6 ms·

Evidence Points To Conscious 'Metacognition' In Some Nonhuman Animals

12 points by limist 17y ago

fnid 17y ago
It really astounds me, the arrogance with which people talk about animals not being conscious. How can they pretend to know what is in the mind of those animals? We can communicate with them. Maybe not as completely as we'd like, but they do get sad and happy. Anytime someone says something about how stupid animals are, I just think they are stupid because they aren't even able to differentiate between what we know and what we don't know. If you can't admit I don't know, then you really need to check yourself.
- a-priori 17y ago
  I agree. There is a grey area between what is known, scientifically, to be true, and what is known to be false. Much of animal cognition falls into this grey area, and it will likely remain there for the foreseeable future. Hell, it's an assumption I make that other humans experience the world the same way I do. My theory, which is based on what I know about neuroscience but is unscientific, is that all animals with a neocortex (that is, all mammals) experience the world much as we do. Bear in mind that our awareness of the world is constructed within the brain, and is therefore only as detailed as our current mental faculties allow (even though you may not realize this). The flip side of my theory is that those lacking a neocortex (non-mammals vertebrates such as reptiles, fish, insects, etc., as well as invertebrates) do not have a similar experience, which I think is also true.
  - fnid 17y ago
    You said, "Bear in mind"... I chuckled. But seriously, I think there is a range of cognitive ability. Some animals and perhaps fish or reptiles, living or dead, or birds even, are smarter than others, this is probably true, or at least appears to be true from observation. However, the big problem to me is that people think somehow humans are distinct and unique and above aaall other life forms. That consciousness begins and ends in homo sapiens. But, like you alluded to, even within humans, there is a vast range of conscious capabilities.
    - a-priori 17y ago
      Haha, I didn't even see that pun. Good eye :) Let me clarify though: while I don't think humans are much different from the other mammals, I think it's a big stretch to lump us in with fish and reptiles. The key is the neocortex, which is unique to mammals. (Birds are another story that I don't know much about. I'm tempted to think that through parallel evolution at least some species have developed a similar faculty without a neocortex.) More important than variations between people are variations within one person over time. I remember cases when, as a child, I didn't understand what was going on around me. Maybe I did at the time, but I realize now that I didn't. I was still conscious and aware of course, but had a much simpler model of the world that I was working with. I imagine that's what it would be like if you could see what's going on in another mammal's brain -- very similar processes going on, with a simpler model of their environment.
    - gloob 17y ago
      But, like you alluded to, even within humans, there is a vast range of conscious capabilities. I'm not entirely certain that that is what was being alluded to (although feel free to correct me if I'm wildly off base). Some branches of philosophy (especially philosophy of mind, especially philosophical idealism, especially solipsism) that are internally consistent but raise the question of whether consciousnesses other than one's own exist at all. A fairly common question, for instance, when talking about strong AI is: How can we tell if it's conscious? Since we lack any real sort of objective metric for such a thing, there are two plausible answers: 1) We ask it, or 2) We follow our gut and make a guess. Both of these answers have fairly obvious problems with them. All of those problems apply just strongly when we're dealing with the idea of animal consciousness as well, or even with the idea of anything other than oneself being conscious.
    - giardini 17y ago
