From: dab@ism.isc.com (Dave Butterfield)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Consciousness in animals
Date: 12 Nov 1992 02:02:23 GMT
Organization: x
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plumpton@wampyr.cc.uow.edu.au (David Plumpton) writes:
>>On the assumption that animals experience consciousness (which I believe),
>>where abouts in the level of animal development would people think that
>>it starts? i.e. where is the very first 'spark' of self-awareness?

> From: danny@orthanc.cs.su.oz.au (Danny)
> Newsgroups: alt.books.reviews,sci.athropology,sci.biology,sci.psychology
> Subject: Book Review - How Monkeys See the World
> Date: 9 Nov 92 05:33:25 GMT
> 
> How Monkeys See the World
> Dorothy L. Cheney and Robert M. Seyfarth
> Chicago University Press 1990
> pp. 377
> 
> _How Monkeys See the World_ is about one of those questions that has
> always intrigued people - how much do animals understand about the
> world?  It concentrates on vervet monkeys (the authors' own fieldwork was
> done on groups of vervet monkeys in Amboseli national park, Kenya), but
> it also draws on studies of other primate species - in the wild, in
> captivity, and in laboratory experiments.  Comparisons are made
> throughout with non-primate species.  
> 
> Since the questions being asked are of a difficult nature - Are monkeys
> self-conscious?  Do they have emotions?  etc. - methodological issues are
> important.  The authors eschew an explicitly behaviourist approach, but
> are very careful when interpreting anecdotal evidence of monkey
> behaviour.  They are conservative in their claims for monkey
> intentionality, with the result that what they do claim seems
> convincing.  
> 
> The book starts of by looking at vervet monkeys - their ecology, social
> hierarchy, behaviour, and vocalisations.  This is then used to look more
> generally at such things as deception and attribution, using these
> behaviours to obtain insight into monkeys' mental processes.
> 
> The conclusion the authors draw is that monkeys have at least first order
> intentionality - ie they have emotions, mental states, etc. - and a very
> good understanding of monkey behaviour.  It is also argued that monkey
> vocalisations do have meaning and form a rudimentary "language".
> However there is no clear evidence that monkeys know that other monkeys
> have mental states, or that they have self-awareness.  The evidence for
> this kind of second order intentionality is most convincing (but still
> equivocal) for chimpanzees, and there seem to be qualitative differences
> between monkeys and apes.  
> 
> Intelligence in primates is domain specific - restricted to certain
> areas of application and not generally accessible.  Social problems are
> often more adeptly solved than non-social ones, and it seems likely that
> a major selective force acting in the evolution of human intelligence
> was the need to understand and organise social interactions.  The ideas
> presented have interesting consequences for the origins of human
> language.  
> 
> This is a very very interesting book, and anyone interested in cognitive
> psychology, human evolution, linguistics or ethology (or even just
> monkeys!) will want to read it.  A minor complaint is that all references
> to evolution seem to assume a fairly naive adaptionist viewpoint (but
> then maybe I've just been reading too much Stephen Jay Gould :-).  
> 
> 6/11/92
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-- 
	Truth is an evaluation of a statement within a context.
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy