Comment by c22

What possible evidence do you have to support this? Why is it crazy to think that the beaver builds a dam because it wants a place to live? Why wouldn't the beaver choose to cut down logs with the intention of using them to build a dam? After all, this is what we observe the beaver doing. Of course since we cannot inhabit the mind of the beaver we cannot know for certain whether the beaver is a thinking being or a blind automaton, but since we consider ourselves thinking beings and the beaver's brain is not wholly unlike our own, why don't we give the beaver some benefit of the doubt? Most of us extend this courtesy to other humans...