      fnid says: "the big problem to me is that people think somehow humans are distinct and unique {and _above_ all other life forms). That consciousness begins and ends in homo sapiens." But except for the part I bracketed, the above is pretty much true. There is little evidence of self-awareness in other animals and certainly nothing like what humans display. Along with that, our language ability is unique (Sure I know about signing apes, dolphins, African parrots, et al, wherein minimal language abilities are present). No doubt that animals have emotions. But consciousness? No. Animals other than man live in the "here and now". Other than following genetically-programmed patterns, they neither plan for the future nor reminisce about the past as we do. And that is just fine: that's all they apparently need. Some unique situation (I have no idea what ) must have occurred in man's history for the ability to think outside of the "here and now" to develop. About the bracketed part: I would omit it because I don't think that there is any design where man has any inherently "higher" role/purpose/goal than other animals.
  - scott_s 17y ago
    In the article, they mention that capuchin monkeys don't "barely showed capacity" for meta-cognition in their experiments. So, going on their evidence, even within mammals there is a wide spectrum.
- pasbesoin 17y ago
  I see similar misguided attitudes in both science and medicine. A pre-disposition, often strongly held, in practitioners to falsely equate "not proven" with "doesn't exist". It leads to many poor decisions, especially as some of these people are in positions of heightened responsibility and influence. I think that sometimes, although not always, these attitudes are held as a matter of convenience. If an idea can be dismissed immediately and out of hand, the person dismissing it doesn't have to deal with, or even think about, its implications. In the case of animals, if they are "mere brutes", then you are free to do with them as you please. Nice escape from any further ethical implications, in your own mind. Or the terror of contemplating one's own existence, and whether it may similarly be at the mercy of the larger world.
xexers 17y ago
If animals were discovered to be nearly as intelligent as humans, would it still be ethical to eat them? Farmers often talk about how stupid chickens are and they, therefore, have no problems eating them. But yet pigs are smarter than most dogs and we eat lots of pigs (but almost no dogs). Where does the line get drawn?
- jrmurad 17y ago
  This seems to be common knowledge about pigs. What makes them smart? I've spent a lot of time with pet dogs and maybe an hour with pigs (livestock, not pets) on my Aunt's farm. I saw no evidence that pigs have intelligence or personalities like dogs. What should I have been looking for?
  - shellerik 17y ago
    In my experience pigs are easier to train than dogs (they learn more quickly) and are less easily distracted. I trained pigs for 4-H and showed them at the county fair. I could walk a pig around with just a cane to tap it and keep it going the way I wanted. Bringing my dog to the fair would likely take all of my strength trying to hold the leash. Dogs require acclimation to novel stimulating situations or they forget their training. Pigs don't seem to care. The interesting thing to me was that if we forgot to feed them they would always seem to be able to take apart the fence and get out to eat. The patriarch got out and visited the other pens before he passed away which reinforced my feeling that they treated each other like family. Read the first google hit for pig intelligence if I haven't already gone on too long on the subject.
- logjam 17y ago
  I've been a vegetarian the last 10 years or so....grew up eating meat, and became a vegetarian for ethical, rather than health reasons (although I believe firmly that a vegetarian diet is healthier for people and the planet). For me, the issue of eating animals doesn't spring from a consideration of their level of intelligence - otherwise, I guess it could be open season on many of us. I personally grew to feel it is wrong to harm sentient beings.
- 17y ago
limist 17y ago
The fact that there remains a controversy over even the possibility of at least some animals having some form of consciousness, indicates how the evolutionary world-view still has ground to gain over the Judeo-Christian religious world-view. Put another way, I'd wager that most users of this site are familiar with Darwin's theory of evolution via natural selection. And if one accepted the basics of that theory, one would have to accept the possibility of animal consciousness, or take on the nearly untenable position that human consciousness sprang into existence from seemingly nowhere...

