As we have seen, animals have more in common with humans than previously thought. They are able to use higher-level functions such as memory that were previously believed that only people could use. However, some would argue that only some animal species have this, and that there should be a ranking system of what animals should receive moral standing. Karen Davis mentioned in her article, The Provocative Elitism of “Personhood” for Nonhuman Creatures in Animal Advocacy Parlance and Polemics, “ranking animals according to a cognitive scale of intelligence is an aspect of cross-species comparisons that should be avoided” (Davis). With this model it would ultimately lead to people not caring much about animals that are deemed unintelligent
