Animal Minds (Animals)

by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Monday, June 20, 2011, 00:51 (4904 days ago) @ David Turell

David says that humans are different in kind from other animals. I pointed out that all species were different in kind, and asked what was the significance of this fact.
> > 
> > DAVID: Hyenas, humpbacks, bees, elephants, humming birds all have what we have to a degree, but we are different in kind (Adler). Where are the elephant Mozarts? The Bach bees? The Shakespeare sheep? The animals have a smidgen of what we have. You are equating an ant hill with Mt Everest.
> > 
> > I must stress that I am equating the basic instincts, not the intellectual, aesthetic, scientific or philosophical capacity!
> 
> And that is fine, but it is bypassing the points I have made over the years. I am not discussing animals as organisms with certain physical and mental qualities. I am looking as humans as possessing an infinitely more complex brain with extraordinary capacities. That brain is different in kind, not degree from bats, buffaloes, whales, dolphins, apes, chimps, corvids, etc. Same basic instincts, yes. Aestheic capacities, infinitely enormous in the human brain. Compare the lower animals from us? You should know better. There is no real comparison, except at the simple levels you decribe, we inherit the same basic comparisons. Again, that is tiny portion of what we humans are. And that brain is contained in a body which is much more capable of intricate activity than our closest relatives. Put a chimp at bat in cricket. Any doubt as to the outcome? Even with training, if that is possible. There are so many ways in which we differ.
> 
> See Raymond Talls' book, 'Aping Mankind', just being released, which states that we differ in kind, not degree.-I'm going to call you out on this one here... because anatomically, the only real difference between us and the rest of the ape kingdom is that we have a larger prefrontal cortex. (Outside of a larger brain overall.) On a cellular level, we all have axons, neurons, and spindle cells. Spindle cells, it turns out are the likely source of our emotional intelligences... although the fact that dogs read human emotions like us and they LACK these cells is definitely a mystery for that explanation. -Bottom line is, you can technically argue that each species' brain is different when you just pluck it out of the head, but the fact that all our brains are made of the same basic 'stuff' screams degree rather than kind. -As a caveat, mathematically speaking, each brain you look at is completely different from the next, so technically speaking, there is NO similarity even between the brains of two healthy adult humans (even if they are identical twins). But if we travel down that path, we come directly to Agrippan skepticism, and I'll leave it to you (or dhw) to come up with a proper refutation of THAT.

--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"