The nature and nurturing of animal minds

Abstract

Introduction:This chapter deals with ideas as old as Western philosophy itself. What is the nature of the mind, and how is it shaped? What is humanity’s place in nature? In Aristotelian philosophy, nature was conceived as a linear, ladder-like progression of forms, from the lowly to the divine. During the Middle Ages, beautiful tableaus depicted this scala naturae as a glorious ladder of life with God and heavenly beings followed in descending order down the rungs by noblemen (not women) and commoners and then in turn by wild animals, domesticated animals, plants and minerals (Figure 1). Under this view, the human mind was uniquely endowed with the capacity for thought; a capacity that separates us from the rest of the animal kingdom and links us to the divine. Whereas animals were mere automata, Descartes (1637/1994) taught that humanity had a dual nature: a material body inhabited by a divine soul (residing in the pineal gland). Through this duality, we alone could reason and think. [...]