Five years ago I read an astonishing article in Discover Magazine. I remember thinking at the time that it was the best article I had ever read. The title of the article was: What Do Animals Think? by Verlyn Klinkenborg. The subject was Temple Grandin, a high-functioning autistic animal behaviorist.
I had never heard of her, but I never forgot her because of her observations in the article about human and animal behavior.
Briefly, in the 1950s Grandin was diagnosed at the age of two as autistic. To ensure that she did not stay trapped in that world, her parents gave her extensive behavioral training. She was sent to regular schools and expected to get along and fit in, which she did. She later earned a PhD in animal science and is a professor in Colorado State University.
She is most well known as an animal welfare advocate and her work in livestock yards and slaughterhouses. She designed the “Stairway to Heaven,” a humane pathway that cows walk on their way to be slaughtered. She’s able to see the world the way an animal does and understands its sensibilities.
In the article, as an autistic, she claimed to be more similar to animals than humans in mental and emotional character. For instance, a dog doesn’t filter its emotions. That is a strictly a human behavior. A dog responds exactly how it feels. It doesn’t pretend to be fine when it isn’t—happy when it’s really sad. Humans can present artifice. Animals can’t.
The article also talked about how humans “are built to see what they are expecting to see…hard to see things you’re not expecting…new things don’t register” whereas animals “act like they see everything.” For humans, perception is reality. For animals, reality is reality.
Another interesting part of the article was similar to a theory I learned in business school called “High Tech/High Touch,” which postulates for every amount of “high tech” we’re exposed to, we need an equal amount of “high touch” to be balanced/functional/psychologically sound.
The article states that we are “increasingly (in) a world devoid of nature” and as such “we lose the comparative frame that helps us balance our lives.” The author says that “one of the greatest risks humans face is living in an all-human environment.” The article ends with the idea that “humans are not humans without animals;” that humans as a species co-evolved with dogs and our essence as humans depends on our present relationship with animals.
Grandin is an interesting and extraordinary person. She’s written several books about her life and professional experiences with animals.
She’s also done some fascinating interviews on NPR over the years. On Saturday night HBO is airing a movie about her called—what else?— Temple Grandin. The tag line is “What made her different is what made her exceptional.”
Temple Grandin and Claire Danes
http://www.hbo.com/movies?cmpid=s6#/movies/temple-grandin
I don’t get HBO but I look forward to watching the movie when it is released on DVD. The movie stars Claire Danes in the title role. In a Fresh Air interview, Temple Grandin told Terry Gross that Claire Danes did an excellent job portraying her. Here are links to the interviews:
http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=99009110
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123383699
