Animal Consciousness
Colin Allen, Michael Trestman · 2020 · Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
This source is used as context evidence across 3 linked claims and 7 related evidence hubs. Its citation record is marked verified; that verifies the source trail, not the truth of any linked claim.
Summary
Surveys the empirical and philosophical evidence for consciousness in non-human animals.
How this source is used on the map
The default reference for the case that mammals, birds, and at least some invertebrates are conscious.
Citation record
- Authors
- Colin Allen, Michael Trestman
- Year
- 2020
- Publication
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Source type
- Philosophy reference
- Map role
- context
- Credibility level
- primary
- Citation status
- Verified
- DOI
- Not recorded
- PubMed
- Not recorded
- Not recorded
Linked claims
Behavioural, neural and pharmacological evidence converges. The 2012 Cambridge Declaration formalized the scientific position.
Anecdotes of dogs anticipating their owner's return or sensing distant trauma are common. Controlled video studies show some signal, contested.
A popular comforting belief among grieving pet owners. No documented case archive on the order of human past-life cases.
Related evidence hubs
What consciousness is, how it relates to brains, and whether it's basic to reality.
The nature of subjective experience.
Animal consciousness, plant cognition, animal psi.
Lab-tested claims of telepathy, precognition, remote viewing, and PK.
Telepathy, precognition, remote viewing, PK.
Children's past-life memories, birthmark cases, and the rebirth interpretation.
Past-life memories, karma, soul contracts.
Related research reports
Related sources
Companion to the consciousness-animal entry; useful for claims about animal navigation, recognition, and inference.
Use this as the philosophical background for solipsism and for disputed minds in non-human or artificial systems. It is context, not direct evidence that any specific entity is conscious.
Mainstream-science context for claims that animals 'sense' impending events: many such reports have ordinary sensory explanations.
Useful for the breadth of the concept across traditions, and for keeping doctrinal reincarnation distinct from empirical child-memory case research.