animal intelligence - are we underestimating it?

[foofighter]

sometimes i wonder if our perception of animal intelligence in species other than chimps and simliar primates is limited because in general animals lack complex communication and dexterity. both are crucial for displaying intelligence to us human observers, given that these are our standards, besides having bigger brains of course. but does a lack of complex communication and dexterity, or either, indicate a LACK of intelligence? or could it be that they are intelligent, but we simply can't tell because of the language/dexterity barrier? is there a way that we can measure absolute intelligence in animals? also i was wondering if anyone knows any good books on the subject. thx

[CaptainPanic]

I think we're not underestimating animal intelligence. We're overestimating our own

[pioneer]

There are many forms of intelligence. Humans tend to focus on those aspects that makes us look better. For example, say we randomly pick a wild wolf and a human. We put them both in the wolf's environment, to see which is able able to adapt and call this the intelligent critter. If the wolves' were running the experiment, this would be their approach so they could stack the deck to prove they come out on top. They may conclude their smaller brain is better and the larger brain of humans contains more air which makes them less able to adapt. Humans will do it the other way to feature our strong points to assure that we come out on top.

 

Even with humans, there are many measures of intelligence. There is intellectual, emotional, ingenuity, artistic, intuitive, instinctive, athletic, etc. The intellectuals who originally define intelligence biased the criteria to make sure they come out on top. Maybe what we need to do is use all the possible criteria we can come up with, take an average, and call that universal intelligence (UI). It may be surprising who ends up at the top of the UI ladder. It won't be the specialists in anyone of these criteria, but those who are average in all of them.

 

Some animal placement may change using the UI scale. For example, some dogs, if they only had hands, would place higher than apes. One could run a complex puzzle like an outdoor obstacle course where we also bury an article of clothing in a field, to see if apes are smarter than dogs. We can also do an experiment to see which do better working in the more complex situation of a team project we set up. Or which is able to adapt a wider range of environments, including human environments. Or which shows more human characteristics such will power against their own inertia, self initiative, loyalty and self sacrifice. We won't do that this since we have a vested interest in making sure experiments allow the apes to win. It would be unsettling to realize human evolved from a second string UI. Maybe less UI was needed so we band together and not be so self reliant.

[fredrik]

I see this from a physical point, but I think we may underestimate what can happen in complex systems in general.

 

I have been very impressed by something as simpled as a living yeast cell. You can not "talk to a cell", but you can observe it, disturb it and see how it reacts, and you can be amazed how it "seems" that there is a reason for everything because there is a logic to the cells responses, that is clearly distinguishable from a random response.

 

I played with the thought of what would I do if I were a yeast cell, and I really don't think I could do any better. So in some sense, I'm not sure if my "specific intelligence" is higher than a yeast cell. Neither do I think there is anything "divine" with intelligence whatsoever.

 

We humans have mapped the genome of cells, mapped alot of the enzymes and the reactions taking place in a cell, and if we are given that description and ask ourselves how the cell should behave in order to survive and reproduce, it seems the cells is doing a great job. It seems the origin of "intelligence" somehow lies in the laws of nature by some intrinsic ability of self-organisation and selection.

 

Surely the human brain is fantastic and impressive, no doubt about that. But somehow, so is the very structure of nature. Not only animals, but also plants and single cellular life, and even smaller physical systems are pretty amazing.

 

/Fredrik

[Realitycheck]

Wolves and all animals in general know how to do a few specific things, feeding themselves, primarily. They can be very good at it. They can be very lucky and eat a lot and become real strong and fast, but they only know how to do that one thing. If they set their mind to something, they could probably figure something else out, like building a dam or a lodge, but when confronted with the problem, how long do you think it would take them to figure out the solution without having this knowledge passed down to them from their parents?

[pioneer]

If you ever raised a kitten, even if we take it away from the mother and siblings at an early age, such as six weeks, and raise with it children and even dogs, it will still develop into a cat, with all the expected instincts and adaptation skills expected from a cat. Through this observation cats appear sort of preprogrammed to be cats without a lot of cat education. They are often self educated with the kitten making up imaginary chase games to practice and evolve hunting skills.

 

One of the mistakes humans make is not realizing how much culture props up humans to make us appear and think we more than we are. What comes to mind is a childhood memory of the loud mouth kid who picks fights, often with bigger kids, because he has a gang to back him up. The victim may not be afraid of the big mouth, but he knows if he fights back and kick's Big Mouth's butt, Moose and Bear will beat the crap out of him even worse that big mouth.

