Sentient: How Animals Illuminate the Wonder of Our Human Senses

by Jackie Higgins

Overview

Perfect for fans of The Soul of an Octopus and The Genius of Birds, this “revelatory book” (Sy Montgomery, New York Times bestselling author) explores how we process the world around us through the lens of the incredible sensory capabilities of thirteen animals, revealing that we are not limited to merely five senses.

There is a scientific revolution stirring in the field of human perception. Research has shown that the extraordinary sensory powers of our animal friends can help us better understand the same powers that lie dormant within us.

From the harlequin mantis shrimp with its ability to see a vast range of colors, to the bloodhound and its hundreds of millions of scent receptors; from the orb-weaving spider whose eyes recognize not only space but time, to the cheetah whose ears are responsible for its perfect agility, these astonishing animals hold the key to better understanding how we make sense of the world around us.

“An appealingly written, enlightening, and sometimes eerie journey into the extraordinary possibilities for the human senses” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review), Sentient will change the way you look at humanity.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781982156565
Publisher:	Atria Books
Publication date:	11/01/2022
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	360,963
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Jackie Higgins is a graduate of Oxford University with an MA in zoology and has worked for Oxford Scientific Films for over a decade, along with National Geographic, PBS Nova, and the Discovery Channel. She has also written, directed, and produced films at the BBC Science Department. She lives in London.

Table of Contents

Introduction ix

1 The Peacock Mantis Shrimp and Our Sense of Color 1

2 The Spookfish and Our Dark Vision 23

3 The Great Gray Owl and Our Sense of Hearing 43

4 The Star-Nosed Mole and Our Sense of Touch 63

5 The Common Vampire Bat and Our Senses of Pleasure and Pain 83

6 The Goliath Catfish and Our Sense of Taste 105

7 The Bloodhound and Our Sense of Smell 125

8 The Giant Peacock of the Night and Our Sense of Desire 143

9 The Cheetah and Our Sense of Balance 165

10 The Trashline Orbweaver and Our Sense of Time 185

11 The Bar-Tailed Godwit and Our Sense of Direction 205

12 The Common Octopus and Our Sense of Body 227

The Duck-Billed Platypus: An Afterword 247

Acknowledgments 251

Notes 253

References 275

Index 297

Editorial Reviews

[A] masterpiece of science and nature writing.” —Washington Post

“Illuminating...an extraordinary book.” —The Wall Street Journal

"Sentient is a revelatory book. Exploring animals' beyond-human senses opens to us whole new realms of experience. Thank you, Jackie Higgins, for enlarging our understanding of what the world looks, feels, tastes, and smells like." —Sy Montgomery, New York Times bestselling author of The Soul of an Octopus

“Jackie puts a mirror up to the natural world so we can sense ourselves through our animal relatives. I love this book because it reminds me of our wildness, it reminds me how powerful our senses are, and it celebrates animals and humans in a way that binds us together. The stories are so interesting and well researched, and the language speaks of an author with a deep sense of biological wisdom and wonder.” —Craig Foster, filmmaker and Academy Award winner for My Octopus Teacher

“In Sentient, Jackie Higgins deftly explores the sensory world of animals — the exquisite touch-sense of a mole’s bizarre nose, the magnetic sense of migratory birds, the electric sense of the platypus — as a window onto our human senses, which echo and some cases even exceed their wild counterparts. Extraordinarily rich in detail, there is a miracle on every page.” —Scott Weidensaul, New York Times bestselling author of A World on the Wing

“Jackie Higgins digs deep to show us star-nosed moles that see what they touch, discovers how great grey owls fly silently in search of their prey, and how sightless humans can see with their faces. You will never see in the same way again. With potentially endless reverberations for our creative and perceptive states, Higgins delivers a series of delicious lessons in what it is to be sensate, and shows how our own brains can emulate the miraculous feat of the animals with whom we share this fragile planet.” –Philip Hoare, Samuel Johnson Prize-winning author of Leviathan and Albert and the Whale

“I loved Sentient, it's filled with the wonder of knowing and the infinite surprises of nature.” —Stephen Rutt, author of The Seafarers and Wintering

“For all that it’s stuffed with entertaining oddities, Sentient is not a book about oddities, and Higgins’s argument, although colorful, is rigorous and focused. She leads us to adopt an entirely unfamiliar way of thinking about the senses.” —The Times (London)

“In an authoritative and captivating tone, Higgins provides numerous entertaining lessons regarding how information gained from animals can be applied to humans.... An appealingly written, enlightening, and sometimes eerie journey into the extraordinary possibilities for the human senses.” –Kirkus (starred review)

“Elucidated with scientific fluency and narrative verve. . . Higgins’ in-depth tour of the senses recalibrates our sense of ourselves, other species, and the singular miracle of life.” —Booklist (Starred Review)

“[An] eminently entertaining look at the natural world...a moving and perspective-shifting examination of ‘the everyday miracle of being sentient.’” —Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)

“How would the First Encounter with an extraterrestrial alien change our view of ourselves? Great science fiction explores the question. But we don’t need science fiction. The aliens are all around us – the octopus with its mysterious body-image, the electric scanner of the platypus’s bill, the magnetic compass of a migrating bird, the moth antenna that can detect the scent of a female in quadrillion-fold dilution. Jackie Higgins’s lyrical, literate style will charm you while her book stuns your imagination with strange, other-worldly truths.” —Richard Dawkins, New York Times bestselling author of The Greatest Show on Earth

