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Articles 181 - 210 of 454
Full-Text Articles in Animal Sciences
Phooey On Comparisons, Gwen J. Broude
Phooey On Comparisons, Gwen J. Broude
Animal Sentience
Chapman & Huffman reject the notion that human beings are very different from other animals. The goal is to undermine the claim that human uniqueness and even superiority are reason enough to treat other animals badly. But evaluating human uniqueness for this purpose only plays into the hands of those who exploit invidious comparisons between us and other animals to justify mistreatment of the rest of the animal kingdom. What human uniqueness we may discover would still be no justification for how we behave toward other animals. We should also ask ourselves whether any human-centric criterion can be justification for …
Human Superiority Is Obvious But Does Not Justify Cruelty, Yew-Kwang Ng
Human Superiority Is Obvious But Does Not Justify Cruelty, Yew-Kwang Ng
Animal Sentience
Humans are obviously superior, in general, to other animals. This is also supported by evolution and Jerison’s encephalization quotient. However, superiority does not justify cruelty towards other animals. Rather, it suggests higher responsibility. Just as adults are more capable than 2-year-olds, they also have a much higher responsibility in helping others in need, including other animals.
Across The Great Divide, Debra Merskin
Across The Great Divide, Debra Merskin
Animal Sentience
Chapman & Huffman’s target article calls for a reevaluation of claims of human uniqueness and superiority. It also adds to the literature on how species differences, as Darwin noted, are more of degree than kind. The threats to environmental health and species survival are a consequence of excluding nonhuman animals from moral concern and consideration. The theory of intersectionality should include speciesism in the array of discriminatory practices.
Refining Thoughts About Human/Nonhuman Differences, Colin A. Chapman, Michael A. Huffman
Refining Thoughts About Human/Nonhuman Differences, Colin A. Chapman, Michael A. Huffman
Animal Sentience
Our commentators come from many fields and disciplines and express highly divergent views, illustrating broad interest in the question. From the breadth of comments, we have identified two recurring themes, which we focus on here. The first is a preponderance of cautionary remarks about evaluating the differences between humans and nonhuman animals. The second concerns whether considering animals as worthy of moral consideration is one of many useful tools for conservationists trying to prevent extinction, habitat destruction, and climate change.
Diversity On Human Difference: Unanimity On Human Responsibility, Colin A. Chapman, Michael A. Huffman
Diversity On Human Difference: Unanimity On Human Responsibility, Colin A. Chapman, Michael A. Huffman
Animal Sentience
Further commentaries on our original target article add important new points and expand our understanding of the differences between animals, particularly between non-human and human primates. But whether they affirm or deny that humans are unique, all commentators agree that our special abilities mean we should be taking responsibility for the care of nature and the plants and animals it supports. We ask: is humankind doing this?
Octopus Experience, Peter Godfrey-Smith
Octopus Experience, Peter Godfrey-Smith
Animal Sentience
The first part of this commentary attempts to get "inside" the octopus mind a little further than Mather does, drawing on her description of octopus cognition in many places but diverging in others. The second part outlines other disagreements with her account of the animals, especially in the area of social behavior.
Casting A Sheep’S Eye On Science, David M. Peña-Guzmán
Casting A Sheep’S Eye On Science, David M. Peña-Guzmán
Animal Sentience
Marino & Merskin review evidence that sheep are not just passive and reactive creatures. They have personalities that vary from individual to individual and endure over time. It follows that we must rethink what it means to study them scientifically.
Far More To Sheep Than Meets The Casual Eye, Bernard Rollin
Far More To Sheep Than Meets The Casual Eye, Bernard Rollin
Animal Sentience
Marino & Merskin’s survey of the cognitive and social capacities of sheep is an eye-opener about the individuality and emotionality of this most maligned of all farm animals. My own eyes had already been opened by an adopted orphaned lamb, so much more like a dog as a companion animal than the mindless robot I had been conditioned to expect. I am morally certain that Marino & Merskin’s survey will have a similar effect on readers open to changing their minds.
