All representation of thought in humans is linguistic, whether vocal or otherwise. — Mww

I've gotten the impression that pigs, at least when young, have a sense of humor. (A mother pig with a litter of piglets, not so much.) — wonderer1

How totally fascinating. That would make a great research project. We know animals change once they pass puberty, and we know the young are more open to exploring new things. Could our capacity for humor change as we age? Is a sense of humor and joy of learning new things something we can preserve as we age, delaying the negative effects of aging. And there is also that human-pig bonding issue. Can playfulness improve our relationships with animals? Where as that old sow is stuck in her ways and is not open to a relationship with humans?

Yes, pigs are social animals:
Social groups
Pigs live in stable social groups, often in matriarchal structures, where they form close bonds with each other.
Social hierarchies
Pigs develop social hierarchies through scent and noise, and these hierarchies can be established even when pigs are blindfolded. https://www.merckvetmanual.com/behavior/normal-social-behavior-and-behavioral-problems-of-domestic-animals/social-behavior-of-swine

1. There is a difference between rational behavior, and behaving according to reason. It is certainly rational to pull one's hand out of fire if one wants to keep one's hand from being destroyed. But we don't say: "Boy, when your hand went into that fire and you pulled it out, you did some quick thinking and came up with a really rational response." The hand was not pulled out of the fire because of a thought process, balancing various concepts, choosing the most logical and then taking action. It is instinctual to pull a hand out of fire. It's not behavior that is according to reason; it's behavior according to instinct or reflex. Those instincts can later be rationalized (saving hands from destruction is the purpose of the reflex, or at least the result of the development of that reflex), but the actor, the person with the hand, wasn't behaving according to reason when his own hand flew out of the fire. Human beings can both recognize the rationality of certain actions and functions (after the fact, post hoc), and they can use reason to develop causes behind their own behaviors before they behave according to those thoughts. People who are saying animals are simpler versions of humans using reason are seeing rationality after the fact and asserting the animal must have seen that rationality before the fact and then acted according to that reason. But rationality in a function doesn't mean there is an actor who thought about that rationality before the function occurred and then acted according to that rationality. 2+2+4 shows rationality, but we don't need to think 2 is being rational when it adds 2 more to itself to make itself, now plus the other 2, equal to 4. That's silly. There are no agents or desires or things communicated within the rational pile of characters "2+2=4".

2. I'm talking about behaving according to reason. Do animals use reason to inform their actions before they act? People seem to be saying that animal behavior, like human behavior, shows evidence of being influenced by some level of that animal's thoughts. Thinking, conceptualizing, wanting and choosing leading to actions. I disagree, for many reasons.

A dog wants to lick a bowl. So the dog begs. When the person looks at the dog, the dog moves his eyes to the bowl to communicate or tell the person what he wants. The dogs sits very still like a good boy, wags his tail, gets the person's attention and looks at the bowl and looks at the person, and looks at the bowl. The dog must be conceptualizing licking the bowl and using reasonable methods to bring about a future state of actually having the bowl and getting the person to help him bring about that future state by communicating that conceptualized mental state in the dog. Right? Sounds like a rational explanation for why the dog looks at the bowl and then looks at the person and begs. We insert rational agency into the dog and use it to explain behavior. Makes sense.

Eyeballs are designed to sense light and the brain uses this to locate objects. The system works very well, especially for some birds. The development of the binocular vision is so complex, so purposeful, it doesn't seem like it could have arisen without a designer. Therefore, to explain the existence of eyeballs, we can insert a rational designer at work over millions of years to bring about a purpose called vision.

That's what we are doing when we insert rationality in animal agents. We can't explain their behavior without saying it is like our behavior, so we just say they must be doing what we are doing. But like intelligent design, saying a dog is using reason and thinking things, is not the only explanation, nor the simplest or demonstrative of the most evidence.

3. Instinct. Humans are animals and dogs are animals. Both, at times, act according to instinct. We just do what we do because of the stimuli and the way we are structured. Humans, like those on this thread, sometimes, instead of instinct (maybe), conceptualize things like "behavior" and "communication" and other things we are talking about here on this post. We think. Humans, use the concepts to develop "reasons" or optional choices for ourselves, and then, sometimes, base our actions on these thoughts. We choose to hold our hand in the fire no matter how much it hurts because of thoughts that this will make some brilliant philosophical point (or whatever). We act both according to instinct (pull the hand out quickly), and according to rationality (keep the hand in, or never touch the fire, or whatever the thought is).

Do we really need rational thought to explain what animals do? Couldn't their instincts be so highly developed that they never need any thoughts to move from the present into the future? I say, certainly could. I do all kinds of rational things without thinking. A ball is hurling at my head and I duck and the ball misses me - does that make me really smart? I need to move a heavy stone, so I set up a lever and move it - does that mean I've communicated my desire for the stone to move to the stone?

This speaks to all of the accusations that saying animals do not use reason or thought to inform their actions is elitist; saying humans think they are better than animals because we can use reason. But it is just as elitist to say humans and dogs both use reason, but humans are just better at it.

