Rational Animals?
Published on 1. February 2006
Book
Hardback
568 pages
978-0-19-852826-5 (ISBN)
Description
To what extent can animal behaviour be described as rational? What does it even mean to describe behaviour as rational? This book focuses on one of the major debates in science today - how closely does mental processing in animals resembles mental processing in humans. It addresses the question of whether and to what extent non-human animals are rational, that is, whether any animal behaviour can be regarded as the result of rational thought processes. It does this with attention to three key questions, which recur throughout the book and which have both empirical and philosophical aspects: What kinds of behavioural tasks can animals successfully perform? What if any mental processes must be postulated to explain their performance at these tasks? What properties must processes have to count as rational? The book is distinctive in pursuing these questions not only in relation to our closest relatives, the primates, whose intelligence usually gets the most attention, but also in relation to birds and dolphins, where striking results are also being obtained. Some chapters focus on a particular species.
They describe some of the extraordinary and complex behaviour of these species - using tools in novel ways to solve foraging problems, for example, or behaving in novel ways to solve complex social problems - and ask whether such behaviour should be explained in rational or merely mechanistic terms. Other chapters address more theoretical issues and ask, for example, what it means for behaviour to be rational, and whether rationality can be understood in the absence of language. The book includes many of the world's leading figures doing empirical work on rationality in primates, dolphins, and birds, as well as distinguished philosophers of mind and science. The book includes an editors' introduction which summarises the philosophical and empirical work presented, and draws together the issues discussed by the contributors.
They describe some of the extraordinary and complex behaviour of these species - using tools in novel ways to solve foraging problems, for example, or behaving in novel ways to solve complex social problems - and ask whether such behaviour should be explained in rational or merely mechanistic terms. Other chapters address more theoretical issues and ask, for example, what it means for behaviour to be rational, and whether rationality can be understood in the absence of language. The book includes many of the world's leading figures doing empirical work on rationality in primates, dolphins, and birds, as well as distinguished philosophers of mind and science. The book includes an editors' introduction which summarises the philosophical and empirical work presented, and draws together the issues discussed by the contributors.
Reviews / Votes
Rational Animals? is thoughtful, thought-provoking, informative and fascinating and will do a great deal to further interdisciplinary understanding and informed debate. Journal of Consciousness Studies, Vol 13, No 12 This is an excellent, informative book on animal rationality. Doody's NotesMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
Oxford
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Psychologists and philosophers interested in animal behaviour and animal cognition. Evolutionary psychologists
Illustrations
line drawings, tabl.
Dimensions
Height: 240 mm
Width: 168 mm
Weight
1225 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-19-852826-5 (9780198528265)
Copyright in bibliographic data is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or its licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Edited by Susan Hurley, University of Warwick and All Souls College, Oxford, UK and Matthew Nudds, Department of Philosophy, University of Edinburgh, UK
Contributors: Elsa Addessi, Istituto di Scienze e Tecnologie della Cognizione, Rome, Italy Colin Allen, Dept of History & Philsophy of Science, Indiana University, Bloomington, USA Jose Luis Bermudez, Philosophy, Neuroscience & Psychology Program, Washington University, St Louis, USA Sarah T Boysen, The Ohio State University, Columbia, USA Josep Call, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany Nicky Clayton, Dept of Experimental Psychology, University of Cambridge, UK Richard Connor, Dept of Biology, University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, USA Gregory Currie, Dept of Philosophy, University of Nottingham, UK Anthony Dickinson, Dept of Experimental Psychology, University of Cambridge, UK Fred I Dretske, Dept of Philosophy, Duke University, Durham, USA Nathan Emery, Sub-dept of Animal Behaviour, University of Cambridge, UK William M Fields, Dept of Biology & Language Research Center, Georgia State University, Atlanta, USA Louis M Herman, Kewalo Basin Marine Mammal Laboratory, Honolulu, USA Cecilia Heyes, Dept of Psychology, University College London, UK Susan Hurley, Dept of Politics & International Studies, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK Alex Kacelnik,Dept of Zoology, University of Oxford, UK Janet Mann, Dept of