
The Smart Set: On Animal Intelligence - Hooke
http://inference-review.com/article/the-smart-set
======
ggm
Intelligence begins to feel like the set of things which no matter how hard
you try, you can't entirely pin down which are core, which are ephemeral, and
which have to come together in the absence of direct communication.

Say (hah) what you like about different cultures, we appear to be able to
perform remarkably consistent reasoned, abstract interchanges with people we
can't actually speak to, purely with stick-figure diagrams and hand-miming.
Including communicating the idea "thats a lion, this is a parrot" to somebody
who might not have actually seen either but has seen the lion king as a video,
and watches youtube.

I totally get that animals are now understood to have introspection,
abstraction, abnegation, pride, lust, envy, altruism, you name it, we can show
in crude form how animals have it. But, in the end, we completely fail and
explaining why a subscription to the new york times is better than only
reading four free articles a month. No grey parrot, dolphin or very smart dog
appears able to grasp what we're saying.

I love animals, and I feel empathetically connected with animals and as a
meat-eater, I have some qualms about my a-moral stance eating obviously highly
intelligent animals like pigs. But, and it is a crucial _but_ , there is a
really narrow band of communication they seem willing to engage with me in,
which appears focussed on very direct basic drives of food and reward. they
aren't really into higher abstract reasoning that centers on communication.
Maybe they have a rich interior dialogue of abstact thought? Could we know? is
an fMRI able to say that its not just dreaming, its having intelligent dreams?

I think they don't actually _want_ to display intelligence to me. I think. I
probably believe they can't but I really doubt they even want to. Maybe
they're smarter than they look?

~~~
protonfish
When I hear people talking about how things are "mysterious" I assume that the
actual answers are not difficult, but what they imply conflicts with what we
want to believe to be true. In this instance, we want to think that we are
separate from animals and that they are stupid objects. It helps us get
through our days without too much guilt and remorse regarding how they are
treated in our society.

But the facts seem to be simple and clear: animals are highly intelligent and
closely related to us. They are our brothers and sisters.

I am not saying, "go vegan". I think our priority should first be improving
how we treat other humans. There is a lot of opportunity for improvement there
before we direct our energies to other animals.

~~~
pessimizer
> When I hear people talking about how things are "mysterious" I assume that
> the actual answers are not difficult, but what they imply conflicts with
> what we want to believe to be true.

So true. When someone says that there are no answers, there's usually an
obvious answer which makes the speaker's continuing lifestyle untenable or
their professed values hypocritical.

Closely related to "no one could see it coming" when people saw it coming.

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petermcneeley
Another good source for intelligence experimentation on primates.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mentality_of_Apes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mentality_of_Apes)

