Why would they need to think exactly the same way we do in order to be considered rational? — Vera Mont

As our discussion of week-ends below shows, they don't.

And only to communicate with other people. — Vera Mont

That's true. But one feels that the version for other people is not the truth, because it doesn't represent the dog's point of view accurately. The difference may never make any difference. But it might possible, so pedants like me like to have both versions at hand to use as and when appropriate.

And they've developed a non-verbal set of symbols and patterns that work for them. — Vera Mont

I had heard of the language problem. Do you have a reference that would tell me more about the symbols and patterns that they use?

Perhaps "rational" is being equated with "the way I think"? (If only subconsciously.) — wonderer1

If you check out my comments to Vera Mont, you'll see that if you want to communicate what the dog is doing to other humans, you may have to distort how the dog is actually thinking. It's an obscure feature of the intentionality of concepts of believe and know which most people miss because they don't think things through from the point of view of speaker and audience.

Perhaps another issue worth considering in this thread is, do animals think critically? Do humans think critically? What percent of humans? — wonderer1

Those question need a good deal of teasing out with specific cases before I would venture on anwers. But they are quite capable of mistrusting people.

Is rationality the result of having culturally acquired skills that improve the reliability of one's thinking? — wonderer1

There are some skills one can acquire from the culture. But real life experience is also a great teacher. Either way, I'm sure it is learned. Though children learn to pretend and even to deceive quite early.

To think critically one first has to have abstract reasoning skills, which I don’t believe is possessed by animals, for the reasons stated. — Wayfarer

Yes. It depends whether by "critical thinking" you mean the skills in informal logic sometimes taught in schools. Many people never acquire those skills , but they're still capable of detecting falsehoods and deceptions.

On my view, all thought based upon prior belief is rational thought. All action based upon one's own thought and belief is caused - in part at least - by rational thought.
— creativesoul

At least with respect to my experience, cutting through the clutter, has always been your philosophical modus operandi.

Gotta appreciate that bottom-up approach you instigated... — Mww

Thanks. I appreciatcha for appreciating me. :wink:

We know there are competing contradictory notions of "rational" at work here in this thread. They do not all rest upon the same ground. Unless we critically examine these notions and show their lacking(explanatory power in this case), then there's always those who will say stuff like, "Well it all boils down to how you define the term "rational". Well, yes and no. Yes, because whether or not any particular notion of "rational" can admit of language less rational animals' thought, belief, and/or actions and remain coherent is all a matter of how one defines the word. So, if we realize that the only reason some notion or other denies language less rational thought is on pains of maintaining coherency alone, and we realize that coherency is necessary but insufficient for truth, and we know beyond all reasonable doubt that learning how to open a door by observation alone IS rational thinking, then we can conclude that the notion under consideration is wrong. It leads to conclusions that stand in direct contradiction with everyday happenings.

Because some language less animals form, have, and/or hold rational thought, as learning how to open doors, gates, and tool invention/use clearly proves, if we accept/acknowledge and include evolutionary progression, it only follows that some rational thought existed in its entirety prior to our naming and descriptive practices. Whatever language less rational thought consists of, it is most certainly content/elements/something that is amenable to brute evolutionary progression such that it is capable of resulting in our own very complex thought and belief.

In my book, as you know, it's correlations.

Hence, the a priori bottom up approach seems to be irrevocable to this subject matter.

That’s what I thought you would say, although I still say there’s a fundamental distinction you’re not recognising. — Wayfarer

Well, either I'm not recognizing the distinction, or I'm not recognizing how fundamental it is. Perhaps if you were specific, it would be possible to discern which.

Because some language less animals form, have, and/or hold rational thought, as learning how to open doors, gates, and tool invention/use clearly proves, if we accept/acknowledge and include evolutionary progression, it only follows that some rational thought existed in its entirety prior to our naming and descriptive practices. Whatever language less rational thought consists of, it is most certainly content/elements/something that is amenable to brute evolutionary progression such that it is capable of resulting in our own very complex thought and belief.

In my book, as you know, it's correlations.

Hence, the a priori bottom up approach seems to be irrevocable to this subject matter. — creativesoul

I think I mostly agree with you.

In my book, as you know, it's correlations. Hence, the a priori bottom up approach seems to be irrevocable to this subject matter. — creativesoul

I agree, at last in principle. From Day One your correlations and my relations have busied themselves trying to meet in the middle. A priori has always been my centerpiece, so for me a priori relations are a cinch.

What, in your view, constitutes an a priori correlation?

Forgive me if I’m supposed to know this, if I’ve been informed already and let it slip away.

Well, either I'm not recognizing the distinction, or I'm not recognizing how fundamental it is. Perhaps if you were specific, it would be possible to discern which. — Ludwig V

Throughout this conversation, whenever you seek to justify an argument, you give reasons. If you wish me to justify my position, you ask me to do the same. Obviously animals cannot do that, in part because they lack language, but also because of the lack the cognitive skills which the ability to speak brings with it. That's the distinction I'm making between human and animal reason. Yes, animals can act intelligently, especially higher animals like cetaceans, primates, birds, canines, etc. But they lack reason in the human sense (which, as you say above that you're 'a pedant' might be, I would have thought, a distinction a pedant would recognise ;-) )

As noted, I think this distinction is resisted in contemporary culture because it's politically incorrect. There's an aversion to the Christian doctrine of mankind's sovereignty over nature as it is associated with religion and old-fashioned cultural attitudes. It's today's 'popular wisdom'.

