Is it possible for an animal or child or mentally challenged person to be enlightened?
Very likely not and here we come to the role of discriminative intellect.
In and of itself consciousness does not know it's nature. Only through calm observation and discrimination can it appreciate the distinction among consciousness (itself) and attachment.
All this requires the discriminating faculty which is only present in (some) adult humans. Even there it is rare because it is developed through much practice in mediation (such as Vipassana).
A somewhat simplified analogy can be that of quantum physics. Although it us the way that things work and have always worked only few can grasp it and the knowledge of it took a lot of time to appear amongst humanity.
So is the knowledge of the self. Knowledge is in the nature of the intellect and not of the self/consciousness itself.
Thus the state of knowledge or enlightenment is not possible in animals children etc unless the intellect is also present.
That is it is possible but since discriminative intellect is a prerequisite it is quite unlikely.
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