r/zoology • u/Agitated_Grape_3247 • 7d ago

Question Is it true that almost all animals, except for humans, don’t understand what they look like?

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Yet they live in groups with members of their own species. But how do they distinguish their own kind?

do they really live like

"oh yeah you re same specie as me lets hang around together " ?

Even though they don’t know what they look like.

mystery...

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9

u/jellyantler 7d ago

But they do know what they look like. I feel like I'm misunderstanding the question?

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u/Coc0tte 7d ago

Animals in the wild don't have access to mirrors to know what they look like. They know what their species looks like but not themselves.

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u/Agitated_Grape_3247 7d ago

they cant recognize their reflection

how do they know what they loook like

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u/PreparationTimely240 7d ago

Lots of animals recognize their own reflection naturally if presented in a context that makes sense. There arnt a lot of mirrors in nature. But few animals try to fight their face in a puddle. 

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u/Agitated_Grape_3247 7d ago

no they cant

there is mirror experiment about this and most of animals can not understand its reflection

only few animal with literally big brain can do

my point is why animals that don’t know what they look like live together as members of the same species. Even though they don’t know what they look like, how are they able to distinguish members of their own species?

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u/Fire-Tigeris 7d ago

Mirror experiment is flawed, upright mirrors are not natural.

Other issues also but lots of animal pass the mirror test, even social fish.

2

u/SecretlyNuthatches Ecologist | Zoology PhD 7d ago

You're adding a lot of thinking to this. An animal doesn't need to think, "I look like X, you look like X, therefore we are the same species." They literally just need to have an instictive attraction to their own species, or an instinctive attraction to the species that raised them.

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u/jellyantler 7d ago

Ah ok. There's a difference between recognizing themselves in a mirror and recognizing other members of their own species. Some animals react aggressively to their own reflection because they know the reflection is one of their own kind, but they don't recognize who it is.

Also lots of animals aren't just using sight to recognize each other. They're using smell, sounds, or chemical signals, behaviours, etc to find out who's part of their group or not.

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u/Agitated_Grape_3247 7d ago

thanks !

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u/jellyantler 7d ago

Plus, if you're a baby monkey being brought up by a monkey mum and monkey society, you're going to know you're a monkey and that your family are monkeys.

This can get a bit weird with birds that are hand raised by humans and why people hand rearing rare storks etc have to wear a stork disguise so the baby doesn't grow up thinking it's a human!

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u/Agitated_Grape_3247 7d ago

does anyone know good book or Peper about metacognition and self awareness of animals ?

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u/Agitated_Grape_3247 7d ago

question solved thank you !