can animals play chess

No, in the grand scheme of things, it's definitely the primary objective.

Ultimately you're correct, seeing as all knowledge in some way gives you peace of mind. It can dispel fear. But that isn't the only thing that knowledge provides. After all, certain knowledge can arguably erode your inner peace rather than nurture it. We can also seek knowledge for purely recreational reasons. But the reason we seek it is to gain understanding of said 'things'. The inner peace comes once we've understood it.

first we have pastors

Only scorpions as far as I know.

When I play chess, my cat will often come by and knock over the king (along with some other pieces). I don't know if that's a commentary on the play or not.

The cat my Mum had did that too! He knew what he was doing, I'm sure of it. When they want attention they're pretty clever about getting it.

I have heard that there are pidgeons in Chinatown in NYC that can play tic tac toe. I used to live near Chinatown but never saw them. 

I was taught that no scientific theory can be proven, it can be only be disproven. 

The thing is that I got kicked out of live chess because of something I didn`t do. I am very mad. Can`t the staff do something about it? The people I talked to were very mean, teasing me about my name. They said offensive comments about me. They even swore, but with a different spelling so that it doesn`t go through the moderator. Can you please help?

You are correct. The process of corroboration is never a real proof, but a practical proof. It is the test what the explanatory power of a theory is, what the explanatory power of its alternatives is and what explanations are gone when you discard the theory.

Evolution theory has still some things to find out, but in general is the explanatory power enormous. DNA and RNA were not discovered before the evolution theory existed, yet it combines great with evolution theory. It combines great with the movement of the earth plates, it combines great with the process of reproduction etc etc..

To say it more precisely then that it is not disproven might you say: it is on this subject by far the theory with the greatest explanatory power of itself and has the most knowledge enriching links to previously unrelated theories of the world. But there is no verdict anywhere that you should believe it.

All "Science" was at first something that fit into the field of "Philosophy", although the word first appeared, if I remember correctly, in the 1300's or something like that. Medieval Catholic priests used the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle to prove the existence of God; they saw similarities, for instance, with Aristotle's "Unmoved Mover", the "first" mover who set everything else in motion in Aristotle's world system - how he described and pictured the universe - and the Catholic God. Aristotle's system describing the universe is a very intricate one, everything is explained in a way that it answers all questions - even if it is in some cases paradoxical. The work done by Catholic priests - and later on, great philosophers like René Descartes (you know, the "Cogito, ergo sum" guy), was, in a sense research being done, either for the purpose of proving, or resulting in the conclusion that, God exists. Later in the 1600's, "Natural Philosophy" became a discipline to which some philosophers associated themselves with, and eventually "Natural Science" became a discipline where the philosophical reasoning and the questioning of empirical knowledge was not focused as much as by the philosophers before the late Enlightenment.

Science wasn't always called "science", but it has always been there, trying to prove different things, using different methods like philosophical reasoning, logical deduction methods, empirical knowledge or emotional experiences. One "phase" that science - in Europe, that is - went through was trying to prove the existence of God. If it was the first one depends on what, historically, you choose to define as science, of course.

And no, animals can't play chess. (I'm pretty sure that the question is meant to exclude humans.)

SHARKS play chess.

Now this thread is going to collapse into a flame war. RIP. Predicting huge paragraphs from both sides.

I guess I should have said scientific method, not just the general word "science."  I was aware that there was a lot of philosophical/spiritual work done by people in the Catholic church.  I agree you can weasel around it by choosing a definition of science.  I also agree "science" has always been around and is used all the time by everyone.

It's pretty hard to be certain of something when you're super rigorous.  Not even math is safe.  Check out Godel's incompleteness theorem.

Chess is played by humans.

Humans are primates.

Primates are mammals.

Mammals are classified as a type of animal.

Therefore, we know of one specific animal that plays chess.

Syllogism based on the premise that all mammals are animals.

This is not an undisputable fact that everyone agrees on. Others has classified humans as " 'humans', as opposed to 'animals' " Regardless of whether one has an antropocentric or an ecocentric view of the world, we have to recognize that our own view isn't absolute.

I am too pretty sure that the question meant to exclude humans, but then you have a question in the category 'do you love beating your wife?' It is for me a fallacy of the type loaded questions.

When you classify humans opposite to animals, then do you classify humans at the same time not as a primate or mammal. That is inevitable. You can not say that we are family of the chimpansees (animals) yet we are no animals. If you put humans on one side and animals on the other, then are all human beings not a mammal anymore. If someone is reasoning incorrectly yet to stubborn to admit his own illogical reasoning does not make the reasoning correct or logical. If you contradict yourself, then you contradict yourself.

Since the OP asked if animals can play chess, not if they can play it WELL, then the question is "could an animal play either side of the line 1.f4 e5 2. g4 Qh4 mate?

I would suggest that squid, bonobos, baboons, mountain gorilla, domestic cats, lions, dogs, parrots, dolphins and ostriches could all do this.

The only question is, why would Mr Lion WANT to do this? He's too busy hunting for food and having a good sex life with Mrs Lion. Thta's what makes him smart. He sees that chess is useless for his survival.