Evolution and Animal Welfare

Animal welfare is a topic often thought to reside outside mainstream biology. The complexity of the methods used to assess welfare (such as health, physiology, immunological state, and behavior) require an understanding of a wide range of biological phenomena. Furthermore, the welfare of an animal provides a framework in which a diversity of its responses can be understood as fitness-enhancing mechanisms. Different methods for assessing animal welfare are discussed, with particular emphasis on the role of an animal\u27s own choices and reinforcement mechanisms. No part of biology is as yet able to explain consciousness, but by confronting the possibility that nonhuman animals have conscious experiences of suffering, animal welfare studies force a consideration of even this hardest problem of all biological phenomena in a particularly direct and evolutionary way

Through animal eyes: What behaviour tells us

Abstract To Charles Darwin, it was obvious that animals are sentient, so why should the idea not be now universally accepted? I review the difficulties and issues with animal sentience with a view to answering some of the critics. Sentience is 'the hard problem' and it is important we acknowledge the difficulties and do not claim too much for the evidence we have. Two sorts of evidence are examined: evidence from animal cognition and evidence from animal emotion, including the ways we now have of 'asking' animals what they want, behaviour, brain imaging and parallels with our own emotions. Despite the problems, the study of animal sentience is one of the most important areas of biology. Although conclusive evidence that animals are sentient may elude us, evidence of what they want and how they see the world is increasingly open to us and it is important that it is used. There is a danger that wellmeaning people define animal welfare in terms of what they think animals want or what pleases them. But if we take animal sentience seriously, we must ensure that the animal voice is heard.

The corruption of honest signalling

Abstract. It is argued that recent analyses of the evolution of animal signals, which claim that signalling systems must be honest indicators of underlying quality, have neglected a vital consideration: the costs receivers pay in assessment. Where the costs of fully assessing a signaller are high, in terms of energy, time, or risk, and the value of the extra information gained is low, then it will pay receivers to settle for cheaper, but less reliable, indicators of quality instead. Thus, it is argued, honest assessment will be replaced by conventional signalling. Conventional signals are open to cheating, but cheating will be kept at low frequencies by the frequency-dependent benefits of occasional assessment (or 'probing'), so dishonest signalling remains stable. The concept of 'honesty' is discussed. We argue here, in contrast, that dishonest signals are likely to be a widespread component of signalling systems concerned with quality advertisement, and that previous discussions have neglected a vital evolutionary consideration, the cost to the receiver of eliciting and evaluating honest signals. If both signaller and receiver pay costs, it will be to their mutual (but not necessarily equal) advantage to reduce them wherever the value of the extra information contained in a costly (rather than a less costly) signal is outweighed by the costs of giving and receiving the costly signal. We first argue that receiver costs are widespread and then show how this results in the favouring of conventional rather than full assessment signals. Conventional signals RECEIVER COSTS IN SIGNALLING Most accounts of animal communication assume that the costs of signalling are borne entirely by the sender of a signal. Thus, roaring, calling, singing and other sorts of display are seen as costly to the performer (e.g. Burk 1988; Ryan 1988) but not to the recipient. This one-sided view is, however, quite erroneous. In the classic case of roaring in red deer stags, Cervus elaphus , for example, the only way in which a challenger can elicit an 'honest' signal from a harem-holder is by paying the cost of roaring at his own honest rate. At the beginning of an encounter, the roaring rate of a stag defending his group of females will be low and will not be a reliable indicator of his true fighting ability. Only if the roaring contest escalates with the challenger and the defender both being prepared to pay the costs of roaring at a high rate will the roaring rate o

Towards an animal-centred ethics for Animal–Computer Interaction

The emerging discipline of Animal–Computer Interaction (ACI) aims to take what in Interaction Design is known as a user-centred approach to the design of technology intended for animals, placing them at the centre of the design process as stakeholders, users, and contributors. However, current regulatory frameworks for the involvement of animals in research are not animal-centred, regarding them as research instruments, unable to consent to procedures that may harm them, rather than consenting research participants and design contributors. Such frameworks aim to minimise the impacts of research procedures on the welfare of individual animals, but this minimisation is subordinated to specific scientific and societal interests, and to the integrity of the procedures required to serve those interests. From this standpoint, the universally advocated principles of replacement, reduction and refinement aim to address the ethical conflicts arising from the assumed inability of individual animals to consent to potentially harmful procedures, but such principles in fact reflect a lack of individual centrality. This paper makes the case for moving beyond existing regulations and guidelines towards an animal-centred framework that can better support the development of ACI as a discipline. Firstly, recognising animal welfare as a fundamental requirement for users and research participants alike, the paper articulates the implications of a welfare-centred ethics framework. Secondly, recognising consent as an essential requirement of participation, the paper also defines criteria for obtaining animals׳ mediated and contingent consent to engaging with research procedures. Further, the paper argues for the methodological necessity, as well as the ethical desirability, of such an animal-centred framework, examining the boundaries of its applicability as well as the benefits of its application. Finally, the paper puts forward a series of practical principles for conducting ACI research, which imply but also essentially exceed the welfare and ethics requirements of current regulatory frameworks

Nonhuman animal suffering : critical pedagogy and practical animal ethics

Each year millions of nonhuman animals are exposed to suffering in universities as they are routinely (ab)used in teaching and research in the natural sciences. Drawing on the work of Giroux and Derrida, we make the case for a critical pedagogy of nonhuman animal suffering. We discuss critical pedagogy as an underrepresented form of teaching in universities, consider suffering as a concept, and explore the pedagogy of suffering. The discussion focuses on the use of nonhuman animal subjects in universities, in particular in teaching, scientific research, and associated experiments. We conclude that a critical pedagogy of nonhuman animal suffering has the capacity to contribute to the establishment of a practical animal ethics conducive to the constitution of a radically different form of social life able to promote a more just and non-speciesist future in which nonhuman animals are not used as resources in scientific research in universities

Foraging for foundations in decision neuroscience: insights from ethology

Modern decision neuroscience offers a powerful and broad account of human behaviour using computational techniques that link psychological and neuroscientific approaches to the ways that individuals can generate near-optimal choices in complex controlled environments. However, until recently, relatively little attention has been paid to the extent to which the structure of experimental environments relates to natural scenarios, and the survival problems that individuals have evolved to solve. This situation not only risks leaving decision-theoretic accounts ungrounded but also makes various aspects of the solutions, such as hard-wired or Pavlovian policies, difficult to interpret in the natural world. Here, we suggest importing concepts, paradigms and approaches from the fields of ethology and behavioural ecology, which concentrate on the contextual and functional correlates of decisions made about foraging and escape and address these lacunae

How do hens view other hens? The use of lateral and binocular visual fields in social recognition

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The role of behaviour in the assessment of poultry welfare

The problem of assessing welfare in poultry has been exacerbated by three widespread but erroneous assumptions. These are (1) that there are general indicators of welfare that apply to all situations, (2) that indicators of good welfare and those of reduced welfare are distinct from one another and (3) that any change in a welfare ‘indicator’ reflects a change in the welfare state of the animal. These three assumptions are challenged and replaced with a more evolutionary view of the behavioural and physiological responses of the domestic fowl to its environment. Apart from physical health, which is the Cornerstone of all good welfare, the most important additional component of poultry welfare is psychological health or ‘contentment’, which can be most reliably accessed through the birds\u27 own choice behaviour