Reference: Article of Anthropomorphism and Anthropomorphic Selection – Beyond the “Cute Response” James A. Serpell
Anthropomorphism appears to have its roots in the human capacity for so-called “reflexive consciousness”—that is, the ability to use self-knowledge, knowledge of what it is like to be a person, to understand and anticipate the behavior of others (Humphrey, 1983)
From earliest childhood, it seems, we instinctively view other animals as social subjects (Myers & Saunders, 2002) and imbue them with human-like intelligence, desires, beliefs, and intentions.
Anthropomorphism has been a tremendous boon to animals according to the increasing amount of domestic animals, which species now vastly outnumber their wild ancestor.
From an animal welfare perspective, however, the effects of anthropomor- phism are far less benign. Anthropomorphic selection8—that is, selection in favor of physical and behavioral traits that facilitate the attribution of human men- tal states to nonhumans—imposes unusual and unique pressures on the objects of its attentions, in much the same way that the phenomenon of “female choice” does in sexual selection.
Tom & Jerry
In the article of James, there are positive and negative thoughts from the author’s perspective. Anthropomorphism affects animals and importantly, the human response to animals. The article mentions examples of pets using humans “art of releasing and exploiting our innate parental instinct” to react “cute response” which is a classic example of pet and human interaction. It’s an interesting phenomenon that pet know how to “please” human in order to ask for their needs. It is also correspond the interview with La La’s owner, who claims that her pet will take his leash in front of the owner when he heard the owner said “let’s go downstairs”. Barking at the owner if they go out without him. which from the behaviors appear to this time, with his owner’s experience, is being told not to go outside without him. This case shows that La La could give his consent to his owner, have abilities to deliver his thoughts about what he like or dislike.
Animal right activists use Anthropomorphism instead of swing animal as private property, they view animals have the same hierarchy as human.
Negative points of Anthropomorphism:
Over expectations of animal behaviors such as never to express their natural instincts
Today I interviewed with some pet owners who used to lived or living with their dog or cat. For a better in-depth details of the information from their experience and incase the answers are unified, I had a one to one interview with each of the owner. During the chat, I found that they have common feelings with their pets that they considered their pets as part of their family. They seem like they are quite sure about their pet’s feeling and purpose of the behaviors from some experiences.
For this interview I’ve asked them below these main questions:
Do you think your pet understand or know about what you are saying?
Can you know how your pet feels in any situation or what’s the pet want to do?
Do you feel your pet’s emotion?
Do you think is important for your pet to understand human world?
Do you have any interesting or unforgettable stories you want to share?
Case 1
Pet: Poodle , name: Daisy, Stan
The owner claims that her dogs have different IQ levels which she thinks her female dog Daisy usually is more clever than the other male dog called Stan. She thinks Daisy can understand her from human facial expressions as well as the behavior. On the other hand, the owner can also read Daisy’s emotions and feelings from Daisy’s facial expression because she will turn her eyeballs around and show her the white part of the eye which normally dogs only show their eyeballs. She thinks Daisy shows her attitude of “disdain”.
Daisy can realize when her family members got sick. She saved the owner’s niece’s life when she saw her lying on the bed feeling really bad, then started barking at the owner to tell her to save her niece. Stan got depressed when her sister Daisy got sick.
Left Stan, Right Daisy
The owner thinks the pet understands her more than she understands her dog.
Case 2
Pet: male dog, Pet name: 拉拉 La La
Fiona: “Sometimes I think 拉拉（La La) understands me when I felt not happy, he would come to me and stay with me very quietly. I think he can feel my feelings. In daily life, he is very naughty, but when you feel not happy, he may understand you and just stay with you. La La has lived with us for around 20 years, we may know some of his daily habits as well as some requirements. For example, he really likes going downstairs to play, as long as we said “let’s go down stairs, he will go to find her leash and approach us to put it on. If we are about to go out without him, he will bark at us and ask to bring him together.
Sometimes I can feel my dog’s emotions but he only knows his family members. He always follows us and can not stay without us. Otherwise he will get scared. His tail condition is related to his mood, for example shaking his tail mostly means he is happy.
I don’t think it is important for La La to understand the human world because dogs with their independent life, are all different indepence. He has a short life compared to humans. I just want him to be happy and it’s not necessary to understand us. But we believe if we feed him well and love him, he can feel a sense of security and love.”
拉拉 （La La)
Case 3
Pet: male cat, Name: Mi Mi
“I do think he understood me. Whenever he wanted to scratch our sofa he always checked and made sure that my mom wasn’t there. Because she was the only person who would shout him off the sofa.
