So lots of people want in game pets...


logang

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Oh my gosh, LoganG - that's such a difficult thing to ask! D:

I likely wouldn't right away, depending on the pet because of the measure of security provided (and emotional attachment). ...Eat my wolf-dog only to get eaten by some other hungry animals. Of course, depends how dire the situation is before I have to. I know my daddy says to save your horse for last because of the life-saving benefits in so many other ways than just for the horse flesh! But I'd probably hope that I'd be able to find something else to chew on before long and keep looking.

Sad but true, the dog likely wouldn't fight too hard or realize what was happening and I wouldn't need too much strength to kill and eat it if push came to shove and I had to. Difficult to say, my eyes sting just thinking about it right now as a reasonable, not-starving human being.

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Guest Alan Lawrance

If I was in the same shoes as that hiker, it's impossible to know what I would do. I think the longest I've gone without eating is maybe 12 hours? I have no reference to understand what it feels like to not eat for days.

I have a 7-year old yellow lab, and I honestly can't imagine killing her with my bare hands because I was starving. I would keep holding out hope that we would be rescued, or that we would find something to eat soon.

At least that is what I believe I would do, as I sit here typing at my computer surrounded by Halloween candy wrappers.

In a game scenario, it's a different story. Even though I want to be immersed into the game, I know at the back of my mind it's only a simulation, and that is going to influence the choices I make. I would probably still feel guilty about it though. :)

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I agree that it is impossible to know how you will act in any given scenario unless you are actually placed in that scenario.

I have two dogs that are definitely part of the family and while I would attempt to hold out as long as possible, if it came to me possibly dying of starvation and never seeing my wife and two children again or killing my dog, even with the emotional connection that exists, I would think that the yearning to see and be there for my family would be stronger and I would do what was necessary to stay alive. Of course I would look for any and all avenues to avoid killing the dog.

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Well this being all about survival, it wouldn't even be a question to me. When you are in a place, where you are starving to death, your mind is telling you, you are not going to survive, and you have been lost for weeks, your mental state is going to be nothing it like right now, sitting in front of a computer, reading the question and then trying to decide if you would eat the dog or not.

As i said, in a survival situation, the answer will be YES and i wouldn't think twice about doing it. Once i have then consumed it, and when I'm finally alive and rescued and survived, will be the time to let out the emotion of loosing your best mate and the way you went about loosing him . . . But until you get there, eat anything thats available if you have no other choices.

I got taught, if you exert x amount to get a feed, you need to be able to x amount back. So if you have nothing to eat for a week, and its going to take 10energy pts to go out and hunt for something, you need to make sure that what ever you kill will give you 10 energy pts back. If it doesn't then you don't go out and kill it.

Nect to you is something that will give you 20 pts of energy so you eat that then you have x amount to look for more and do other things to survive . . .

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So to prefice this, I've had a lot of pets that I've been fond up growing up, but I grew up on a farm raising animals that we would later take to slaughter.

So....Yeah, I'd eat him, and I would enjoy every bite. MMMM.... dog!

(I've never eaten dog before/any domesticated animal other than your general pig, chicken, cow, etc.)

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So to prefice this, I've had a lot of pets that I've been fond up growing up, but I grew up on a farm raising animals that we would later take to slaughter.

So....Yeah, I'd eat him, and I would enjoy every bite. MMMM.... dog!

(I've never eaten dog before/any domesticated animal other than your general pig, chicken, cow, etc.)

Im with you, but have eaten cat, rat, horse, camel, racehorse goanna,crocodile, pigeon (variety of birds including budgies) and witchery grubs (good bush tucker fried up they taste like fried whiting) KcMMpMc.jpg

My biggest challenge is going to be the change in region, climate, and knowing whats up there to eat, hence me looking in iTunes iBooks for a guide for the Norther region this is situated in, so i can go in prepared, which IRL that wouldn't happen, so in a way, I'm cheating a little :( lol

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If it moves, it's food.

So you're not a big veggie eater then? Or does rustling in the wind count as movement?

Also, I'm pretty sure there are some amphibians and insects that you wouldn't want to apply this rule to, you know, due to poison.

I didn't say "if it doesn't move, it's not food".

The latter part is where logic comes in.... It's easy, don't eat anything that's poisonous.

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@TattooedMac, what to eat in winter in the Arctic region is easy: if you can't hunt or fish, you're screwed. That is, unless you find some house where there are supplies.

@TarjaS Thanks for that, Well i can throw a spear and with the help of a woomera, which is a wooden Australian Aboriginal spear-throwing device, i think i can fish and hunt :) now lets just hope the physics of the game allows things like this ;P

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There's rather more to eat in the arctic winter than just fish and game. You won't survive without eating things you need to kill first, you need that concentrated energy from proteins and lipids, but you can stretch things out with other things, especially if you have a working appendix.

