Susan recently spoke at the Annual Oxford University Animal Ethics Summer School on the paradigm-shifting research of Frans de Waal.
Through hundreds of peer-reviewed scientific articles and popular books comparing human and primate behavior, de Waal’s main interest was in what emotions are shared across species, especially cognitively, emotionally, and morally. de Waal’s pioneering studies of animal behavior once ascribed solely to humans were highly controversial. His research on empathy, altruism, reciprocity, cognition, self-recognition, reconciliation, cooperation, conflict resolution, grief, consolation, morality, and friendship played a pivotal role in bringing about the acceptance of animal emotion as a valid line of scientific inquiry. Today, these are major areas of research. He demonstrated that the basis of our emotions, consciousness, and morality originated in animals, creating a responsibility toward how we treat them. Rather than impose ideological narratives, de Waal was committed to an ethological approach with careful observation of free natural behavior, getting research ideas from watching animals’ natural behavior.
You can read more about Frans de Waal here.
“Emotions infuse everything with meaning and are the main inspiration of cognition, also in our lives. Instead of tiptoeing around them, it’s time for us to squarely face the degree to which all animals are driven by them.”
– Frans deWaal