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It's time to move beyond the “Great Chain of Being”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 August 2017

Robert J. Sternberg*
Affiliation:
Department of Human Development, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853robert.sternberg@gmail.comrobert.sternberg@cornell.eduwww.robertjsternberg.com

Abstract

The target article provides an anthropocentric model of understanding intelligence in nonhuman animals. Such an idea dates back to Plato and, more recently, Lovejoy: On Earth, humans are at the top and other animals at successively lower levels. We then evaluate these other animals by our anthropocentric folk theories of their intelligence rather than by their own adaptive requirements.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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