Are you feeling what I'm feeling?

If you doubt that non-human animals have emotions, just look at them, listen to them and inhale the odours that pour out when they interact with friend or foe. I believe that what you see on the outside speaks volumes about what is happening inside an animal's head and heart. Not long ago, the notion that animals have emotions was considered subversive, but opinion is changing. In recent years, reputable scientific journals have published research about moral dogs and chimps, joyful rats, grieving elephants, empathetic mice and fearful fish. Just watching a frolicking wolf, a whimpering dog, or a squealing piglet having his tail and testicles cut off without an anaesthetic is enough to convince me that these are emotional beings. The evidence of a single anecdote may not be very scientific, but as philosopher Dale Jamieson says, the plural of anecdote is data. What's more, anecdotes such as those I recount in this article can also inspire new research. Marc Bekoff