Reddit reviews The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among the Primates

Check out this book, The Bonobo and the Atheist. It’s about the Bonobo culture and how they behave altruistically.

> What is consciousness?

"Consciousness is the state or quality of awareness, or, of being aware of an external object or something within oneself. It has been defined as: sentience, awareness, subjectivity, the ability to experience or to feel, wakefulness, having a sense of selfhood, and the executive control system of the mind... In the majority of experiments that are specifically about consciousness, the subjects are human, and the criterion that is used is verbal report: in other words, subjects are asked to describe their experiences, and their descriptions are treated as observations of the contents of consciousness." These methods are obviously heavily biased towards humans, we can't just ask a chimpanzee if it self aware, we must infer it from their behaviours and how they interact with their physical and social worlds. Easier said than done.

> Are single celled organisms like bacteria, conscious?

No.

> How much up the evolutionary ladder do we have to go to start finding consciousness?

Evolution is not a ladder, there is no best species at the top of this ladder. Its more like a tree. In evolution, there can be many solutions to one problem. Take flight for example, insects, birds, and bats have all solved the problem of flight in different ways, with different combinations of traits, with different kinds of genes. The same is very likely true for consciousness and higher cognitive intelligence. We may very well find the exact gene(s) that make use conscious that does not mean that other species need those exact genes in order to be conscious too. Other species may solve the problem of consciousness in a different way than we have. If we look for species with characteristics that are exactly our own, well its like just looking for species with feathers and assuming they are the only ones that fly - you miss the bats and insects.

> How are humans able to make another conscious being?

We are not born conscious, it is a series of skills, traits, and abilities that develop during infancy and early childhood that lead to our conscious abilities. For example, children learn between the ages of 3-5 how to lie. Before this time period their brains are not developed enough to make the connection that their thoughts are distinct and different from other individuals thoughts. They think everyone knows what they are thinking, they can't lie. Some humans never develop the ability to be fully conscious, like severely autistic individuals. "Deficits occur in people with autism spectrum disorders, schizophrenia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, as well as neurotoxicity due to alcohol abuse."

Other animals can lie, and deceive if they want to. Are they conscious? its really hard to say. We have a couple of tests that give us a pretty good idea that other species exhibit consciousness. For example, the mirror test. You place an individual in front of a mirror with a dot on their body that they can only see looking through the mirror. If they touch the dot or look for the dot on their own bodies then they are making the link that the image in the mirror is themselves. Infants older than 18 months usually pass the mirror test, infants under 18 months don't. Other higher cognitive skills that have been observed in some species include object manipulation, tool making, multi-step problem solving, lying, sense of fairness, morals, ethics, and mourning the dead.

These animals in no particular order are: elephants, dolphins, birds like crows, ravens, or pigeons, pigs, all of the great apes, and some monkeys. Obviously we are talking about a really diverse group of species, species from many different and distinct evolutionary paths that are able to solve complex problems, communicate in complex ways, form complex social bonds, and importantly show signs of theory of mind, or consciousness. Generally speaking these animals function at a cognitive level similar to a 3-5 year old child.

The ethical question then becomes, if a chimpanzee can pass a mirror test, can be shown to have higher cognitive functions why do we deny them the basic rights we give to humans, when some humans including infants lack these skills? Should we keep these animals for our own amusement or instrument, we don't with ourselves but why is it ok with them? I won't comment on my opinion, but these are important ethical questions worth thinking about.

I recommend:

• The bonobo and the atheist.
  
  
• Age of empathy
  
  
• Beyond the brain.

I'm currently reading a book by Frans de Waal, The Bonobo and the Atheist in which he argues proves that altruism is evolutionary. One example: caring for babies that are not your own. It happens in most mammal species and across species. He also mentions findings of Neandertal bones that indicate the crippled & deformed lived rather long lives: http://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/fossils/shanidar-1

Also, Paul Bloom in Just Babies talks about studies of infants that show that both "good" and "evil" are inborn (vs. the Christian view that we are born in a state of sin, which is rather remarkable since we are "innocent" when we are fetuses)

Is this from The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among the Primates?

Please cite your source.

Anyways, that book makes an interesting, and IMO a very strong case akin to your post title.

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson is a very readable and engaging book that covers what we know and more importantly HOW we know it. There's another version I believe called A Really Short History of Nearly Everything that appears to be a condensed version.

There are 3 audiobook versions, but the best one is narrated by William Roberts and is impossible to find online. I'm currently working on turning my mp3 version into a proper audiobook with chapters, etc. PM me and I'll send you the link when I upload it.

You may also be interested in Caveman Logic and the more dangerously titled The Bonobo and the Atheist

Peter Railton's great essay about the subject is worth a read, as well as the TED Talk of Frans de Waal and his Book "The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among the Primates"

Morality is one of those concepts that are older than mankind itself.

Because the limits you're defining aren't even limits, they're impossibilities. It's like if I asked the worlds best mathematician to solve the square root of negative 1. It's an inane question. 'But I thought you were the best mathematician!'

Again, you're describing rules, principals, but not impossibilities. These rules, they function. As a small example, gravity. We know with [near] absolute certainty if gravity wasn't exactly as it was, life wouldn't exist. A touch weaker, no stars and planets [planet here I'm using the more strict definition which normally dictates a mass large enough to become spherical by default]. A touch stronger, planets too large and stars too powerful. You can't ascribe functions that don't work. It's like if I asked you to build a machine without the 6 basic machines.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simple_machine

Do bad things happen in nature? Yes, I wasn't denying that. but the picture you're painting of nature is merciless. I suggest you do some studying of your own. Read up on Bonobos.
http://smile.amazon.com/Bonobo-Atheist-Search-Humanism-Primates/dp/0393347796/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1427661542&sr=8-1&keywords=bonobo+and+the+atheist
Or hell, look up times animals have sacrificed themselves for other species. It happens.
I could also take the lame cop out and say animals with no abstract consciousness [such as insects] don't live in fear of being killed, but, that'd be lame of me.

From that second line of the last paragraph, it sounds more like you're examining everything from a dark coloured lens and being all nihilistic about this whole affair. You're picking the data that pleases your pessimism.

Human nature isn't a matter of opinion--modern psychology and associated disciplines show humans to genuinely care about behaviors that show good will toward most strangers. The idea of humans as having a selfish core with a friendly exterior has been labeled "veneer theory" by the leading primatologist Frans de Waal and thoroughly debunked in that form. The idea that humans are generally unsociable and won't be nice to strangers if given zero motivation to do so has been shown to be incorrect by social psychology. The "Lord of the Flies" view of humans as unable to self-organize in uncertain times is also false as argued by cognitive psychologists. Humans are severely interested in being nice to other humans, according to the latest multicultural research in moral psychology.

I could give scientific articles instead of books, but these books are actually fun to read!