Psychology, Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA Ruth Garrett Millikan, University of Connecticut, Storrs, USA Matthew Nudds, Dept of Philosophy, University of Edinburgh, UK David Papineau, Dept of Philosophy, King's College London, UK Irene M Pepperberg, Dept of Psychology, Brandeis University, Waltham, USA Daniel Povinelli, Cognitive Evolution Group, University of Louisiana, Lafayette, USA Joelle Proust, Institut Jean Nicod, Paris, France Duane M Rumbaugh, Great Ape Trust of Iowa, Des Moines, USA E Sue Savage-Rumbaugh, Dept of Biology & Language Research Center, Georgia State University, Atlanta, USA Sara J Shettleworth, Dept of Psychology, University of Toronto, Canada Kim Sterelny, Philosophy Program, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia Jennifer E Sutton, Dept of Psychology, University of Western Ontario, Canada Michael Tomasello, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany Alain J-P C Tschudin, Corpus Christi College, University of Cambridge, UK Elisabetta Visalberghi, Istituto di Scienze e Tecnologie della Cognizione, Rome, Italy Jennifer Vonk, Cognitive Evolution Group, University of Louisiana, Lafayette, USA
Contributors: Elsa Addessi, Istituto di Scienze e Tecnologie della Cognizione, Rome, Italy Colin Allen, Dept of History & Philsophy of Science, Indiana University, Bloomington, USA Jose Luis Bermudez, Philosophy, Neuroscience & Psychology Program, Washington University, St Louis, USA Sarah T Boysen, The Ohio State University, Columbia, USA Josep Call, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany Nicky Clayton, Dept of Experimental Psychology, University of Cambridge, UK Richard Connor, Dept of Biology, University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, USA Gregory Currie, Dept of Philosophy, University of Nottingham, UK Anthony Dickinson, Dept of Experimental Psychology, University of Cambridge, UK Fred I Dretske, Dept of Philosophy, Duke University, Durham, USA Nathan Emery, Sub-dept of Animal Behaviour, University of Cambridge, UK William M Fields, Dept of Biology & Language Research Center, Georgia State University, Atlanta, USA Louis M Herman, Kewalo Basin Marine Mammal Laboratory, Honolulu, USA Cecilia Heyes, Dept of Psychology, University College London, UK Susan Hurley, Dept of Politics & International Studies, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK Alex Kacelnik,Dept of Zoology, University of Oxford, UK Janet Mann, Dept of Psychology, Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA Ruth Garrett Millikan, University of Connecticut, Storrs, USA Matthew Nudds, Dept of Philosophy, University of Edinburgh, UK David Papineau, Dept of Philosophy, King's College London, UK Irene M Pepperberg, Dept of Psychology, Brandeis University, Waltham, USA Daniel Povinelli, Cognitive Evolution Group, University of Louisiana, Lafayette, USA Joelle Proust, Institut Jean Nicod, Paris, France Duane M Rumbaugh, Great Ape Trust of Iowa, Des Moines, USA E Sue Savage-Rumbaugh, Dept of Biology & Language Research Center, Georgia State University, Atlanta, USA Sara J Shettleworth, Dept of Psychology, University of Toronto, Canada Kim Sterelny, Philosophy Program, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia Jennifer E Sutton, Dept of Psychology, University of Western Ontario, Canada Michael Tomasello, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany Alain J-P C Tschudin, Corpus Christi College, University of Cambridge, UK Elisabetta Visalberghi, Istituto di Scienze e Tecnologie della Cognizione, Rome, Italy Jennifer Vonk, Cognitive Evolution Group, University of Louisiana, Lafayette, USA
Content
1. The questions of animal rationality: theory and evidence; PART I - TYPES AND LEVELS OF RATIONALITY; 2. Meanings of rationality; 3. Minimal rationality; 4. Styles of rationality; 5. Animal reasoning and proto-logic; 6. Making sense of animals; PART II - RATIONAL VERSUS ASSOCIATIVE PROCESSES; 7. Transitive inference in animals: reasoning or conditioned associations?; 8. Rational or associative: Imitation in Japanese quail; 9. The rationality of animal memory: complex caching strategies of western scrub jays; PART III - METACOGNITION; 10. Descartes' two errors: reason and reflection in the great apes; 11. Do animals know what they know?; 12. Metacognition and animal rationality; 13. Rationality, decentring, and the evidence for pretence in nonhuman animals; PART IV - SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR AND COGNITION; 14. Folk logic and animal rationality; 15. Rationality in capuchin monkey's feeding behaviour?; 16. Social cognition in the wild: Machiavellian dolphins?; PAART V - MIND READING AND BEHAVIOUR READING; 17. Do chimpanzees know what others see - or only what they are looking at?; 18. We don't need a microscope to explore the chimpanzee's mind; 19. Belief attribution tasks with dolphins: what social minds can reveal about animal rationality; PART VI - BEHAVIOR AND COGNITION IN SYMBOLIC ENVIRONMENTS; 20. Intelligence and rational behaviour in the bottle-nosed dolphin; 21. Intelligence and rationality in parrots; 22. Effects of symbols on chimpanzee cognition; 23. Language as a window on rationality