“Animals are not machines; one of my main concerns is to combat this notion. Actually only machines are machines.”

—  Mary Midgley

Introduction, Beast and Man: The Roots of Human Nature (1979).
Context: Consideration of motives brings up the matter of free will. I had better say once, that my project of taking animal comparisons seriously does not involve a slick mechanistic or deterministic view of freedom. Animals are not machines; one of my main concerns is to combat this notion. Actually only machines are machines.

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Mary Midgley 42
British philosopher and ethicist 1919–2018

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