There's also the sense that we believe Darwinism has shown that we're on a continuum with other species, and this provides the satisfaction of us being part of nature, which is consistent with philosophical naturalism.

This is where I think a philosophical critique of naturalism fits in, but I won't advance it again, as it's clearly not registering.

So, they have some intuitive sense of time passing, as I mentioned earlier... perhaps accompanied by pattern recognition? I'm still not sure that that counts as knowing what time their humans are expected to arrive home.
— creativesoul
Dogs sure look expectant! You get clues off the standing up, prancing and sitting down every two minutes, tail wagging every time a car goes by and slobber all over the glass. — Vera Mont

Those behaviors have a multitude of very different and equally accurate explanations for why the dog is behaving that way. Behavior alone underdetermines thought and belief of the behavioral subject under consideration. That much is very well known. Dog behavior is not fine grained or nuanced enough for us to know with any certainty exactly why dogs slobber, wag tails, or are acting 'antsy'. It happens for a variety of different reasons. That issue causes trouble for every attribution of thought and belief to another creature, when based upon behavior alone, humans notwithstanding.

All that being said, I readily agree that dogs clearly form, have, and/or hold expectations. I've no issue claiming dogs form, have, and/or hold rational thought. What I'm particularly hesitant about, currently, is making any claims based upon ungrounded presuppositions regarding the breadth and width of that scope. Anthropomorphism looms large. I make every attempt to avoid making that mistake. Hence, my hair splitting is just as much about the development of my own position as it is about any particular claim you've made.

To be clear, there is no doubt that "the dog looks expectant" is a perfectly sensible thing to say in that situation. That's not what's in question here, with this particular example. What I'm questioning is how to make sense of saying that an animal knows what time the humans are expected to arrive home.

A candidate not only has to have an intuitive sense of the passage of time, but it also must possess some means of differentiating between timeframes such that they also know that other periods are not that arrival time. They have to think along the lines of different timeframes. I see no way for this candidate to know what time an expected arrival happens. For such knowledge is about a specific timeframe and it's relation to others. Without that there is just the arrival and the dog knowing that that is happening. It does not know so much what time the human is expected to arrive, so much as knowing when the human is about to arrive or has arrived, based upon any multitude of things(all of which must be perceptible to the dog) that always accompany the arrival.

The dog clearly connects the five o'clock train with the master's arrival... but hope?
— creativesoul

Why else would he keep going there every day for three years? The train had nothing for him. He never accepted treats from the staff or made friends with anyone on the platform. He just waited. — Vera Mont

He kept going, perhaps, for several reasons. Dogs have very limited conception/understanding of time, none of death, and the train still most certainly had something for him. The train is part of the arrival, as was the human. The arrival of the train meant the arrival of the human, to the dog that is... due to the correlations the dog had drawn, time and time again between all the regularities surrounding the five o'clock train. None of which were the fact that it was the five o'clock train.

What does "looking forward to going for a car ride on days the human doesn't drive away on" miss?
— creativesoul
I don't know. I suppose the fact that he didn't leave after breakfast. But why would they start getting excited at breakfast - which would take place later than on weekdays? Time sense, probably. — Vera Mont

Perhaps, in addition to recognizing all the individual particular regularities included in weekend car rides, except the fact that they happened on the weekends. The dog has no clue about that much. Weekends are human constructs, made possible by naming and descriptive practices, in addition to the regularity of cosmological events.

I claimed, not Wayfarer, that looking forward to Thursday requires knowing how to use the word.
— creativesoul

Sure, the name of the day is needed to convey your anticipation to another human. But what you're actually anticipating is not the day, or its name, but the event. — Vera Mont

Sometimes. Lots of folk dread Monday, simply because it's Monday. Makes no sense whatsoever to me, but I'm not most folk, and I hear it expressed nearly every Monday.

You could as easily say, "I look forward to seeing my father every week." They don't really need to know that he comes to dinner on Thursdays, it's just quicker and less self-revealing to say the day and not the event. — Vera Mont

For us, and our thoughts. For dogs, it makes more sense to talk about the events. The day of the week means nothing to the dog. Nor does the time the train arrives. To the dog, the train means the human. For three years, if what you say is true.

Mww
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In my book, as you know, it's correlations. Hence, the a priori bottom up approach seems to be irrevocable to this subject matter.
— creativesoul

I agree, at last in principle. From Day One your correlations and my relations have busied themselves trying to meet in the middle. A priori has always been my centerpiece, so for me a priori relations are a cinch.

What, in your view, constitutes an a priori correlation?

Forgive me if I’m supposed to know this, if I’ve been informed already and let it slip away. — Mww

Ah, no worries Mww. I do not believe that I've ever tried to fill that prescription.

I was just highlighting the approach set out in my reply to you. The notions of a priori and a posteriori are not used in my position. Both depend upon experience, even if that means just thinking about one's own thought and belief.

