Sofia Kyriakopoulou
Although the question of whether we (humans) can understand a non human perspective, has been historically the subject of considerable debate and research, up until now there is no conclusive supportive evidence to demonstrate that this is indeed a real possibility. Focusing on non human animals and inquiring on the nature of their mental states is a practical version of the classic problem of other minds i.e. how to know the mind of someone other than oneself. This seems particularly difficult to ascertain, especially if one considers how difficult it is to even be certain of ones own mental states. The question is one of philosophy and of science, this essay will limit itself to philosophical arguments. This essay will address the issue by evaluating the similarity between oneself and the other, making this a case of comparing animal to human minds. Beginning with an examination of historically influential views on animal thought and reason and then surveying contemporary philosophical views, the essay will present arguments against and arguments in support of animal mind capabilities framed as (i) a problem of animal thought and reason, (ii) a problem of animal consciousness.
Despite the lack of consensus on the inner workings of animal minds, attempting to do so provides insights that enrich our understanding of what it means to be human, and consider the implications of emerging evidence that humans can be understood as one species among many and do not necessarily deserve the special status that they so far enjoy. Looking at ancient literature could be deemed anachronistic, however it is useful to un- derstand the origins of the idea that humans are endowed with distinctly human mental capacities, such as self consciousness and so deserve a moral status that animals do not (human exceptionalism). Aristotle is a philosopher that denies reason (logos) to animals, a conclusion that is based on their absence of speech (Lurz, 2009). However, this reading excludes memory and emotions from its scope, which one might consider quite relevant to the notion of mind. Consequently, the discussion can open towards what we understand by mind. In a broader sense mind is similar to what Aristotle would call soul or psyche. In this sense, human soul is understood as intellection or thinking, the capacity of understanding and reasoning (Barnes, 1991). In modern terms, following John Locke’s notion of mind, a wider array of mental activities can be included, such as perception, sensation, representation, desire, imagination, memory, emotions, allowing for an expansion of a narrowly defined concept of mind which is based on the faculty of reasoning only (Mesaroș, 2013). Does the lack of thinking or logos entail the absolute denial of an animal mind? According to Aristotle, animals have sensory perception, desires, memory, imagination, and even emotions (Sorabji, 1995). Wouldn’t it follow then that in the sense of a broader definition of mind, animals can become candidates to the status of beings that bear a mind?
In the 17th century, Descartes (1596-1650) famously argued that animals are like automatons or machines; they act in sophisticated ways, but they do not feel pain (Regan and Singer, 1976). Descartes maintained that animals are living organic creatures but they cannot reason; only humans are conscious, have minds and souls and therefore only humans deserve moral consideration. (Panaman, 2008). Descartes gave two arguments in support of his denial of animal thought and reason, known as the language-test argument and the action-test argument (Radner & Radner, 1989). It should be noted that Descartes does not deny organism consciousness, percep- tual consciousness, access consciousness or phenomenal consciousness to animals. He denies the capacity for self-conscious reflective receipt or awareness of one’s inner states which, he maintains, belongs uniquely to humans and their rational souls (Thomas, 2006). In the vein of Descarte’s arguments a more modern interpretation offered by Davidson (1982), proposes that language is necessary in all propositional attitudes and goes further to maintain that even belief depends on having the concept of objective truth which comes only with language. But how can one tell when a creature has propositional attitudes? What sort of empirical evidence is relevant in view of a language barrier between humans and animals? Descarte’s view seems to be mostly useful in absolving us from moral responsibility towards animals.
