Ce que ressentent les animaux (2016)

If animals are obviously endowed with emotions, such as joy, fear or pain, are they capable of experiencing more complex feelings, such as altruism or empathy? Do they have a sense of morality or justice? For some ethologists, these qualities could have played a crucial role in the survival and evolution of species. At the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig and at Emory University in Atlanta, research on the behavior of chimpanzees, elephants and crows has highlighted their cooperative qualities and social skills, which are crucial to ensure the cohesion and survival of the group. Can they be assimilated to a form of morality, resulting from evolution? Scientists have come up with some surprising answers.