Is compassion only human?
Are animals much more complex than what we believe? Could God have
granted attributes to animals that, in our opinion, are solely human?
Some evidence suggests that elephants might be able to express
human-like compassion, according to a paper that is going to be
published in the August issue of Applied Animal Behaviour Science.
Researchers came to this conclusion after observing the behavior of a
group of elephants in a Kenyan reserve that watched as one of the
matriarchs, Eleanor, fell ill and died. Not only the dying animal was
assisted by an elephant unrelated to her, but once she fell dead,
Eleanor was visited by elephants from her own family and other families
as well. All the elephants showed interest in the body, sniffing it,
hovering a foot over it and nudging it with her tusks. Scientists
believe that this type of behavior "[It] leads to the conclusion that
elephants have a generalized response to suffering and death... and that
this is not restricted to kin."
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