To Preserve Or To Conserve?, Liv Baker
To Preserve Or To Conserve?, Liv Baker
Animal Sentience
Treves et al. propose the notion of trusteeship to help meet our responsibility to nature and individual animals, their homes, cultures, and societies. This proposal is grounded in a real-world framework that reveals how conservation has become distorted by anthropocentrism, human exceptionalism, and ethical hypocrisy.
The Intrinsic Value Of Nature, Joanna E. Lambert
The Intrinsic Value Of Nature, Joanna E. Lambert
Animal Sentience
Treves et al. explain the need to preserve the rights of nonhuman species, human youth, and future generations. Although conservation biology has claimed to have an intrinsic valuation ethic since its inception in the 1980s, many aspects of the field have taken a decidedly anthropocentric and instrumentalist trajectory. This has important consequences for conservation-related policy and practice at all scales: local, regional, and global.
Are Our Ideas About Octopus Life Too Anthropomorphic To Help?, Kenneth J. Aitken
Are Our Ideas About Octopus Life Too Anthropomorphic To Help?, Kenneth J. Aitken
Animal Sentience
Our understanding of the evolution and ontogeny of the octopus and its behavioral repertoire in its natural habitat remains rudimentary at best. There are many parallels, but also just as many differences from our models of human biology and ontogeny, making anthropocentric generalizations of limited use in explanation.
A Behavior-Analytic Approach To Understanding Octopus “Mind”, Lindsay R. Mehrkam
A Behavior-Analytic Approach To Understanding Octopus “Mind”, Lindsay R. Mehrkam
Animal Sentience
Mather makes a convincing case for octopus sentience based on a lot of evidence of their complex learning capabilities. It should follow from Mather’s findings that these intelligent invertebrates are worthy of welfare considerations, just as vertebrate species with similar capabilities are. I provide a complementary environment-behavior analysis of how we might understand the world of the octopus more straightforwardly, borrowing from Mather’s examples, to show how to promote opportunities for complex learning and species-typical behaviors in the octopus.
Chickens Play To The Crowd, Cinzia Chiandetti
Chickens Play To The Crowd, Cinzia Chiandetti
Animal Sentience
The time was ripe for Marino’s review of chickens’ cognitive capacities. The research community, apart from expressing gratitude for Marino’s work, should now use it to increase public awareness of chickens’ abilities. People’s views on many animals are ill-informed. Scientists need to communicate and engage with the public about the relevance and societal implications of their findings.
Post-Darwin Skepticism And Run-Of-The-Mill Suicide, John Hadley
Post-Darwin Skepticism And Run-Of-The-Mill Suicide, John Hadley
Animal Sentience
Peña-Guzmán’s depiction of the opponent of animal suicide as a conservative is a straw man. It is possible to accept that animals are self-conscious and reflexive yet still reject the view that they have the mental wherewithal to commit run-of-the-mill suicide. That animal behaviour can be positioned on a continuum of self-destructive behaviour does not establish that animals can intentionally kill themselves.
An Adaptationist Perspective On Animal Suicide, Timothy P. Racine
An Adaptationist Perspective On Animal Suicide, Timothy P. Racine
Animal Sentience
Peña-Guzmán’s discussion of suicide in nonhuman animals has broad implications. In this commentary, I focus on the logical relation between suicide and intention. Proximate cause must be distinguished from ultimate function in explanations of suicide. I briefly discuss two adaptationist accounts of suicidal behavior.
Lessons From Chimpanzee Sign Language Studies, Mary Lee Jensvold
Lessons From Chimpanzee Sign Language Studies, Mary Lee Jensvold
Animal Sentience
Claims are often made about behaviors being unique to humans; the evidence usually shows they are not. Sign language studies on chimpanzees may provide a useful model for comparative studies of suicide. A productive approach to comparative studies is to focus on observable behaviors rather than getting lost in the pitfalls of vague definitions and changing measures.
