When Elephants Weep: The Emotional Lives of Animals

Rating:
Summary: One of my favorite books
Review: "When Elephants Weep" was the first book by Jeffrey Masson that I read. It was deeply moving. Not intended to be a scientific treatise, it is an honest and deeply emotional account of one persons very qualified view on the emotional lives of animals. Only the most anthropocentric of readers could not love this book. I followed up by reading "Dogs Never Lie About Love" and "The Emperor's Embrace" and was also very pleased with these efforts by Mr. Masson. I look forward to all his future work. Hoping for a future world of less violence and more compassion, I wish I could magically put all his books in the hands of children of all ages.

Rating:
Summary: Pseudo-scientific nonsense
Review: A great disappointment! The author proposes to prove that animals have a rich emotional range that humans can understand and interact with, but offers no rigorous evidence whatever! His argument is to repeat again and again assertions along the lines of "People who work with animals a LOT will certainly tell you that animals really do experience emotions". Well, there it is: the whole book in a nutshell. Anyone hoping for revealing research and authoritative insights will be left wanting. What drivel! Save your money and watch some pop-expose on E! instead -- it'll be more engaging and far more scientific.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting Even If Only Anecdotally
Review: Despite its flaws this book is an interesting look at a largely unexplored subject. While yes, like most lay people to the field I don't have a problem with giving animals some basic emotions like excitement but am more reluctant to surrender man's supreme uniqueness in matters of the heart.

First and foremost it is important it is important to understand that this book is by no means an objective scientific look at the subject. While at times being willing to give up a point as being unproven or unprovable mostly the authors just provide evidence to support the points that they have obviously already come to. Keeping this bias in mind though much of the anecdotal evidence presented in the book is fascinating.

As strange as it sounds I think the story that I was most struck by involved a gorilla, Koko, who play house with her dolls when no one was looking. I don't know why but this playful action full of imagination and self awareness seems so human to me. (Also, I think the only Shakespeare has more people/animals dropping dead of grief than this book does.)

In the end though I don't think we will ever really be able to pierce the vail between man and beats-but after reading this book I now believe that divide to be far smaller than I once thought.

Rating:
Summary: When Elephants Weep
Review: Even if you don't really agree with all of the author's hypothesis about animals, it is still a good read. To those who DO care about animals, it won't give you that much information you didn't already know from the Discovery Channel or Nature on PBS. This book not only attacks speciesists (my word: those who discriminate against other species)but is an attack agianst the scientific meathod in general. In fact, that is the main theme of the book--scientists are elitists male stubborn snobs--the animals are just there to prove that point. Had he focused ENTIRELY on the animals and left his soapbox a little more often at home (were the attacks on Sea World REALLY necessary?), this book would have gotten a 10. Still, it is an important book in that it might help promote people to think for themselves and to be more concerned about animals as other beings, not just as "inhuman beasts"

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Summary: Animals have emotions and souls, but this book was terrible!
Review: I love animals. Anyone who has ever lived with a dog, cat, horse, or any other species know animals have emotions. Some humans just don't have the time or the heart to recognize them and respond to them. This book deserved to be so much better than it actually was. Great idea executed poorly. "When Elephants Weep" ended up being too much of an intellectual discussion about what is wrong with the human race and is written from a sophomoric slant enough to bore all but the most devout pop psychology buff to complete and utter insanity. In the first two chapters, authors Susan McCarthy and Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson just rail on unfeeling humans (there is actually a chapter entitled "Unfeeling Brutes") and all we get for over 40 pages is a diatribe against the scientific community. The author even goes so far to discuss the deficiencies in Freudian psychology in the area of human child sexual abuse, but never fully explains why this is relevant to the topic of the book.

