A Change of Heart Vocabulary Challenge

Though much of big science has centered on breakthroughs in biotechnology, nanotechnology and more esoteric questions like the age of our universe...

• Understood by a small amount of people

• mentally draining

• boring

• politically charged

Pressured by animal rights activists and by growing public support for the humane treatment of animals...

• horrific

• compassionate

• light hearted

• foolish

Studies on pigs’ social behavior funded by McDonald’s at Purdue University, for example, have found that they crave affection and are easily depressed if isolated or denied playtime with each other.

• coddled

• harmed

• close

• remote

The lack of mental and physical stimuli can result in deterioration of health.

• thinking

• a physical science

• something that evokes a reaction

• insects

Other funding sources have fueled the growing field of study into animal emotions and cognitive abilities.

• conscious intellectual activity

• impaired

• machine like

• anti intellectual

Researchers were stunned recently by findings (published in the journal Science) on the conceptual abilities of New Caledonian crows.

• handicapped

• consisting in the imagination

• evil

• selfish

It’s commonly believed that other animals have no sense of their mortality and are unable to comprehend the concept of their own death.

• live forever

• looks

• structure

• death

Until very recently, scientists were still advancing the idea that most creatures behaved by sheer instinct and that what appeared to be learned behavior was merely genetically wired activity.

• fake

• impulsive

• coding in a gene being compared to electrical wiring

• misfiring of a cell

So what does all of this portend for the way we treat our fellow creatures?

• foreshadow

• play

• comprehend

• challenge

The human journey is, at its core, about the extension of empathy to broader and more inclusive domains.

• happiness

• Understand another's feelings

• sorrow

• courage