Who cares for a minute whether instinct or reason is more complex or better than the other? Not me. I'm trying to make a reasoned argument, communicate it to other people. My dogs could care less about any of this - that makes them innocent and pure, maybe geniuses, not stupid.

So the creature who uses reason, the human, sees rational thought all over the universe - is it possible that we are narrowly, simple-mindedly, rationalizing or personifying all of these other things to be just like us? I say yes. No wonder we see animals as rational agents - we are too proud of being rational agents ourselves to deny it of other creatures.

If a dog could talk (and therefore display evidence of an ability to think and reason), might they say "keep your slow moving thoughts and reasons to yourself - I need none of it ever."

I say, for sake of this point I'm making, instinct is way better than reason. If the goal of living things is to live, to procreate and live more, then the sequoia tree or the fungus is way more advanced than we reasoning animals. If the sequoia tree could talk they could say "take my lifespan and shove that up your hierarchical, rationalizing ass - plus, I don't have an ass."

Instinct is good enough. Amazing enough. Complex enough.

4. Philosophy of Mind. Saying my dog is communicating with me when he begs for food is placing a mind of his own in the dog. This places all of the epistemological problems of knowledge, the mind-body problem, questions of free-agency and choice, all in the dog. To simply think "I am hungry" is to think "I am." So we are saying dogs create the same illusory, ill-defined "self" in their consciousness and build communication methods like begging postures in order to share these self-reflections with some other self for a that dog's purposes and conceptualized intentions. We are saying the dog, in some simpler fashion, feels his hunger and then thinks of ways to communicate the concept of hunger (not the feeling itself) to some other creature in response to this thought. But why saddle the dog with all of this "rational" activity of mind? Neither humans nor dogs are behaving according to reason when they feel hunger. We don't think "I need to consume energy to live, so I should make myself feel hungry." We just feel hungry. Like an instinct. Dogs, it seems to me, don't feel hunger and then ask themselves "what can I do to satisfy this hunger?" Just like the hunger just is because of their structure, begging just is because of the dog's structure. There need be no theoretical, hypothesis formation in a dog's mind; they don't have to think "If, theoretically, I beg, and look cute, I can convince that person to move the bowl to the floor." They don't form this hypothesis and then experiment with different cute acts second. They just feel hunger; this produces certain other behaviors; I happen to think it's cute; and sometimes this produces licking bowls. All of the rationalization of what should "I" do next to communicate "my mind" to that "other mind" so that the "other mind" will take certain actions that "I want" - that's all just as weak of an explanation as intelligent design to explain why the earth needed a moon to regulate the tides - God placed a moon there to help build the earthly environment, like I place a mind in a dog to help build a rational explanation for how good he is at obtaining bowls to lick.

5. What I am saying and what I am not saying. I am saying this: the chemical is not a living thing. Fire is a chemical reaction. Fire consumes fuel, produces waste, breathes oxygen, moves itself. But fire isn't alive. We can "breath life into the hot coals and revive the fire" but this is metaphor. The plant is a living thing. Plants are not better than fires because plants live and fires don't. Plants are different than fires. Period. Animals are alive like plants, but animals can move themselves to food, better adapt to acute environmental changes (like run from a forest fire), but animals can accidentally jump into fire or run themselves to a place where there is no food at all, or fall into the sea and drown. Animals are not better or higher than plants either, just like a living thing isn't higher or better or more complex than a chemical reaction. Humans can use reason. Reason can be used to obtain food, adapt to environment, etc. This does not mean humans must be better than animals or higher than animals because they use reason; I see no reason to saddle other animals with reasoning minds, like I see no reason to saddle fire with being "alive" in a biological sense (not a metaphorical sense). The chemical is not a living thing. The plant is not an animal. The animal is not a reasoning mind. These are all different. All with their own complexities and goods and beauties, and simplicities, bads, and uglinesses.

Lastly, none of the above speaks to what reason really is. Reason happens in a mind. Minds happen in a consciousness. Animals have a consciousness. So, just like my dog, I am a conscious, sensing, perceiving being. Somewhere in the evolutionary process, animal consciousness, along with sense perception, came to include concepts and thoughts. Like the chemical became the protein, and the protein became the cell, and the cell became the animal, the human animal became "self" conscious or a thinking, reflecting thing.

I think many people are too enamored with the idea that humans are on the same scale as the other higher mammals. We are, but, just like it is imprecise to say a fire and a dog are living beings, it is imprecise to say that all animal consciousness must involve concepts, thoughts, logic and decisions.

We personify the universe in intelligent design. And we are doing it again talking about what our dog is "thinking" and communicating to us. My dogs have no time to think. Only we humans take time to think about whether something else thinks about anything. We just do. They just don't. That's okay with me. In fact, it makes them more amazing to me. I can't imagine getting through this life without thinking and planning and testing and planning again at some point, yet they do such amazing things I could never do, all by instinct and their complex, beautiful structure.

Ever read Stranger in a Stranger Land? The protagonist decided that's what separates us. Man is the animal that laughs. — Patterner

Some researchers believe other animals have a sense of humor.

We think of humour as a distinctly human emotion, but some animals may also use it to strengthen their bonds. https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240223-do-animals-have-sense-of-humour

I would love to see research with pigs because of what @wonderer said about piglets.

