The dog through Darwin’s eyes

animal mind in Victorian England and in Darwinian speech

Abstract

This paper discusses the issue of animal mind in Charles Darwin’s defense of his evolutionary theory. In a case study, we follow “Darwin’s dog” along his work. We intend to show that: 1) in Darwin’s speech the subject of animal mind is intimately related to the Darwinian theory of common descent by establishing a mental continuity between animals and man; 2) Darwin’s dog, as a prototype of the Darwinian animal, possesses a complex mental and subjective life, with components of both continuity and discon-tinuity to animals as perceived by Victorian England imagery.