| | To start by the original post, I read two points:
1) humans are the only rational animals, hence the only animals capable of volition
2) Objectivism holds that there exists an evolutionary gap that separates humans from other animals.
ad 1) i lack the proper definitions of volition and will.
It would seem that humans more often than not react and choose before conscience have had it's say, that selection is the product of desires. Conscience, a trait that seems to have developed relatively late in human history, only step in to sanction the choice made - raising our hand in greeting, grabbing the coffee cup, opening the fridge to see if we have a snack et al. Even when choosing a house, conscience, i take it, only provides the awareness that 'no we can't afford it' or 'it's too far from shops', the choice that we want the house, is made unconsciously. So only definition can decide if conceptual ability is a premise for free choice - if free choice, simply is the choice not to react.
ad 2) this is where i object. Clearly man has shown to utilize cognitive abilities, by the standard set by man, to a greater extend than any other known living entity - including the organic structure of which man himself is a part - that is a defining property of man, but to call this an evolutionary gap is rubbish, unless we accept that any unique feature of any animal should be an evolutionary gap, allowing any animal it's unique abilities, if swimming, climbing, biting, running, thinking, hiding, hunting, surviving et al.
Jordan, i agree that we have cognitive abilities, enabling us to discuss and choose (against) the rights we grant whomever we grant them, but the basis for those rights are not given by any particular trait. Like any animal we try to protect ourselves, our cognitive abilities helps us realize that the best way to serve this interest is by protecting our persons, our flock, our community, our globe. Like any other animal we kill and eat other animals - personally i prefer the eating, leaving the killing to others - but occasionally i may do the killing directly. There is an ultimate them or us about it. We need food. Yesterday i made the choice between killing a cow or killing the dust mites on some pasta, the dust mites got to live another day. Accepting rights of non-human animals is something we do only to protect humans. That some people want to protect animals that are cute, or want to adopt the spirit of the bison or whatever is as irrelevant to this discussion as any other religious beliefs.
Our cognitive abilities have created a need for us to know what we are, and we use those cognitive abilities in an attempt to map cognition. We compare it to other animals, we take it apart, to examine it, it is rewarding - we look at elephants and say they are less developed because they can't learn human lingo, blissfully disregarding that humans are equally poor at elephant lingo. Whatever our abilities, it doesn't make humans a better evolutionary alternative than worms - we all fill our positions in the dynamics of the universe.
I find it strange that debates on animal cognition often ends in heated discussions leaving the existence of human cognition in doubt. I find it extremely interesting to search for the truths about cognitive abilities in other animals, to grasp the causality of other brains, to search for traces of mind, but i find the tendency to ferociously defend mere beliefs about possible results tedious, we are no less unique because other animals can walk on two legs, we are no less unique because monkeys and beavers can use tools. If an ostrich should show its tiny brain capable of complex imagination, its meat would taste no less delicious. Its another type of animal, its food.
We don't have rights because we can think, we have rights within our own group simply by belonging to that group. We don't have universal rights as we can't persuade a lion of those rights of ours. The lion will have rights within its own group too, and will see us as an easy snack should he feel like it.
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