"As reported by zoologist Maurice Burton, two hens of different breeds walked, ate, dustbathed, sunbathed, and slept together. One, Aggie, was elderly and nearly blind. The other (unnamed) was younger and could fend for two. During the day the younger hen would guide Aggie around the garden and place food before her, clucking an invitation to eat. At night she would lead Aggie back to their roost. When Aggie died, the younger hen stopped eating, "was dejected," and rapidly deteriorated. Within a week she, too, died.

Humans caricature chickens' interactions as negative and rigid "pecking orders." Our species' massive, needless violence toward chickens requires seeing them as unfeeling things, not individuals who can love and grieve. Whether or not she died from grief, the younger hen was Aggie's friend.

Affiliative behavior and other pseudoscientific terms that substituted for nonhuman friendship falsify. With such jargon, skeptics remain safely at the surface of nonhuman lives, whose depths they deny."

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