Perhaps your bar for "meaningful" is calibrated too high. Perhaps a dog-level of self-reflection is still quite a big deal, when compared to say a fish or whatnot.
Anyway, can you elaborate on why you think dogs ar "clearly" conscious?
> Perhaps a dog-level of self-reflection is still quite a big deal, when compared to say a fish or whatnot.
Fish are probably conscious.
> Anyway, can you elaborate on why you think dogs ar "clearly" conscious?
Unless you think it's ok to torture dogs, you already agree with me that dogs are conscious.
Or, a more philosophical response:
1. I am conscious
2. My consciousness is, broadly speaking, seated in my brain
3. A dogs has a brain broadly similar to my own
4. Dogs respond to stimuli in a way similar to the way I do. Both of us appear to be able to respond to painful stimuli, for instance.
5. It therefore seems reasonable to conclude that the dog is capable of subjective experience such as suffering, i.e. dogs are conscious.
Of course, dogs appear to be much less intelligent, and it doesn't seem justified to assume that dog consciousness is on the same 'level' as human consciousness, whatever that might mean.
This is broadly similar to an argument like anyone who wishes to argue for solipsism needs to explain why they, one human being among billions, are the only one with consciousness.