Animal Suicide: An Account Worth Giving?, Irina Mikhalevich
Animal Suicide: An Account Worth Giving?, Irina Mikhalevich
Animal Sentience
Peña-Guzmán (2017) argues that empirical evidence and evolutionary theory compel us to treat the phenomenon of suicide as continuous in the animal kingdom. He defends a “continuist” account in which suicide is a multiply-realizable phenomenon characterized by self-injurious and self-annihilative behaviors. This view is problematic for several reasons. First, it appears to mischaracterize the Darwinian view that mind is continuous in nature. Second, by focusing only on surface-level features of behavior, it groups causally and etiologically disparate phenomena under a single conceptual umbrella, thereby reducing the account’s explanatory power. Third, it obscures existing analyses of suicide in biomedical ethics and …
Can Nondolphins Commit Suicide?, David M. Peña-Guzmán
Can Nondolphins Commit Suicide?, David M. Peña-Guzmán
Animal Sentience
This Response addresses the scientific and philosophical criticisms of my 2017 target article “Can nonhuman animals commit suicide?” It defends my key claims and explores topics (such as animal judgment, animal theory of mind, and the evolution of suicide) that did not appear in the original article. It also points out areas in which further research is needed and concludes that we should be wary of accusations of “anthropomorphism” in debates about animal suicide.
Animal Suicide: Evolutionary Continuity Or Anthropomorphism?, Antonio Preti
Animal Suicide: Evolutionary Continuity Or Anthropomorphism?, Antonio Preti
Animal Sentience
Evolutionary processes are characterized by both continuity and discontinuity. Evidence on suicide in nonhuman animals is faint and often rests on the metaphorical or anthropomorphic use of the term. Suicidal behavior might be an evolutionary jump relatively recent in our species: a byproduct of living in groups of people who are not as closely related genetically as in social groups of nonhuman mammals.
Roots Of Self-Preservation Failure In Animal Behavior, Denys Decatanzaro
Roots Of Self-Preservation Failure In Animal Behavior, Denys Decatanzaro
Animal Sentience
Affective variation from euphoria to dysphoria, best understood in humans, is also found in the behavior and neurochemistry of many other mammals. Suicide in humans typically occurs in highly dysphoric and despondent individuals. Self-injurious behavior has been observed in dysphoric and despondent nonhuman primates. In humans, suicide is facilitated by a highly-evolved neocortex giving rise to behavioral flexibility and culture. As Peña-Guzmán indicates, some other mammals also have elaborate neocortices and the capacity for cognitive insight, particularly apes, delphinids, and whales. Suicide is most likely to occur in species where individuals live in stable groups of highly interdependent kin.
Animal Suicide And "Anthropodenial", Ryan Hediger
Animal Suicide And "Anthropodenial", Ryan Hediger
Animal Sentience
Increasing understanding of the impressive cognitive and social capacities of nonhuman animals suggests the possibility that they may sometimes commit suicide. Such notions tend to be dismissed as “anthropomorphism.” That interpretive hazard, I argue, must be weighed against the opposite hazard of “anthropodenial” — “the a priori rejection of shared characteristics between humans and animals” (de Waal 2006). If animals do commit suicide, how often is it motivated precisely by the impact of humans on animal life?
Continuum And Temporality, Gerard Kuperus
Continuum And Temporality, Gerard Kuperus
Animal Sentience
I fully support the continuum proposed in the target article and argue along the same lines that we should be suspicious of drawing any strict borders between human and non-human animals. Since we can say very little with absolute certainty about human intentions regarding suicide, we have no certainty about the intentions of non-human animals. Although I am very sympathetic to Peña-Guzmán’s overall argument, I suggest that time could be taken into consideration as well.
Thinking About Thinking Chickens, Lori Marino
Thinking About Thinking Chickens, Lori Marino
Animal Sentience
This response focuses on three major conceptual threads that run through the peer commentary on my target article: (1) how the use of chickens influences our views of them, (2) whether education is effective, and (3) what components of chicken psychology are most relevant to understanding who chickens are.
