[__MatrixMan__]

I totally agree. I have noticed that the implicit skepticism for the faculties of animals that you're picking up on is not just present in this research, but seems to represent the attitudes of psychologists and philosophers generally--or at least it does in my university.

Every time it came up in one of my classes (I'm thinking of three: epistemology, learning and cognition, and philosophy of language) there was always somebody around ready to act authoritative on the matter and squash the idea that animals are more capable than we think they are.

On two separate occasions, elsewhere on campus, I found conversations among students in those classes but not majoring in either philosophy or psychology (like myself) where there was unanimous agreement that those disciplines have a stick up their ass about the subject.

Maybe I should accept that they're more familiar with the research in this area than I am, and therefore probably just correct, but I'm inclined to suspect a more particular bias. Like maybe certain influential folk in the recent past tried to make an academic stand for the specialness of humans (if there's a place for such a stand, it's in philosophy or psychology) and their work only travels in certain circles, which makes the cliques stand out to us muggles.

I've found academic discourse to be quirky like that.