Among psychologists, neurologists, and mind scientists, the question whether animals are conscious is controversial. Even admitting the similarity and continuity in brain structure between the higher animals and humans, many scientists hesitate to state conclusively that these animals are conscious in the same way as humans. The scientific problem is to devise an experiment that would demonstrate animal consciousness. Of course, such an experiment would be difficult, considering that it is difficult to devise an experiment that proves conclusively to one human that another human is conscious.
Setting aside the problem of experimental proof as an issue for scientists that I can't address, I think it is nonetheless possible to test whether we can recognize animals are conscious. For we recognize beyond doubt that other humans are conscious and when they are not. I have in mind the experience of observing epileptic seizure. My son had childhood petit mal seizures, now called absence seizures. (This was a condition that he inherited from me.) I have watched my son have absence seizures. In one instance, he was walking down the hallway of our home, in normal daylight, toward me. He stopped in place, as if he was going to say something to me. Then he had a seizure. He stood still. He had been looking at me. Now in midst of the seizure, something disappeared from his eyes. After a few seconds, I felt panic began to rise in me. I thought, he's dead. I understood that he couldn't be dead, if he was standing up; but in the seizure, something died in him. A few moments later, he seizure passed, and life returned to his eyes. Relief flooded me that he was not dead. Something had died, of course; it was his consciousness. I could not prove that he did not have consciousness during the seizure; but I recognized that he did not have it during the episode.
It seems to me that we could devise a test with a higher animal to observe a similar effect. We should be able to implant an electrode in, say, a dog, or a primate, allowing us to trigger a seizure at will. While we are together with the dog (or other animal), we would engage the dog. We would participate in some activity that would bring the dog to pay attention to us in a way that we would recognize as being aware of our presence and our activity. At such a moment, a seizure could be triggered. If the seizure was similar those my son experienced, we would observe something disappear from the dog's eyes, from its attention to us. If that would occur, we would recognize that its consciousness had ceased. And when the seizure would be over, we would recognize when its consciousness returns. If there were no change in the dog's eyes during the seizure, then, of course, we would have reason to conclude that it was not conscious to begin with. But I have no doubt what the finding of the test would be.
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