The Inner World of Our Animal Cousins

“Do animals think? Do they experience joy, grief, even love? Do they laugh?” These are some of the questions explored in two new books on research into animal minds and emotions, which Kari Weil, University Professor of Letters, Director of the College of Letters, recently reviewed in The Washington Post.

Of the books, How Animals Grieve, by Barbara J. King, and Animal Wise: The Thoughts and Emotions of Our Fellow Creatures, by Virginia Morell, Weil writes: “Partial to the kinds of stories they know lay readers enjoy, the authors also draw attention to the evidentiary weakness of anecdote and the need for repeatable experiments. Both writers are hopeful that, with increasing proof of the ways humans and animals share needs and emotions, animals will receive better protection in the lab and in the wild.”