"Boy, when your hand went into that fire and you pulled it out, you did some quick thinking and came up with a really rational response." — Fire Ologist

:rofl: Thank you for the humorous gift.

A dog wants to lick a bowl. So the dog begs. When the person looks at the dog, the dog moves his eyes to the bowl to communicate or tell the person what he wants. — Fire Ologist

Wow that is insightful. In a documentary on TV they made a big deal out of the fact that a dog will investigate where a person points, and you are telling us that a dog points with its eyes. That deserves some research. Oh and the pointer dog!

Pointing dogs, sometimes called bird dogs, are a type of gundog typically used in finding game. Gundogs are traditionally divided into three classes: retrievers, flushing dogs, and pointing breeds. The name pointer comes from the dog's instinct to point, by stopping and aiming its muzzle towards game. Wikipedia

I wish I could talk to the people who made the documentary for TV and raise awareness of dogs naturally pointing.

We think. — Fire Ologist

That could be the subject for a whole thread.

Au contraire, mon frère, and I know this from personal experience. What swims around in our brains 99 percent of the time are memories, worries, ruminations, replays, reactions, and judgments (of ourselves, as well as of others). They’re sound bytes and flashbacks. We can call them thoughts–but they don’t constitute thinking....

Real thinking is active, not passive. Real thinking is purposeful.

What’s more, real thinking is almost always more positive and productive than the unchecked babble that goes on in our heads much of the time. Real…
https://medium.com/the-orange-journal/how-much-time-do-we-actually-spend-thinking-45a4bf09db40

This is my favorite explanation of thinking.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqXVAo7dVRU

I harp about thinking because we tend to jump to conclusions without doing the real work of thinking. And people will kill each other because of differences in belief. Maybe we can not stop that, but perhaps awareness of how our brains work will help us go through life a little more sanely.

It is certainly rational to pull one's hand out of fire if one wants to keep one's hand from being destroyed. — Fire Ologist

Instinctive behaviour can usually be explained rationally. However, when pulling one's hand out of a fire, one has no time to think, rationally or otherwise, one - whether the subject be human or other - simply reacts.
Behaviour that purposeful and reasoning can also be explained rationally. (A firefighter heads toward the fire, rather than running away from it, because his purpose is to douse the fire and end the danger it poses.)
So can emotional and irrational behaviour be explained rationally. (A man whose child is inside the building may rush into the flames, even though reason clearly indicates that he cannot reach the child and survive; he does it because love and distress impel him to act.)

We can't explain their behavior without saying it is like our behavior, — Fire Ologist

So... we have a reasonable explanation, which is declared false, even though no alternative explanation is offered. The example, incidentally, is within the range of an intellectually challenged Afghan. It would be harder to 'splain away what a search and rescue dog is expected to do.

Couldn't their instincts be so highly developed that they never need any thoughts to move from the present into the future? — Fire Ologist

In unnatural situations, in unfamiliar environments, to tackle human-constructed challenges - no.

So the creature who uses reason, the human, sees rational thought all over the universe — Fire Ologist

Most of us only we see it in living entities that evolved alongside of us, in the same environments, under the same conditions, and share a large percent of our DNA, when they behave in the same way we do in similar situations.
Some of us see it in inanimate matter, and some choose to see it only in fictional characters and their authors, while denying it in other flesh-and-brain entities. Humans see a lot of things that are not there; some of these things are more plausible than others.

Saying my dog is communicating with me when he begs for food is placing a mind of his own in the dog. — Fire Ologist

No, it's not your saying that causes him to have a mind; it's his brain.

This places all of the epistemological problems of knowledge, the mind-body problem, questions of free-agency and choice, all in the dog.

Why the hell would you do that?? Indeed, why would you even do it to yourself?

I’m guessing the inference should be that the Magritte is relevant to what I said. I’m just not sure which relevance, affirmation or negation, I would be looking for.

Little help??

Humans see a lot of things that are not there; some of these things are more plausible than others. — Vera Mont

By “see” you mean more precisely “conceive of” because we are talking about thinking, not just vision.

If you think animals think, then you are saying animals must conceive of a lot of things that aren’t there as well. (Why would you do that to animals?)

Do you think rational animals are higher, better beings than say, a vegetable too?

By “see” you mean more precisely “conceive of” because we are talking about thinking, not just vision. — Fire Ologist

Used your same word is all.

So the creature who uses reason, the human, sees rational thought all over the universe - — Fire Ologist

I'm fine with more precision.

If you think animals think, then you are saying animals must conceive of a lot of things that aren’t there as well. — Fire Ologist

Did I say that rational thought must include the entire range of human thought and imagination and mental illness? No. However, sometimes domestic animals do chase imaginary prey or cringe from non-existent threats.

Little help?? — Mww

I was attempting to convey a contradiction to the following without using language. (With the irony of using an image with linguistic content thrown in for my own amusement I suppose.)

All representation of thought in humans is linguistic, whether vocal or otherwise. — Mww

So more straightforwardly, isn't a painting (generally) a non-linguistic representation of human thought?

