I was 13 when Benji came into our lives. With his deep brown eyes, floppy cars and cheerful disposition, he was my constant companion throughout my teenage years. We would play together in the garden, and take long walks over the hills behind the house and on the beach. Benji would hang on my every word with his head tilted to one side. Despite being a dog, he seemed to have a sympathy for my problems that went deeper than words could express. He was my best friend. Benji left us about 15 years ago for that great kennel in the sky. But recently I've been thinking about him a lot. Was he really conscious? Could any animal have consciousness like we do? Does it matter whether animals are conscious or not? For many, it is a matter of life and death. On the one hand, animal research has helped prevent some of the most pressing human diseases, including hepatitis B, hepatitis C, 'mad cow' disease, malaria, cystic fibrosis and emphysema. On the other hand, this research is performed largely on chimps, our closest nonhuman relatives, with whom we share 98.4% of our genetic material, and great apes, with whom we are similarly biologically close. Some people feel this connection is strong enough to warrant special treatment. An international group called the Great Ape Project is lobbying the United Nations to adopt a declaration on the rights of great apes modeled on the UN declaration On the Rights of Man. The group believes that apes are 'conscious' and so deserve legal protection of their right to life and freedom from imprisonment and torture. If great apes were shown to have consciousness or something like our own, I would consider it among the scientific discoveries of the century. I would then agree with the Australian philosopher and founder of the animal rights movement, Peter Singer, that performing medical experiments on chimps would be like experimenting on orphan children. That's a pretty chilling thought, and no amount of human suffering saved could justify such an action. But before we close down the laboratories and stop searching for a vaccine against AIDS, we had better take a long hard look at the evidence for ape consciousness. Why does the author bring up the example of Benji?