Learn about animal cognition in this philosophy course in Sydney.
Have you ever wondered what goes on inside an animal’s mind? Whether it be your beloved pets or animals you come across in the wild. From dogs and birds to primates and corvids, this course introduces key philosophical debates about how non-human animals perceive, think, learn and feel. Drawing on philosophy, comparative psychology and other areas of contemporary research, participants will explore how animals understand the world and how humans attempt to study and interpret animal cognition.
This course is designed for curious learners with no prior background in philosophy. Although the content focuses on animal cognition, the ultimate aim is to help you gain philosophical skills which apply across many areas of philosophy, as well as your daily life. Rather than memorising what experts think, you’ll learn how to ask better questions, clarify concepts, evaluate evidence and arguments, and develop your own reasoned viewpoint about difficult, open-ended issues.
By the end of this course, you should be able to:
- Identify prominent contemporary philosophical approaches to animal cognition
- Understand major debates around animal perception, memory and intelligence
- Evaluate common research methods used to study animal minds
- Critically reflect on claims about animal thinking and behaviour
- Develop informed and critical questions and viewpoints on animal cognition
- What is the study of animal cognition/animal minds, and why does it matter?
- Animal cognition as a philosophical case study: learning to clarify concepts, test assumptions, and build reasoned views
- Brief overview of historical and contemporary views, touching on some important building blocks of philosophy e.g. the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle’s naturalistic inquiry; famous French philosopher Descartes’ scepticism, which helped pave the way to the Enlightenment; modern Australian philosopher Peter Singer on ethical engagements
- Introduction of core concepts, including behaviour vs cognition; evidence vs interpretation; anthropomorphism vs anthropodenial
- Framing questions and learning directions, such as: What would count as evidence for a mind? How do we think about animal minds in the absence of definitive evidence?
- How do researchers conduct experiments to study animal minds in practice. For instance, what counts as “good evidence” for sophisticated cognition rather than just associative behaviour
- Introduction to classic experimental designs and what they aim to measure. e.g. detour tasks, problem boxes, memory tests, matching-to-sample tasks, and how researchers use controls to rule out simpler explanations
- More detailed exploration of the tension between anthropomorphism (over-attributing human-like minds) and anthropodenial (over-rejecting mindedness), and why both can distort our conclusions
- Key ethical and methodological challenges in studying animal minds, which also apply to other areas of philosophy (in particular, experimental philosophy): the limits of inference, researcher bias, ecological concerns, and our moral duties toward subjects used in researcjh
- Exploring further questions, such as: When is a cognitive explanation warranted? What would change our minds about an animal’s abilities?
Session 3 - Communication, Learning and Adaptation
- How animals communicate and interpret information, from simple cues to more complex communication systems
- Overview of how animals learn, introducing major categories of learning, e.g. trial-and-error, associative learning, social learning, and how memory supports flexible behaviour across contexts.
- Critical comparisons with human cognition: what kinds of similarities and differences are meaningful, and what it means to claim that a behaviour shows “understanding” rather than training.
- Environmental adaptation and behavioural flexibility as a lens on intelligence: how cognition may be shaped by an animal’s natural environment, social structures, and practical needs
- Further questions: How can one communicate without language? How do we tell whether a behaviour reflects true understanding?
Session 4 - Problem-Solving and Intelligence
- Exploring problem-solving across species e.g. tool use, innovation, planning, and asking what exactly these behaviours demonstrate
- Conceptual analysis of different ways philosophers and scientists think about “intelligence”, and why one definition or ranking system may not fit all species
- Debating whether human intelligence is unique, and in what aspect e.g. cumulative culture, symbolic language, and what evidence would be needed to support or challenge these claims
- Drawing together the course’s core skills: how to evaluate competing explanations, recognise assumptions, and develop your own reasoned viewpoint about animal minds.
- Closing questions and reflection: In light of the evidence we have examined, how should we think about animal minds and animal cognition, and how can we engage with animals more ethically?
Core readings (very brief readings or summaries of material, no longer than 1-2 pages total) and recommended further readings will be distributed at least one week before relevant session.
Participants post optional discussion notes/thoughts are encouraged and may posted anytime, but in order to receive instructor feedback and to be potentially featured in class discussions, need to be submitted at least 2 days before relevant session. Similarly, questions about readings and the upcoming session should be emailed to instructor 2-3 days before session in order to guarantee receiving a response.
Each session will include a 20-30 minute discussion component, structure flexible depending on cohort.
At the end of the course, participants are encouraged to write a short essay to reflect on what they have learned. Comments will be given from instructor.
Participants interested in ethical and policy implications may wish to enrol in The Animal Mind: Ethics, Sentience and Society.
