Why weren't dinosaurs more intelligent?

[Forensicmad]

This is one question I have been pondering over for a while; why were the dinosaurs so dumb? I mean, from evidence so far, we can speculate that they first really started roaming the earth 230 million years ago and then obliterated 65 million years ago.

Now, they had 165 million years to walk the Earth and evolve into smarter creatures but they didn't. As far as we can tell, all they did was eat, sleep and breed. Not a bad life - except having to run for it every now and again - but why didn't they gain intelligence? The only knowledge of fire they had was that lightning and lava made it (and that it was hot).

 

Humans (Homo Sapiens) have only really been around for 200,000 years and within 100 years, look how far we have advanced. Within 60 years we went from first flight to outer space. Look in that tiny space of time, how we went from primate intelligence to that of today. Now this only occured in the fraction of a fraction of the time that the dinosaurs roamed. How did we become so intelligent in a small space of time when the dinosaurs had absolutely none in the millions of years they had?

 

Is it because dinosaurs had no need to evolve, to become smarter?

Is it because we were pushed so far by our early predators that it was merely a matter of study to survive?

 

What are your thoughts?

[insane_alien]

1. they didn't need the intelligence to survive. the fact that they survived 165million years is a good indicator of this.

 

2. we have no idea how intelligent they were

[Sisyphus]

Intelligence doesn't automatically evolve. A species only becomes more intelligent if the increase in intelligence, every step of the way, is more valuable than the added resources needed to support that intelligence. For example, humans are very intelligent, but our brains are huge nutrient sponges and we have a longer period of parental dependancy than any other animal, because our minds take so long to develop. For these reasons, it's sometimes advantageous to be less intelligent, and evolution moves in that direction. By "advantageous" I mean only that it tends to result in more surviving offspring, which is the only criterion that evolution "uses."

[herpguy]

Is it because dinosaurs had no need to evolve' date=' to become smarter?[/quote']

Yes. Well, at least not until about 67 million years ago.By that time, many dinosaurs were evolving intelligence. For example, the velociraptor. Most scientists agree that Velociraptor mongoliensis could have been good problem solvers, but not quite to the extent seen in Jurassic Park.

[The Peon]

Not to mention how do you measure intelligence? A large portion of our achievements is due to culture, not intelligence. It's knowledge passed down from generation to generation and built upon. I am not trying to downgrade the human brain, I am merely saying a better question would be if the dinosaurs had a way of extensive communication like we do. I think our communication skills play a much larger factor in our achievements than brain potential, although in the end I guess they are all linked.

[drochaid]

You might like to have a look at this book... http://tinyurl.com/qsg3j ...I haven't read it, but I've just returned from a lecture by Baroness Greenfield about it and she covered this very question (not specifically, but what she was saying would answer this too).

[Sisyphus]

Yes.

 

 

Wait, no. They never stopped evolving, but their evolution didn't involve becoming that much smarter, at least in the sense of the OP.

[herpguy]

Wait, no. They never stopped evolving, but their evolution didn't involve becoming that much smarter, at least in the sense of the OP.

As The Peon stated, the OP wasn't very descriptive of what kind of intelligence the dinosaurs didn't evolove. So, as I stated, some dinosaurs did eventually evolved some sort of intelligence. I am going to edit my previous post to make it more descriptive of what I meant.

[bascule]

I'm going to go with "economy"

 

More intelligence comes at a price. Look at the one humans paid.

[herpguy]

More intelligence comes at a price. Look at the one humans paid.

But look at what we've done that nothing else has...

[tejaswini]

if u were a good swimmer and could even swim seas b'coz ur strong ,would u ever bother to learn how to build a boat.no . same thing with the dino's as well, they didn't need intelligence.the nature did not permit them to gain any ,and they did not try as well.

[bascule]

But look at what we've done that nothing else has...

 

Well, indeed, but we probably have one of the most painful birth processes of any animal, and the crazy skull plating system so our heads will fit through the birth canal

[silkworm]

It's a natural progression. Life apparantly started via the processes of mindless chemical machines. That's my take anyway.

