I’ve learned so much about rats lately! Did you know that rats:
“…act through complex expectation-based representations of possible actions and outcomes, behaving more like inquirers actively seeking to anticipate the future than creatures of habit-channeled drives…
[Build] up an evaluative map of the possibilities their environment afforded, stretching well beyond actual experience and enabling them to improvise opportunistically on the spot…
[Use] resources of internal simulation to redeploy elements of past experience efficiently and creatively…
[Navigate] into the future by considering future possibilities and electing action in light of the benefits and risks they promise.
…continuously model what might lie ahead and proactively seek information, allocate mental resources, evaluate alternatives and select actions."
In other words, rats make choices based on what they want and what they consider possible. They imagine the future, weigh the relative merit of different actions, seek additional information if needed, choose what to do, and then act. They are agents with desires and goals. A lot like us.
All this from “Navigating Into the Future or Driven by the Past?” (Seligman et al, 2013), available online at http://pps.sagepub.com/content/8/2/119.
Reference:
Martin E. P. Seligman, Peter Railton, Roy F. Baumeister and Chandra Sripada Navigating Into the Future or Driven by the Past Perspectives on Psychological Science 2013 8: 119 DOI: 10.1177/1745691612474317