RE: The Intelligence of Crows
November 6, 2010 at 3:06 pm
(This post was last modified: November 6, 2010 at 3:10 pm by Anomalocaris.)
Actually, being trainable to flexibly perform complex tasks is strong evidence of versatile intelligence. Chimps, dolphins, and other big brained mammals are highly trainable.
However, Doing complex tasks without training is ambiguous evidence that leans the other way. When a creature can do apparently complex tasks without training, it is more likely the creature was hardwired to excel at a narrow range of tasks including this one, and much less likely the creature's adoptive intelligence is so superior it reasoned out how to do it by itself.
To be sure, in cases where human infant ihas been raised without any training at all, they generally are unable to do some of the tricks these crows do. This suggests the crows are hardwired, unless you propose crows are natively smarter then you are, and lack only the training to trounce you in intelligence test.
However, Doing complex tasks without training is ambiguous evidence that leans the other way. When a creature can do apparently complex tasks without training, it is more likely the creature was hardwired to excel at a narrow range of tasks including this one, and much less likely the creature's adoptive intelligence is so superior it reasoned out how to do it by itself.
To be sure, in cases where human infant ihas been raised without any training at all, they generally are unable to do some of the tricks these crows do. This suggests the crows are hardwired, unless you propose crows are natively smarter then you are, and lack only the training to trounce you in intelligence test.
