Do Animals Possess Consciousness Research Paper

Central Idea: Dolphins are unique creatures that possess numerous abilities such as, their intelligence, communication skills, and behavioral patterns.

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.

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.

They are also intelligent enough to recognize themselves in a mirror, and as well as empathy, which makes us human because of our emotions and feelings. Dolphins creates sounds, make physical contacts, and body clusters to communicate with their own and another species. They make vocals such as whistles, clicking, and squeaking sounds, to interact with another. An good example of an intelligent dolphin is Kelly the dolphin at the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies in Mississippi; from the study, Kelly the dolphin has a good critical thinking skills comparing to human. From the article "Why dolphins are deep thinkers" written by Anuschka de Rohan; Rohan stated many examples such as showing Kelly having a sense of future and delay gratification. Rohan said "When people drop paper into the water she hides it under a rock at the bottom of the pool. The next time a trainer passes, she goes down to the rock and tears off a piece of paper to give to the trainer. After a fish reward, she goes back down, tears off another piece of paper, gets another fish, and so on." Kelly wasn't trained this way, but she figured another way to receive

Chimpanzees can solve puzzles, play with objects and have been witnessed to mourn the death of other chimpanzees. When tested against humans challenging their mental agility and short and long term memory, the chimpanzees won with no difficulty. Yet, a memory test is no sufficient way of testing ones’ intelligence. However, successful problem solving skills demonstrates that the chimp has a complex brain that can comprehend and adapt to different

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.

Monkeys can lean to use symbols and numbers and can understand aspects of human language.

Although the percentage of animals used in research is small, ‘studies of animal cognition have provided comparative and ecological perspective on issues of the mind and intelligence’ (American Psychological Association, no date:online), and a wide range of animal models have been and will continue to be critical in understanding the brain and behaviour of humans, particularly for understanding psychiatric disorders and neurological diseases.

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.

Pink dolphins don't only make sounds only from their mouths. Unlike regular dolphins pink dolphins can bend like a dolphin doughnut. A dolphin doughnut is is when a pink dolphin touches its tail to its nose. A pink dolphin sleeps upside down like a dead goldfish. Dolphins have big flippers that allow them to crawl on land. According to the text, dolphins can locate objects by their echoes. This is called

Despite of the different perspectives from philosophers on whether animals have conscious or not, most animals are depicted as cognizant. This indicates that they can think; distinguish their own surrounding besides endure suffering and gratification (Griffin, 2001). The animals experience and understand in a different perspective as compared to human beings. Animals have different levels of consciousness whereby some poses higher and others lower mental perspectives

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 have a good level of intelligence. Self recognition, social skills, language skills and the use of tools are all signs that scientist use to prove that these animals have a good capacity of smarts in their brain.

However, how fast humans are able to learn can be disposed by a few animals, such as dolphins (Toothman). Dolphins can quickly generalize basic words to objects that have the same characteristics. Dolphins can comprehend pointing as well. This is demonstrated by their self-awareness using mirrors to inspect marks on their bodies.

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