:wink:

I think this distinction is resisted in contemporary culture because it's politically incorrect. There's an aversion to the Christian doctrine … It's today's 'popular wisdom'.

There's also the sense that we believe Darwinism has shown that we're on a continuum with other species, and this provides the satisfaction of us being part of nature...

This is where I think a philosophical critique of naturalism fits in, but I won't advance it again, as it's clearly not registering. — Wayfarer

It registers here.

People invest a lot in the observation that we humans, like many other animals, are “higher” animals on the evolutionary continuum. This allows them to humble human beings making them closer to the animals (and with no need of religion). But still allows pride in the argument as we human apes reign as the highest in rational ability. We are still the only animals who do, in fact, rank continuums.

I would say, this ranking process (called rationality to generalize it) requires something that the animals do not need to exhibit to explain their behavior. Instinct and structure are all my dogs need to be so brilliant.

My take is, in order to discuss this topic with a truly skeptical eye, to hell with the hierarchies and even all continuums. There is no evolutionary continuum between chemical motions and biological motions. At some point chemicals mixed enough to begin a new occurrence called the evolution of life. Before that, there was no selection and mutation in any species. Evolution was once new. And then, by my observation, humans (and only humans) at some point started talking about it all. The human mind (with reason, language, concepts and judgment) was once new as well. So just like at some point chemicals stopped just being chemicals and life began being life, at some point animal consciousness stops being animal consciousness and started being human, being personal.

We are personifying the other animals by placing them on our same human continuum, just like a single-cell would be speaking metaphorically if it said saline “come to life” when you mix H2O with NaCl. There is no life in saline solution. In my view, there is likely no deliberative, rational process in my beautiful dogs.

We can have some other conversation about whether persons are higher than other animals or animals are higher than plants, or life and evolution are higher than chemical motions. But for now, I just see the differences, not the continuums.

There are such vast differences between what humans are and what the other “higher animals” are. Like there are vast differences between what early RNA was doing and what chemicals do.

“Evolution” has been fetishized to explain too much.

Perhaps "rational" is being equated with "the way I think"? (If only subconsciously.) — wonderer1

Indeed. Can you point to species not only capable, but very often guilty of acting, speaking and thinking in ways that are anti-rational? I can.... So, "like me" is not a constant, perfect benchmark.

Perhaps another issue worth considering in this thread is, do animals think critically? Do humans think critically? What percent of humans? — wonderer1

That's a very difficult question. It appears that a very large percentage of humans do not think critically about some issues. But are they capable of critical thinking? Do they never think critically about anything, or are they selective in the subjects on which they choose to be uncritical? There is no way that I can know.
Nor am I confident in my understanding of the criteria for critical thought. I know how I do it, have theories on how it ought to be done; I actually taught a short night-school course. But I don't know when, how or even whether someone else does.

Dogs - the subject with which I'm most familiar - discriminate in their preference for situations, locations and associates. They vary widely in their preferences and standards. In general, I've found that dogs distrust dishonest people - that is, the dog didn't like the person from first encounter and the humans didn't find out until much later. (I've seen children under six exhibit the same discernment.) They generally dislike ambiguous situations, for instance when the humans in their life disagree, and environments with too much busyness, noise, competitive odours and motion.
i don't know whether any of that qualifies for the definition.

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.
— creativesoul
From another perspective, the question is what notion of "rational" enables us to explain the fact that some animals are capable of learning how to open gates, etc. I mean that the starting-point is that they can, and that stands in need of explanation. — Ludwig V

Nice. So, we're in complete agreement on that much. I thought we were very close. Nice confirmation.

Here's how I look at it - for what it's worth.
We know how to explain how humans learn to do these things. But humans are our paradigm (reference point) of what a rational being is. So that's what we turn to. It involves a complex conceptual structure (think of it as a game - a rule-governed activity). The obvious recourse, then, is our existing practice in explaining how people do these things. We apply those concepts to the animals that learn to do these things. Our difficulty is that animals are in many ways different from human beings, most relevantly in the respect that many of the things that human beings can routinely do, they (apparently) cannot. So some modification of our paradigm is necessary. — Ludwig V

Nice.

That's not a desperately difficult problem, but it is where the disagreements arise, though in the nature of the case, determinate answers will not be easy to arrive at. But we are already familiar with such situations, where we apply the concept of interpretation. The readiest way of explaining this is by reference to puzzle pictures, which can be seen (interpreted) in more than one way. There is no truth of the matter, just different ways of looking at the facts. So, competing (non-rational) interpretations cannot be conclusively ruled out. However, in this case, the same interpretations can be applied to human beings as well. They are found lacking because they do not recognize the kinds of relationship that we have with each other. The same lack is found with, for example, the application of mechanical (reductionist) accounts of animals. — Ludwig V

I'm not seeing how that approach could help. What does it mean when you say "we apply the concept of interpretation"? What's the difference between say, a concept of interpretation and a notion of "interpretation". Is applying a concept of interpretation any different than sensibly using "interpretation"?

