The Mirror Test: Humans, Animals and Sentience
The Mirror Test: Humans, Animals and Sentience
This chapter focuses on the investigation of sentience in animals, describing the mirror test, which assesses consciousness and intelligence in animal research. When the animal recognises itself in the mirror, it passes the mirror test. Animals fail the test either by ignoring the mirror or by recognising in it another being like oneself but separate from oneself. The chapter argues that the mirror test denotes self-awareness as an indicator of sentience. The image of the mirror also signifies the ways in which human representations of animals can be mirrors for the construction of oneself.
Keywords: sentience, animals, mirror test, consciousness, intelligence, animal research
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