CogSci1 Top 10 List Chapter Summary
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The following Top Ten List of Big Ideas summarizes Chapter 3, "Animal Minds", of Stan Franklin's [[Artificial Minds]]. The words are generally taken straight from the text.

  1. Thou shall not anthropomorphize This is the first commandment of ethology. This means that people shouldn't attribute human feelings, capacities, and such to animals.

  2. Another bit on anthropomopphzing Griffin has his own bit to be saying about this. He wants to completely do away with the first commandment of ethology. He claims that if you don't anthropomorphize then you're going to miss out on what's going on. "Anthropomorphizing works: attributing motives and strategies to animals is ofen the best way for an observer to predict what an individual is likely to do next."

  3. Do animals have minds? This question is explored throughout the chapter by looking at the question of animals being conscious, being self aware, and having rational minds.

  4. Another view on animal minds Some behavioral psychologists and antrhopologists would argue against animal minds to this day.

  5. If animals don't have minds, then what? A alternative to animals not having minds is the mechanistic alernative. This alternative statees that animal behaviour is adequately explained by genetic instructions conveyed by DNA and molded bby natural selections, or by learning during the lifetime of the individual animal, or by some combination of both.

  6. Solipsism A solipist believes that they are the only one there is, and that everybody else is a figment of their imagination." This is somehting I very much believed in as a young child and still think about to some extent.

  7. Panpyschist A panpsychist believes that some mentality is everything. They also claim that every particle of matter has a physical character or aspect.

  8. What makes the conscious work? The nervous system structures crucial to consciousness are the cerebral cortex and the reticular system.

  9. What forms consciousness? There is a belief that states that consciousness results from patterns of activity involving thousands or millions of neurons.

  10. What seperates our us from animals on a conscious level? If our consciousness is derived from neurlogical activity then what seperates us from animals? There are only minor differences with a human's neurons and synapses and a insects. Because of this there is speculation that its not the physical equipment but instead its the interactive organization.