Monday, January 25, 2010
Human/Non-human animals
I think what distinguishes human animals from non-human animals is the ability to reason, think critically and make advancements. We can invent many different things to enhance our society and make things easier for ourselves. We are also capable of preventing things from happening due to our reasoning and common sense. Animals act based on instinct which is survival. These are basic things such as protecting themselves, reproduction and consumption. Even though we also act on survival, there is deeper thought and reasoning used for these necessities. Our capabilities make human animals more distinct than non-human animals
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I disagree with your statement that animals act solely from instinct and merely in the interests of survival. When we compare differences both physiologically and behaviorally we find that there is " Close similarity of basic central nervous system structure and function in a wide variety of animals, indicating that whatever processes lead to conscious experiences are not limited to human brains." animals also show "versatile adjustment of behavior in response to unpredictable challenges." and many animals use language systems " which often seems to inform receivers about the conscious experiences of the sender; and which can also provide information about them to eavesdropping cognitive ethologists. We rely heavily on both verbal and nonverbal communication to infer what our human companions are thinking and feeling, and the same basic approach can be applied to many other species."
Donald, Griffin. Gayle, Speck. "New Evidence of Animal Consciousness." The Animal Ethics Reader. Ed. Susan Armstrong. Richard Botzler. Routledge, 2008. 127. Anthology.
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