Are Humans the Only Rational Animals?
While growing empirical evidence suggests a continuity between human and non-human psychology, many philosophers still think that only humans can act and form beliefs rationally. In this paper, we challenge this claim. We first clarify the notion of rationality. We then focus on the rationality of b...
| Publicado en: | Philosophical Quarterly Vol. 74; no. 3; pp. 844 - 865 |
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| Autores principales: | , |
| Formato: | Artículo |
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Oxford University Press / USA
Jul2024
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=177680983&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 177680983 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 00318094 PHQ jtl: Philosophical Quarterly issn: 00318094 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Jul2024 vid: 74 iid: 3 pid: 622 pub: Oxford University Press / USA artinfo: ui: 177680983 10.1093/pq/pqad090 ppf: 844 ppct: 21 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 523KB tig: atl: Are Humans the Only Rational Animals? aug: au: Melis, Giacomo Monsó, Susana affil: University of Stirling , UK Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia , Spain Messerli Research Institute, University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna , Austria su: Human-animal relationships Comparative psychology Theory of knowledge Belief & doubt Philosophers sug: subj: Human-animal relationships Comparative psychology Theory of knowledge Belief & doubt Philosophers keyword: belief revision comparative psychology defeaters epistemology non-human animals rationality responsiveness to reasons ab: While growing empirical evidence suggests a continuity between human and non-human psychology, many philosophers still think that only humans can act and form beliefs rationally. In this paper, we challenge this claim. We first clarify the notion of rationality. We then focus on the rationality of beliefs and argue that, in the relevant sense , humans are not the only rational animals. We do so by first distinguishing between unreflective and reflective responsiveness to epistemic reasons in belief formation and revision. We argue that unreflective responsiveness is clearly within the reach of many animals. We then defend that a key demonstration of reflective responsiveness would be the ability to respond to undermining defeaters. We end by presenting some empirical evidence that suggests that some animal species are capable of processing these defeaters, which would entail that even by the strictest standards, humans are not the only rational animals. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: © 2019 Scots Philosophical Association and the University of St. Andrews. item: Philosophical Quarterly holder: Oxford University Press / USA dt: @attributes: year: 2024 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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