization and radio-collaring has been remarkably low in India. In some unfortunate cases of mortality occurring during radio-collaring, the press and media in India generated an acrimonious debate over the use of radio-telemetry as a tool. In the first such incident, five tigers died after two months of a collaring exercise in Nagarhole NP. However, investigations revealed no relation between the radio-collaring and mortality. One tiger died due to pulmonary disease, one was old and three others died in territorial fights on different occasions." - Habib et al (2014)
+
"The territorial marking fluid of the male Bengal tiger contained a complex mixture of compounds, distributed between the aqueous (urine) and lipid phases of the fluid. The analytical problems resulting from the presence of these two phases and particularly the coelution of a large percentage of the volatile organic constituents of the marking fluid were compounded by the presence of a number of fatty acids that eluted as broad distorted peaks from the apolar capillary columns. Therefore, most of the GC and GC-MS analytical work was done on a capillary column coated with the polar phase AT-1000 (FFAP equivalent) from which the carboxylic acids eluted as sharp peaks, minimizing overlap of the carboxylic acid peaks with those of other constituents. Polar compounds (e.g., amides) eluted later than related but less polar compounds with higher molecular masses (e.g., certain N- or Calkyl-substituted amides) from this phase." - Burger et al (2008)
As I cautioned earlier, nature of an animal does not change in a short span, competitive pressures or not.
Lions are an exception to the norm:
Lions, the world’s second largest and only social felid, are primarily known for their brute strength. The average weight of an adult male can range between 180 to 225 kg (mean 190 kg), whereas the females average approximately 128 kg (Skinner and Chimimba, 2005). Although not the fastest land animal (reaching speeds of up to 70 km/h during short sprints), lions are known as fierce killers and can easily take down animals their own size. The female lions are the primary hunters whereas the males rarely aid in killing prey, but conserve themselves to defend the pride against other male lions. Lion physiology is designed to allow stalking prey for long periods of time, whereafter a short chase ensues. When hunting as a pride, female lions can take down zebra (± 300 kg), buffalo (± 600 kg), eland (± 1000 kg) and female elephants (± 4000 kg). This characteristic is largely a result of their ability to work together as a group rather than that of individual muscle strength. However, being physically fit is a requirement to stay part of the pride (Skinner and Chimimba, 2005)." - Kohn et al (2011)
+
"Big cats diverged from an asocial common ancestor roughly 6 MYA, and following the split, sociality evolved only in the lion lineage (Finarelli and Flynn 2009; Johnson et al., 2006; Nyakatura and Bininda-Emonds, 2012; Perez-Barberia et al., 2007). Originally, the evolution of sociality in lions was attributed to fitness payoffs associated with cooperative hunting. However, if the benefits of group hunting drove the evolution of sociality in lions, then compared to singletons, group-hunters should experience greater hunting success and higher food intake. Contrary to this prediction, lone lions perform as well as group hunters and hunting success does not vary with group size (Packer et al., 1990; Scheel and Packer 1991). Instead, the benefits of group territoriality (e.g., cooperative offspring defense and resource defense) appear to outweigh the benefits of group hunting, indicating sociality in lions is likely driven by the benefits of group territoriality (Mosser and Packer 2009; Mosser et al., 2015).
Akin to primates, lions live in large fission-fusion societies consisting of a permanent pride of females (up to 21 individuals) and an associated coalition of males (Mosser and Packer 2009; Packer, 1986). Similar to other species with complex social systems, lion sociality is characterized by a high degree of cooperation: lions cooperatively hunt (Packer and Pusey, 1997), cooperate to defend their territory against intruders (McComb et al., 1994; Heinsohn and Packer, 1995; Heinsohn et al., 1996; Grinnell 2002; Mosser and Packer 2009), and communally nurse their young (Packer and Pusey, 1994). A recent analysis of lion social networks reveals a high degree of cohesiveness and provides additional support for the presence of socially complex associations (Dunston et al., 2016). In contrast, leopards, tigers, and jaguars are asocial and associate only during mating and with dependent offspring (Mazak 1981; Schaller 1972; Seymore 1989). Thus, cognition in leopards and tigers evolved in the absence of social complexity; cognitive abilities exhibited by lions but absent in asocial big cats represent abilities that evolved after their evolutionary split and under the selective pressures of sociality." - Borrego (2017)
I do not doubt adaptability potential of the Felids at large but Felids are not exactly extinction-proof:
FYI:
Some of the most impressive Felids are EXTINCT.
REFERENCES
Burger, B. V., Viviers, M. Z., Bekker, J. P. I., Le Roux, M., Fish, N., Fourie, W. B., & Weibchen, G. (2008). Chemical characterization of territorial marking fluid of male Bengal tiger, Panthera tigris. Journal of chemical ecology, 34(5), 659.
Bailey, I., Myatt, J. P., & Wilson, A. M. (2013). Group hunting within the Carnivora: physiological, cognitive and environmental influences on strategy and cooperation. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, 67(1), 1-17.
Borrego, N. (2017). Big cats as a model system for the study of the evolution of intelligence. Behavioural processes, 141, 261-266.
Habib, B., Shrotriya, S., Sivakumar, K., Sinha, P. R., & Mathur, V. B. (2014). Three decades of wildlife radio telemetry in India: a review. Animal Biotelemetry, 2(1), 4.
Karanth, K. U., & Sunquist, M. E. (2000). Behavioural correlates of predation by tiger (Panthera tigris), leopard (Panthera pardus) and dhole (Cuon alpinus) in Nagarahole, India. Journal of Zoology, 250(2), 255-265.
Kohn, T. A., Burroughs, R., Hartman, M. J., & Noakes, T. D. (2011). Fiber type and metabolic characteristics of lion (Panthera leo), caracal (Caracal caracal) and human skeletal muscle. Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology Part A: Molecular & Integrative Physiology, 159(2), 125-133.
Odden, M., Wegge, P., & Fredriksen, T. (2010). Do tigers displace leopards? If so, why?. Ecological research, 25(4), 875-881.
