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L'Odyssée de la conscience : Vie animale et expérience humaine
Peter Godfrey-Smith
- Flammarion
- Sciences
- 28 Août 2024
- 9782081482067
Après Le Prince des profondeurs, dans lequel Peter Godfrey-Smith , explorait l'intelligence exceptionnelle des poulpes, L'Odyssée de la conscience nous fait de nouveau plonger dans les fonds marins et rencontrer de multiples formes de vie qui semblent à première vue complètement éloignées de la nôtre. Éponges de mer, coraux, crustacés, méduses et autres créatures fascinantes, tantôt minuscules, tantôt gigantesques, permettent pourtant de comprendre, par l'observation animale, le mystère de la conscience. Associant à ses récits de plongées et de rencontres avec ces animaux les découvertes les plus récentes de la biologie de l'évolution, Godfrey-Smith examine l'apparition de l'expérience subjective chez certaines espèces animales nées il y a parfois plus d'un milliard d'années. Percevoir, observer, se déplacer, manipuler des objets, réagir et interagir : autant d'aptitudes apparues dans des micro-organismes sous-marins qui se sont ensuite développées chez les insectes, les oiseaux, les primates et enfin les humains. L'expérience animale, en ce sens, est aussi la nôtre. Avec un talent de vulgarisateur qui a fait du Prince des profondeurs un succès international, Peter Godfrey-Smith réussit à convertir sa rencontre avec une crevette manchote en une approche empirique de la philosophie de l'esprit. Et si la conscience n'était pas un privilège humain mais le résultat de l'évolution de nos sens ?
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Le prince des profondeurs ; l'intelligence exceptionnelle des poulpes
Peter Godfrey-Smith
- Flammarion
- Champs Sciences
- 3 Février 2021
- 9782081511057
Il possède un énorme cerveau ? quasiment autant de neurones qu'un chat ? localisé en partie dans ses huit bras. Il «voit» et «goûte» avec la peau, dont la couleur change instantanément pour mieux le camoufler. Dépourvu d'os, il se faufile à travers la moindre fente. Il joue, adore collectionner les objets, apprend de ses erreurs et reconnaît les humains... Ce prince des profondeurs, c'est le poulpe, dont on prend aujourd'hui la mesure de l'intelligence, déjà pressentie par Charles Darwin.Mais il y a plus extraordinaire encore... En explorant Octopolis, une étrange cité sous-marine fondée par des poulpes, Peter Godfrey-Smith découvre des animaux capables d'interactions complexes et dotés de surprenantes personnalités. De quelle conscience témoignent-ils ? Se pourrait-il que nous ne soyons pas la seule branche du vivant à disposer d'un «moi» intérieur ? Que nous apprennent ces céphalopodes sur notre propre intelligence ?Une fascinante rencontre du troisième type.
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OTHER MINDS - THE OCTOPUS AND THE EVOLUTION OF INTELLIGENT LIFE
Peter Godfrey-Smith
- William Collins
- 8 Mars 2018
- 9780008226299
What if intelligent life on Earth evolved not once, but twice? The octopus is the closest we will come to meeting an intelligent alien. What can we learn from the encounter?
In Other Minds, Peter Godfrey-Smith, a distinguished philosopher of science and a skilled scuba diver, tells a bold new story of how nature became aware of itself - a story that largely occurs in the ocean, where animals first appeared.
Tracking the mind''s fitful development from unruly clumps of seaborne cells to the first evolved nervous systems in ancient relatives of jellyfish, he explores the incredible evolutionary journey of the cephalopods, which began as inconspicuous molluscs who would later abandon their shells to rise above the ocean floor, searching for prey and acquiring the greater intelligence needed to do so - a journey completely independent from the route that mammals and birds would later take.
But what kind of intelligence do cephalopods possess? How did the octopus, a solitary creature with little social life, become so smart? What is it like to have eight tentacles that are so packed with neurons that they virtually ''think for themselves''? By tracing the question of inner life back to its roots and comparing human beings with our most remarkable animal relatives, Godfrey-Smith casts crucial new light on the octopus mind - and on our own.
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METAZOA ; ANIMAL MINDS AND THE BIRTH OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Peter Godfrey-Smith
- William Collins
- 8 Juillet 2021
- 9780008321239
The scuba-diving philosopher and bestselling author of Other Minds explores the origins of animal consciousness. Dip below the ocean''s surface and you are soon confronted by forms of life that could not seem more foreign to our own: sea sponges, soft corals and flower-like worms, whose rooted bodies and intricate geometry are more reminiscent of plant life than anything recognisably animal. Yet these creatures are our cousins. As fellow members of the animal kingdom - theMetazoa - they can teach us about the evolutionary origins of not only our bodies, but also our minds. In his acclaimed book,Other Minds, Peter Godfrey-Smith explored the mind of the octopus - the closest thing to an intelligent alien on Earth. InMetazoa, he expands his inquiry to animals at large, investigating the evolution of experience with the assistance of far-flung species.Godfrey-Smith shows that the appearance of the first animal body form well over half a billion years ago was a profound innovation that set life upon a new path. He charts the ways that subsequent evolutionary developments - eyes that track, for example, and bodies that move through and manipulate the environment - shaped the lives of animals. Following the evolutionary paths of a glass sponge, soft coral, banded shrimp, octopus and fish, then moving onto land and the world of insects, birds and primates like ourselves,Metazoa gathers these stories together to bridge the gap between matter and mind and address one of the most important philosophical questions: what is the origin of consciousness? Combining vivid animal encounters with philosophy and biology,Metazoareveals the impossibility of separating the evolution of our minds from the evolution of animals themselves.
