Are animals conscious? We’re finally realising that many species are

The following is an extract from our nature newsletter Wild Wild Life. Sign up to receive it for free in your inbox every month.

In recent decades, experiments have begun to catch up with what people who work closely with animals have always known – that animals have an inner life, and consciousness isn’t uniquely human.

Consciousness is a concept that is fiendishly difficult to define. There have been many attempts: is it awareness, or awareness of that awareness, or self-awareness instead? But a useful working definition might be…