I disagree that there is no truth to the matter of interpretation. Interpretation presupposes meaning. When one interprets another, one is attempting to acquire knowledge of what they mean. Correctly attributing meaning is correct interpretation. When one misinterprets, one is misattributing meaning.

On my view, puzzle pictures are meaningless in and of themselves. All interpretation is of meaning. So, to me, we're not interpreting them so much as attributing meaning to them. Hence, there is no truth in that matter. There is no wrong way to 'interpret' the duck-rabbit or horse-frog, for there is no meaning to be interpreted. Rather, in such cases, we attribute meaning to that which has none, as compared to interpreting meaning already 'there' so to speak.

It has nothing to do with our word use. Language less animals have none.
— creativesoul
Well, it has and it hasn't. It hasn't because we are considering actions without language. But we are used to applying our concepts of action without language, since we happily explain what human beings to even when we do not have access to anything that they might say. (Foreign languages, for example) Indeed, sometimes we reject what the agent says about their own action in favour of the explanation we formulate for it. That is, agents can be deceptive or mistaken about their own actions.

The catch is that we have no recourse but to explain their actions in our language. But this is not a special difficulty. It applies whenever we explain someone else's action. — Ludwig V

We are considering the clearly rational behavior of a language less animal. Sure, we have no choice but to explain their actions in our language. That's not a problem.

There are all sorts of problems. Using our language isn't one of them.

I thinking pulling oneself from flames is not rational or deliberated or reasoned or thought about at all. It's just done.
— creativesoul
That doesn't mean it is not a rational response, does it? — Ludwig V

As far as I can tell, it's not at all rational. It's autonomous. Automatic. Involuntary.

Are involuntary reactions rational? That scope would include all living biological creatures capable of avoiding danger and/or gathering resources, regardless of the biological machinery involved. Hence, the ground for denying that such responses are rational, in kind.

Believing that touching the fire caused pain is. Applied, that belief becomes operative in the sense that it stops one from doing it again.
— creativesoul
That is the animal's response - something that it does. Since it is rational and something the animal does and there for an example of animal rationality. — Ludwig V

The important aspect concerns what makes it rational as opposed to not. It is rational behavior because it was caused by rational thought(thought based upon prior thought and belief). In this case the avoidance was based on the belief that touching the fire caused the pain.

Leaving all that out, misses the entirety of the point, or glosses over it. Neither is acceptable here, considering the matter under consideration/contention is what counts as rational thought as compared/contrasted to thought that is not rational in kind.

I think you're assessing behavior using conventional belief attribution practices, so I think I understand why.

What he's actually looking forward to is the particular event that usually takes place. Do we also know that no other animal can guage the interval at which a routine pleasant event usually occurs? To a small child, one would say: two more sleeps until Grandpa comes to dinner. For a dog who never gets to ride in the car when his human is going to work, and doesn't even ask, looks forward to weekends.
— Vera Mont
There's a complication here, that how the animal thinks about it may not be how we think about it. But, if we are to understand the animal, it needs to be expressed in terms that we can understand. To a small child, one would say "Two more sleeps...", but we would report to Grandpa that the child is really looking forward to him coming for dinner on Thursday.

In the case of the dog, we would have trouble saying to anyone on Wednesday that they are looking forward to the week-end. (How would that manifest itself? I'm not saying that there couldn't be any signs, only that I can't think of any). We might say they are looking forward to the week-end by extrapolation from the enthusiasm that we see on Saturday, but that would be risky in a philosophical context.
Still, when the signs appear, there is no doubt and we well might say the dog is excited because it's the week-end, while acknowledging that that does not reflect how the dog thinks about it. It could be "the day breakfast is late" - but even then, we don't suppose that's what the dog is saying to itself. Perhaps it is more like the response to the fire. I don't think there is a clear answer to this. — Ludwig V

It's difficult, for sure. I'll not address this here in this post. I addressed it in my reply to Vera.

Perhaps another issue worth considering in this thread is, do animals think critically? — wonderer1

I do not see how that could be possible. Critical thinking is a metacognitive endeavor. Metacognitive endeavors require naming and descriptive practices.

Because some language less animals form, have, and/or hold rational thought, as learning how to open doors, gates, and tool invention/use clearly proves, if we accept/acknowledge and include evolutionary progression, it only follows that some rational thought existed in its entirety prior to our naming and descriptive practices. Whatever language less rational thought consists of, it is most certainly content/elements/something that is amenable to brute evolutionary progression such that it is capable of resulting in our own very complex thought and belief.

In my book, as you know, it's correlations.

Hence, the a priori bottom up approach seems to be irrevocable to this subject matter.
— creativesoul

I think I mostly agree with you. — Ludwig V

Sweet. Much obliged.

Instinct and structure are all my dogs need to be so brilliant. — Fire Ologist

I don't know what you have in mind with "structure", and whether it is relevant to the following, but I don't think it reasonable to see what is shown below as merely a matter of instinct.

But one feels that the version for other people is not the truth, because it doesn't represent the dog's point of view accurately. — Ludwig V

It doesn't reflect the human's accurately, either, but that doesn't matter, because a common language gives us a thumbnail picture of what is in the other's mind. We don't need every detail to understand the gist of their meaning.