Opinions, opinions, and more opinions. I kept waiting for even moderately detailed, heartwarming accounts of animal emotions and all I got were short burst of dry, clinical accounts of various animals followed by paragraphs and paragraphs of human psychology. The main author Masson has a PhD in Sanskrit. Maybe he should stick to something he knows about, because he doesn't demonstrate that he knows anything about emotion in this book - animal or otherwise. This book is overwrought, poorly written, not well thought out, disorganized, doesn't make a good argument for animal emotions (which deserves one), and doesn't do anything to seriously convince the scientific community why they should study this subject more closely. Books like this actually hurt the cause more than they promote it. I just can't believe he got this published. I don't care what the critics say, or the fact that this was a New York Times best seller. Don't waste your money on this book. The authors come off like raving lunatics, making a respectable topic for research and further study look like it belongs on the magazine rack with the tabloids.

I have learned more about being human from my dog than I have ever learned from another human being. Animals have emotions - and I believe they have souls. Most humans know that by instinct and we'll have to rely on instinct until better written books and thorough research on this subject are published.

Rating:
Summary: Animals have emotions and souls, but this book was terrible!
Review: I love animals. Anyone who has ever lived with a dog, cat, horse, or many other species of animals knows that they have emotions. Some humans just don't have the time or the heart to respond to them. This book deserved to be so much better than it actually was. Great idea executed poorly. "When Elephants Weep" ended up being too much of an intellectual discussion about what is wrong with the human race and is written from a sophomoric slant enough to bore all but the most devout pop psychology buff to complete and utter insanity. In the first two chapters, authors Susan McCarthy and Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson just rail on unfeeling humans (there is actually a chapter entitled "Unfeeling Brutes") and all we get for over 40 pages is a diatribe against the scientific community. The author even goes so far to discuss the deficiencies in Freudian psychology in the area of human child sexual abuse, but never fully explains why this is relevant to the topic of the book.

Opinions, opinions, and more opinions. I kept waiting for even moderately detailed, heartwarming accounts of animal emotions and all I got were short burst of dry, clinical accounts of various animals followed by paragraphs and paragraphs of human psychology. The main author Masson has a PhD in Sanskrit. Maybe he should stick to something he knows about, because he doesn't demonstrate that he knows anything about emotion in this book - animal or otherwise. This book is overwrought, poorly written, not well thought out, disorganized, doesn't make a good argument for animal emotions (which deserves one), and doesn't do anything to seriously convince the scientific community why they should study this subject more closely. Books like this actually hurt the cause more than they promote it. I just can't believe he got this published. I don't care what the critics say, or the fact that this was a New York Times best seller. Don't waste your money on this book. The authors come off like raving lunatics, making a respectable topic for research and further study look like it belongs on the magazine rack with the tabloids.

I have learned more about being human from my dog than I have ever learned from another human being. Animals have emotions - and I believe they have souls. Most humans know that by instinct and we'll have to rely on instinct until better written books and thorough research on this subject are published.

Rating:
Summary: Flawed But Worthwhile Exploration of an Important Subject
Review: In "When Elephants Weep", author Jeffrey Moussaief Masson attempts to demonstrate that humans are far from being the only animals to lead complex emotional lives. If someone wanted to make a case for animal rights, it would probably have a greater chance of success if it were based on animal intelligence, as that is much easier to prove and quantify than emotions. But there is already a body of literature on animal intelligence, and many researchers continue to pursue an understanding in that area. This is why Jeffrey Masson has written a book on animal emotions. It is a topic that is very much underrepresented in literature, probably because the idea of animal emotions is much vilified in the scientific community. The content of "When Elephants Weep" comprises, almost entirely, evidence of the existence of emotions -some primitive, some complex- in animals other than humans. Most of the evidence is anecdotal, although there are some examples of controlled studies as well. Most of the emotions that are discussed fit into these broad categories: fear, hope, love, sadness, grief, rage, compassion, shame, aesthetic appreciation, and a sense of justice. Apart from the evidence presented, the text contains a lot of criticism of the scientific community's staunch reluctance to acknowledge the existence of emotions in animals on the basis that any such idea would be anthropomorphic. But the fact is that the scientific community can no more prove the existence of emotions in humans than it can in animals. And it will not be able to do so until it possesses the technology to identify and detect the neuropathways responsible for emotions. Until then, we accept that humans have emotions based on their behavior and our own experience. The author believes it perfectly reasonable to acknowledge the emotional lives of animals for the same reasons. The quality of the writing itself in "When Elephants Weep" is not especially good, but I do recognize that it is very difficult to produce a pleasant and engaging writing style when one is simply cataloging a lot of data. And the author occasionally does seem to be imagining emotions where they could not possibly exist. But I give this book 4 stars and recommend it because it tackles an important subject that we read about all too little. And, despite its faults, readers will come away from this book having learned a lot about the lives of animals. If you need more encouragement, Dr. Jane Goodall has given the book high praise.

