Applied philosophical thought experiments

The Boycat has spent the past week at the vet; he's still a very sick kitty, and one whose health and life expectancy are unknowns at this point, but he came home today, and ate a little bit, and is now sleeping under the kidlet's bed, purring whenever anyone speaks to him.

It's kidney failure, just like the Ladycat, except that he's young and was pretty healthy before. There's some hope that the failure might have been the result of some other problem (like a bladder infection) and that if the problem is taken care of, the kidneys will be functioning well enough for everyday life.

Or possibly not. At this point there's no way of knowing.

Bleakly funny, though: When the spouse took him in last Friday, the vet said, "I estimate this has a 50/50 chance of saving his life, and we're closed all weekend, so we'll call you Monday with an update." So we spent the entire weekend not knowing whether he was alive or dead -- we had a literal Schrodinger's cat.