ABSTRACT
Defenders of the human distinctiveness of IR deploy two converging lines of argument. On the one hand, they argue that IR entails an interlocking package of complex capacities that are only found in humans; on the other, they argue that putative instances of nonhuman IR can be explained by simpler associative mechanisms. This chapter argues that each of these complex capacities can be implemented in a way that some other animals do plausibly instantiate. It outlines some constraints on the production of IR, and also argues that the conditions for goal-directed action, and IR in particular, do outstrip the resources of purely associative explanation. Most discussions of instrumental cognition in animals focus on tool use, especially in primates and some bird species. The chapter concludes by sketching some key further differences between human and animal reason. People engage in instrumental reasoning all the time, in fluid and complex ways.
