Do Animals Possess Consciousness Research Paper

The documentary Alien of the Deep Sea presented us with six different experiments aimed at studying different aspects of octopuses' intelligence. I will focus on just one of those experiments and attempt to apply Jackendoff's First Fundamental Argument which argues that a language user's mind can be viewed as an internal computational system containing unconscious set of rules.

Animal Intelligence Animals are smarter than people think they are. As animal studies keep on increasing, we find out that some animals are close to our level of thinking. Animals such as chimps, parrots, elephants, dolphins and monkeys have been studied and proved to us that they too

The chapter states that if animals are conscious, their conscious level probably varies from the simplest feelings to thinking about the common problems they can face, and ways to avoid it.

According to Martin Schonfield in “Animal Consciousness: Paradigm Change in the Life Sciences” “In the old analytic climate, claims that animals are sentient raised methodological and ideological problems and seemed debatable at best.”(Schonfield p. 1) Claims that animals were self-aware or intelligent were regarded as unfounded. “The task of science in the past four centuries had been to demythologize the past.”(Schonfield p.1) Daniel C. Dennett in “Animal Consciousness: What Matters and Why” states “that speculating about animal consciousness makes no sense.” (Dennett p.19) He wonders why we need to know about animal consciousness at all. I disagree with Dennett and will explore the possibilities of animals actually experiencing

In the article “A Change of Heart about Animals” (2003), published by Los Angeles Times, author Jeremy Rifkin discusses how our fellow creatures are more like humans than we had ever imagined. Using academic diction, Rifkin develops his main idea with evidence such as Caledonian crows being able to make tools to complete a task. These birds were given the task of grabbing meat out of a tube with a choice of two tools, a hooked wire and a straight wire. Both of the birds were able to complete the task, however, one bird showed exceptional cognitive abilities when she bent a straight wire into a hook to grab the meat. This suggests a logos persuasive appeal that broadens the reader’s awareness of the conceptual abilities of crows. Rifkin’s use

Introduction: In recent years, animals in captive environments such as zoos and theme parks have grown more controversial. The literature I have reviewed focuses on a particular group of animals in captivity, cetaceans. Cetaceans include whales, dolphins, and porpoises. The literature includes a range of themes, from their unique level

How Intelligent Are Dolphins? There is something about dolphins that fascinates me. They are some of the most intelligent and beautiful animals that I have ever seen. Their faces are so cute that every time I look at a dolphin it looks like it is smiling at me and wants to tell me something. The noises they make represent some kind of language and it makes me wonder if they can really communicate. I also want to know what kind of feeling they have and whether they have emotions. This is why I chose to do this I-search project on dolphins; the different kinds of dolphins there are, the places that they can be found and their mental abilities.

Animals communicate to each other just as we do by making sounds to warn another. However, some nonhuman animals developed languages and cognitive capacities; psychologist refer it as animal cognitive. From the psychology 7th edition textbook by Sandra E. Hockenbury, Susan A. Nolan, and Don H. Hockenbury stated that "Going

The Bottlenose Dolphin Specific Purpose: To inform my audience about the bottlenose dolphin species. Central Idea: Dolphins are unique creatures that possess numerous abilities such as, their intelligence, communication skills, and behavioral patterns.

It is impossible to know how exactly how an animal thinks but research has shown that chimpanzees are very intelligent animals and in some aspects they are more intelligent than humans.

Perception is what makes the mind and body predicament actually obstinate. ‘What is it like to be a bat’ is an intricate argument geared at disproving reductionism according to Nagel (Hirstein, 2012). In human way of thinking, it is possible to imagine being shortsighted and flapping our arms to

I personally do believe animals have minds. An animal would acquire knowledge of their environment and then interpret that information and know how to act. The theory that mainly supports my argument is the behaviorism theory. The behaviorism theory argues that an animal has a mind by the way they behave.

What am I? What am I? Well essentially, I am a sentient consciousness and along with this consciousness I am able to reason (sapience). Having a combination of consciousness and the ability to reason is what I believe makes me a human being and differentiates me from other ways of being in the world.

In the past, animals were assumed to have no real intelligence. They were thought of as mindless beasts that only survived purely on instinct. However, by studying animals people have discovered that animals are not mindless beasts. They are complex life forms. Animals are capable of understanding their environment like humans do and using it in ways that would ultimately benefit them. In the article Personhood, Animals, And The Law, “an animal forms some sort of representation of their environment. As a result of instinct, learning, and in the case of some animals, intelligent thought, objects in the animal’s environment are represented as desirable or aversive in specific ways: as something to eat, or to flee from, or to mate with, or to take care of” (Korsgaard). Animals categorize information in their memories in order to assess what could potentially harm or benefit them within their own environment. This could be considered as rational thought. Rationality is the “the ability to choose intelligently between options or to solve problems by taking thought” (Korsgaard). If animals are able to categorize information and distinguish between what is going to hurt or benefit them, then they will make conscious decisions that will end up benefiting themselves. People do the same thing. People categorize objects in our environment and give them certain qualities and objectives. People understand that certain things will help us live better, and that other things

Dolphins are a widely known mammal throughout the world. Mainly known for performing at aquariums such as sea world, not many people have seen wild dolphins. Being from the Florida Keys I have been lucky enough to be able to see these animals in their natural habitat. Dolphins are part of the family of toothed whales that also include Orcas. They normally grow to about 8 feet long and weight up to about 600 pounds. They are carnivores and their diet consist of different species of fish and squid. Dolphins normally will hunt in groups called “Pods” which they use sonar to help them find food from a distance away. The interesting thing about sonar vision is that dolphins can use this signal to visualize what the object is that lies ahead of them. Like how humans can visualize an object by touching it they can get a visualization of an object by scanning it with their sonar. They communicate in many ways to each other first is by sound which consist of whistles and different clicking sounds. Another way they communicate is by visual movement such as breaching, jumping and falling back into the water, and by moving either their pectoral or tail fin. They have streamlined bodies and have a relatively high muscle mass which allow them to swim up to speeds of 35 miles per hour. They do swim normally at about 20 miles per hour and can do this for a consistent amount of time. Dolphins are also widespread throughout the world but like to stay in warmer water regions. However, they