If Nonhuman Animals Can Suicide, Why Don’T They?, C. A. Soper, Todd K. Shackelford
If Nonhuman Animals Can Suicide, Why Don’T They?, C. A. Soper, Todd K. Shackelford
Animal Sentience
An evolutionary analysis suggests that selection is unlikely to have tolerated the capacity for intentional self-killing in nonhuman animals. The potential to escape pain by suicide would have presented a recurrent and severe adaptive problem for an animal with a reproductive future to protect. If the potential for suicide arose in the evolutionary past, anti-suicide mechanisms may have co-evolved, as we believe they have in adult humans. Peña-Guzmán’s (2017) argument that some nonhuman animals can suicide is incomplete without an account of the defences that result in the vast majority opting not to.
Dogs Aren’T Jealous – They Are Just Asking For Accurate Information, Karen L. Overall
Dogs Aren’T Jealous – They Are Just Asking For Accurate Information, Karen L. Overall
Animal Sentience
Awake fMRI offers us a unique opportunity to view and understand how dogs see the world and use the information in it. Given the limitations of behavioral assays and the small sample sizes inherent in these studies, labeling of patterns of canine behaviors using pop psychology terms may actually interfere with our understanding of canine brains and obscure for us a more parsimonious but exciting interpretation of canine behavior. We should use this window into how dogs think wisely.
Chicken Minds And Moral Standing, Kristin Andrews
Chicken Minds And Moral Standing, Kristin Andrews
Animal Sentience
Some of the cognitive traits that Marino reviews are not in themselves relevant to ethics, either for chickens or human infants, but affective traits are, among them desires.
Lessons From Behaviour For Brain Imaging, Carolyn J. Walsh
Lessons From Behaviour For Brain Imaging, Carolyn J. Walsh
Animal Sentience
Integrating physiological and behavioural arousal with social context is fundamental to understanding affect in dogs. Cook et al. (2018) have made a worthy start towards illuminating the neural basis of dog affect underlying resource loss. However, their study depends on retrospective behaviour reports versus direct testing, and an interpretation of differential neural activation that is based on too few dogs. Research groups conducting canine brain-imaging work might: (1) consider collaborative approaches to augment sample sizes and replicability, and (2) take a recent lesson from dog behavioural research regarding a more cautious approach to applying functional labels to physiological and/or behavioural …
The Degeneracy Of Behavior And The Rise Of Neuroimaging To Measure Affective States In Dogs, Peter F. Cook, Gregory S. Berns
The Degeneracy Of Behavior And The Rise Of Neuroimaging To Measure Affective States In Dogs, Peter F. Cook, Gregory S. Berns
Animal Sentience
It is gratifying and significant that so many scientists from diverse fields are arguing in-depth regarding a particularly complex set of social emotions in a non-human animal. Emotions play a fundamental role in decision making and information processing. Neuroimaging is important in understanding the cognitive and emotional worlds of non-human animals and can help measure covert emotions lacking clear behavioral correlates. Various experimental approaches could clarify the relative importance of attachment and aggression in jealousy and whether the phenomenon we measured is more akin to human envy or jealousy. Reverse inference from amygdala activation is probably justified because behavior is …
Finding The Green-Eyed Monster In The Brain Of A Dog, Peter Singer
Finding The Green-Eyed Monster In The Brain Of A Dog, Peter Singer
Animal Sentience
That dogs show behavior suggestive of jealousy has long been known and has been demonstrated under controlled conditions. Cook et al. have now shown arousal in the amygdala when dogs see a caregiver feeding another dog. This finding has ethical significance in two respects. First, the consideration shown by the investigators for the welfare of their experimental subjects sets an example for other researchers using animals. Second, the greater understanding of the emotional lives of animals should lead to more concern for their needs.
What Can The Social Emotions Of Dogs Teach Us About Human Emotions?, Dean Mobbs
What Can The Social Emotions Of Dogs Teach Us About Human Emotions?, Dean Mobbs
Animal Sentience
It has long been believed that social emotions such as guilt and jealousy are only expressed in humans. In the case of jealousy, its adaptive value has been linked to the prevention of sexual infidelity or fairness. So why would dogs feel jealousy? I suggest that understanding how social emotions have been bred into dogs can help us understand our own emotions, including their functionality — and potentially their mechanisms.