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Of all the different topics that have come up thus far, I’m definitely most interested in the questions about animal morality. I do think that there’s enough evidence at this point to say that some species other than our own posses the capability to act in moral ways. And yet, I still want to make the argument that animal morality is very different from human morality. I think it was Tamara that pointed out that one of the reasons we anthropomorphize is because when we describe the actions and experiences of animals we only have our own actions and experiences with which to explain them. I absolutely agree with this, but I think it highlights a need to proceed with caution when we apply terms for human experiences to animals because we can never really know that their experiences are the same as ours.

So for example, one of the recent trends in pain research is looking at empathy in animal models (if you’re interested in this talk to Alex T., Kara B., or Amelia- their thesis has to do with empathy and they know a ton more than I do about it). Mice that see other mice in pain are more susceptible to pain themselves, and this phenomenon is even stronger if the mice were cage-mates. In this way there is evidence that mice are “in tune” with the experiences of other mice. But at the same time we have always defined empathy as having a sense of introspection that comes into play, which likely is not a component of mouse empathy. In other words, the mouse isn’t sitting there thinking, “Oh no, that mouse is showing pain behavior, he must really be in pain, and I feel bad for him because I know that pain is unpleasant for me.” Mice don’t even have a sense of self, so that’s just not what’s going on with mice empathy. I’ve always felt a little uneasy with using this very human term for a mouse experience, because even though some of the aspects of the experience are the same, not all are. And that’s exactly the same point that I’ve gotten to with talking about animal morality. (Sorry that my example was so long and tangential, but if you’re interested here’s a short article about animal empathy and some brief discussion of issues with using the term empathy: http://www.the-scientist.com/news/display/23764/ )

Ok now getting back to animal morality. I would say that the two examples that Marissa and Danielle gave (punishment in primate society for behaving in a way not consistent with the society’s rules and drowning to try to save another society member in danger) do provide enough evidence (to me anyways!) that animals do behave with some sense of morality. But I think that the sense of morality with which they behave is different from our sense of morality in some ways. They may have an innate sense that they should behave in accordance with the norms of their society. And they may also behave with emotional motivations, such as trying to help another chimp in danger. But I don’t think that they have the introspective aspect of morality that humans do. The rationalization that you will have your toe bitten off if you do something that your society says you shouldn’t do is not necessarily the same as the rationalization process that goes into deciding whether or not you think abortion is okay. I’m not saying that it definitely isn’t the same, just that it isn’t necessarily the same and we should be cautious not to over extend the term morality.

It also seems to me that there’s a spectrum of the capability of morality. Almost all organisms that are capable of interacting with others of the same species also act in accordance to their species (I’m thinking of those simple organisms from hc bio 200 that all pulse together and form a little swirling pile to accomplish some goal that I can’t remember). But I don’t think that an ant that goes out and gathers food to take back to the colony, what could be argued is a moral task, has a sense of right and wrong. And I don’t think that animals that don’t have a sense of self are capable of introspective rationalization that we associate with morality. It’s interesting that as a human I’m placing humans at one end of the morality scale… But then again we’re the only species (to my knowledge at least) that is capable of discussing morality and thinking about the moral experiences of other species.