Saturday, May 02, 2009

Mirror test



The above video is really nice and it concludes that apes are self-aware as they can recognize their faces from the mirror. Recognizing oneself in a mirror is self-recognition and that certainly is a sufficient condition for self-awareness.

But, I just want to put out a caveat here. From this test, we cannot conclude that animals that cannot recognize themselves in a mirror are not self-aware. Self-recognition is not a necessary condition for self-awareness. This is amply demonstrated by the disorder in some humans called prosopagnosia. People who suffer from this disorder are totally self-aware but cannot recognize their image in a mirror. The video makes no such claim. I just felt like making a note of this.

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