Gorillas have achieved personhood (from the late Jane Goodall’s anthropological perspective, at the very least) so now we must move the goal-post just a little bit farther ahead and get our human heads around the magnanimity of a river.
The river has life. Its bountifulness nourishes life along its banks. The river supports and carries life and it is life.
Long accepted is the notion that rivers, lakes and ocean systems possess a unique and powerful energy. Harder to quantify is the way in which water systems move our human minds to new places and ways of seeing. We know that there is scientific evidence of animals, thinking.
https://x.com/earthcurated/status/2096265019319103511?s=61
But does the river think? Do trees think? Some anthropologists say yes. More on this wonderful subject on this blog which delves more deeply into the concept of perspectivism.
Science research tells us that raccoons solve puzzle for amusement and enjoyment.
https://science.ubc.ca/news/2026-03/raccoons-solve-puzzles-fun-it-new-study-finds
Chimpanzees have been seen to mock their siblings, make fun and annoy their parents with bratty-like behaviours not unlike human teenagers. They also mean business make they get mad or upset, setting them above lions in terms of animal-kingdom hierarchy in behavioural dominance.
We are learning that there is more to know about the complexities of the animal mind and nature’s presence. There is simply more to it, humans are not the only ones to possess agency. A woman describes “a portal to another dimension” in the life of squirrels.
Trees have been recognized as sentient beings in Quebec town.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/terrasse-vaudreil-quebec-tree-rights-9.7243634
Queen beas can live in water defying mostly what would be commonly believed about the capabilities of an insect’s breathing apparatus.
https://phys.org/news/2026-03-queen-bees-survive-winter-underwater.html
Tea parties aren’t only the pastime of humans apparently and rational thinking is not only Descartes-ian once we investigate the manner in which chimpanzees think and rationalize.
One example of a rational safety move is animals using canopy bridge to cross a road — the point being that we, as humans, are only beginning to grapple with the highly sophisticated brain intelligence of animals.
https://www.ucpress.edu/books/how-forests-think/paper
And also we are learning to interpret in new and inventive ways so that we can accept the notion of, for example, trees thinking. Trees reach, with their roots systems and communicate underground.
An INDY JOURNALIST’S BLOG 
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