Rating:
Summary: a thoughtful book on a difficult subject
Review: In the scientific community, "anthropomorphism" (assigning human qualities to inanimate ojects or animals) is villified to an astonishing degree. Masson has bravely written a book which contains stories of animals interacting with members of their own species and also with humans, stories that definitely would indicate emotion to any sensible person. Unfortunately, emotion in animals cannot be proven, because they cannot talk (with the notable exception of Koko the signing gorilla and Alex the parrot). And because animals-as-objects are important to research and industry, this is a subject that no one wants to touch. Although at times the writing in the book is somewhat bland, I recommend it and am grateful to people like Masson, Jane Goodall, and Marc Bekoff who are not afraid to bring this issue to the forefront.

Rating:
Summary: a thoughtful book on a difficult subject
Review: In the scientific community, "anthropomorphism" (assigning human qualities to inanimate ojects or animals) is villified to an astonishing degree. Masson has bravely written a book which contains stories of animals interacting with members of their own species and also with humans, stories that definitely would indicate emotion to any sensible person. Unfortunately, emotion in animals cannot be proven, because they cannot talk (with the notable exception of Koko the signing gorilla and Alex the parrot). And because animals-as-objects are important to research and industry, this is a subject that no one wants to touch. Although at times the writing in the book is somewhat bland, I recommend it and am grateful to people like Masson, Jane Goodall, and Marc Bekoff who are not afraid to bring this issue to the forefront.

Rating:
Summary: Emotions for all
Review: In this book, the authors Masson and McCarthy compile thoughtful and deeply educational stories that demonstrate the presence of emotions in non-human animals. Throughout the book these two authors draw from numerous stories and experiences that range from love to jealousy, to hate and compassion to convey to the reader the capacity of animals to experience emotions and feelings. One would expect such a book that is predominantly based on secondary information to be less informative and lack the knowledge to deliver a quality piece of writing. However Masson and McCarthy are able to communicate the controversial subject of the emotional lives of species other than are own, in a crystal clear manner.
The book delivers intelligent arguments that force the reader to pry deeper into the idea that animals do in fact have emotions. If emotions such as joy, grief, fear, and hope are able to cross cultural boundaries, why shouldn't it be plausible for these very same emotions to cross an interspecies boundary as well? By viewing animals as simple species that are incapable to feel and understand their emotions; we are robbing them of their capacity to be equal with the human race. The book continues to deliver the idea of a "double standard" that humans have developed when it comes to ethical treatment; and finds the route of this problem to be deeply imbedded in the minds of our civilization. Descartes has referred to animals as senseless machines, incapable of emotions and feelings, but is countered by Masson and McCarthy.
"To describe the lives of animals without including their emotions may be just inaccurate, just as superficial and distorted and may strip them of their wholeness just as profoundly. To understand animals, it is essential to understand what they feel." (Masson 23)