From the Publisher

★ 11/29/2021

Wildlife filmmaker Higgins (David Bailey: Look) uses discoveries about animal perception to explore human senses in this eminently entertaining look at the natural world. Adopting the simplest definition of sentience as “our ability to sense the world around us,” Higgins “reflects on how each of the sentient beings with whom we share the planet offers a different perspective on how we sense” things. She covers a mind-boggling array of creatures with confounding abilities: there’s the peacock mantis shrimp, which has an unusually large number of photoreceptors and can detect colors that humans cannot, but is less able to distinguish subtle changes in shading; the goliath catfish, whose entire skin functions as a tongue and shows “that our sense of taste is more diverse than we could have imagined, and its reach extends beyond that of our tongue”; and the star-nosed mole, who teaches “much about our sense of touch through an organ we normally associate with our sense of smell.” Higgins does a great job at describing scientific studies and their results, and at connecting them to humans, making for a moving and perspective-shifting examination of “the everyday miracle of being sentient.” Fans of David Attenborough’s documentaries or the works of Helen Scales will savor this delightful study. Agent: Elizabeth Sheinkman, Peters Fraser and Dunlop. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

12/01/2021

Higgins (a filmmaker for Oxford Scientific Films) explores the senses in this fascinating, well-documented work. Going beyond the five widely accepted senses of sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell, she also investigates the senses of dark vision, pleasure/pain, desire, balance, time, direction, and body. Each chapter highlights an animal that epitomizes the sense (e.g., the owl for hearing; the star-nosed mole for touch; the bloodhound for smell) and discusses in great detail the anatomy involved and how animals use the sense. Higgins then discusses the range of human abilities for each sense. For example, some people can distinguish a far greater range of colors than most, while others lack the ability to see color at all. Throughout the work, she interviews scientists and shares the results of the experiments they conducted to learn more about how sensory perception works in animals and humans, covering anatomy, physiology, behavior, and neuroscience. Occasional black-and-white illustrations enhance the narrative. VERDICT An engaging, thoroughly researched work for thoughtful readers that will appeal to those who wish to explore the senses, neuroscience, and the extraordinary abilities of animals. Higgins is a patient guide, and her writing is accessible throughout.—Sue O'Brien, Downers Grove, IL

Library Journal

This fantastic audiobook about the neuroscience of sense perception in animals is an engaging listen. Narrator Joan Walker makes it exciting to follow the author’s many journeys into extreme worlds, such as the planet’s deepest sea trenches, where the four-eyed spookfish sees in the dark. In each chapter the author describes a different animal’s super sense. Memorable examples include the bloodhound’s ability to smell, the owl’s sharp hearing, and the star-nosed mole’s ultra-refined touch. Walker sounds like a scientist, and her performance reflects the author’s energetic passion to explore lesser-known senses like balance, color, time, and direction. Each sense specialty the author discusses opens up interesting questions about human perception. This audiobook is exciting science listening for the truly curious. J.T. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine

MARCH 2022 - AudioFile

This fantastic audiobook about the neuroscience of sense perception in animals is an engaging listen. Narrator Joan Walker makes it exciting to follow the author’s many journeys into extreme worlds, such as the planet’s deepest sea trenches, where the four-eyed spookfish sees in the dark. In each chapter the author describes a different animal’s super sense. Memorable examples include the bloodhound’s ability to smell, the owl’s sharp hearing, and the star-nosed mole’s ultra-refined touch. Walker sounds like a scientist, and her performance reflects the author’s energetic passion to explore lesser-known senses like balance, color, time, and direction. Each sense specialty the author discusses opens up interesting questions about human perception. This audiobook is exciting science listening for the truly curious. J.T. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine

MARCH 2022 - AudioFile

★ 2021-10-30
An exploration of the ways the animal kingdom is providing insight into human senses.

What can we learn about ourselves by studying a vampire bat, a cheetah, or a moth? According to Higgins, who works for Oxford Scientific Films, quite a bit. In a series of essays, each focusing on an extraordinary sense of a specific animal, the author invites us to open up “to the everyday miracle of being sentient.” While we are taught that humans only have five senses, Higgins argues that we are capable of perceiving the world to a much greater degree than we may think. The limitations we put on ourselves become apparent as we study the ways in which animals use their senses. For example, the peacock mantis shrimp has spectacular eyesight largely due to additional photoreceptors that allow it to see colors that are invisible to the human eye. But as Higgins explains, many humans unknowingly possess a condition known as tetrachromacy, in which they have four cones (instead of three) and perceive the world in a wider range of colors, including a “rich and beautiful mosaic of lilacs, lavenders, violets, emeralds.” In a chapter on the great gray owl, the author suggests that anyone can learn a version of echolocation. When placed in a room similar to Beranek’s Box, the echo-free chamber created by acoustics scientist Leo Beranek during World War II, humans are able to hear blood rushing through their own veins. The reason is that our ears “become more sensitive as a place gets quieter.” In an authoritative and captivating tone, Higgins provides numerous entertaining lessons regarding how information gained from animals can be applied to humans. In fact, scientists are already utilizing this information to develop devices and enhancements to “cure” conditions such as blindness and deafness. Though full of arcane scientific information, the book is narrated in an easily readable tone, and Church’s well-rendered illustrations are a bonus.

An appealingly written, enlightening, and sometimes eerie journey into the extraordinary possibilities for the human senses.

Kirkus Reviews