Abstract
Anthropomorphism is the methodology of attributing human-like mental states to animals. Zoomorphism is the converse of this: it is the attribution of animal-like mental states to humans. Zoomorphism proceeds by first understanding what kind of mental states animals have and then attributing these mental states to humans. Zoomorphism has been widely used as scientific methodology especially in cognitive neuroscience. But it has not been taken seriously as a philosophical explanatory paradigm: as a way of explaining the building blocks of the human mind. The philosophical explanatory paradigm of zoomorphism may not explain all aspects of human behavior (although it may explain surprisingly many), but if we accept the zoomorphic way of thinking about the human mind, we should only posit new, different kinds of mental states if the zoomorphic attribution of animal mental states fails to explain our behavior.
Highlights
Anthropomorphism is the methodology of attributing human-like mental states to animals: when it comes to explaining the minds of non-human animals, we can and should make reference to mental states that we are familiar with from our understanding of the human mind
Anthropomorphism, the attribution of human-like mental states to animals can be used as a piece of scientific methodology: when explaining some specific behavior of a certain kind of animals, we should attribute certain mental states to them that we know from human psychology
Anthropomorphism is not merely a piece of scientific methodology, it is a philosophical explanatory paradigm, according to which we arrive at the correct way of understanding animal minds if we start by postulating that these animals have human-like mental states
Summary
Anthropomorphism is the methodology of attributing human-like mental states to animals: when it comes to explaining the minds of non-human animals, we can and should make reference to mental states that we are familiar with from our understanding of the human mind. Zoomorphism is the methodology of attributing mental states we know from the study of nonhuman animals to humans. B. Nanay seriously as philosophical explanatory paradigm: it should guide the way we think about the human mind. 2, I distinguish zoomorphism as scientific methodology and zoomorphism as philosophical explanatory paradigm and point out that zoomorphism has long been a thriving and successful piece of scientific methodology I argue that, understood properly, zoomorphism is not a radical explanatory paradigm at all 4) and it is preferable to other philosophical explanatory paradigms about the human mind 6, I consider what mental states we can expect to attribute to humans if we accept zoomorphism as philosophical explanatory paradigm
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