I had heard of the language problem. Do you have a reference that would tell me more about the symbols and patterns that they use? — Ludwig V

Of course not. The feral children - and there have not been many - cannot communicate how they think, because they're inept in our language, even if they can learn it, and we have no access to theirs.

Those behaviors have a multitude of very different and equally accurate explanations for why the dog is behaving that way. — creativesoul

Of that specific cluster of behaviours at that same time every weekday, but not on weekends or holidays? Show me three of that multitude of accurate explanations.

Anthropomorphism looms large. — creativesoul

And terrifying! Why? Similarity and commonality are not diseases; they're a natural result of sharing a planet and a history.

A candidate not only has to have an intuitive sense of the passage of time, but it also must possess some means of differentiating between timeframes such that they also know that other periods are not that arrival time. They have to think along the lines of different timeframes. — creativesoul

You're overcomplicating something simple. A biological clock: so much time has elapsed; at this interval, something is supposed to happen.

The arrival of the train meant the arrival of the human, to the dog that is... due to the correlations the dog had drawn, time and time again between all the regularities surrounding the five o'clock train. — creativesoul

And that's not rational, because....?

Sometimes. Lots of folk dread Monday, simply because it's Monday. — creativesoul

No. Because it's the first day of a new work-week. Early rising (possibly with hangover) (possibly lover departing), rigid morning routine, uncomfortable clothing, commute, staff meeting, unpleasant colleague regaling you with their spectacular weekend adventures, bossy department head dumping unwanted task on your desk.... Some people who enjoy their work actually look forward to Mondays; most people don't enjoy their work. Pity!

To the dog, the train means the human. — creativesoul

No other train, just the five o'clock local.
But never mind, I have lots of other examples you can explain away.

I don't know what you have in mind with "structure", and whether it is relevant to the following, but I don't think it reasonable to see what is shown below as merely a matter of instinct. — wonderer1

:up: Fascinating! This seems to confirm what I have always believed: that dogs are capable of deductive inferences, rational thought.

It seems nothing will convince the diehard human exceptionalists; probably because their thinking is rooted in some religious dogma or other.

And very interesting to me. Do you have more to share about animals and laughing? That surely involves a degree of thinking. But what is thinking without words? — Athena

I guess I do, but then much of it wouldn't be in keeping with this thread's topic. To make things more philosophical, though, first off no human concept is perceptual. I make a somewhat more in depth argument for that here - although the chapter in general is not the easiest of reads. The very concept of "animal" for example has no look, no tactile feel, no smell, taste, and no sound. Yet we understand the concept nonetheless and, in English use, associate the auditory, visual, or tactile (for the blind) symbols of "animal" as a perceptual word to the non-perceptual concept we associate the perceptual word to. In like manner "3", and "III", and "three" are all perceptual givens that reference a commonly referenced fully non-perceptual concept.

Words of course allow us the ability to manipulate concepts to great extents. But words are not required for concepts to occur within anyone's awareness. If words were sufficient for expressing all concepts, many if not all artistic manifestations would be direly redundant.

To again address lesser animals, my last dog, for example, had no problems in understanding "(go) inside" and "(go) outside" in relation to particular rooms, the house itself, the car, etc. And this is a relatively complex concept, for it addresses relations between non-specifics. It's no big deal nowadays to claim that lesser animals, dogs included, gain a theory of mind as they mature: My first dog, whom I greatly loved (just like the other two) and who did have an Alpha personality (a Bouvier des Flandres weighing 120 pounds healthily) knew how to (try to) deceive us. I'd say "come" at a distance after he'd misbehaved and he'd sit his ass on the ground and calmly stare in all directions except toward me, as though he was not hearing what I was saying. I've got far better anecdotes of deception but these would take far longer to tell. At any rate, a theory of mind can only be conceptual - addressing the conceptualized perspectives of the other mind and how to act and react relative to these, such as when attempting to intentionally deceive the other. Other than maintaining that lesser animals are automata (wherein one encounters the philosophical problem of other minds as it applies even to other humans), there's no reason to infer that lesser-animals are devoid of conceptualizations and hence of concepts.

Great apes exhibit eureka moments - which don't occur absent thoughts. An example I hastily found:

The young female gorilla watched another older male attempt to collect ants from a hole in the ground, only to see the ants bite his arm, scaring him away. The female gorilla tried to put her own arm in the hole, and she too was bitten. But instead of giving up, the young ape then had her very own ‘eureka’ moment. She looked around for a suitable implement, and selected a piece of wood approximately 20 cm long, tapering from 2 cm wide at one end to 1 cm long at the other. She then inserted the stick into the hole, withdrew it, and licked off ants clambering over it, avoiding being stung. — http://www.virunganews.com/wild-gorilla-creates-a-food-tool-in-eureka-moment/

The one example I distinctly remember from undergrad studies was of a chimp faced with a banana hanging from a rope - this in a taken video. He stood there in the yard for a few minutes appearing to do nothing after trying and failing to get the banana. Then he all of a sudden stood up without hesitation and purposelessly walked to collect a few items which he next put under the banana in a pile, then climbed on top of, and then proceeded to easily take the banana from the string.

