In Panopticon they covered the history of uplifting and they said that uplifting targeted all of the low hanging fruit of the species that exist. That's why there was a surge of uplifted species and then a 30+ year period of no uplifts. Dog and cat brains are too simple to uplift to sentience. But I'm sure that there are plenty of splicer/exalt morphs that look like you would expect a canine and feline uplift to look. In Transhuman there is the Critter morph, which was written to be a quadruped uplift looking animal pod morph but the artist submitted an anthropomorphic image.

You can also go the other way around. While lorewise there are no uplifted Cats or Dogs, you will surely find folks who make "Anthropomorphic Animal" not just a look but also a culture to the point of bringing up their kids fit for it. Basically Furries exist and you can draw all the conclusions from that in regards to colorful and interesting morphs as well as lots of queerness and genderfuckery going on. :D

Uplifted dogs would be fine, but can you imagine what chaos an uplifted cat would cause? Transhuman sociopaths.

There could also be a simple explanation; the authors doesn’t want their game to attract the Furry community. LOL (Just a joke. Don’t overreact on my comment. I know they have nothing against that community.)

Just imagine all the cat fur floating in 0g..or octomorph/cat hybrids

(What is HSD?) The question for you, GB, is is it sufficient to have a 'human' morph modded to look kitty, or does it actually have to be primarily cat genestock? And is a modified cat morph without a cat ego sufficient, or do you actually need full uplift?

If I'm remembering correctly, in the playtest docs for Transhuman there was a feline pod morph called the Predator (or something). A bit of fiction came with it as a report that it WAS initially an uplift but all the subjects were predatory sociopaths and just make the morph a pod to recoup some of the losses! Unfortunately, those files aren't available anymore as they weren't CC licensed. That's all I can do as I don't have any copies to transcribe...which is a bummer since there were some other gems in that playtest as well!

Elephant uplifts aren't a big thing in EP for the same reason most people don't play whale uplifts. They are too damn big. Most hab corridors are too small to accommodate either one, and Pandora gate openings are only occasionally large enough to allow vehicles to translate threw, let alone a literal elephant sized morph. When they do come up, its always in a very niche way. Like spaceship morphs, or the dolphin morphs that don't function well outside of water. That said, any decent GM can make it work as long as they are willing to fuzz over some of the facts. slightly larger corridors, create some more reasonably sized analogs, glaze over some of the facts about uplift science, and Boom! You have a funky new ego/morph uplift combo! All it takes is a GM willing to go the extra mile. And there are plenty of amazing Mercurial plot hooks you can grab onto. [indent][i]"Better watch out, or Somatek[sup]tm[/sup] is commin to get ya! They are looking for their escaped, experimental, borderline sociopath, cat/dog/snake/hamster/etc... uplift and they aren't taking any chances!"[/i][/indent] Your players relay RELAY want to play a Whale uplift? Put him in a Surya, ride the rest of your players in salamander morphs, there's lore in EP about an Exhuman group that thinks the TITANs are hiding in the sun... who is to say they are wrong? A pure Mercurial campaign would be an intense experience, and there is an entire chapter in Panopticon just filled with uplift themed hooks and history. Let your PC's go wild (metaphorically and literally)!