Jump to content
Objectivism Online Forum

Don't animals regard entities as units too?

Rate this topic


Recommended Posts

I am a student of Objectivism and have read most of Rand including IOE and the beginning of OPAR, but am having a little difficulty with a part of it's epistemology.

I understand how Humans eventually grasp the implicit concept "unit". A "unit" according to Ayn Rand is "an exsistent regarded as a seperate member of a group of two or more similar members". In OPAR pg 75 "this is the entrance to the conceptual level of man's conciousness. The ability to regard entities as units is man's distinctive method of cognition."

What I do not understand is why this can not also be said of animals. Do they not in fact make this primitive leap? If a predator did not have at least the implicit concept of "unit" wouldn't a lion chase down a rhino or a Range Rover for supper, just as it would a gazelle or a water buffalo. Since the former does not occur and the latter does on a consistent basis, does it not imply that a lion undertsnds "unit" at least on an implicit basis?

Ayn Rand has been a godsend (figuratively) to me as well as many of you. What am I missing?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What I do not understand is why this can not also be said of animals. Do they not in fact make this primitive leap? If a predator did not have at least the implicit concept of "unit" wouldn't  a lion chase down a rhino or a Range Rover for supper, just as it would a gazelle or a water buffalo. Since the former does not occur and the latter does on a consistent basis, does it not imply that a lion undertsnds "unit" at least on an implicit basis?

Interesting question! First of all, making the transition from the entity-perspective to the unit-perspective is anything but primitive! It is the key to civilization and to man's distinctive means of cognition; it is the primary thing distinguishing man from the rest of the animal kingdom.

I have two points that I hope will help you out. In ITOE (p. 6), Miss Rand discusses the three stages of development with respect to the implicit concept "existent." We clearly share the first stage, the stage of "entity," of this development with many animals: lions are able to perceive gazelles as distinct from Land Rovers. This is a physiological mode of awareness, in other words, the brains of organisms that are able to perceive automatically integrate sensations into percepts (percepts being awareness of entities).

I will not venture into a comparison of the second stage of development (the stage of "identity") since I am unsure how this applies to other animals' awareness. I believe that an argument could be made to support the claim that some more developed mammals are able to reach this stage of development.

The second point that I want to make involves volition. You see, the unit-perspective is a “selective focus” (see “Differentiation and Integration as the Means to a Unit-Perspective” in Chapter 3, OPAR and ITOE pp.6-7). The unit-perspective is a state of awareness that must be volitionally initiated and maintained. Thus, it is not just by coincidence that the being that possesses a volitional consciousness is also the being that possesses a conceptual consciousness—they go hand-in-hand. In fact, they are one-in-the-same faculty.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The second point that I want to make involves volition. You see, the unit-perspective is a “selective focus” (see “Differentiation and Integration as the Means to a Unit-Perspective” in Chapter 3, OPAR and ITOE pp.6-7). The unit-perspective is a state of awareness that must be volitionally initiated and maintained. Thus, it is not just by coincidence that the being that possesses a volitional consciousness is also the being that possesses a conceptual consciousness—they go hand-in-hand. In fact, they are one-in-the-same faculty.

I was confused by Tribeof1's original question....wouldn't a unit in this (predatory) context mean the Lion distinguishing one gazelle from another rather than a gazelle from a Land Rover? Certainly the Lion can distinguish the wounded, ill, slower moving gazelle for an easier kill.

But dogs can distinguish "units" of humans. Certainly they can distinguish their owners and other, human, family members. But perhaps, to a dog, the smell of each human is so distinct that they are never regarded as a group in the first place?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was confused by  Tribeof1's original question....wouldn't a unit in this (predatory) context mean the Lion distinguishing one gazelle from another rather than a gazelle from a Land Rover? Certainly the Lion can distinguish the wounded, ill, slower moving gazelle for an easier kill.

But dogs can distinguish "units" of humans. Certainly they can distinguish their owners and other, human, family members.  But perhaps, to a dog, the smell of each human is so distinct that they are never regarded as a group in the first place?

The ability in question here is not perceiving separate concretes as separate from each other, but rather recognizing that one gazelle is only one of many. As Bowzer pointed out, animals and humans can do the former via their senses, but only humans are able to do the latter. People can look at a gazelle and realize that there are more gazelle out there in the world than the ones in a herd they can see immediately. The human can count them and recognize the ideas of "one gazelle" vs. "two gazelle" vs. "all gazelle".

Does that help any?

d_s

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...