Ever feel lonely? Unloved? How about the opposite — having a surplus of love that you could give out? These states of mind hit us pretty often, so it’s important to have benefactors of love as well as objects of affection. But the humans, drugs, food, homework and devices that typically fulfill these functions are unreliable and unsatisfactory at best. Face it: your significant other will and has cheated on you, your friends don’t understand you, homework is absent several months out of the year, and drugs ... well, let’s leave drugs out of this.

The only things that can reliably fill your love needs are cute animals. With hearts of gold, no ulterior motives and constant companionship, cute animals can put out as much love as they take in. Can you honestly say that you receive as many warm nuzzles or let out as many squeals of joy with a human as opposed to a cute little puppy? Aside from increasing personal happiness, cute animals help keep society strong. Case in point is Japan: They have cute animals or depictions of them everywhere: subways, sidewalks, anime, food, school books ... And the result? One of the most cohesive, pacifist and orderly societies in the world. The abundance of cute animals works so well that when people get angry or sad in Japan, they tend to take it out on themselves, not others, thus the high rate of suicide and low rate of homicide.

What exactly constitutes a cute animal? Check out CuteOverload.com, the world’s leading authority on cuteness. It features pictures from a wide variety of very cute creatures, organized by animal as well as other categories, like inter-species loving or “Cats ‘n’ Racks.” CuteOverload has revolutionized the way we think about cuteness by creating the “Rules of Cuteness,” which attempt to catalog what exactly creates cuteness. Also worth noting is StuffOnMyCat.com, where people send in photos of random stuff — such as dolls, clothing, other animals or Flava Flav alarm clocks — piled on top of their cats. You’d be surprised at the feline’s level of tolerance, and the combination of a cute creature and funny situations always leaves you with a smile.

I’d like to shift the focus to the cute creatures themselves, but not your standard cat or dog — more like amazingly cute creatures that are off the beaten track. I want to introduce a few exotic creatures that epitomize cute and that, if a part of your life, make you wholly satisfied like no other thing in this world could.

Hedgehogs: Although I have warm feelings for all hedgehogs, it’s specifically the small African Pygmy hedgehog that has stolen my heart. Their cuteness stems from a variety of things. One is their tiny, aesthetic, well-defined features — hedgehogs are far more beautiful than any other small rodent. They have this never-ending look of inquisitiveness that is decidedly cute. And perhaps because they are covered with spikes, making you work harder to get to their cuteness, you end up appreciating their non-spiky features that much more. (By the way, you can still hold hedgehogs, spikes and all.)

Owl Monkeys: I was watching a documentary about these researchers from MIT, Duke and SUNY who pulled off an amazing feat: training a monkey to control a robotic arm simply by its brain activity, via electrodes placed directly in its brain. Although it was a scientific breakthrough, I was struck by how incredibly cute the owl monkey was — a kind, friendly-looking thing with big eyes, like an owl. Look it up on Google Images or email me for a picture to truly understand its cuteness. It would be a heart-wrenching battle if I had to choose between an owl monkey or a hedgehog to keep as a pet.

Sloths: I need to qualify my decision to talk about sloths by admitting that yes, they are not the cutest things in the world. However, I include them because they are the friendliest-looking. If you had to rank animals on how comfortable you would feel walking up to them and starting a conversation, sloths would rank first. Probably because of the perpetual smile they have on their faces.

Tama-chan: The flying turtle featured in the anime “Love Hina.” Incredibly cute, this mischievous creature flies around making cute noises, doing cute things like drinking Coke, and generally helping to drive the plot of the story. Yes it’s mythical, but if you deal in animated cute animals, this is the one for you.

Although these creatures are some of the cutest in the world, you don’t necessarily need to snuggle with an owl monkey every night to be happy. Start with a mouse, an octopus, a parrot, even AIBO the robotic dog. There are a lot of cute animals in the world, waiting to give you some loving and receive some of yours. So next time you have problems with the boyfriend or girlfriend, don’t get upset — just dump the person in question and locate your nearest hedgehog breeder.

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In the spirit of the Big Game, our resident (dirty) Cal student Ziv offers to answer any questions you may have about our beloved rival. Questions and responses will be published in Ziv’s column on Thursday, Nov. 29. Email questions to zivs (at) stanford (dot) edu.