Playing possum

how animals understand death

Playing possum

how animals understand death
Susana Monsó
Book - 2024

"A philosophical exploration of what animal behavior reveals about their understanding of death, as well as our own"--

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Barcode Status Material Type CallNumber
37413322327828 Available New Adult Non-Fiction 591.5 MONSO
Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Monsó, Susana, 1988- (Author)
Format: Book
Language:English
Spanish
Published: Princeton : Princeton University Press, [2024]
Subjects:

MARC

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100 1 |a Monsó, Susana,  |d 1988-  |e author. 
245 1 0 |a Playing possum :  |b how animals understand death /  |c Susana Monsó. 
264 1 |a Princeton :  |b Princeton University Press,  |c [2024] 
300 |a xii, 243 pages :  |b illustrations ;  |c 23 cm 
336 |a text  |b txt  |2 rdacontent 
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337 |a unmediated  |b n  |2 rdamedia 
338 |a volume  |b nc  |2 rdacarrier 
500 |a Translated from the Spanish. 
504 |a Includes bibliographical references (pages 215-233) and index. 
505 0 |a Introduction: The Silence of the Chimps -- The Ant who Attended her Own Funeral -- The Whale who Carried her Baby Across Half the World -- The Ape who Played House with Corpses -- The Dog who Mistook his Human for a Snack -- The Elephant who Collected Ivory -- The Opossum who Was Both Dead and Alive -- Conclusion: The Animal who Brought Flowers to the Dead. 
520 |a "A philosophical exploration of what animal behavior reveals about their understanding of death, as well as our own"--  |c Provided by publisher. 
520 |a "How animals conceive of death and dying-and what they can teach us about our own relationships with mortality. When the opossum feels threatened, she becomes paralyzed. Her body temperature plummets, her breathing and heart rates drop to a minimum, and her glands simulate the smell of a putrefying corpse. Playing Possum explores what the opossum and other creatures can teach us about how we and other species understand mortality, and demonstrates that the concept of death, far from being a uniquely human attribute, is widespread in the animal kingdom. With humor and empathy, Susana Monsó tells the stories of ants who attend their own funerals, chimpanzees who clean the teeth of their dead, dogs who snack on their caregivers, crows who avoid the places where they saw a carcass, elephants obsessed with collecting ivory, and whales who carry their dead for weeks. Monsó, one of today's leading experts on animal cognition and ethics, shows how there are more ways to conceive of mortality than the human way, and challenges the notion that the only emotional reactions to death worthy of our attention are ones that resemble our own. Blending philosophical insight with new evidence from behavioral science and comparative psychology, Playing Possum dispels the anthropocentric biases that cloud our understanding of the natural world, and reveals that, when it comes to death and dying, we are just another animal"--  |c Provided by publisher. 
650 0 |a Animals  |x Mortality. 
650 0 |a Animal psychology. 
650 0 |a Perception in animals. 
650 0 |a Animal behavior. 
655 7 |a Informational works.  |2 lcgft 
776 0 8 |i Online version:  |a Monsó, Susana, 1988-  |t Playing possum  |d Princeton : Princeton University Press, [2024]  |z 9780691260853  |w (DLC) 2023057784 
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