Yeah I think because humans are way smarter than our pets, so we could detect their emotions and motivations easily. I used to use dog treats to entice my dog back to her cage, and then she noticed that whenever she sees the treat when we are going out or it is time for her to go back to the cage she will just look away and drooling. She knows that she can’t resist the temptation if she sees the treat. I don’t know how does she detect when we want her to get back the cage or just want to treat her, she will have treats without a second thought when it is “safe “. It is important for her to understand our world, otherwise it might be difficult for people and animals to live under the same roof. I think people understand animals less than animals because people will find lots of ways to make animals understand them.”
Mi Mi
Case 4
Pet: Female cat, Name: tomato
“My cat like living independently, but when she want to eat or play, she will spread out in front of me or rub around my foot. I do know her mood, if she feel unhappy she will stay alone and saying “meow meow”. When she feel happy she will run around the house. For me, I don’t think she have ability to understand the human world. When I was alone with out my boyfriend at night, I will call her then she will come to me with the annoying “meow”, but still accompany me to sleep.”
Tomato
My conclusion
½ of the interviewers think it is important for animals to understand the human world. However, all of them have cases to prove their pet understands them through the owner’s behavior or facial expression. And all of the interviewers have experience to know that sometimes they can read their emotions.
Lala case proves that dogs can give consent to humans.
Most of the interviewers claim that they understand their pet through their behaviors or facial expressions. However, if humans understand their pet is realistic?
Or are they just guesting from human consciousness and ideas?
Descartes considered animal as merely ‘mechanisms’ or ‘automata’——complex physical machines without experience because they can’t talk or philosophizing as human. So, they are lack of soul and thinking. Method (1637) and Meditations (1641)
Ralph Cudworth disagreement of René Descartes and his concept of soul
Animals might not speak or think like human, however they have feeling and regarding to the various animal behaviors, Cudworth claimed animals like human, have soul.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau philosophy theory of animal right
Rousseau in the Discourse on Inequality argued that animals should be part of natural law, not because they are rational but because they are sentient. He argued that sensitivity, the capacity to experience pleasure and suffering, entitles rights. Animals being sensitive experience pain and suffering and therefore as a consequence they should have rights.
Ronald Grimsley The philosophy of Rousseau
Compare to human, for us it is hard to tell what is their actual feelings and consciousness. But based on the current understanding of the animals behavior, some behaviors or purposes of the animals are quite obviously recognized such as “eating”, “playing”, “hot”, “family”. However, I believe they don’t have ideas or concepts of diet, heat stroke, mental illness even though some animals might also suffer from mental illness according to the cases happening until now. On the other hand, people might ignore that animals also have their life circle and they might also have their perception or defination of things, for example they will use their language to defined “heat stroke” in their world that we will never know. Even so, they still use their language to communicate with human.
For the animals, do they realize anything happened on them, for example, if they can realize concept such as disease, over eat, mental illness?
Reference: Philosophy Now, Sydney, Kaldas (2015) Available at https://philosophynow.org/issues/108/Descartes_versus_Cudworth_On_The_Moral_Wort h_of_Animals
Grimsley. R, (1973) The phiolsophy of Rousseau, London Oxford NewYork
As a pet lover, I always curious about animals. Because of my dad with an interest of gardening, he own some golden fishes and turtle living in the garden of our house. For some reason I don’t have experience of living with pet such as cat, dog or rabbit. However I always have chances to get in touch with them because most of my friends or relatives around me have pet such as cat and dog. When I was interacting with them, I was always wondering how many thoughts are there within their bright beautiful eyes and their little brain. And how they think about who we are to them?
As a starting point of this project, I bring some research about service animals and how pets have positively impact for human mental health to my first tutorial. Obviously many pets are good companions for us for sure, but this also question me many times that are we a good companion for them? Why are we always sure about their thoughts and their emotions? For exploring this topic, I have different uncertainties about animal as well as their connection with human. From the animal consciousness, do they think they have the same hierarchy with human being? Is it important for them to understand the human world? What is going on with their behavior and their “barking sound”?
Dog Girl series Emilie Gossiaux 2011
Before the first tutorial, I went to the Welcome Collection museum and found a work by artist Emilie Gossiaux. She creates some works about the relationship between her and her guide dog, becoming a hybrid-being to represent their interdependence. The first image showing the two hybrid-beings holding hand and looking at each other, it is looks like they have equal sight and share feelings with each other. And they all have dog and human features on their body, it is hard to say who is the “human dog” and who is the “dog human”. Emilie creates these work to show her interdependence relationship with her guide dog, which show how strong feeling she feel when she considers her guide dog as her soul mate. However, how the guide dog feels about this relationship?