However, sometimes domestic animals do chase imaginary prey or cringe from non-existent threats. — Vera Mont

So sometimes animals are irrational? And there is mental illness? So more rational is better than less rational or irrational? If so, is something that behaves without using reason at all, say a river flowing downstream, is much lower and less than a rational thing?

You didn’t address any distinction between instinct as a cause of behavior and thinking as a cause of behavior.

And you missed the distinction between seeing rationality in something, like seeing it in the pile of characters “2+2=4”, and using thought and logic and reason to form a choice and then acting on that thought and choice. If you say a dog is behaving reasonably, you aren’t saying the same thing as the dog is using reason in order to base his behavior. That’s two different things. Rationality may be everywhere. Only humans seem to notice it and manipulate it with thoughts and concepts (or give a damn to bother with these constructions).

Animals are better than us because they don’t use reason, or even need to. Saying they do is just a quick and easy explanation, making them like us, like reason is so special and instinct is less special.

I like that the Greeks thought we are political creatures and it is fitting for this thread to question if any other life form is political. — Athena

That is a very popular quote - I'm fond of it myself. But Aristotle didn't mean by "political" what we mean by it; we took the Greek word and distorted its meaning. He meant that human beings live in cities - that's all. It's still a surprising thought for its time.

Also, I don't think we all have an agreement about what language is. I think we have agreement that animals are capable of communication but does that equal language? Even if it did equal language is that language limited to a few words and what concepts does that serve? — Athena

No, we don't. It makes this discussion much more difficult than it need be.

They'll be weighing the leap up before acting. But I don't see any justification to say that this implies they're thinking.
— Wayfarer
Then what, precisely, are they doing? If a human stood on that same bank, assessing the distance and scanning the far shore for safe landing spots, would you doubt that he's thinking?
ETA Moreover, exactly like the man, if the leap is deemed not worth risking, a cat will walk some way up and down along the bank, looking for a place where the water narrows or there is a stepping-stone. — Vera Mont

I agree with you and Wayfarer that they are weighing up the leap before acting. I agree with you that weighing up before acting is thinking - and thinking rationally to boot.

Still, I make that judgement. It's entirely subjective, after all. I think our intelligence and consciousness (I believe the two are very tightly intertwined) is the most extraordinary thing we are aware of, and capable of more wonders than we can imagine. — Patterner

Yes. I was a bit flummoxed when I wrote it - that last sentence is a mess. My problem is that you announce that your judgement is entirely subjective, which puts it beyond discussion and at the same appear to expect me to discuss it with you. I don't think that judgement is a simply objective one, but I don't think it is wholly subjective either.

Of course; not one of my contentions. Expression is objectified representation of conceptions, but not necessarily of rational thought, which is a certain form of representation of its own, re: propositional.
A concept is the meaning of a word. The meaning of a word is its use in propositions. — Mww

All that says nothing about the origin of our conceptions, which has nothing whatsoever to do with the expression of them, but is always presupposed by it, and thereby legitimizes the death of the “meaning is use” nonsense, — Mww

I can't make sense of this.

insofar as it is quite obviously the case we all, at one time or another and I wager more often than not, conceptualize….think rationally….without ever expressing even a part of it via “verbal behavior”. — Mww

So we are in agreement, after all.

Where did I say or hint at that? All representation of thought in humans is linguistic, whether vocal or otherwise. It is thought itself, that is not, in that humans think in images, THAT being my major metaphysical contention from which all else follows. — Mww

I even agree that humans sometimes think in images. I can testify from my own experience that not all humans do that, but it is quite sufficient for me that they sometimes do.

Ever considered how hard it is to express an image? Why else would there even be a language, other than to both satisfy the necessity to express, and overcome the impossibility of expressing in mere imagery? And there’s evolution for ya, writ large. — Mww

Oh, I think there's more to language than making good the deficiencies of images. Some people think that an image is worth a thousand words, so there are deficiencies in words, as well. Perhaps its a question of horses for courses.

……and I do not, not that it matters. In general, theory and logic depend on an intellect capable of constructing them. That to which each is directed, the relations in the former or the truths in the latter, may depend on our way of life, but method always antecedes product. — Mww

H'm. What precedes method? Or do we construct methods and then discover what they produce?

All people are human beings. All human beings are people. Two names for the same thing. If animals are like all human beings in certain respects, then all people are like animals in certain respects.
Makes sense. — creativesoul

I'm so glad you think so. I'm afraid it is a rather boring conclusion and so seems to be of little interest here.

What about human behaviour cannot be described in behaviourist terms? (Fortunately, that fad has faded) — Vera Mont

Nothing. That's why it was so frustrating to argue with. Strict behaviourism left out everything that made actions what they are and represented them as a series of meaningless twitches.

I'm talking about behaving according to reason. Do animals use reason to inform their actions before they act? People seem to be saying that animal behavior, like human behavior, shows evidence of being influenced by some level of that animal's thoughts. Thinking, conceptualizing, wanting and choosing leading to actions. I disagree, for many reasons. — Fire Ologist

Granted that sometimes we use reason to inform our actions before we act, we do not always do so. Sometimes, we must act without working out reasons beforehand. Otherwise there would be an infinite regress of preparation to act.