As to humans and our purposeful fire use, I know bonobos did not invent the match stick, but check this out all the same:



One can of course try to bend over backwards to explain this factual occurrence as having consisted of no concepts and thoughts on the bonobo's part, but I'd find it more ontologically believable if one were to try to stipulate that this one bonobo was actually an extraterrestrial alien which had descended form a UFO and took the disguise of a bonobo for fun (and I wouldn't be all that enamored with the latter explanation).

Human language creates a scaffolding for greater concept manipulation, and hence for far more abstract levels of thought than any lesser animal is capable of. But language is not required for either acquired concepts or thoughts.

So, what is thinking without words? I'd say it consists of forethought regarding what one best do given two or more alternatives so as to actualize that which one wants, hence intentions, hence holds as a goal. And to claim that this must then be utterly unemotional in order to be valid reason, or rationality, is to be full of self-hypocritical baloney: no human that has ever been has ever found themselves in states of rational thought utterly devoid of some emotion or other, be it contentment, curiosity, or some other.

Well, that's my overall take on this thread's subject at least. But, to be honest, I get bored in repeatedly presenting the same facts regarding lesser animal's observed behaviors - as just one measly example, that dogs can understand hundreds and great apes thousands of words, with each word entailing its own understanding of a concept - to only find these same factual presentations repeatedly overlooked for the sake of the given counter argument.

My first dog, whom I greatly loved (just like the other two) and who did have an Alpha personality (a Bouvier des Flandres weighing 120 pounds healthily) knew how to (try to) deceive us. I'd say "come" at a distance after he'd misbehaved and he'd sit his ass on the ground and calmly stare in all directions except toward me, as though he was not hearing what I was saying. — javra

The "I'm deaf" tactic. And then there is the "Who, me? I was just standing there, minding my own business. It was the cat." And the "Toilet paper? What toilet paper?" gambit. And "I don't know anything about a magnifying glass. Huh? How'd that get in my bed?"
As to innocence - They lie, they cheat, they steal, they hold grudges and they're spiteful. IOW, a lot like us, which is why we love them.

IOW, a lot like us, which is why we love them. — Vera Mont

:grin: :up:

I'd say "come" at a distance after he'd misbehaved and he'd sit his ass on the ground and calmly stare in all directions except toward me — javra

For nearly 15 years we had a smallish (10kg) sheltie cross, who was a very polite little dog (except towards postmen and motorcyles). This is him:


Woody

He had this quirk of hanging around near the kitchen or the dining room table at meal times, presumably hoping for a hand out. But if you looked at him while he was doing this, he'd never meet your gaze, always looking down or away from you, as a kind of feigned indifference. ('What? Me? Beg?')

:grin: Yea. I think I've already mentioned in this thread that I often muse of lesser animals being nothing more and nothing less then lesser "anima-endowed beings" ... which, if one gets the gist of this train of thought, would then also entail their having their own lesser animus - this by comparison to that of humans.

Right. Well, unlike Descartes, who thought animals had no soul whatever, many of the pre-modern and Asiatic religions recognised that human beings can also be born into the animal realm (presumably from behaving like them.) There's a legend about Pythagoras that he once exclaimed that he recognised the soul of one of his departed friends in the howl of a dog. Buddhist sermons would say that if you held to wrong ideas, you would find yourself 'in the womb of a cow'. I suppose it's simply poetic mythology, but then.....

(Actually brought a bit of a tear to the eye, posting that photo of Woody. We really loved that little guy, I walked him nearly every day of his life.)

anima-endowed beings — javra

and also, Aristotle's 'De Anima', translated as 'On the Soul'. I love the connection between Anima, Animal, and Animated. (More I read of the old guy, more I like him.)

It doesn't reflect the human's accurately, either, but that doesn't matter, because a common language gives us a thumbnail picture of what is in the other's mind. We don't need every detail to understand the gist of their meaning. — Vera Mont

That's true. What I'm after is that truth is not the only criterion in play. There's also the desire to understand and to be understood. That may require slightly different ways of putting things to cater for differences in perspective. We only need enough accuracy for our actual purposes. Accurate for all purposes is not available. We can always refine things if and when the occasion arises. Philosophers are trained to ignore all that, and trip themselves up quite often.

Of course not. The feral children - and there have not been many - cannot communicate how they think, because they're inept in our language, even if they can learn it, and we have no access to theirs. — Vera Mont

Yes. I did wonder how it was possible, and lived in a wild hope.

Anthropomorphism looms large. — creativesoul

On the one hand, anthropomorphism, on the other mechanism. No escape. Steer a careful course between the two, and be prepared to change direction as necessary.

