Consciousness of other animals. I was wondering about that last night.

[raccoon]

I was listening to a book about diversity of life.
We know that mammals at least have some emotions. But what about the consciousness, the “thoughts“ of other animals? Such as reptiles? Not to mention Mollusks. I wonder what the consciousness of a clam is like.

If any of y’all can point me to any resources about this subject, please do.

[Tanuki]

1. You might find these articles interesting

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/mar/28/alien-intelligence-the-extraordinary-minds-of-octopuses-and-other-cephalopods
..."Cephalopods’ high-resolution camera eyes resemble our own, but we otherwise differ in every way. Octopuses in particular are peculiarly other. The majority of their 500m neurons are in their arms, which can not only touch but smell and taste – they quite literally have minds of their own.

That it was possible to observe some kind of subjective experience, a sense of self, in cephalopods fascinated Godfrey-Smith. How that might differ to humans’ is the subject of his book Other Minds: The Octopus, The Sea and the Deep Origins of Consciousness, published this month by HarperCollins.

In it Godfrey-Smith charts his path through philosophical problems as guided by cephalopods – in one case quite literally, when he recounts an octopus taking his collaborator by hand on a 10-minute tour to its den, “as if he were being led across the sea floor by a very small eight-legged child”.....(more)
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Another interesting article:

https://www.open.edu/openlearn/health-sports-psychology/psychology/psychological-studies/do-cephalopods-have-consciousness

[tblue37]

4. He wrote a whole book ("Other Minds) on the subject. I enjoyed it a lot:

https://www.amazon.com/Other-Minds-Octopus-Origins-Consciousness/dp/0374537194/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=FJWF9ND0SA7R0155KJ7V

[Achilleaze]

2. I for one welcome our new Clam Consciousness Overlords

They will undoubtedly have higher morals and ethics than republicans, and are more likely to remain loyal to the USA rather than go giddy grabby for fistfuls of russian dark money.

[tblue37]

3. Here's a good book:

Peter Godfrey-Smith
Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness

https://www.amazon.com/Other-Minds-Octopus-Origins-Consciousness/dp/0374537194/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=FJWF9ND0SA7R0155KJ7V

[Oneironaut]

5. Consciousness - How Things Become Aware

I'd highly recommend all the videos on this channel as well: