How did the cat die? No one ever tells you that part. If the cat just keeled over and died and they just attributed it to curiosity, couldn�t the cause of death just as easily have been that he had an allergic reaction to something he ate earlier? Or maybe he had a massive heart attack coupled with a brain hemorrhage. If the cat twitched a couple times after collapsing, that could be why. The options need to be explored before assigning the blame to curiosity.
Also, some would say that the cat�s curiosity got him into a bad situation so we can say that it was curiosity that killed the cat. For instance, they might say that if a cat saw an open dryer, wondered what was inside, climbed in, and was killed when someone turned it on, the curiosity was what killed him because it made him climb in the first place. This is a fallacious statement because curiosity did not kill the cat. Technically, what killed him was the combination of extreme heat while being thrown and knocked around inside the dryer. If a cat bites an electrical cord, what kills him is the 30,000 volts surging through his tiny body - not curiosity.
Another avenue that needs to be explored is the character and mental state of this cat. Who is he anyway? Is it really fair to attribute curiosity as a trait of all cathood if, in reality, this particular cat was just abnormally curious. I don�t think so. If this cat had a nasty habit of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, maybe he just accidentally wandered into a dangerous situation without really caring what was there or not. Perhaps the cat was actually suicidal and the curiosity that he expressed was a search for a way to kill himself. If that were true, then normal curiosity is not dangerous at all; it is only suicidal curiosity that could be hazardous to your health.
All I want is for the options to be explored before curiosity is given a bad name. Curiosity has actually been a good quality many times throughout history. If we don�t explore all of the options, who knows what other positive personality traits will be tainted because of a single, unlucky cat.