On the other hand, Montaigne (1533-1592) in his essay An Apology for Raymond Sebond reflects on the interactions with an animal intimately familiar to him: “When I play with my cat, who knows if I am not a pastime to her more than she is to me?” (Screech, 1982: 17). Montaigne continues by putting forward the question: “Why should it be a defect in the beasts not in us which stops all communication between us? We can only guess whose fault it is that we cannot understand each other: for we do not understand them any more than they understand us. They may reckon us to be brute beasts for the same reason that we reckon them to be so” (Screech, 1982: 18). Hence, Montaigne presents a relationship with nature in which human reason must come to terms with its own limits. The perceptions of animals suggests that the human intellect is only one among many possible others, that remain inaccessible to us. He points out that certain gestures of animals could be construed as a form of speaking which would indicate a form of intelligence, albeit unknown to us. “Montaigne thereby posits a border between human beings and animals, one that is not traversable by human language and reason (Melehy, 2005: 271). Consequently, Montaigne identifies some sort of interspecies equality which can be seen as laying the ground for the development of a non human centric outlook: “We ought to note the parity there is between us. We have some modest understanding of what they mean: they have the same of us, in about equal measure” (Screech, 1982: 16).
David Hume (1711-1776) takes an even bolder stance by maintaining that animals not only possess thought but possess reason too. He develops an argument from analogy by comparing how humans make causal inferences with how animals make such inferences.He brings humans into the realm of nature, understanding their reason as a kind of Instinct, contrary to the Cartesian view according to which only humans possess the unique ability to reason. Hume uses a type of thought that is understood as Belief, which he defines as a “lively idea” or “image” caused by or associated with a prior sensory experience. He defines Reason as a mere disposition or instinct to create associations among ideas on the basis of past experience. By following Hume’s argument and definitions, one can find evident similarities in the ways that animals and humans act and therefore attribute them an ability for thought and reason (Boyle, 2013). A well-known problem with Hume’s argument is the fact that Belief does not appear to be definable in terms of vivid ideas presented to consciousness. Additionally, there is an issue with how incontestable his analogical proof is, since similar types of behaviours can often be caused by very different types of processes, by those of machines even. The ways that human beings behave in the presence of vivid ideas to their consciousness, is not in itself a fact that can provide incontestable proof that these objects act as a result of vivid ideas presented to their consciousness (Searle, 1994).
In more contemporary discussions on the topic we can find intentional systems theory (Dennett, 1987), according to which our concepts of intentional states are theoretical concepts whose identity and existence are determined by a common-sense psychological theory or folk-psychology. Subjects, on the assumption that they are rational, tend to believe what they perceive, draw obvious logical inferences and act so as to satisfy their desires. Furthermore, all that is required for a creature to have intentional states is for its behaviours to be well predicted and explained by the principles of folk psychology. Intentional state concepts only refer to abstract entities that are constructs for predicting and explaining various behaviours. Consequently, the fact that much of animal behaviour is usefully predicted and explained from the intentional stance, one could deem animals to be genuine thinkers and reasoners. Nonetheless, arguments against deny that our intentional state concepts are theoretical concepts (Searle, 1983) and critique intentional systems theory’s instrumentalism, arguing that on such an interpretation even thermostats would have beliefs and desires (Braddon-Mitchell & Jackson 2007).
Common-sense Functionalism is another theory which also maintains that our intentional state concepts are theoretical and determined by our folk psychology but takes a realist interpreta- tion that explain intentional states as a variety of discrete internal states in the mind that play the causal roles and have the internal structures that our intentional state concepts describe (Fodor 1987, 1991). Common sense functionalism is often taken to support the view that thinking in- volves an internal language or language of thought (Fodor, 1975). It is then argued that since an- imal behaviour is successfully predicted and explained by our folk psychology, it is possible that animals actually have such internal states (Fodor, 1987; Stich, 1979; Carruthers, 2004). Critiques consider intentional ascriptions to animals to have become a far more speculative practice than it actually is (Stalnaker, 1999). Moreover, based on Evan’s (1982) generality constraint principle, critiques point out that few animals have the sorts of structured representational states as described by folk psychology.
Another type of argument can be found in Biological Naturalism (Searle, 1983, 1992). Here, our concepts of intentional states are concepts of experienced subjective states caused by low-level biochemical states of the brain that result from causal structures, not from functional or causal roles. The conclusions of his argument is that animals have intentional states. First, because many animals have perceptual organs, similar to human organs and as such one can assume, that they operate according to similar physiological principles. Extrapolating from the human case, if the stimulation of our perceptual organs leads to certain physiological processes, which cause us to have certain perceptual experiences, it follows, from the principle of similar cause-similar effect, that the stimulation of perceptual organs in animals leads to similar physio- logical processes with similar perceptual experiences. But one might question, how is it possible to determine that the brain states of animals are relevantly similar to human?
