Comparison of the Mental Powers of Man and the Lower Animals by Charles Darwin Summarized and Analyzed

                                                                                               

Through this essay Charles Darwin intends to show that there is no fundamental difference between man and higher mammals in their mental faculties. Though the gap in mental power between one of the lowest fishes and one of the higher apes is greater than that between an ape and man, the gap is filled up by gradual process of evolution. 

Darwin gives many examples and references to prove his thesis. According to him like man even the lower animals feel pleasure and pain, happiness and misery. Young animals such as puppies, kittens, lambs, etc. show emotions and instincts while playing together. Like human children even the insects play together. They also experience the similar emotions and excitements as humans do. Feelings of terror have the same effects of muscles or beating hearts on animals. They also show the character of courage and fear. Darwin believes some dogs and horses are ill-tempered and others are good-tempered. He refers to Rengger and Brehm to say that the monkeys have the feelings of revenge. Similarly, a zoologist, Sir Andrew Smith talks about the sense of humour of a baboon. A dog can express a verydeep feeling of love to his master. It can express feeling of sympathy as it caresses its master when he is dead.

Darwin claims that the females of animals show the feeling of maternal affection towards their children. He refers to Rengger in this regard. Rengger observed an American monkey driving away the flies from her infant. They also wash the faces of their children in a stream. Another naturalist Brehm observed so intense grief of female monkey for the loss of a young that she died of it. Brehm also observed the monkeys adopting orphans. One female baboon not only adopted young monkeys of other species but also took young dogs and cats with her.

Darwin says that even the complex emotions are common to the higher animals and human beings. Everyone can observe how jealous a dog is when its master loves any other creature. Similarly, monkeys also show the same jealousy according to Darwin. These animals have desire to be loved and be praised. A dog can feel shame as different from fear. Feeling of pride as well as anger can also be seen in dog.

Darwin also claims that the animals also have the more intellectual emotions and faculties. They show excitement and have the feelings of being bored. Such emotions can be observed in dogs or in monkeys. All animals are in wonder and they exhibit curiosity. For example, deer are curious to the tricks and traps of  hunters. Darwin also witnessed such curiosity with dogs. Brehm talks about the instinctive dread among his monkeys for snakes. But, his monkeys were so much curious with snakes that they lifted the lead of the box in which snakes were kept.

The principles of imitation are strong in man and especially with savages. Talking about animals, only monkeys voluntarily imitate the actions of man. However, animals can imitate each other’s actions. For example, wolves reared by dogs learn to bark. Birds imitate the songs of their parents. Darwin quotes Dureau de la Malle who gives an example of a dog reared by a cat. That dog learnt to lick her paws and wash her face and ears. It also learnt from the kittens to play a ball by rolling it about. The parents of many animals teach their young different actions following the principle of imitation.

Darwin claims that faculty of attention is more important than others for the intellectual progress of man. He also claims that animals clearly exhibit this power. A cat watches by a hole and prepares to spring on its prey. Other wild animals are also so attentive while trying to catch their preys that they themselves can caught. The monkeys that are attentive can be trained easily to act in plays.

Darwin says that it is clear to animals to have excellent memories for person and places. The naturalist Sir Andrew Smith was recognized by a baboon after nine months. Similarly, Darwin himself had savage dog that was never friendly with strangers but it recognized him after an absence of five years and two days.

The imagination is the special privilege of man. This faculty helps us to unite former images and ideas to create new ideas. Darwin says that other animals like dogs, cats, horse, even the birds have some power of imagination. It can be seen by their movements and sounds they utter. Dogs howl in the night especially during moonlight because of the fantastic images that they imagine to see. But, Darwin claims that all the dogs don’t do so because this power varies in every individual.

Reason is the greatest faculty of the human mind according to Darwin. However, this faculty of mind can be observed even in animals. They can be seen to pause, think carefully and decide. Even the animals of very low scale show reasoning power. Sometimes it is difficult to distinguish between the power of reason, and that of instinct. Therefore we can only judge by the circumstance under which the animals perform actions whether they are due to reason or due to association of ideas. Darwin believes that the association of ideas is also related to reason. Darwin quotes Prof. Mobious in this context. Mobious takes a case of a pike which was separated by a plate of glass inside an aquarium filled with fish. He studied that the pike often dashed violently against the glass while trying to catch the other fish. For 3 months the pike did the same but at last it learnt to be cautious. His mind was so strongly associated with the idea of violent shock that it didn’t attack those fish even after the glass was removed.

Darwin claims that though some animals have more power of association than others, we can’t say that there is fundamental difference in their mind. Same is the case with a man and other animals. Darwin takes the example of an elephant in a zoological garden. When a small object was thrown on the ground away from its reach, the elephant blew through its trunk on the ground beyond the object. The current reflected on all sides easily drove the object within its reach. Similarly, he refers to Mr Westrop whose bear made a current in water close to the bars of his cave so as to draw a piece of floating bread within its reach.

Though these animals didn’t know the principle behind the result, they used their reason to make the things happen as they wished. In this way, despite some writers’ denial it is proved that animals also possess the power of reasoning.    

                                                                                                          -Bhim Bhattarai