[FreeThinker]

The truth is we dont really know. That is why I think it is very unlikley that there is intelligent life anywhere else in the universe. Intelligence looks like one of those very rare , to put it midley, evolutionary events.

[Forensicmad]

Thanks for your thoughts back. It was just one of those things I think about during French or Maths. Its just strange to think that over 165 million years they probably(!) couldn't have built a boat or even a semi-stable structure like a building. Whereas within our 200,000 years, we have gone to space. Funny.

[swansont]

Well, indeed, but we probably have one of the most painful birth processes of any animal, and the crazy skull plating system so our heads will fit through the birth canal

 

Not as much an issue if you lay eggs, though.

 

While I'm not sure by how much the original premise is flawed (I'm not sure how intelligent the dinos were) I think you have to ask: what good would a higher level of intelligence have done for the dinosaurs? A feature won't remain in a population if it doesn't somehow add to, or at least not reduce, reproductive success. The example of intelligence in humans has to be coupled with our ability to exploit it by making tools. Lacking that ability would certainly limit how far intelligence would evolve.

[FreeThinker]

Not as much an issue if you lay eggs' date=' though.

 

While I'm not sure by how much the original premise is flawed (I'm not sure how intelligent the dinos were) I think you have to ask: what good would a higher level of intelligence have done for the dinosaurs? A feature won't remain in a population if it doesn't somehow add to, or at least not reduce, reproductive success. The example of intelligence in humans has to be coupled with our ability to exploit it by making tools. Lacking that ability would certainly limit how far intelligence would evolve.[/quote']

 

 

The question is: Why didn't some species in that era exploit tool making, language and all other things Homo sapiens did? Intelligence can not be pointed down to one single point, it is a combination of things. It is pretty safe to asume it only arose once in the history of life on this planet. The question , which I think is a very interasting and important one, is why hasn't this happened more than once in the history of life on earth? We have seen organs such as the eye and wings develope independently in a number of ogranisms. Why hasn't intelligence done the same?

[WillTheNewf]

well if you think about it, protists have been around much longer then any dinosaur and look at them, their two cells thick

[silkworm]

Speciation does not require the parent species to die out.

[gcol]

Hey, who said the dinosaurs were not intelligent? Show me a dinosaur IQ test. Can't, can you? They were smart enough to exist for a few million years, which is a lot longer than homo sapiens looks like doing at the present rate of progress. They were smart enough not to destroy their own environment.

[Sisyphus]

Hey, who said the dinosaurs were not intelligent? Show me a dinosaur IQ test. Can't, can you? They were smart enough to exist for a few million years, which is a lot longer than homo sapiens looks like doing at the present rate of progress. They were smart enough not to destroy their own environment.

 

Algae must be the smartest of all, then. They've survived many, many times longer than the dinosaurs did!

[swansont]

The question is: Why didn't some species in that era exploit tool making, language and all other things Homo sapiens did? Intelligence can not be pointed down to one single point, it is a combination of things. It is pretty safe to asume it only arose once in the history of life on this planet. The question , which I think is a very interasting and important one, is why hasn't this happened more than once in the history of life on earth? We have seen organs such as the eye and wings develope independently in a number of ogranisms. Why hasn't intelligence done the same?

 

 

Our tool-making ability is tied in to our opposable thumbs, which allow us to exploit the intelligence. Complex verbal communication requires a certain physiology, too.

 

And I think dolphins are considered to be pretty intelligent. (Mice, too, if you believe Douglas Adams.)

[Sisyphus]

(Mice, too, if you believe Douglas Adams.)

 

Ah, but who knows what extra-dimensional physiology was required for that.

[FreeThinker]

Our tool-making ability is tied in to our opposable thumbs' date=' which allow us to exploit the intelligence. Complex verbal communication requires a certain physiology, too.

 

And I think dolphins are considered to be pretty intelligent. (Mice, too, if you believe Douglas Adams.)[/quote']

 

Yes, but why didn't these things evolve in another species before Homo Sapiens?

[swansont]

Yes, but why didn't these things evolve in another species before Homo Sapiens?

 

Why should they have?