That's what we are doing when we insert rationality in animal agents. We can't explain their behavior without saying it is like our behavior, so we just say they must be doing what we are doing. But like intelligent design, saying a dog is using reason and thinking things, is not the only explanation, nor the simplest or demonstrative of the most evidence. — Fire Ologist

To describe what's going as "insert" rationality begs the question. The rationality is not an add-on or an insertion into the act. It is inherent in the act, or it is nothing.
You describe the animal as an agent, which makes their case quite different from the inference of a designer from the design. Nice argument. But the two cases are not parallel, so they don't work.
You are right that there are difficult issues about reading too much, or too little into an action. But that problem applies just as strongly to our reading of human actions, so you can't conclude from the difficulties that the way of looking at dogs, or human as agents - and therefore rational agents - is a mistake. When we recognize that animals are conscious, perceptive, creatures who have wants and desires, the only question is how far you can apply our paradigm of personhood, not whether you can apply it at all. If you question whether animals are conscious perceptive agents, then you are implictly question whether human are conscious, perceptive agents, and that makes no sense.

Philosophy of Mind. Saying my dog is communicating with me when he begs for food is placing a mind of his own in the dog. — Fire Ologist

I wouldn't say "placing", but recognizing. I think when we imagine that trees or storms have minds, we are "placing" a mind in them - otherwise known as personifying them. But that's just a way of speaking, not a metaphor. Few people nowadays that there really is a mind behind in them - though people used to.

like I place a mind in a dog to help build a rational explanation for how good he is at obtaining bowls to lick. — Fire Ologist

No, it is his skills at obtaining bowls to lick that justify recognizing that there is a mind at work there. It's like swallows and summer. There's a complex interplay between the symptoms of summer and the recognition that it is summer.

The chemical is not a living thing. The plant is not an animal. The animal is not a reasoning mind. These are all different. All with their own complexities and goods and beauties, and simplicities, bads, and uglinesses. — Fire Ologist

Oh, I can get behind that. For all my defence of animal rationality, I recognize that dogs are not people. They are like people, but that's different. Or, perhaps better, they are people, but differently. And some animals, but not all. But that position doesn't have the excitement or simplicity of the dogmatic, all-or-nothing approach.

Lastly, none of the above speaks to what reason really is. Reason happens in a mind. Minds happen in a consciousness. Animals have a consciousness. So, just like my dog, I am a conscious, sensing, perceiving being. Somewhere in the evolutionary process, animal consciousness, along with sense perception, came to include concepts and thoughts. Like the chemical became the protein, and the protein became the cell, and the cell became the animal, the human animal became "self" conscious or a thinking, reflecting thing. — Fire Ologist

Yes, self-consciousness is tempting as a distinction between animals and humans. So people have done experiments with mirrors and concluded that some animals are self-conscious because they can recognize themselves in a mirror. I think there's more to it than that. Existing as a conscious being requires a recognition of the difference between self and other. So some level of self-consciousness is inherent in consciousness. Even that may not be the end of it.

So sometimes animals are irrational? — Fire Ologist

Yes.

And there is mental illness? — Fire Ologist

Sure. In domestic animals. I think that it's generally caused by human activity, deliberately as in laboratory experiments, or inadvertently as in stressing the animals through violence or environmental degradation.

So more rational is better than less rational or irrational?

Better? According to whose values? Based on what standard? Measured by what metric?

You didn’t address any distinction between instinct as a cause of behavior and thinking as a cause of behavior. — Fire Ologist

Yes, I have. Often.

And you missed the distinction between seeing rationality in something, like seeing it in the pile of characters “2+2=4”, and using thought and logic and reason to form a choice and then acting on that thought and choice. — Fire Ologist

No, I didn't miss that conceptualization. Nor do I miss the actual difference when observing behaviour in humans and other animals. I just didn't think further comment was needed.

Saying they do is just a quick and easy explanation, making them like us, like reason is so special and instinct is less special. — Fire Ologist

It's not the explanation that makes all living things similar; it's evolution on the same planet. All animals are aware of the self/environment distinction, and respond to stimuli. Most exhibit hard-wired responses to certain situations. A large percentage have instincts and emotions; a smaller percentage use reason; some have imagination and foresight; a few are complex enough to develop psychological problems; only one - so far - is capable of inventing technology, medicine, politics, religion and torture.

only one - so far - is capable of inventing technology, medicine, politics, religion and torture. — Vera Mont

That is my point. We are the only one who invented knowledge and concepts and base our actions on these.

If you would even say “only one” you should able to see my simple point.

I don’t saddle my dogs with the ability to behave according to whatever faculty in me invented “politics” or language. My dogs are not doing a simple version of thinking like me, they are doing a complex version of instinct like me. Only people think or conceptualize their own consciousness.

If you would even say “only one” you should able to see my simple point. — Fire Ologist

Knowing that there are extreme ends on every spectrum does not require to accept everything other poeple impute to some aspect of that spectrum.
I see your simple point and reject on the basis of my experience and observation.

A classic!

Ever read Stranger in a Stranger Land? The protagonist decided that's what separates us. Man is the animal that laughs.
— Patterner

Some researchers believe other animals have a sense of humor. — Athena

You just can't argue with Martians.

