I think what he meant is the "humanizing" and a bit cliché language of that article -
you can't say that animals are "impassionate" about anything because you have no clue how they actually think, or what they think, or what their motivations are.
Indeed, but they cry and mourn like humans... Do you really know what your fellow humans think and what their motivations are? The thing that separates us is structured language. I tend to trust the display of emotions more than a long discourse.
I'd also like to point that in the case of great apes and some other mammalians, the brain structure is not very different than a human brain. We can reasonably expect that a similar emotional state is acheived when a similar external display is observed. I mean that for instance, when they cry, we can assume that they are sad, because their brain is quite similar to ours.
Counter-example to show that your assumptions about animal behaviour plus human emotions can turn out horribly wrong:
You'd think that the act of "smiling" (twisting the corners of your mouths while baring your teeth) conveys a state of happiness, like it works in humans. You'd see a monkey "smile" and think: That monkey is happy.
But in most other primates, the act of "smiling" is an act that's likely to be followed by violence, so it's actually seen as a threat. So if you're in the wild, see a monkey smile and think "oh he's happy, I'd better smile back" he might assume you're "threatening back" and attack you.
I agree that emotions reading of primates can turn wrong when taken out of context (even the reading of human facial expression can be confusing out of context). But in context, you'll quickly (and sometimes painfully) learn the meaning of their facial expressions, and other affective displays.
Also, tears are not necessary to cry. In your source, scientists prefer to conservatively talk about "distress vocalizations" instead of crying. But that's necessary because they are so similar in the first place! That's my point: they express their distress! In everyday life (not writing a paper), I'd just say that "this ape is crying because her baby died". Heck, even my dog, I'd say that he's crying. I don't care that there are no tears. They have a mammalian limbic system, and the rewards it contextualizes have to be evolutionarily sensible!
Btw, and I know that's not a strong argument, but my eyes don't produce tears (following some medication). Does it downgrade my crying into a distress vocalization? If not, is it because you think that you know how I am feeling? How I am thinking? really? How do you know that?
PS: as a_bonobo yourself, you know that what I say makes sense ;).
Passion = “any powerful or compelling emotion or feeling”. It’s definitely possible to witness powerful emotions in non-human animals. Nothing inherently human about it.
How do you know that animals have emotions, or feelings? How do you know that they have something similar, or nothing like that?
Just because you use your knowledge of human emotions on your dog's behaviour doesn't mean that your dog is capable of fear (it's likely, but absolutely impossible to prove).
Can you back up that claim? It sounds like an argument based on group selection theory. Animals may have a desire to help out those that are genetically related to them. But to say they want to save any and all members of their own kind violates the thesis of Darwin's Selfish Gene.
You are right, the altruistic behavior is not indiscriminately directed to any member of the same specie. In fact, some within the grate ape family had developed a behavior to purposefully attack members of of the same "kind" in order to gain more resources for themselves. Chimpanzees and humans are two examples who exhibit this behavior (but not gorillas I believe). However, desire to help members of close kin is pretty universal.
Either way, this distinction is irrelevant. What I was trying to say was simply that you shouldn't assume that human emotions and motivations are very special. We won the genetic lottery by getting a lucky combination of traits which allowed us build civilization. Our ability to communicate using language and art seems to be our most distinguishing feature. But there's not much special about our emotions.
I wouldn't say it violates the premise of The Selfish Gene. The question is, can the animal easily distinguish between members of its somewhat close kin and one it isn't closely related to? Without this ability, any animal that looks similar enough would be subject to behavior attributed to kin-altruism. For a lot of animals in the wild I would wager that they lack the ability to discriminate between close and distant kin.