By delivering a variety of stories about different animals ranging from butterfly fish to elephants, When Elephants Weep is able to show the large spectrum of feelings that animals have been known to experience in their own existence. It does however bring to light one of the most worrisome and critical aspects of animal emotions: the idea of anthropomorphism. "Science considers anthropomorphism toward animals a grave mistake, even a sin," (Masson 32) states Masson. Reflecting human emotions on to individual animals changes the way in which mankind views other species, and in essence takes away their individuality as separate beings. We may think that a dog is happy, yet we have no capacity to feel the feelings and emotions that a dog has ever experienced. "Anthropocentrism treats animals as inferior forms of people and denies what they really are." (Masson 42) Being the controversial subject that it is, anthropomorphism has its pros and cons, and is constantly the focus when it comes to behavioral analysis in animals.
Once the topic of anthropomorphism is discussed and dissected, the book continues on to its primary focus which is the actual existence of emotions in non-human animals. Littered with short, second hand stories that have been collected through the century; each emotion that is known to humans is applied to animals in a variety of ways. Love and friendship between chimpanzees; grief and mourning of elephant herds, as well as jealousy through gray parrots; these are just an example of the broad range of emotions that span through the natural world of animals. This book does something that most books about animals cannot do; it portrays them not as savage beasts but as highly delicate and meaningful creatures that are more evolved emotionally than once believed. One unique story that is told is that of the trap-door spider and their capacity to love.
"Moggridge shook the baby spiders off her back and dropped her into the alcohol. After a while, supposing her to be "dead to sense," he dropped her twenty-four babies in too. To his horror, the mother spider reached out her legs, folded the babies beneath her, and clasped them until she died." (Masson 68)
Many other stories are told throughout the pages, some sad, and portray animals as humans, while other stories distinctly draw the line between humans and animals.
If animals are able to feel shouldn't society acknowledge this and treat them accordingly. It once thought that the ability to cry was a human trait, and only a human trait. As a habit, most people consider bodily fluids disgusting (such as urine, feces, etc.), but embrace the concept of tears and crying. The reason for this mindset was because it was an action that only humans had the capability of performing. Mason proves otherwise through the stories of a particular elephant. "Okha does cry at times, but that he had no idea why. Okha sometimes shed a tear when being scolded, it is reported, and at least once wept while giving children rides." (Masson 106) This does not just end with the idea of elephants crying and shedding tears, but also delivers stories of poodles, apes, and seals crying in painful or distressful situations. Not only does the topic of animals weeping relate directly to the title of this book, it demonstrates that other species besides humans are capable of a multitude of emotions.
Another major topic that is brought up is that of zoos and animals being imprisoned by them. When a human is put behind bars, they feel lonely and an aurora of despair and depression overtakes them; the same emotions have been found in animals. Many studies have been conducted to see if animals do in fact have these emotions. There is a story that tells the tale of a monkey who was put in a black isolation chamber for six months and then placed in a cage with other monkeys who were left to socialize during the six month time period. Once the isolated monkey was placed with the others, it immediately ran into the corner and embraced itself and was assaulted by his mates until the monkey perished away. These studies in fact are a lot like zoos; the animals cannot enjoy their abilities, a function that is labeled as "funktionslust". A cheetah may appear to be happy in an enclosed pasture, however it does not have the freedom to sprint for miles or to hunt and reproduce under its own terms. What happens now that it has been revealed that we share many human attributes with animals; is it time we stop their suffering, is time we discontinue using them as a food resource? Masson is still unclear about this. Has the time finally arrived where we as a society have realized that we hold no dominion over animals and that they are in fact equal to us in the field of emotions, or shall we just imprison more species behind the steal cages we call zoos.

I enjoyed reading this book and only have a slight criticism of this book. I would have liked to read more about the stories that are touched upon rather than have them summarized in a few sentences. Masson and McCarthy touch on some amazing accounts of animals exhibiting truly unique emotional qualities that could be better understood if detailed more. I have also realized that perhaps testing on animals is not the best way to learn their emotions, if in fact it is true that they share emotions with humans, why not test on humans themselves.