….isn't a painting (generally) a non-linguistic representation…. — wonderer1

I’d answer that the fact an object is named, makes explicit, e.g., a “painting”, has already represented a thought, or more likely an aggregate of them, without regard to the subject of it.

There's a dissonance between those two statements - not exactly a contradiction, but close. How do you get from one to the other? — Ludwig V

I've tried to illustrate what I've stated and so far uphold via examples. Using those previously provided, on what grounds would you disagree that a bacterium is a different kind of lifeform relative to an ameba? ... This despite their being evolutionary continuity in-between (most of which is now extinct) and, hence, , for example, degrees of awareness-ability between the two otherwise distinct lifeforms.

That looks very like trying to have your cake and eat it. — Ludwig V

Even so, see the just mentioned.

Yes. Whether there is anything substantial behind it is an interesting question. But if they do, they are superior to us in that respect. Just as homing pigeons and other migratory species have superior navigational abilities to us (in that they don't require elaborate technologies to find their way about the globe). So why do you insist that they are lesser? — Ludwig V

To address the first portion of this, not all lesser animals (say all cats or all dogs) give evidence of something that might anecdotally be termed a sixth-sense. This just as not all humans experience events that might anecdotally be termed a sixth-sense. (Example, one of my grandmas occasionally had REM dreams which she interpreted in ways such that she was certain of things that would occur in the future and, generally to the best of my knowledge, she was able to - coincidentally or not - predict some future events in this way. Tangentially, this can get into a more in-depth philosophical question, one for which I have no answer: how many co-incidences does it take to make one entertain the possibility of a causal connection?)

As to why lesser animals (rather than, say, fellow animals of equal status to us): to mention just one pivotal reason, no other known lifeform, either as an individual self or as a collective, has a total selfhood (hence, a body-mind totality of being) which is anywhere near in holding the same degree of power - by which I here strictly mean "the ability to do and to undergo" - that human selfhood holds ... and, one would hope, the same then entailed degrees of responsibilities for this very same power. And this despite the sometimes extensive range of perceptual abilities which humans are not endowed with but which some lesser animals are: to include magnetoception (e.g., pigeons), electroreception (e.g. sharks), infrared sensing (e.g., certain snakes - which ought not to be confused with vision (e.g., with our use of infrared binoculars)), and so forth.

Of course lesser animals hold concepts of which they experientially learn. No mature canid or feline, for example, is devoid of an understanding of what is and is not their territory - and this can only be a non-concrete but abstract understanding regarding concrete percepts, and, hence, a non-verbal concept. But their concepts come nowhere near the complexity and magnitudes of the concepts humans can entertain. And, with us being a species other than the other species out there, we are of a different kind, despite the evolutionary continuity addressed.

But all this ties into notions of value. There are two senses of being "evolved". "An adult human's mind is more evolved that that of an infants" - is one such usage. Here, whatever the standards might be, an adult human's mind is closer to these standards than is that of the infant's. In this same general sense, humans are more evolved than bacteria as lifeforms. The other notion that stands at a stark crossroad to this is that of "evolved" signifying "adapted to the ever-changing physical reality all life on Earth inhabits"; and in this second sense of the word, all life presently living is equally evolved, bar none. Evolutionary biologists know of this second sense of the term all too well, but even an evolutionary biologist will not hesitate to kill a mosquito, for example, in some sort of then rather twisted belief that the mosquito's life is of equal value to the life of a human. An individual mosquito is then of lesser value than an individual human - thereby again leading to the term "lesser animals" (or, as I like to sometimes muse, lesser "anima-endowed beings").

My problem is that you announce that your judgement is entirely subjective, which puts it beyond discussion and at the same appear to expect me to discuss it with you — Ludwig V

you have been participating on a philosophy forum to the tune of 1.5K posts. Surely, you've been in one or two discussions where you did not expect the other person to change their mind.

But I don't know why subjective judgement puts something beyond discussion. Opinions change. Tastes change. Someone can present an opposing opinion in just the right way to sway the other person.

Some people think that an image is worth a thousand words, so there are deficiencies in words, as well. — Ludwig V

Indeed. Just as B&W Mary knew all the words, but didn't know what red looked like until she stepped out of the room and saw the rose. There are some things words can't do.

A concept is the meaning of a word. The meaning of a word is its use in propositions.
— Mww

I can't make sense of this. — Ludwig V

That part attributed to me, isn’t mine. Or isn’t mine in conjunction with what came before it. I’d like to deny I ever said it, but….crap, I forget stuff so easy these days. If you would be so kind, refresh me? Or, retract the attribution?
————-

….method always antecedes product.
— Mww

H'm. What precedes method? — Ludwig V

Intellectual capacity? For what it’s worth, metaphysics treats intellectual capacity in humans as a necessary condition, so with respect to formulation of methods regarding the possibility of empirical knowledge, such condition is reason.
—————

I think there's more to language than making good the deficiencies of images. — Ludwig V

Except there cannot be any. If an image is the precursor to all that follows, what is there to say there was something missing in it? When you perceive a thing, your perception is complete, to the extent that whatever your thoughts on that thing, they relate exactly what that which was given by the image. Which is why it is said the image just is the thought.

