Cognition of Animal Consciousness as a Way of Human Self-cognition

The article attempts to examine scientific and philosophical approaches to the study of animal consciousness in the light of other mind problem and the principle according to which our "Self-image" is already embedded in our model of other mind as a reference point and a standard of comparison (this is a principle of xenology as defined by V. Lysenko). If one sets out to place research on animal consciousness in a category of philosophical issues, the problem of other minds, other selves, and, in general, the subjectivity of others, seems to the author of this article to be the best solution. The very existence of this problem in philosophy testifies to the recognition of subjective reality, as well as to the problematization of the first-person sensory experience (What Is It Like to Be a Bat? - after the title of Thomas Nagel's famous article). In contemporary philosophy, the question "what it would be like to be someone else?", refers to the problem of qualia (individual, qualitative side of experience), or to the concept of phenomenal consciousness, which is considered by many scientists and philosophers as "the hard problem of consciousness" (D. Chalmers). The history of the animal consciousness studies, closely related to the history of research into human consciousness ("Self-image"), has gone a long way from anthropocentrism and apologia of our species as rightfully dominant on earth to the recognition of the supreme value of other living beings and living nature as a whole (biocentrism). If we view this history through the lens of attitudes toward otherness of the others, it would present a journey from self-affirmation and self-justification to self-criticism and the search for ways to improve ourselves. In the light of the xenological approach, the article analyzes the materials of the international conference "Animal Consciousness" (Dharamsala, India, May 2023), organized by the Institute for Advanced Brain Research of Moscow State University, the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives (Dharamsala, India) and the Save Tibet Foundation (Moscow).