In the Western (globalized) culture, we have long adhered to the assumptions that moral life entitles peaceful interactions and that moral life is achieved through constraint, duty and solemnity. Morality is also, in our minds, strongly linked to practicing abstinence and denouncement of pleasures.
However, animal societies might offer an alternative outlook.
Play is an activity which we do not normally associate with morality. Yet, play involves many mechanisms (agreed-upon rules, assuming roles that downplay one’s status, forgiveness etc.) that are necessary to prolong the playful mood and to prevent the fun turning into a conflict.
Studies (e.g., Bekoff, M., 1995) demonstrate that canids use specific gestures to announce their intent or to explain their intent to the play partner. For example, bowing (lowering of the frontal part of the body in a stretching manner) is often used in play by coyotes, wolves and dogs before or after an act which might be otherwise interpreted as threatening (e.g., biting with the shaking of one’s head).
While the anatomic mechanisms behind these gestures have not been fully explained, it is possible that the bowing also relieves muscle tension thus physically (chemically, neurally) dissipating aggression potentially accumulated in a fight simulation.
This might enable the ‘attacker’ to ‘tread more lightly’ and to better control the physical manifestation of their intent. Meanwhile, the ‘attacked’ individual has been given notice that the ‘threat’ is not real, it is just a game. As a consequence, the play does not escalate into an actual conflict and it can be prolonged – fun ensues.
The ability to make merry together with others is apparently as closely linked to morality and the upholding of a peaceful and orderly social coexistence as the denouncement of delights and hermitism.
While in the latter case, the individual applies effort not to engage in unwanted activities, in the canid play, the individual learns intricate methods to partake in self-preserving hedonism (having fun for as long as possible without injury).
The mechanisms that allow to maintain the state of jollies are in themselves pleasurable. Stretch-bowing feels good and so might the act of submission (e.g., rolling on one’s back and showing one’s belly) which revokes the state learned back in puphood to provoke benign attitudes in the partner or to reset the roles in play in order to prevent the culmination (the determination of the ultimate winner and loser).
Submission is very much related to the concept of humility, downplaying of one’s true status and accepting ‘unfair’ treatment in order to give the other a chance.
It is a question worth asking whether these acts and gestures involve willpower and active decision making or rather, they are a pursuit of the most pleasurable state (or both). Indeed, were they a pursuit of pleasure, this might imply that pleasure is a moral state in animals who, unlike humans, are not as prone to self-destruction.
The effort involved in maintaining the playful mood might arise from the need to overcome the behavioural conditioning necessary to perform the duty of aggression and dominance that ensures the survival of one’s family.
Perhaps our inability to perceive the fun aspect in moral exercises limits our recognition of morality in the animal species.
It is also understandable. Mostly, play is rather cost-free for us.
For animals, engaging in play can deplete energy and the benefits of exercising and improving agility as well as quick decision-making can be offset by exhaustion and necessity to adjust food uptake.
It can even be dangerous to play because nothing comes free in the animal world.
Moreover, groups have dynamic hierarchies that sometimes have profound impacts on individual fitness.
In some respects, play is the ultimate form of honesty.
Through physical and cognitive interactions, playmates learn each other’s strengths and vulnerabilities and little remains hidden.
The motivations behind play have to therefore be strong in order to risk the costs associated with it in a wild life.
Consequently, practising morality in play is not frivolous at all.
It is a choice of high stakes and it is a choice animals make to become better individuals at the possible expense of their own survival.
Notes by Ieva 