Now, there are errors possible in the system as a whole, just not here and now, at this time and procedural place of the method, insofar as we are at “thought”, which is a process we like to call understanding, but not yet at “rational thought”, which is the logical quality of the process, which we like to call judgement. And “we” intended as literary license, donchaknow.

This makes sense, in juxtaposition to the adage “a picture’s worth a thousand words”, in that it is possible an image cannot be sufficiently represented by words, simply because we don’t have a word or words to represent the sum of the conceptions contained in it. So it is that there is more to imagery than making good the deficiencies of language.

People seem to be saying that animal behavior, like human behavior, shows evidence of being influenced by some level of that animal's thoughts. Thinking, conceptualizing, wanting and choosing leading to actions. I disagree, for many reasons. — Fire Ologist

:up: As do I.

...something that might anecdotally be termed a sixth-sense. — javra

I rather fancy the idea that there might really be a kind of field effect, analogous to but different from electric fields, that is only detectable to organisms. Maybe something like the akashic field, or the morphic field.

do other animals laugh? — Athena

What counts as thinking? What counts as rational thinking? The answers need a minimal criterion, which in turn, requires the right sort of methodological approach. Do you have a minimum criterion which, when met by a candidate, counts as thinking? Rational thinking? If not, then upon what ground do you rest your denial that some creatures other than humans are capable of thought, rational or otherwise?
— creativesoul
I agree. But I don't have the answers. — Patterner

Right. I'm trying to point the discussion in the right direction, so to speak.

To believe that only humans are capable of any rational thought requires not believing one's own eyes.
— creativesoul

But doesn't that contradict what you've said here?:

We know that no other known creature is capable of knowingly looking forward to Thursday. We cannot check to see if that's the case. But we can know that it is.

That kind of thought/knowledge requires naming and descriptive practices. All naming and descriptive practices are language. Deliberately, rationally, and reasonably looking forward to Thursday is an experience that can only be lived by a very specific type of language user. Us. Knowing how to use the word is required for having the experience.
— creativesoul

Language less rational thought must be meaningful to the thinking creature. The process of becoming meaningful must be similar enough to our own in order to bridge any evolutionary divide between language users' thought and language less creatures' thought(
— creativesoul — Wayfarer

I'm unclear what you think is inconsistent/incoherent/contradictory?

:worry:

What is the evidence that there is any such thing?

What exactly are you asking evidence for? What does "any such thing" pick out to the exclusion of all else? Sorry Jeep, I'm at a loss to what you're saying or trying to get at.

Help?

What, about animal behaviour, cannot be described in behaviourist terms, i.e., when confronted by such and such a stimuli, we can observe such and such behaviour.

Set out meaningful thought and belief using any behaviorist model. The topic involves rational thought as compared contrasted to non rational thought. Show me how behaviorist models apply.

I've seen cats, for example, gauging whether they can make a leap up a height or across a stream. They'll pause for a few seconds, their eyes will dart about, sometimes moving back and forth a little. They'll be weighing the leap up before acting. But I don't see any justification to say that this implies they're thinking.

Weighing the leap is thinking about where they are heading.

...something that might anecdotally be termed a sixth-sense. — javra


I rather fancy the idea that there might really be a kind of field effect, analogous to but different from electric fields, that is only detectable to organisms. Maybe something like the akashic field, or the morphic field. — Wayfarer

:up:

do other animals laugh? — Athena

BTW, one can easily find a bunch of videos and articles on great ape laughter online via a search for "great ape laughter" or some such. When its intense enough, it often enough sounds like a broken up yell or scream, which if not broken up vocally would indicate a good deal of aggression, canines exposed as a form of intimidation and all (apes can do a lot of harm with them). This being in tune with laughter (and what is in ethology termed the "play face") being non-verbal forms of communication that have evolved from emotions and states of mind associated with playing - which in essence almost always involves some sort of mock conflict and, hence, often, mock aggression. This approach then will hold human laughter to be a non-verbal communication of mock aggression which, then, can be either pleasant or unpleasant to undergo, depending on contexts. E.g., the difference between laughing at the absurdity (i.e., laughability) of an idea someone expresses or of otherwise laughing at the worth of the very person themselves. (my independent research and experiment projects as an undergraduate concerned this and like topics, pivoting on the evolution of the human smile; interesting stuff to me)

you have been participating on a philosophy forum to the tune of 1.5K posts. Surely, you've been in one or two discussions where you did not expect the other person to change their mind. — Patterner

I never expect to change anyone's mind - except possibly at the margins. Major changes of mind take a lot of time.

But I don't know why subjective judgement puts something beyond discussion. Opinions change. Tastes change. Someone can present an opposing opinion in just the right way to sway the other person. — Patterner

Oh, I was working to the usual idea that a subjective judgement is not open to objective argument. That may have been a bit of a cop-out. But I couldn't make enough sense of what your judgement was to be able to work out how to reply to it.

