An example of an analogy used to explain an historic scientific conception:
"With no back-end operator, animals have very limited function. Like a thermostat, they can sense but cannot prefer one sensation over another. They have neither pain nor pleasure. The animal receives an objective signal input and responds automatically, without a subjective experience of being helped or harmed."
Lucas John Mix (2018) Life Concepts from Aristotle to Darwin. On vegetable souls. Cham, Switzerland: plagrave macmillan.
Read examples of scientific analogies
The notion being described, due to Descartes and other natural philosophers, saw animals as lacking essential human attributes (that we no longer consider as limited to humans) and being like mechanical automata.
