Animal Consciousness Debate

Comments debate whether humans are uniquely intelligent, conscious, or sentient compared to other animals, challenging anthropocentric views and highlighting animal sentience, emotions, and cognition in species like mammals, birds, and octopuses.

📉 Falling 0.4x Science
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Comments
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Top Authors
#891
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Keywords

e.g AI AnimalsBeingJerks wikipedia.org reddit.com EDIT BUT animals humans species mammals intelligent birds intelligence consciousness human animal

Sample Comments

CMCDragonkai Jul 27, 2020 View on HN

Your comment seems to imply that there's something fundamentally different from humans and other animals.

eanzenberg Sep 15, 2016 View on HN

Neither do other animals...? We're not all that different.

attemptone Feb 10, 2022 View on HN

There are also lots of non self-aware human animals :P

ars Feb 25, 2011 View on HN

So you think humans are not smarter than animals?

your argument makes a distinction between animals and humans. why?

xyzzy9563 Jun 4, 2025 View on HN

People are a more intelligent type of animal but still animals.

Sylos Jun 15, 2018 View on HN

Might be related to some people thinking the same of animals. An infant is not necessarily more intelligent than certain animals.

jackmott42 Jun 6, 2023 View on HN

Are you sure no animals have intent?

hencq Jan 11, 2018 View on HN

A long time ago I came across this question [1] (probably through Hackernews): "What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it." I found the question hugely fascinating. For me one answer is that some attributes which we think of as uniquely human, such as intelligence or consciousness, aren't actually so unique. I believe at least many mammals and possibly other animals (birds? some fish?) have some form of (perhaps basic) intelligence.Of course there is always a

p1necone Oct 27, 2020 View on HN

Why are you assuming that humans are the only conscious animals?