Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site bbncca.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!ihnp4!bbncca!rrizzo From: rrizzo@bbncca.ARPA (Ron Rizzo) Newsgroups: net.philosophy Subject: Re: animal vs human rights, morality Message-ID: <1313@bbncca.ARPA> Date: Fri, 8-Feb-85 10:33:34 EST Article-I.D.: bbncca.1313 Posted: Fri Feb 8 10:33:34 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 9-Feb-85 08:15:51 EST References: <233@usl.UUCP> Organization: Bolt, Beranek and Newman, Cambridge, Ma. Lines: 49But most writing on the human/animal difference assume an intelligence difference in kind, not merely in degree, if they allow intelligence in animals at all. Saying we are obliged to treat less intelligent humans as less (than) human rests on an equivocation: the word intelligence is used to mean alternately a capacity for thought & reason etc., OR the greater use or development of such a capacity. Attempts to make intelli- gence the basis of as strong a moral distinction as that usually drawn between humans & animals (vs. say a desire for eugenics or a meritocracy) have always concerned possession of the capacity, not its exercise, as far as I know. To emphasize this point: Alexander Marshak has studied paleolithic (human) artifacts to extract by inference etc. as much information about symbolic and cognitive abilities of early humankind as possible. His conclusion: mind as human cognitive & symbol-making capacity (& even in terms of specific skills) has remained constant for the last 40,000 years. We can't know even by report what occurs in animal minds (if they have "minds") for they lack language. Every attempt to demonstrate the exis- tence of an "animal language" has been exploded in precisely the same way: dolphins, chimpanzees, whales, or ants, for that matter, can learn and use a system of "signals" (signs representing objects characterized by proximity in time or space to those objects) but have never displayed the ability to manipulate a system of "symbols" ("abstract" signs, or representations of objects removed in time & space from those objects) which is what (human) language is par excellence. However, this fact does not seem to deter the "animal language" enthusiasts. Human intelligence has been repeatedly & intimately linked to the nature and powers of development of language by many scientists & philosophers. Besides "animal language", the only other source for belief in animal intelligence is the detailed observations of & thinking about animal behavior by ethologists, who feel strongly moved to impute "drives" & "emotions" to many species. I'm inclined to favor this attribution since it's based on careful & considered observation. But it points up the gap between thought & feeling on which the idea of "intelligence" is based. It certainly is interesting to speculate about human/animal differences (or their lack), but given the contrary evidence that exists, it seems a fruitless enterprise. Regards, Ron Rizzo