An interesting read. “A group of prominent biologists and philosophers announced a new consensus: There’s “a realistic possibility” that insects, octopuses, crustaceans, fish and other overlooked animals experience consciousness.” quantamagazine.org/insects-and-other-animals-have…
I really don’t understand their examples. Like I get self-recognition and memory but what makes play behaviour, curiosity, anxiety-like states, and problem-solving signs of consciousness? These are at the end of the day organisms responding to stimuli, something all organisms by definition do. Is pain response a sign of consciousness but something like phototaxis isn’t only because the former is ‘complex’ and the latter ‘simple’?
If consciousness is merely defined as being aware of one’s surroundings: I would think that most living things have it.
Has the actual mechanism of consciousness been discovered? Do we know what causes it? Where it comes from? How it is separate from simply reacting to stimuli?
The fundamental mechanism is still unknown, however we do know some important details about consciousness:
It’s not a simple binary all-or-nothing
It can change naturally or artificially
It’s divisible and perhaps even additive
We know this due to a number of phenomena:
Natural variation in states like awake, alert, groggy, asleep, comatose
Altered states due to alcohol or drugs (drunk, high, caffeinated, hallucinating, suppressed with anaesthesia)
Disorders such as Body Identity Dismorphic Disorder (BIID - thinking a major limb doesn’t belong to your body) or Phantom Limb (sensing an limb that isn’t there). Look these up if you’re unfamiliar, they’re fascinating.
Together these and other observations suggest that consciousness is an emergent phenomena (not present in simple organ structures alone) and occurs along a scale, likely proportional to brain size. And just as your daily state can change (between sleep and wakefulness at minimum) it seems a reasonable hypothesis that other creatures experience something similar, though perhaps with a lower maximum awareness in their most alert state.
“Humans and insects both have free will” and “humans and insects both lack free will” are each easier to swallow than “humans have free will but insects don’t.”
I have ads turned off and do not benefit in any way from my blog. I feel confident that my write-up should persuade open-minded individuals to give other animals the benefit of the doubt regarding possessing consciousness.
I have doubts about insect consciousness is any sort of relatable sense to humans, but many other animals absolutely possess consciousness similar to humans.
Octopuses are so wildly smart I can’t imagine them not being conscious. Of all the animals we should not be eating they’re one of the big ones. I’m convinced if they have the chance (over like an evolutionary amount of years) they could develop past being solitary and set up rudimentary societies
One of the biggest hindrances for their species is the lack of social learning. The mother starves and dies protecting the eggs, so all octopuses have to learn for themselves over their short lifespans.
And that is a testament to their cunning intellect and problem-solving capability. They learn so much and so quickly.
I’ve wondered what would happen in an experiment where a mother octopus was hooked up to machines to deliver nutrients to prevent her from starving to death while guarding her eggs. What kind of social dynamic would then follow once they hatched? Would she teach her young?
Why do we need machines? Can’t we just give her some food? “Hey momma octopus, have a Snicker’s. You’re not you when you’re hungry.”
Worth keeping in mind, though, teaching is a skill. I know lots of brilliant people who can’t teach worth a damn. And humans are biologically hardwired for teaching. Imagine how hard teaching has got to be for an octopus.
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