There has been so much underestimating of animal cognition that to perhaps overestimate it, as I probably do, is probably a healthy reaction.
Interpretation
This quote highlights the tendency to underestimate animal intelligence and suggests that acknowledging their cognitive abilities may be beneficial.
Frans De Waal emphasizes the common misconception that animals possess limited cognitive abilities. By advocating for the acknowledgment of potential complexities in animal intelligence, he argues that perhaps overestimating these abilities is a more favorable perspective, fostering a deeper respect and understanding of non-human minds and their capabilities.
In practice
In a speech about wildlife conservation, one could use this quote to highlight the importance of understanding animal intelligence.
As in a Russian doll, however, the outer layers always contain an inner core. Instead of evolution having replaced simpler forms of empathy with more advanced ones, the latter are merely elaborations on the former and remain dependent on them. This also means that empathy comes naturally to us. It is not something we only learn later in life, or that is culturally constructed.
Sometimes I read about someone saying with great authority that animals have no intentions and no feelings, and I wonder, 'Doesn't this guy have a dog?'
Experiments with animals have long been handicapped by our anthropocentric attitude: We often test them in ways that work fine with humans but not so well with other species.
Being both more systematically brutal than chimps and more empathetic than _x000D_ bonobos, we are by far the most bipolar ape. Our societies are never completely peaceful, never completely competitive, never ruled by sheer selfishness, and never perfectly moral.
If you look at human society, it is very easy, of course, to compare our warfare and territoriality with the chimpanzee. But that's only one side of what we do. We also trade, we intermarry, we allow each other to travel through our territory. There's an enormous amount of cooperation.
Human morality is unthinkable without empathy.
I think the next century will be the century of complexity.
Science is basically an inoculation against charlatans.
Spacewalking trumps everything. Viscerally, it is a phenomenal place to be; to be able to glance right and see the world, glance left and see the universe, and realise for a moment that you're holding on to your known existence with one hand. That's the thing.
Every mode of transport that we use - whether it's planes, trains, automobiles, bikes, horses - is reusable, but not rockets. So we must solve this problem in order to become a space-faring civilization.
Science without conscience is the death of the soul.
The only relevant test of the validity of a hypothesis is comparison of prediction with experience.
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