I disagree that there is no truth to the matter of interpretation. Interpretation presupposes meaning. ... On my view, puzzle pictures are meaningless in and of themselves. — creativesoul

Yes, it is more nuanced a matter than I allowed. Interpretation is not a free for all. It has limits.
There are many examples of ambiguity in pictures and that shows that what a picture shows is not straightforwardly given. But not every picture is ambiguous and not any "interpretation" is possible for a given picture. The puzzle picture is a picture of a duck and a picture of a rabbit. This is confusing just because most pictures aren't ambiguous. It wouldn't be difficult to provide a bit of additional context that would disambiguate the picture as presented. It is certainly not a picture of a horse or a frog. If someone tried to suggest that interpretation, we would correct them.
But it is wrong to say that the picture has no meaning. It is not just a meaningless scribble. The supposedly neutral description in terms of lines on paper suggests a misleading comparison. The only truth is that the picture can be described in all three interpretations. It has multiple meanings, not none. And additional context, in a particular case, can disambiguate the picture.

In one way, actions can be interpreted in a rational or in a mechanistic framework. We are used to using language to disambiguate, but sometimes this fails us. Nevertheless, there is a question of context which often allows us to juggle the two.

But, I emphasize, the description of an action provided by the agent in language may be an important criterion for us, but it is not decisive in all circumstances. The agent may be lying or misrepresenting the action for various purposes. Or the agent may not be recognizing how we might see it - what is just banter to the agent, may be a serious slur to us. It is even possible that the agent may be wrong - deceiving themselves.

Yes, animals can act intelligently, especially higher animals like cetaceans, primates, birds, canines, etc. But they lack reason in the human sense (which, as you say above that you're 'a pedant' might be, I would have thought, a distinction a pedant would recognise ;-) ) — Wayfarer

Very neat. But I would have thought that a pedant might refuse to recognize a distinction on pedantic grounds? In any case, I'm only a pedant when I want to be - I don't claim to be any different from other pedants in that respect.

But since you grant intelligence to "higher" animals, I take you to be granting rationality in some sense to them, but then maintaining there is a different sense that is available to human beings. I don't have a clear grasp of these two different senses, much less of why the difference is important. It may be merely pedantic.

As noted, I think this distinction is resisted in contemporary culture because it's politically incorrect. There's an aversion to the Christian doctrine of mankind's sovereignty over nature as it is associated with religion and old-fashioned cultural attitudes. It's today's 'popular wisdom'. — Wayfarer

Yes, and like all popular wisdom, tends to be a bit broad-brush.

The Christian doctrine has been interpreted in certain ways that are objectionable, as justifying tyranny and cruelty. But there's another interpretation that interprets sovereignty as requiring stewardship and care (recognizing, for example, that animals are also God's creation and deserve respect for that reason, if no other). This still may (or may not) be patronizing and demeaning. Even if it is, it is better than the alternative. If it is not, then I don't see how the Christian doctrine would necessarily be objectionable.

"Politically incorrect" seems to me to mean "at variance with the consensus view". But a view is not necessarily incorrect (or correct) just because it is a consensus view. So there's something missing here.

There's also the sense that we believe Darwinism has shown that we're on a continuum with other species, and this provides the satisfaction of us being part of nature, which is consistent with philosophical naturalism. — Wayfarer

Yes. I sense a criticism there, but I don't quite see what it is. There is a further difficulty that I'm not clear just what philosophical naturalism is.

The idea that we are "just monkeys" was a major issue at the time. But I gather than many Christians are now at peace with evolution, so they must have found some resolution of the issue. For myself, I notice that we did still carry many of the basic animal behaviour patterns and that we find predecessor or proto- versions of many of our patterns of behaviour in animals (and even insects). So the idea of a radical discontinuity seems a bit implausible.

This is where I think a philosophical critique of naturalism fits in, but I won't advance it again, as it's clearly not registering. — Wayfarer

Well, if you could favour me with a link to where you have advanced your critique, I could look at it more carefully.

But, to be honest, I get bored in repeatedly presenting the same facts regarding lesser animal's observed behaviors -- to only find these same factual presentations repeatedly overlooked for the sake of the given counter argument. — javra

Yes. It's not restricted to this issue. People (including me, sometimes) get over-focused and can't see what they don't want to see.

It's very tempting to think that engagement with specific cases is crucial to making this argument and it's not wrong. But perhaps even more important is engagement with animals. But it's not so simple as that. What is needed is engagement of a particular kind, so that one can grasp that animals in many ways will engage with us in many (but not all) of the same ways that we engage with other people.

It's not the same as the engagement of a farmer with his stock, which is transactional and does not require the kind of empathy that is needed to understand them. (Not that farmers are necessarily incapable of empathetic engagement alongside the transactional aspects of their business.) Short story - living with animals as companions or colleagues makes a huge difference. (Aristotle makes a huge mistake when he describes animals (and slaves) as "living tools".

That's very vague, but I'm trying to gesture at the idea that this is not just a matter for abstract reason. It's about how to live with beings recognizably like us. After all, that's how we come to treat people as people and not "just" animals".

But since you grant intelligence to "higher" animals, I take you to be granting rationality in some sense to them, but then maintaining there is a different sense that is available to human beings. I don't have a clear grasp of these two different senses, much less of why the difference is important. It may be merely pedantic. — Ludwig V

I'm not clear just what philosophical naturalism is. — Ludwig V

The meaning is not clearly defined, but SEP tells us that it 'aims to ally philosophy more closely with science. Naturalists urge that reality is exhausted by nature, containing nothing “supernatural”, and that the scientific method should be used to investigate all areas of reality, including the “human spirit” '. Specifically it takes the natural sciences, including the biological sciences, as authoritative regarding what is validly knowledge, and rejects any claims of religious revelation or the possibility of a spiritual enlightenment.

