Are cats telepathic?

To answer the question, you have to ask first whether telepathy is a genuine subject to discuss seriously. I think that you will find that the scientists and the experts believe that telepathy is pseudoscience. I don't think there's any hard evidence to prove that it exists in people. Therefore, it will not exist in cats either.

Definition of telepathy: the supposed communication of thoughts or ideas by means other than the known senses. Sounds like mind-reading. Cats don't mind read but they can understand pick up our mood and learn our habits.

So, I'm going to stick my neck out right away and say that cats are not telepathic. However, they have skills which might hint to some people that they are telepathic. I will provide some examples.

Your cat is always at the front door when you come home. They are behind the front door waiting to greet you. Or they sense when you are going to get up when they're on your lap. They appear to be reading your mind.

But this is not mind-reading. Cats greet their owners when they return home back because they've waited very patiently for a very long time (perhaps hours) behind that front door and they know in general terms through their internal clock and through the rhythms and habits of their relationship with their owner that he or she is going to come home at a certain time plus or minus an hour or two. That's how it works. It is far more functional and realistic than mystical.

And if a cat jumps off your lap before you get up even when you are thinking of getting up it is because you are showing signs of getting up such as, for example, turning off the television so there's no sound coming from the TV. Or putting down the newspaper. There will be some sort of signal as a preliminary to you getting up which tells your cat that it is going to happen at which point, they prepare for it.

This is because cats are very sensitive to auditory and olfactory stimuli. They have great senses. Their hearing is more sensitive than ours and they can detect higher frequencies. Their nose is more sensitive than ours and they can detect smells which we can't. Their sight is not better than ours and is slightly worse in fact but they combine their sight with their hearing and sense of smell to become very sharp on picking up changes in the environment around them.

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You might, for example, be sitting with your cat and he suddenly turns his head looks towards a wall or the back door. You've heard or seen nothing. He has seen and heard something probably heard something more than seen it and is inquisitive about what it might be. My cat does this all the time. He picks up the sound of foxes outside when I haven't. Or someone coming to the front door.

Cats are more instinctively and intuitively sharper in terms of sensory input than humans in my opinion. And they are very sensitive to the rhythms and habits of daily life. They like these routines to be set in concrete actually. They like each day to be the same. They like their owner to do the same things day in and day out because it gives them certainty and it reassures them. But they also learn these rhythms and respond to them. This means they can predict sometimes what is going to happen next.

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This is not telepathy but memory in combination with their sharp senses. And cats do have decent memories by the way. They remember their owner even when they haven't seen them for many years. This has been categorically proved when a lost cat is found and reunited with their owner. They settle in immediately to the way they were five years ago.

People might like to believe that cats are telepathic because people like to believe in mysterious things/myths and legends (think big cat sightings in the UK for instance when they are all false). I would rather try and be more scientific and explain feline behaviour from that standpoint.

Developing human-cat routines over years

Although like many others I realise that routines are very important in a domestic cat's life, it was only this morning that it dawned on me that I have developed these routines to the point where my cat predicts my movements and desires. He does things before I ask him to because he understands the routines that exist between us.

Gabriel in my garden years ago. Photo: MikeB

You achieve these routines by being with your cat every day all day over a period of many years. Further, the human has to have a set routine in life as many retired people have incidentally, integrated into which are the routines and lifestyle of your cat. Eventually your cat understands what you will do next and pre-empts it. I will give two examples which apply to me but each person and their cat will have their own examples which are just as valid. It is harder for full-time office workers to develop these routines. For retired people it happens naturally. But you have to be a concerned cat guardian.

Sitting on my lap

When I watch television my cat sits on my lap. That is a very commonplace occurrence anywhere on the planet. When I turn off my television my cat jumps off my lap. The two events are linked. My cat knows that I have stopped watching television and that I will get up from my armchair and do something else such as make a cup of tea and return to the television. The important point is that my cat knows that when the television becomes silent it is time for him to get up off my lap. He does it without any encouragement.

Sitting on my lap in bed

The same sort of rules apply when he sits on my lap while I am in bed. He knows that after I have worked on my computer on the website and I put my laptop computer down it is his turn to come up to my lap and ask for some combing which I'm delighted to give him. This happens every day and once I have stopped combing him I communicate with them for a while and let him sit on my lap for five more minutes. After this time he knows that it is time for him to get off my lap and jump off the bed. He does this without me asking him. I don't have to indicate to him that I'm going to get up by moving my body. He jumps off and walks off the bed before I do anything. He knows through his internal clock and by routine and habits that it is time for him to leave the bed.

These are two examples of routines in which a domestic cat has become fully integrated into the routines of his human companion. It is a great form of communication between two entirely different species of animal. There are other forms such as the sounds we make and the sound that our cat makes to us such as a meow which is a demand for food normally. And there's cat and human body language as well which is a part of the communication process between two different species. But routines play a vital role.