Of course, if all you eat normally is processed food, or you have unfortunate genetics, then your appendix won't do its job and help you get energy out of things like spruce needles. Instead it will inflame or burst when you try it, and you'll just find another way to die.

Most varieties of pine can be eaten, spruce is particularly good in the spring, when the shoots are tender, and even more unpleasant to try and eat than most the rest of the time, when the needles are, well needles. The inner bark can also be eaten, but its so much work to get to that its really a net loss, unless you had some other reason you had to sit around not moving much all day. Most other edible plants would be below the snow, or in the frozen ground, but they are still there if you know what to look for.

As far as poison goes, not much in the far north is that poisonous. Sure, there are some things, but not that many. Poison is always tricky. There's the silver test for alkaloids (useful with mushrooms mostly), but more generally there's always the skin test. If you develop a skin reaction to holding something next to your skin for a long time, then it's probably poisonous. If you don't, well, then you still don't know for sure, but at least you tried.

Sure there are other tests you can do, but they need more things than a scrap of silver, or a strip of cloth and your own flesh.

In regards to eating my dog. Yeah, I would if I had to. I don't want to, don't get me wrong, but I would have to be an ass not to. Any dog worth having would gladly die for you, and only an ass would defile that sort of love by rejecting it, and abandoning the dog in a hell of your own making because you were too selfish to do the right thing and kill it. Any dog not worth having aint worth tying yourself up in knots over eating it or not. That's not even a real question. Eat that funny looking coyote, and get on with it.

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  • 2 weeks later...

But if you did get the in game pet and after hours of gameplay some unfortunate events occurred and you found yourself freezing and starving, would you eat your pet?

Of course I wouldn't. I'd be much more likely to get myself killed trying to defend my pet, who would no doubt be much better able to fight and defend himself than I would.

Usually, it's hard to imagine what you'd in an extreme situation until you're actually tested. In this case, I can answer with 100% certainty. To me, it would be like eating my child. But maybe I'm not the average.

n.b. I haven't read the linked article, so I'm assuming the dog is alive and you have to kill it first. If it's already dead, that changes things. It becomes more of a Donner Party situation.

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I used to have Caucasian Sheepdog (died year ago, so I don't have any pet right now) - and if you were to ask me - I would say no. Why? Because it's more useful alive than dead. First of all - it's a huge source of heat. Got plenty of fur, so you can just hug him and survive freezing temperatures easily. On top of that he got an excellent smell, so he could track animals I even didn't know were there - which will be very helpful in hunting (both: spotting the animals and killing them) - as well as finding water. On top of that he can carry luggage needed be (though I most likely would prefer him to save the energy for hunting instead of luggage).

But in an actual survival situation? Most likely I would eat him if there would be no other food source and I'd be starving. However there's many questions before doing such a desperate move (you basically replace long-term food with short-term food). Certainly I would do my best to keep the animal alive as well as myself.

It'd be much simpler though if the pet wouldn't be much of a use. Say - if it's a small dog unable hunting to substain itself - I certainly wouldn't have any problem killing it if needed.

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The latter part is where logic comes in.... It's easy, don't eat anything that's poisonous.

Hahaha. Easier to say than done :)

If you know the environment you get yourself into - that's not a problem. For example in Europe or very Northen Asia there's very, very few poisonous animals or insects.

However if I would find myself stranded in Australia? I would have A LOT of trouble in touching anything that moves precisely because of poisons (probably snakes would be easiest to figure out assuming you can kill one - just get rid of head and skin - it should be fine - other than that? I have no clue about any poisonous Australian animals).

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The latter part is where logic comes in.... It's easy, don't eat anything that's poisonous.

Hahaha. Easier to say than done :)

If you know the environment you get yourself into - that's not a problem. For example in Europe or very Northen Asia there's very, very few poisonous animals or insects.

However if I would find myself stranded in Australia? I would have A LOT of trouble in touching anything that moves precisely because of poisons (probably snakes would be easiest to figure out assuming you can kill one - just get rid of head and skin - it should be fine - other than that? I have no clue about any poisonous Australian animals).

Research the universal edibility test.

And you're right about snakes, head gone and down the hatch.

Some other reptiles, not so much

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  • 8 months later...
But if you did get the in game pet and after hours of gameplay some unfortunate events occurred and you found yourself freezing and starving, would you eat your pet?

Link to Dailymail article.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... rness.html

Having personally spent rather a lot of time stomping around in the Canadian wilderness I can testify that domesticating forest creatures just ain't gonna happen, unless you're a Disney Princess :).

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