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It’s ‘irresponsible’ to ignore widespread consciousness across animal world, dozens of scientists argue (thehill.com)

submitted 6 months ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to c/biodiversity@mander.xyz

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[-] autotldr 9 points 6 months ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:

The declaration was published Friday at an event at New York University, where scientists engaged in active and at times heated debate about the state of the science on animal consciousness, and the wisdom of releasing such a statement at all.

The problem of considering animal consciousness is that it “immediately brings us into contact with serious imaginative limitations,” signatory Jonathan Birch, a philosopher at the London School of Economics, told attendees.

All scientists, he said, ”are familiar with articles that summarize research that people do not trust — because they feel they are cherry-picking the data, they are relying on studies that are not objective.”

He added that while the signatories themselves disagreed on the dimensions of animal consciousness and its ethical implications, they agreed “big steps have been taken in the last 10 years,” and that these needed to be part of the conversation.

Per a summary of the recent research in Quanta Magazine, “we now know, for example, that octopuses feel pain and cuttlefish remember details of specific past events … and that zebra fish show signs of curiosity.”

In the insect world, Quanta noted that “bees show apparent play behavior, while Drosophila fruit flies have distinct sleep patterns influenced by their social environment.

The original article contains 824 words, the summary contains 196 words. Saved 76%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[-] oDDmON@lemmy.world 12 points 6 months ago

My stylist just got seven baby chicks and was startled that they seemed to be developing distinct personalities. “I thought chickens were, ya know, just chickens”.

[-] KLISHDFSDF@lemmy.ml 7 points 6 months ago

I used to have 3 cockatiels and each one was like a toddler with its own distinct personality.

this post was submitted on 20 Apr 2024

412 points (97.5% liked)

Biodiversity

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A community about the variety of life on Earth at all levels; including plants, animals, bacteria, and fungi.

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Biodiversity is a term used to describe the enormous variety of life on Earth. It can be used more specifically to refer to all of the species in one region or ecosystem. Biodiversity refers to every living thing, including plants, bacteria, animals, and humans. Scientists have estimated that there are around 8.7 million species of plants and animals in existence. However, only around 1.2 million species have been identified and described so far, most of which are insects. This means that millions of other organisms remain a complete mystery.

Over generations, all of the species that are currently alive today have evolved unique traits that make them distinct from other species. These differences are what scientists use to tell one species from another. Organisms that have evolved to be so different from one another that they can no longer reproduce with each other are considered different species. All organisms that can reproduce with each other fall into one species. Read more...

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