Embedded Files
Zoomorphism: Understanding Animal and Human Behaviour
Zoomorphism: Understanding Animal and Human Behaviour
Why do animals do what they do? Why do humans? In this class we will examine animal behaviours and ask how different behaviours evolved. Does competition lead animals to behave optimally? How do they find mates? When do they cooperate? Zoomorphism is when we apply animal characteristics to humans. Can we use the same reasoning we use in studying animal behaviour to humans? If so, when and to what extent? We will address these topics with reading, discussion, and observations of animals in mostly natural circumstances.
Student Reviews
Anonymous AY25/26 Sem 1
About the Instructor:
Prof. Philip is American so he makes jokes every class and is generally very amiable and fun, but sometimes class discussions are a bit disorganized because he'll pick up on everyone's different points to add on and it starts to stray in different directions, which can be kind of tough to follow. Prof also organized an otter watching trip that was fun.
Content (Structure/Organization):
Curriculum structure made sense but the slides were pretty sparse. Prof mentioned wanting to go less into game theory on next iterations of the mod and I agree that it wasn't very useful in any assignment. Although the discussions surrounding the topic ended up becoming rather complicated.
Manageability of Workload:
Couple of days of work for each mini assignment (chasing mynahs and recording data on their flight-initiation-distance + grp research project on an animal on campus - collect data and make a poster)
A few reading quizzes on Canvas but they're not really time-consuming just tricky.
Final essay: full-on NTW research paper (5 pages at least but he doesn't care about word count) "
From Canvas: Our goal is to find an example, in the popular or semi-popular literature, of an ultimate explanation for a human behaviour, i.e., why humans do something. And then we are going to evaluate that claim, based on how we would evaluate similar claims in animals. (Alternatively, we can find an example, in the popular or semi-popular literature, of a proximate explanation for why animals do something as though they are people. And we will evaluate that claim.)"
Ease/Difficulty of Attaining Grades:
You probably won't get an A if there are Life Sciences students in here, but an A- is doable even as someone who doesn't do sciences at all I think because the final essay component gives you a lot of room to explore a phenomenon that you might be more interested in, and link it back to zoomorphism.
Learning Value/Recommendation:
I now can't look at mynahs without thinking about chasing them
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse