Proof of Animal Consciousness Thread

Just a note which might be useful (or not) to this thread - I heard an interesting theory that basically consciousness is an error - like, it appears when there is some kind of malfunction. As long as things function smoothly, consciousness is not required, but when there is some kind of deadlock, consciousness arises.

I'd have to do a bit of searching to clarify it more, but I hope you get the gist.

  On 11/28/2015 at 12:30 PM, phling said:

not that I know a lot about this, but seems like consciousness is often seen in a binary fashion, either you have it or you don't.

sorry if this sounds like wank:

 

but even in humans, throughout the day, your level of consciousness varies wildly, and also probably quite a bit between humans.

when asleep, when obsessively videogame, drunk, stoned, loving, working, meditating, all different levels of consciousness.

and we can be unconscious.

maybe rocks are conscious but in a really slow way,

personal conclusion: everything is conscious to a degree.

Yeah, I also think consciousness is a spectrum instead of a yes/no thing. I feel it's a kind of loopback in the mind where your mind starts to analyze it's own thoughts instead of just the outside sensory stuff and there are different levels how well you are able to do that. For example is it possible to translate your own thoughts to some abstract symbolic framework like language or spatial reasoning.

  On 11/28/2015 at 12:40 PM, hoggy said:

Just a note which might be useful (or not) to this thread - I heard an interesting theory that basically consciousness is an error - like, it appears when there is some kind of malfunction. As long as things function smoothly, consciousness is not required, but when there is some kind of deadlock, consciousness arises.

 

I'd have to do a bit of searching to clarify it more, but I hope you get the gist.

,

There's apparently two different kinds of logical thinking, the things you can solve in your head without conscious effort, like things you know very well; and problems that need conscious thinking because they are too hard to be automatically solved or you haven't practiced enough yet. So when your brain is just going through things as usual you don't really need consciousness but when some new or hard things come along you have to become aware of your own thinking.

  On 11/28/2015 at 1:30 PM, mokz said:

 

There's apparently two different kinds of logical thinking

 

just two?

  On 11/28/2015 at 12:57 AM, psn said:

This forum is proof.

Whoa

  On 11/28/2015 at 1:41 PM, triachus said:

 

  On 11/28/2015 at 12:57 AM, psn said:

This forum is proof.

 

i would say that only humans have human consciousness, and that all living things have some sort of cosciousness, even self-awareness.

Limiter bunny is funny [-;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTPp-IsEYR4

yeah, some birds are surprisingly smart despite their teeny brains.

I thought this was interesting. http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/books/2013/02/06/genius-of-dogs-brian-hare/1861497/

Q: How do you know dogs can retain thousands of words?

A: The interesting finding there is that from a scientific standpoint, it's not amazing. What's amazing is how the dogs learned the words. They learned it through inferential reasoning, the same process kids learn words. ... You can put a dog in a room full of toys and put new ones in, and give the new ones odd names. The dog will bring back the toy it's never seen before because it's called by a name he's never heard before.

Q: And dogs can make inferences? Explain.

A: That's one of the main things we're trying to communicate. They have the ability to use inferential reasoning. There are problems you have to solve quickly. Nature has equipped them with being able to make inferences. They can read our gestures. They're inferring what we're trying to tell them.

People who deny the fact that humans are animals, and who deny the fact that animals are the same things as humans: animals, cause so many problems.

  On 11/29/2015 at 6:58 AM, melancholera said:

 

I thought this was interesting. http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/books/2013/02/06/genius-of-dogs-brian-hare/1861497/

Q: How do you know dogs can retain thousands of words?

A: The interesting finding there is that from a scientific standpoint, it's not amazing. What's amazing is how the dogs learned the words. They learned it through inferential reasoning, the same process kids learn words. ... You can put a dog in a room full of toys and put new ones in, and give the new ones odd names. The dog will bring back the toy it's never seen before because it's called by a name he's never heard before.

Q: And dogs can make inferences? Explain.

A: That's one of the main things we're trying to communicate. They have the ability to use inferential reasoning. There are problems you have to solve quickly. Nature has equipped them with being able to make inferences. They can read our gestures. They're inferring what we're trying to tell them.

 

Does make you appreciate our own intelligence a bit more when you hear about non-human animals doing it.

  On 11/28/2015 at 12:40 PM, hoggy said:

Just a note which might be useful (or not) to this thread - I heard an interesting theory that basically consciousness is an error - like, it appears when there is some kind of malfunction. As long as things function smoothly, consciousness is not required, but when there is some kind of deadlock, consciousness arises.

 

I'd have to do a bit of searching to clarify it more, but I hope you get the gist.

Yeah. I read a study where what we perceive as our conscious decision making is actually slow, lagging behind the unconscious mind's decisions

They tested by telling people to choose when to push a button, but instead of pushing it to just push another button with another hand or something when they've made their decision. That's not it exactly but I can't remember, but it's close enough

Anyway, they found that even taking into account round trip speed-of-neuron-firing latency and everything, the body's muscle tissue knew it was about to make a movement before the person responded that they knew they had made up their mind. Or something to that effect

tl;dr

People's mind are made up for them before they realize they've made up their minds

so i wonder, how can anyone still care about opinions....

  On 11/29/2015 at 6:58 AM, melancholera said:

 

I thought this was interesting. http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/books/2013/02/06/genius-of-dogs-brian-hare/1861497/

Q: How do you know dogs can retain thousands of words?

A: The interesting finding there is that from a scientific standpoint, it's not amazing. What's amazing is how the dogs learned the words. They learned it through inferential reasoning, the same process kids learn words. ... You can put a dog in a room full of toys and put new ones in, and give the new ones odd names. The dog will bring back the toy it's never seen before because it's called by a name he's never heard before.

Q: And dogs can make inferences? Explain.

A: That's one of the main things we're trying to communicate. They have the ability to use inferential reasoning. There are problems you have to solve quickly. Nature has equipped them with being able to make inferences. They can read our gestures. They're inferring what we're trying to tell them.

 

The majority of these so called "animal studies" are bs to the highest degree, specially cat and dog ones because they're always trying to make them more than what they really are.

That rabbit art with all the analog/digital stuff was on the cover of Tape Op magazine once upon a time.

Slightly unrelated but did anyone see that David Attenborough thing The Hunt on BBC1 last Sunday? There was some really beautiful footage of spinner dolphins hunting in huge pods; apparently they can form groups numbering in the hundreds. It'd be awesome to know more about the sort of bonds and society they form.

tldr; dolphins are clever and great

Dolphins are amazing...too bad they're fucked (thanks to greed and corruption, as usual):

https://shadowproof.com/2015/11/28/ban-on-tuna-labeled-dolphin-safe-shows-how-tpp-will-crush-consumer-rights/

dolphins are rapists

Talking about consciousness is tricky. There are no satisfactory definitions on consciousness. If you count an organisms ability to adapt to outside stimuli, then everything from plants to humans have consciousness. There is also a tendency for humans to anthropomorphise animal behaviour.

  On 11/30/2015 at 8:33 AM, AdieuErsatzEnnui said:

dolphins are rapists

correct, all living things have a certain degree of consciousness.

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/consciousness

if you mean self aware then that's another story

i'd like to draw your attention to the gorilla Koko

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koko_(gorilla)

that's Robin on the left

There's an animal collective making music and they seem somewhat conscious.