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Nouv.
LIVING ON EARTH ; LIFE, CONSCIOUSNESS AND THE MAKING OF THE NATURAL WORLD
Peter Godfrey-Smith
- William Collins
- 3 Juillet 2025
- 9780008321284
The eagerly anticipated conclusion to Peter Godfrey-Smith''s three-part exploration of the origins of intelligence on Earth, which began with the bestselling Other Minds in 2018 and continued with Metazoa in 2020.
The eagerly anticipated conclusion to Peter Godfrey-Smith''s three-part exploration of the origins of intelligence on Earth, which began with the bestselling Other Minds in 2018 and continued with Metazoa in 2020.
Peter Godfrey-Smith, the scuba-diving philosopher, examined the evolution of sentience in Other Minds. In Metazoa he asked how that consciousness shaped and was shaped by animal bodies. Now, in Living on Earth, he takes that line of questioning a step further, asking, how has life shaped and been shaped by our planet?
He visits the largest living stromatolite fields, examples of how cyanobacteria began belching oxygen into the atmosphere as they converted carbon dioxide and water into living matter using the sun''s light. The extraordinary increase in oxygen in the atmosphere resulted in an explosion in the diversity of life. And so began a riotous tangle of coevolution between plants and animals, as each changed the environment around them allowing others to utilise these new ecosystems and thus new species to evolve. From cyanobacteria, through algae on to ferns or trees or grasses, and from protists , through invertebrates and fish through the dinosaurs and on to birds and mammals - our planet has seen an explosion of life forms, all reacting to their environment and all creating new environments that allow other life to evolve.
In our own evolutionary line, an initially unremarkable mammal changed in new ways, evolving to come out of the trees to inhabit new savannas and then onto inhabit the whole planet. One of the most adaptable species ever found on Earth, and arguably the species causing the most change, humans are still part of this 3.8 billion year history of life forms changing the world around them.
In Living on Earth, Godfrey-Smith takes us on a grand tour of the history of life on earth. He visits Rwandan gorillas and Australian bowerbirds, returns to coral reefs and octopus dens, considers the impact of language and writing, and weighs the responsibilities our unique powers bring with them, as they relate to factory farming, habitat preservation, climate change, and the use of animals in experiments. Living on Earth shows that Humans belong to the infinitely complex system that is the Earth, and our minds are products of that system, but we are also an acting force within it. We are creatures of Earth, but we hold Earth''s future in our hands. It is a responsibility that we must all understand and accept. -
The scuba-diving philosopher and bestselling author of Other Minds explores the origins of animal consciousness. Dip below the ocean''s surface and you are soon confronted by forms of life that could not seem more foreign to our own: sea sponges, soft corals and flower-like worms, whose rooted bodies and intricate geometry are more reminiscent of plant life than anything recognisably animal. Yet these creatures are our cousins. As fellow members of the animal kingdom - theMetazoa - they can teach us about the evolutionary origins of not only our bodies, but also our minds. In his acclaimed book,Other Minds, Peter Godfrey-Smith explored the mind of the octopus - the closest thing to an intelligent alien on Earth. InMetazoa, he expands his inquiry to animals at large, investigating the evolution of experience with the assistance of far-flung species.Godfrey-Smith shows that the appearance of the first animal body form well over half a billion years ago was a profound innovation that set life upon a new path. He charts the ways that subsequent evolutionary developments - eyes that track, for example, and bodies that move through and manipulate the environment - shaped the lives of animals. Following the evolutionary paths of a glass sponge, soft coral, banded shrimp, octopus and fish, then moving onto land and the world of insects, birds and primates like ourselves,Metazoa gathers these stories together to bridge the gap between matter and mind and address one of the most important philosophical questions: what is the origin of consciousness? Combining vivid animal encounters with philosophy and biology,Metazoareveals the impossibility of separating the evolution of our minds from the evolution of animals themselves.
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The eagerly anticipated conclusion to Peter Godfrey-Smith''s three-part exploration of the origins of intelligence on Earth, which began with the bestselling Other Minds in 2018 and continued with Metazoa in 2020.
Peter Godfrey-Smith, the scuba-diving philosopher, examined the evolution of sentience in Other Minds. In Metazoa he asked how that consciousness shaped and was shaped by animal bodies. Now, in Living on Earth, he takes that line of questioning a step further, asking, how has life shaped and been shaped by our planet?
He explores the last living stromatolite fields, examples of how cyanobacteria from the sea first began colonising the land and belching oxygen into the atmosphere as they photosynthesised the sun''s light. Oxygen meant life, and so began a riotous tangle of coevolution between plants and new animals. And then, in our own evolutionary line, an initially unremarkable mammal changed in new ways, forming societies and technologies. This led eventually to change to the atmosphere itself, as carbon that was buried and transformed to oil was deliberately burned with life-derived oxygen, to power the elaborate world of humanity.
Humans belong to the infinitely complex system that is the Earth, and our minds are products of that system, but they are also an acting force within it. We are creatures of Earth, and we hold Earth''s future in our hands.
