Lecture 9 Flashcards
1
Q
What is Morgan’s Canon?
A
- If something can be interpreted as the outcome of a higher explanation if it can be interpreted as something which stands lower in the scale
- About intuition
- Normally, but some cases do not have to be normal
2
Q
What is the opposite of Morgan’s Canon?
A
- Morgan = simple associative
- Evolutionary = cognition among species = complex mental states outside humans
- Overly general principles not philosophically sound and actually harm progress
- Focus should be on careful experimental tests
3
Q
What are three ways to work out if animals have mental states?
A
- Self-recognition
- Theory of mind
- Metacognition
4
Q
How to measure self-recognition?
A
- Mirror use: he knew that the person is the mirror was him, asked if species can recognise their own reflection = must know its them
- If they can use a mirror problem = conscious as you can recognise self
- Even with animals and humans show a bad reaction to mirrors where we do not recognise self - once experienced is gained they will use it
- Under anaesthesia, put some marks on the animals face who are experienced with mirror
- Before mirror was uncovered, animals did not touch, once mirror was uncovered, they use it to touch their face via orienting their hands
- This was passed by great apes, but not passed by other mammals or primates: some species can use mirrors = self- awareness in species relatively related to humans
- Elephants and dolphins have passed this test = animals far away from humans can do this, even a fish can pass it
- Animals in the mirror had experience learning that mirror reflects things, not the understanding that it is you
5
Q
What is body concept?
A
- Species have to be very aware of their bodies to move through space
- Allows animals to differentiate between information emanating from its own body and info emanating from other sources
6
Q
How to measure Theory of Mind in Animals?
A
- Deception: knowing what another animal is thinking, and then messing with them: cannot do that without knowing about themselves = aware
- Knowledge attribution
7
Q
What was the naturalistic observation with bully monkey?
A
- Older members keep order, Melton was a younger bully and if one of them sees him, the adult male will come to beat him
- Melton would make the snake alarm so the elder adult male would look for the snake to distract him from delivering that beating
- Informal observation - so could be he didn’t get beaten up when he made alarm calls = does not prove he was deliberately deceiving them
8
Q
How was deception looked at a lab study?
A
- Trainer would put food in two boxes then leaves
- Helpful trainer opened box depending on which one Sarah pointed at = tell truth
- Unhelpful trainer took away the food depending on which one Sarah pointed at = lie
- More like a discrimination, not self-awareness
9
Q
What does deception require?
A
- Requires to know what someone else is thinking
- Use that against them
- Don’t care if they can manipulate us, just if they know they are aware
- Can ask what an animal knows about another animal
10
Q
What was a study with knowledge attribution?
A
- Knower and guesser for where the food could be, guesser exits the room, knower is in the room and hides the food
- Knower points at one place the food may be, guesser points
- Where does the Chimp go?
- First time = they can not do it
- After several goes, they can do it
- Part 2: Guesser did not leave but put a paper bag over the head = can they tell that someone with a paper bag on their head cannot see
- First time = they failed, after a while, they got better = power issues or lack of understanding
- Part 3: you can ask either trainer for food, but one cannot see you whereas the other one can with novel ways
- First trials did not pass except for the one where one trainer was facing away
- If they do not get seeing: being aware of what you are looking at = other mental states are even harder = not self-aware
11
Q
Knowledge attribution with Chimpanzees to Chimpanzees?
A
- Have clear dominant/sub relationships in a group
- Dom and Sub animals on opposite, sub can see both
- Shield covering one item of food from Dom
- If sub eats dom food, then it gets beaten
- If it knows that dom can only see one, then sub will run to that space = results = chimps can do and reliably pass = can tell what dom does not know
- Animals know Chimps understand psych states in others but to what extent and which animals
- Also consistent with eating hidden food without getting beaten up = do not need to know why
- Could also be that the Sub reacts to the Doms reactions
12
Q
Knowledge attribution between dogs and humans?
A
- Will a dog ask for food from a person that can see them/not
- Bucket on head on human = does not understand, and actually end up go for the person wearing the bucket
13
Q
Knowledge attribution on Scrub Jays:
A
- Food storing bird
- Observed that in the wild, they hide the food, and then rehide the food
- They will rehide food if they have been seen rehiding food, only if they have stolen food previously from other birds
- Contingent knowledge to hide food from other birds that steal food
14
Q
What are ToM:
A
- All of these tests are explicit
- Human infants are better at implicit tasks than explicit, so maybe tasks are too hard for the animals
- Great apes do well on a looking based implicit ToM task
15
Q
What is metacognition?
A
- Knowledge about knowledge e.g capital cities, and the fact you do not know the fact
- You know what you know - you can tell which question someone knows e.g if someone bets on one answer but not the other - behaviour changes on the function of something he knows
