Welcome to part two of our discussion of Michael Thomas-Cellos, the evolution of agency

and the first part we had him on for a one-hour discussion and now we are going to continue

just among the three of us Seth had to drop.

This point in the book where he talks about head switching, do you remember that with

the squirrels when they are trying to decide what they are going to do?

Are they going to scramble down the tree or jump to another tree?

I've seen this behavior in my cat so I was deliberated a lot about whether to tell this

anecdote but I was living in a house where I had to keep the door to my room closed.

My cat wanted to be in the room a little bit to get treats from me but in general she

didn't like being in a room with a locked door.

It bothered her and so she would go to the door and want to get out.

If I gave her all the treats she wanted, she would immediately go to the door and back

to get out.

If I didn't give her, if I gave her just a small amount, she would hang out even for hours

waiting for the rest of them before she decided to go but if I hit this sweet spot,

she would get indecisive so she'd go stand at the door and I'd open the door for her

and then she'd sit on the threshold and she'd look back into my room and she'd look out again

and she'd do that several times.

This head switching thing, like thinking about,

do I want to stay for more treats or do I want to go and be free and eventually she would often

just give me this look, look right in my face and then run back into the room and I closed the door.

I'd always thought that's just amazing that a cat can be making decisions at that kind of level.

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