12 points by limist 17y ago

fnid 17y ago

It really astounds me, the arrogance with which people talk about animals not being conscious. How can they pretend to know what is in the mind of those animals? We can communicate with them. Maybe not as completely as we'd like, but they do get sad and happy. Anytime someone says something about how stupid animals are, I just think they are stupid because they aren't even able to differentiate between what we know and what we don't know. If you can't admit I don't know, then you really need to check yourself.

a-priori 17y ago
I agree. There is a grey area between what is known, scientifically, to be true, and what is known to be false. Much of animal cognition falls into this grey area, and it will likely remain there for the foreseeable future. Hell, it's an assumption I make that other humans experience the world the same way I do. My theory, which is based on what I know about neuroscience but is unscientific, is that all animals with a neocortex (that is, all mammals) experience the world much as we do. Bear in mind that our awareness of the world is constructed within the brain, and is therefore only as detailed as our current mental faculties allow (even though you may not realize this). The flip side of my theory is that those lacking a neocortex (non-mammals vertebrates such as reptiles, fish, insects, etc., as well as invertebrates) do not have a similar experience, which I think is also true.
- fnid 17y ago
  You said, "Bear in mind"... I chuckled. But seriously, I think there is a range of cognitive ability. Some animals and perhaps fish or reptiles, living or dead, or birds even, are smarter than others, this is probably true, or at least appears to be true from observation. However, the big problem to me is that people think somehow humans are distinct and unique and above aaall other life forms. That consciousness begins and ends in homo sapiens. But, like you alluded to, even within humans, there is a vast range of conscious capabilities.
  - a-priori 17y ago
    Haha, I didn't even see that pun. Good eye :) Let me clarify though: while I don't think humans are much different from the other mammals, I think it's a big stretch to lump us in with fish and reptiles. The key is the neocortex, which is unique to mammals. (Birds are another story that I don't know much about. I'm tempted to think that through parallel evolution at least some species have developed a similar faculty without a neocortex.) More important than variations between people are variations within one person over time. I remember cases when, as a child, I didn't understand what was going on around me. Maybe I did at the time, but I realize now that I didn't. I was still conscious and aware of course, but had a much simpler model of the world that I was working with. I imagine that's what it would be like if you could see what's going on in another mammal's brain -- very similar processes going on, with a simpler model of their environment.
  - gloob 17y ago
    But, like you alluded to, even within humans, there is a vast range of conscious capabilities. I'm not entirely certain that that is what was being alluded to (although feel free to correct me if I'm wildly off base). Some branches of philosophy (especially philosophy of mind, especially philosophical idealism, especially solipsism) that are internally consistent but raise the question of whether consciousnesses other than one's own exist at all. A fairly common question, for instance, when talking about strong AI is: How can we tell if it's conscious? Since we lack any real sort of objective metric for such a thing, there are two plausible answers: 1) We ask it, or 2) We follow our gut and make a guess. Both of these answers have fairly obvious problems with them. All of those problems apply just strongly when we're dealing with the idea of animal consciousness as well, or even with the idea of anything other than oneself being conscious.
  - giardini 17y ago
    fnid says: "the big problem to me is that people think somehow humans are distinct and unique {and _above_ all other life forms). That consciousness begins and ends in homo sapiens." But except for the part I bracketed, the above is pretty much true. There is little evidence of self-awareness in other animals and certainly nothing like what humans display. Along with that, our language ability is unique (Sure I know about signing apes, dolphins, African parrots, et al, wherein minimal language abilities are present). No doubt that animals have emotions. But consciousness? No. Animals other than man live in the "here and now". Other than following genetically-programmed patterns, they neither plan for the future nor reminisce about the past as we do. And that is just fine: that's all they apparently need. Some unique situation (I have no idea what ) must have occurred in man's history for the ability to think outside of the "here and now" to develop. About the bracketed part: I would omit it because I don't think that there is any design where man has any inherently "higher" role/purpose/goal than other animals.
- scott_s 17y ago
  In the article, they mention that capuchin monkeys don't "barely showed capacity" for meta-cognition in their experiments. So, going on their evidence, even within mammals there is a wide spectrum.
pasbesoin 17y ago
I see similar misguided attitudes in both science and medicine. A pre-disposition, often strongly held, in practitioners to falsely equate "not proven" with "doesn't exist". It leads to many poor decisions, especially as some of these people are in positions of heightened responsibility and influence. I think that sometimes, although not always, these attitudes are held as a matter of convenience. If an idea can be dismissed immediately and out of hand, the person dismissing it doesn't have to deal with, or even think about, its implications. In the case of animals, if they are "mere brutes", then you are free to do with them as you please. Nice escape from any further ethical implications, in your own mind. Or the terror of contemplating one's own existence, and whether it may similarly be at the mercy of the larger world.

xexers 17y ago

If animals were discovered to be nearly as intelligent as humans, would it still be ethical to eat them? Farmers often talk about how stupid chickens are and they, therefore, have no problems eating them. But yet pigs are smarter than most dogs and we eat lots of pigs (but almost no dogs). Where does the line get drawn?

jrmurad 17y ago
This seems to be common knowledge about pigs. What makes them smart? I've spent a lot of time with pet dogs and maybe an hour with pigs (livestock, not pets) on my Aunt's farm. I saw no evidence that pigs have intelligence or personalities like dogs. What should I have been looking for?
- shellerik 17y ago
  In my experience pigs are easier to train than dogs (they learn more quickly) and are less easily distracted. I trained pigs for 4-H and showed them at the county fair. I could walk a pig around with just a cane to tap it and keep it going the way I wanted. Bringing my dog to the fair would likely take all of my strength trying to hold the leash. Dogs require acclimation to novel stimulating situations or they forget their training. Pigs don't seem to care. The interesting thing to me was that if we forgot to feed them they would always seem to be able to take apart the fence and get out to eat. The patriarch got out and visited the other pens before he passed away which reinforced my feeling that they treated each other like family. Read the first google hit for pig intelligence if I haven't already gone on too long on the subject.
logjam 17y ago
I've been a vegetarian the last 10 years or so....grew up eating meat, and became a vegetarian for ethical, rather than health reasons (although I believe firmly that a vegetarian diet is healthier for people and the planet). For me, the issue of eating animals doesn't spring from a consideration of their level of intelligence - otherwise, I guess it could be open season on many of us. I personally grew to feel it is wrong to harm sentient beings.
17y ago

limist 17y ago

The fact that there remains a controversy over even the possibility of at least some animals having some form of consciousness, indicates how the evolutionary world-view still has ground to gain over the Judeo-Christian religious world-view. Put another way, I'd wager that most users of this site are familiar with Darwin's theory of evolution via natural selection. And if one accepted the basics of that theory, one would have to accept the possibility of animal consciousness, or take on the nearly untenable position that human consciousness sprang into existence from seemingly nowhere...