A concept is the meaning of a word. The meaning of a word is its use in propositions.
— Mww

I can't make sense of this.
— Ludwig V

That part attributed to me, isn’t mine. Or isn’t mine in conjunction with what came before it. I’d like to deny I ever said it, but….crap, I forget stuff so easy these days. If you would be so kind, refresh me? Or, retract the attribution? — Mww

Yes, you are right. I screwed up the formatting. I apologize. I think your original comment was this.

Expression is objectified representation of conceptions, but not necessarily of rational thought, which is a certain form of representation of its own, re: propositional. — Mww

I intended to add my comment, which was "A concept is the meaning of a word. The meaning of a word is its use in propositions." I will only add that I don't see how a word can be a representation of a concept. They exist in different categories. There can be no structural similarity between them that would justify calling the relationship a representation.

What counts as thinking? What counts as rational thinking?
— creativesoul
The lack of clear definitions does indeed make this debate much more difficult. But there's no easy way round it. Someone who doesn't see rationality in animals will define it in one way, likely by appealing to "language", which is assumed to apply only to languages of the kind that humans speak. Someone who empathizes with animals will be more inclined to a more flexible definitions. — Ludwig V

Clearly this is true. This thread shows that much clearly. There are competing notions of "rational thought" hereabouts. However, all is not lost as a result. They do not all rest on equal ground. They do not all have the capability of taking account of meaningful thought, belief, and/or experience of language less animals.

There is far too much evidence to deny that some non human creatures are perfectly capable of forming, having, and/or holding meaningful thought and belief about the world and/or themselves. As best I can tell, you and I are in agreement regarding that much, as supported by your earlier acknowledgement that learning how to open doors and gates solely by virtue of observation is rational thinking.

I don't think "rational" is about a single thing, but about the multifarious language games that a language consists of; they have different criteria of meaning and truth. "Rational" refers to thinking that gets us the right results. In some cases that's truth of some kind, in others it's actions that are successful by the relevant criteria.

So here's my answer for this context. Meaning and concepts are shown in meaningful behaviour, which includes both verbal and non-verbal applications of the relevant concepts. This means that to attribute concepts to animals is perfectly meaningful, though not capable of the formal clarity beloved of logicians. — Ludwig V

Here, you've veered into what we are doing with the word "rational". I'm more inclined to critically examining whether or not any single notion of "rational" is capable of admitting that language less animals are capable of learning how to open gates, open doors, make and use tools for specific purposes, etc. It's particularly hard to square those facts with a denial that language less creatures are capable of thought, rational or otherwise.

As soon as we acknowledge that much, we can then see how well any notion of "rational" thought explains such behaviour.

So here's my answer for this context. Meaning and concepts are shown in meaningful behaviour, which includes both verbal and non-verbal applications of the relevant concepts. This means that to attribute concepts to animals is perfectly meaningful, though not capable of the formal clarity beloved of logicians.
— Ludwig V — creativesoul

I wanted to note that we differ here. On my view, "concepts" causes far more trouble than it's worth. It does nothing - as far as I can tell - that language less thought and belief cannot exhaust.

What counts as thinking? What counts as rational thinking? The answers need a minimal criterion, which in turn, requires the right sort of methodological approach. Do you have a minimum criterion which, when met by a candidate, counts as thinking? Rational thinking? If not, then upon what ground do you rest your denial that some creatures other than humans are capable of thought, rational or otherwise?
— creativesoul
I agree. But I don't have the answers.
— Patterner

Right. I'm trying to point the discussion in the right direction, so to speak. — creativesoul

This is from Journey of the Mind: How Thinking Emerged from Chaos, by Ogi Ogas and
Sai Gaddam.

A mind is a physical system that converts sensations into action. A mind takes in a set of inputs from its environment and transforms them into a set of environment-impacting outputs that, crucially, influence the welfare of its body. This process of changing inputs into outputs—of changing sensation into useful behavior—is thinking, the defining activity of a mind. THINKING ELEMENTS

Accordingly, every mind requires a minimum of two thinking elements:
•​A sensor that responds to its environment
•​A doer that acts upon its environment — Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam

Being able to keep track of the time between one week and the next - by name - is a bare minimum.
— creativesoul
Why is the name of the day required? Why not an interval? — Vera Mont

Well, given that the anticipatory thought in question is "looking forward to this Thursday", I supposed it was obvious enough.

It's possible that other animals have shorter periods of anticipation (as they also have shorter lives) but every dog knows what time his humans are expected home from work and school. My grandfather died on one of his regular trips and never came home again. His dog continued to meet the five o'clock train, hoping.

What would such a dog's thought, belief, and/or anticipation/expectation consist in/of?

I have no issue with saying that dogs have expectations. I have serious issues with dogs having any conception of time such that the five o'clock train is meaningful as a result of its arrival time. I would say that there's no issue with the five o'clock train being meaningful to the dog as a result of the train being connected to the arrival of your grandfather, as contrasted to the five o'clock arrival time. I see no ground whatsoever to conclude that dogs know what time their humans are expected home from work or school. Dogs can expect to see their humans after hearing the car pull up, or hearing the five o'clock train coming, or hearing the keys into the lock in the front door.

"Hoping" may be too strong, but maybe not. Some dogs certainly grieve the loss of close friendly companions, whether they be canine, feline, or human.