Focusing specifically on the issue of consciousness, arguments are developed from inner- sense theories (a subcategory of higher order theories of consciousness), according to which higher-order awareness is a perceptual awareness directed inwardly toward the mind, not outwardly toward the world and mental-state concepts do not require the capacity for higher order thought (Lycan, 1996; Armstrong, 1997). As such, the mental states of animals are deemed conscious just in case they are higher-order aware of them by means of an inner perception. If higher-order awareness does not require higher-order thought one could deduce that many animals have such an awareness of their own mental states. Arguments against perceptual account of higher-order awareness can be found in such works as those of Rosenthal (1986) and Lurz (2003).
To overcome inner sense theories problems, higher-order thought Theories were devel- oped (Rosenthal,1986). Here, a mental state is conscious just in case one has the higher-order thought that one is in such a mental state. Animals have conscious mental states, provided they are capable of higher-order thoughts about themselves as having mental states. Are animals capa- ble of such higher-order thought? This, it has been argued, would require a concept of ‘I’ that is impossible without language. Arguments supporting that animals do not possess higher order thoughts can be found in Dennett (1991); Quine (1995); Davidson (1985); Bermúdez (2003); and Povinelli (2007). Objections have been raised against such arguments, in favour of animals possessing higher order thought capabilities by Parker et al. (1994); Clayton et al. (2003); Gennaro (2004); Lurz (2006); Proust (2009).
In an attempt to overcome the stalemate in the higher order theories field, first-order theories, are proposed, where conscious mental states make one conscious of the external environment (Evans, 1982). Mental states are not conscious because one is higher-order aware of them but because the states themselves make one aware of the external world. Unconscious men- tal states, affect one’s behaviour but do not make one conscious of their environment. First-order theorists argue that there are animals that form beliefs about their environment based on their perceptional states and bodily sensations and, therefore, can be thought to enjoy conscious per- ceptual states and bodily sensations (Evans, 1982). First-order theories, do not require higher-order awareness for consciousness, and seem to provide a more plausible account of animal consciousness than higher-order theories. However, they too encounter problems (Lurz, 2004, 2006), in response to which hybrid views are developed (Tye, 1997; Dretske, 2000). Here, beliefs and desires are conscious in virtue of having higher-order thoughts about them, while perceptual states and bodily sensations are conscious in virtue of their capacity to impact one’s belief-forming system. However, this was in turn critiqued in that to possess conscious perceptions and bodily sensations, an animal would have to be capable of higher-order thought (Lurz, 2010).
To a large extent the inner workings of non human animals remains a mystery. Through time, many philosophers have argued that consciousness is inherently private, and by consequence one’s own experience is unknowable to others. Language allows humans to cross this gap by communicating their experience to others while animals are not recognised as possessing this ability. However, despite the controversy, it remains a matter of common sense to most people that some animals do have conscious experiences. Most people, if asked why they think familiar animals are conscious, would point to similarities between the behaviour of those animals and human behaviour. Such similarity arguments, are inherently limited in that they are open to critique addressing the disanalogy between animals and humans and arguing that the similarities don’t entail the conclusion that both are sentient. The quest of deriving epistimological conclusions about animal minds and animal consciousness is a particularly difficult one. In absence of an entire theory that can explain the full extent of similarities and disimilarities between human and non human animals, one might at least recognise that perhaps the groundwork has been laid for addressing at least some of the questions about animal minds and animal consciousness. On the other hand, one might conclude that philosophy is still much too far from providing conclusions on matters such as animal consciousness. The arguments on both sides are by no means exhausted. In the meantime, one might use these debates and efforts to rethink the impact of humans’ activities and attempt to re-evaluate their relationships with the rest of the non human animals, on a basis that would appreciate both human and non human life.
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