The idea that we are "just monkeys" was a major issue at the time. But I gather than many Christians are now at peace with evolution, so they must have found some resolution of the issue. For myself, I notice that we did still carry many of the basic animal behaviour patterns and that we find predecessor or proto- versions of many of our patterns of behaviour in animals (and even insects). So the idea of a radical discontinuity seems a bit implausible. — Ludwig V

What I've tried to explain here and especially here is that, even accepting the facts of biological evolution, the development of language, tool use, and the other characteristically human capabilities, means we cross a threshhold which separates us from the natural world in an existential sense as well as a practical sense. Through it, we become different kinds of beings, namely, human beings, and we're not just another class of primate. I harked back to both the Biblical Myth of the Fall and to Aristotle's definition of man as 'rational animal' because I think they represent something real about the human condition, which has been lost sight of in modern culture.

Thomas Nagel has an interesting essay I often refer to, Evolutionary Naturalism and the Fear of Religion. I've mentioned it a few times on the forum, it's generaly not well received, but I find it very insightful. (Nagel is not pushing a religious barrow, he's an avowed atheist but one with the chutzpah to call scientific materialism into question.)

:up: Fascinating! This seems to confirm what I have always believed: that dogs are capable of deductive inferences, rational thought. — Janus

It occurred to me after you responded, that in that video we have a demonstration of Kahneman's fast and slow thinking occurring in a dog. (And literally fast and literally slow.)

Thomas Nagel has an interesting essay I often refer to, Evolutionary Naturalism and the Fear of Religion. I've mentioned it a few times on the forum, it's generaly not well received, but I find it very insightful. (Nagel is not pushing a religious barrow, he's an avowed atheist but one with the chutzpah to call scientific materialism into question.) — Wayfarer

Thomas Nagel is a scientific ignoramus and doesn't have a perspective based on being scientifically well informed. Your attempts to smear scientifically informed people with Nagel's emotional issues amount to pushing propaganda on your part.

Don't sugar-coat it. Tell us how you really feel. :rofl:

As noted, I think this distinction is resisted in contemporary culture because it's politically incorrect. There's an aversion to the Christian doctrine of mankind's sovereignty over nature as it is associated with religion and old-fashioned cultural attitudes. It's today's 'popular wisdom'.
— Wayfarer
There's also the sense that we believe Darwinism has shown that we're on a continuum with other species, and this provides the satisfaction of us being part of nature, which is consistent with philosophical naturalism.
— Wayfarer — Ludwig V

I'm never sure how much weight to put on explanations at this level. Bu there is another issue, not yet mentioned, playing in to this. I think it may be hard for philosophers in the traditions of english-speaking philosophy to accept as philosophical at all - but then, neither Christianity nor Darwin is a philosophical theory. This has its roots in European philosophy and is often deployed in sociology. My suggestion is that there is a tendency to see animals as inherently other than us, human beings, mainly on the ground that they are in what one might call the state of nature, before humans came and developed societies. It's a way of thinking that was prominent in 18th century philosophy, but the roots of it in our way of life are deeper than that. The difference is that they are now openly contested.

Why do I say that the roots are in our way of life? Because so much of our effort over generations to make ourselves more secure, better fed, better sheltered, more prosperous, we have mostly been centred on distinguishing ourselves from animals.

Because they are natural, they are a puzzle and a threat. They live in what, for a human, would be a state of abject poverty and show no evidence of trying to escape from it. These we can exploit for food and labour ("living tools"). Others show a marked inclination to destroy ourselves and all that we have struggled to build up. Of course "we" are different from "them". However, we need to change that attitude and develop a better sense of the ecosystem that we live in, not because it is moral or right, but because we are just as dependent on it as they are. Even if some of us escape to other planets, we cannot all ship out elsewhere - the first time in history that has been true.

Nagel is not pushing a religious barrow, he's an avowed atheist but one with the chutzpah to call scientific materialism into question. — Wayfarer

Thanks for the information and the link. I've secured everything but will need some time to read and think about it.
I'm not particularly offended by calling scientific materialism into question. That has been done ever since science began 1,500 years ago. Mostly, I admit, in the name of religious ideas.

As for chutzpah, don't you think your photograph is a splendid example?

Thomas Nagel is a scientific ignoramus, and doesn't have a perspective based on having a scientifically well informed perspective. Your attempts to smear scientifically informed people with Nagel's emotional issues amount to pushing propaganda on your part. — wonderer1

I don't know how much science Nagel knows, but do you really mean to say that any perspective is not scientifically well-informed is not worth having? That's a very big assumption.
There are people, you know, who find some pronouncements from people who have nothing but a scientifically well-informed perspective extremely ill-informed and annoying.
If you think that Nagel's questioning of scientific materialism is just an emotional issue, perhaps one might look for some actual arguments on the point? (But probably not right now, since they are not really relevant.)
Incidentally, I also find at least some of his arguments extremely annoying as well, but not on those grounds.