 

If Moose and Bear fall for big mouth's ego-centric prosthesis illusion, they may say, big mouth has demonstrated, in the past, he can routinely beat larger opponents, just like he claims. Therefore he must be as tough as he says he is. Next time, we will tell his potential victim, we will not intercede, since big mouth has proven he is as tough as he says. Once the gang prosthesis is removed, he becomes much smaller than he says.

 

We may say humans are superior to animals. Maybe this blank statement is true for humanity, as an abstraction. Through our association with humanity we take more credit than credit is due. In the unlikely event, culture was disrupted, such as a major asteroid, according to the line, humans are very adaptive and resourceful. But what % will actually be able to function like the ideal? With the prosthesis gone, most will become less adaptive than the dogs.

 

Culture sort of allows us to lease other people's ability and claim it for our own. I can build a new house and get credit for it from my neighbors even though it was the builder and all the workers doing all the work. If I take way this prosthesis, then my true skills at house building will show my real ability. One needs to factor that out when comparing animals to humans since they don't enjoy the same level of prosthesis for the illusion. For example, dogs don't go to school. So we would need to compare dogs to humans with no education. Without that prop ,the gap is not as large, but there is still a significant gap.

 

Addendum

 

I am not dumping on humans. But if we took a human from a fourth world culture, this is us without modern cultural prosthesis. It gets down to the barebones humans, who are not in the position to take credit for what culture makes possible. This inflated illusion, made possible by culture, by making us think we are more than we are, allows culture to evolve. What is not real today can appear in the imagination. Culture allows what is not real today to become real tomorrow. This advances culture so we can be propped up further, and dream even more advanced dreams, which are not yet real, but can become real. In the process this further props everyone up for even more dreams. If we took away culture, then the imagination prop is gone and we become smaller. Without culture, the next generation auto, is stuck in the world of limited dreams, where it remains unreal to most, so very few are able to take credit for it, simply by buying it or learning about it.

 

It would be interesting, as a mental exercise, to take away the cultural prop to see what is the reality of barebones humans. I wouldn't expect this to be taken very well, since it sort of removes the inflationary illusion that makes us appear to be advanced humans.

 

I often wondered about the saying blessed are the poor. From a practical point of view, the poor, by default can not use as much cultural prosthesis. This reduces the illusionary cultural inflation relative to the reality of the human underneath. What is left, having to evolve, is primarily barebones reality. If one had to focus on just human reality, then the barebones human becomes more advanced. This may not appear advanced compared to those with the cultural prosthesis inflation. But it would be interesting to strip the the prosthesis affect to see if there is actually a reality correlation in terms of the advancement of barebones humans under all the fluff. I am not getting religious only that there appears to be valid logic.

[lucaspa]

sometimes i wonder if our perception of animal intelligence in species other than chimps and simliar primates is limited because in general animals lack complex communication and dexterity. both are crucial for displaying intelligence to us human observers,... or could it be that they are intelligent, but we simply can't tell because of the language/dexterity barrier? is there a way that we can measure absolute intelligence in animals? also i was wondering if anyone knows any good books on the subject. thx

 

Very possibly. As you noted, we determine intelligence by 3 criteria:

1. Communication

2. Technology

3. Behavior.

 

Any species that cannot use tools to make technology is at a disadvantage. If we can't communicate with that species (I'm thinking about dolphins and whales which may have language but we haven't deciphered it), then that species is also at a disadvantage as we try to determine the intelligence.

 

And no, there is no absolute scale of intelligence.

[thedarkshade]

And no, there is no absolute scale of intelligence.

There is no absolute anything! But if we compare our levels of development in those three criteria that determine intelligence (according to you), then our level of intelligence is quite absolute compared to the majority of animals. This is not underestimation of any kind!

[Mr Skeptic]

And no, there is no absolute scale of intelligence.

 

I'd just say that we don't have an absolute scale for intelligence, because we don't know what intelligence is. Now, there are several aspects that could be measured or considered to get an intelligence scale:

*computing capability (something like FLOPS)

*generalizability (part of our brain can work on any kind of problem, but eg the vision center is pretty much for vision related things only)

*efficiency (eg, algorithmic efficiency for a simple problem, or comparative ratio of problem solved to computing capability)