Listening to Nature
5.6 Listening to Animals: Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness of Non-Human Animals
Animals form an integral part of human life. Animals are companions in the home, cattle we graze to eat, and wildlife we encounter in our backyards, parks, in the wild, or in zoos. The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness in Non-Human Animals, signed by prominent cognitive neuroscientists, neuropharmacologists, neurophysiologists, neuroanatomists, and computational neuroscientists informs us that animals experience emotions, have intentional capabilities, and possess consciousness:
. . . Convergent evidence indicates that non-human animals have the neuroanatomical, neurochemical, and neurophysiological substrates of conscious states along with the capacity to exhibit intentional behaviors . . . humans are not unique in possessing the neurological substrates that generate consciousness.[1]
Given that animals possess consciousness, feel emotions, and are capable of intentional behavior, and that animals are an integral part of our lives, then listening to animals is vital to our understanding and appreciation of human-animal interaction (HAI). The following sections explore this human-animal dynamic of listening to nature.
Human-Marine Animal Interaction
One illustration of HAI[2] research used thematic analysis in encountering, observing, interacting, recognizing, and “reading the signs” of over three hundred Australians’ experiences with marine mammals in the wild.[3] HAI experiences include, “. . . diving, snorkeling, boating, kayaking, swimming, with a variety of marine animals, such as turtles, seals, sharks, dolphins, fish, dugongs, seabirds, whales and rays . . .”[4] The interaction patterns revealed several benefits for humans. Among the benefits are esteem and fulfillment (sense of satisfaction, accomplishment), love, belonging, and connection (feeling cared for, included), positive emotions (happy, awed, appreciative), and perspective gaining (insight into a different way of looking). The HAI researchers conclude that there is an, “. . . innate need for people to feel they have bonded with nature and animals . . . [and] that when humans interact with animals in nature, they describe that their mental health and wellbeing is enhanced.”[5]
The interaction patterns described in Rachel Yerby and Samantha Lukey’s human interaction research with marine animals[6] parallel the three perspectives of listening to nature. The observational-emotional listening perspective begins when the researchers observe and describe participants’ interactions with the marine mammals. The symbolic imagining and meaning making listening perspective is evident in the researcher’s thematic analysis of reading the signs, and in participant accounts of their emotions and lessons learned. The mystical-spiritual listening perspective is apparent in the benefits of HAI. For instance, the impressions of recognizing and being recognized by mammals have an intuitive m