Chapter
Ten
Evolution and animal minds
sounds made by the keyboard and then use the
sounds spontaneously. It seems possible that
dolphins will prove better language learners than
many apes have been, and even that they have
their own underwater language, representing the
shapes of objects using the complex clicks and
whistles by which they echolocate (Kassewitz et al.,
2016). These speculations aside, it seems that we
humans are alone in our spontaneous use of true
language.
THE OCTOPUS
So what is it like to be an octopus? Octopuses are
invertebrates; they are classified specifically as
molluscs, along with animals like clams that do not
even have brains. But octopuses can discriminate
between objects based on size, shape, and bright-
ness; they can learn the right path to a reward and
how to retrieve a crab from a clear bottle sealed
with a plug. They have a sleep–wake cycle, and blow
water at floating objects in play. They have complex
sensory receptors and nervous systems, with as
many neurons as some vertebrates – but with more
neurons located in the tentacles than in the brain,
each tentacle containing a complex semi-autono-
mous neural network.
It is hard to say just how intelligent an octopus may
be, but is intelligence even relevant to conscious-
ness? We will come back to this question in Chap-
ter 12, where we explore how artificial intelligence and artificial consciousness
intersect.
Meanwhile, is the octopus conscious? You might answer ‘Yes’: every creature lives
in its own world of experiences, however simple or primitive its senses might be.
You might even answer that a single octopus tentacle is conscious. David Edel-
man and colleagues declare that ‘it is not likely that the question, “what is it like to
be an octopus tentacle?” will ever be posed by any rational philosopher’ (2005, p.
178), but is there any good reason not to ask?
On the other hand, you might say ‘No’: the octopus lacks some critical ability
without which there is no consciousness, such as intelligence, a self-concept,
theory of mind, memes, or language. If you wanted to be really sceptical, you
might say that it is just as impossible to answer the question, ‘What is it like
to be my partner?’, as it is to answer the question, ‘What is it like to be an
octopus?’ None of us can ever know what it is like to be any other creature, nor
be sure that there is anything it is like to be any other creature. The furthest
step down this radical line is that human consciousness is a grand illusion
and there is nothing it is like to be us. In that case there would be no sense in
ACtIVItY 10.1
Lab choiceIn a ‘Balloon debate’, every participant has to convince
the others that they should not be thrown out to save
the sinking hot-air balloon. In the lab debate, there is
an equally difficult choice to be made between species.
Imagine that just one animal is going to be released
from being tested on in a pharmaceutical laboratory
and returned to the wild. Which species should it be?
Choose several different species and someone to
defend each one, or let students pick their own
favoured species. Each person is given a set length
of time (e.g. 2 or 5 minutes) to make their case.
Afterwards, the audience votes on which animal is
released. If the choice proves easy, vote on which
should go second and third.
This debate can be held without prior planning.
Alternatively, ask students to prepare their case in
advance. They might bring photos, videos, or other
kinds of evidence. They might learn about the social
and communicative skills of their chosen species, or
about its intelligence, capacity for insight, memory,
sensory systems, or pain behaviour. The aim is to
explore the nature of animal suffering.