24 February 2014

Videos of the day -- bird brains





These displays of bird intelligence are especially striking given that almost all the animals we know to be highly intelligent (elephants, dolphins, the great apes including humans) are mammals.  High intelligence may be more widely distributed in the animal world than we believe.  Maybe we should take a closer look at other species which at least show evidence of complex behavior.

posted by Infidel753 at 4:59 AM

4 Comments:

Blogger Green Eagle said...

Certain species of parrots are the smartest animals, apart from humans. An African Grey parrot can have the intelligence of a 3-5 year old child, more than porpoises or chimpanzees.

26 February, 2014 16:28  
Blogger Infidel753 said...

Green: I find it hard to believe they're more intelligent than chimpanzees. Do you have a link to any of the research that supports that?

26 February, 2014 22:55  
Anonymous Blurber said...

It's going to be hard to prove that a bird is more intelligent than a chimp, or vice versa, because first we'd have to define intelligence. This hasn't even been done satisfactorily yet with humans, the most studied species.

03 March, 2014 15:32  
Blogger Infidel753 said...

Blurber: True -- and of course intelligence probably works rather differently in different species, anyway, since their brains evolved under different conditions to handle different kinds of problems.

03 March, 2014 16:02  

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