Category: Natural Intelligence | Page 2

Opabinia in Cambrian Seas - Three Opabinia regalis animals hunt for prey on a reef of Cambrian Seas in the Paleozoic Era.

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News
Date
December 5, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience

Tagged
Cambrian Explosion}

Earliest Brain Found — From Over Half a Billion Years Ago

_{No one was expecting the Cardiodictyon fossil to have a brain} _{News
December 5, 2022

3

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

A surprising find for evolutionary neuroscientists is that a tiny life form that lived more than half a billion years ago had a brain. Creatures like Cardiodictyon were not supposed to have had brains: A study published in Science—led by Nicholas Strausfeld, a Regents Professor in the University of Arizona Department of Neuroscience, and Frank Hirth, a reader of evolutionary neuroscience at King’s College London—provides the first detailed description of Cardiodictyon catenulum, a wormlike animal preserved in rocks in China’s southern Yunnan province. Measuring barely half an inch (less than 1.5 centimeters) long and initially discovered in 1984, the fossil had hidden a crucial secret until now: a delicately preserved nervous system, including a brain. University of Arizona, “525-million-year-old fossil Read More ›

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News
Date
November 28, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Chimpanzees}

What Motivates Chimpanzee Experts Anyway?

_{Is it the welfare of primates or is it “politics by other means”?} _{News
November 28, 2022

4

Natural Intelligence}

A review by animal historian Brigid Prial of a recent book in which chimpanzee experts reflect on their work tells us a good deal about the chimpanzee expert world. The reviewer is also the author of “Primatology is Politics by Other Means” from which we learn: “Adam and Eve, Robinson Crusoe and Man Friday, Tarzan and Jane: these are the figures who tell white western people about the origins and foundations of sociality. The stories make claims about “human” nature, “human” society. Western stories take the high ground from which man — impregnable, potent, and endowed with a keen vision of the whole — can survey the field. The sightings generate the aesthetic-political dialectic of contemplation/exploitation, the distorting mirror twins Read More ›

Summer meadow blow balls landscape painting

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post

Casey Luskin
Date
November 14, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind

Tagged
Blake Lemoine and sentient computers, COSM, Featured, Maria Teresa Cometto}

Could AI ever pass the Van Gogh test?

_{Van Gogh was crazy but he was talented and AI can be neither} _{Casey Luskin
November 14, 2022

6

Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind}

The Van Gogh Test for sheer creativity? Thursday night at COSM presented a live, in-person interview with Federico Faggin, the Italian physicist and computer engineer who co-won the prestigious Kyoto prize in 1997 for helping develop the Intel 4004 chip. Faggin was interviewed by technology reporter Maria Teresa Cometto, who asked him to regale the audience with tales about helping to design early microchips. Eventually Faggin recounted a time when he was “studying neuroscience and biology, trying to understand how the brain works,” and came upon a startling realization: And at one point I asked myself, “But wait a second, I mean these books, all this talk about electrical signals, biochemical signals, but when I taste some chocolate, I mean Read More ›

A jay in its beak holds an acorn. A colorful Eurasian jay sits on a thick oak branch. Close-up. Autumn. Natural blurred background. Wild nature.

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
November 4, 2022

Categorized
Ethics, Natural Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind}

Researchers: More Intelligent Jays Show More Self-Control

_{The researchers say that the same relationship holds true for cuttlefish, chimpanzees, and humans} _{Denyse O'Leary
November 4, 2022

6

Ethics, Natural Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind}

A recent study finds that Eurasian jays can pass a version of the “Marshmallow test” and that the smarter jays had the greatest self-control. The original Marshmallow test tested children to see if they could resist eating one marshmallow if they were offered two later. So enterprising researchers decided to try it on smart birds: To test the self-control of ten Eurasian jays, Garrulus glandarius, researchers designed an experiment inspired by the 1972 Stanford Marshmallow test — in which children were offered a choice between one marshmallow immediately, or two if they waited for a period of time. Instead of marshmallows, the jays were presented with mealworms, bread and cheese. Mealworms are a common favourite; bread and cheese come second Read More ›

stately Bengal Male Cat with beautiful spots Standing and Looking up on Isolated Black Background, Front view, Gorgerous breed

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
October 28, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Carly Cassella, Cats}

Researchers: Cats Do Recognize and Respond To Our Voices

_{If you are a cat’s human friend, he cares when you talk to him. Whether he will, or even can, do what you want is a separate question} _{Denyse O'Leary
October 28, 2022

8

Natural Intelligence}

Do cats care whether we talk to them or not? In a recent study, animal cognition experts found that cats may change their behavior when their “humans” are talking in a tone directed to them. But they don’t react the same way to a stranger who is talking that way or when the voice is directed elsewhere. Charlotte de Mouzon and colleagues from Université Paris Nanterre (Nanterre, France) investigated the way 16 cats reacted to “pre-recorded voices from both their owner and that of a stranger when saying phrases in cat-directed and human adult-directed tones.” With adult-directed tones, no “endearing” kitty talk is used. It might not be clear who the intended recipient of the message is, apart from what Read More ›

Funny boy and his dog looking at piles of coins

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News
Date
October 14, 2022

Categorized
Mathematics, Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience

Tagged
Brian Butterworth}

Researchers Are Zeroing In on Animal Number Sense

_{We’re beginning to find out more about how animals that don’t really “think” much can keep track of numbers, when needed} _{News
October 14, 2022

4

Mathematics, Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

University College cognitive psychology prof Brian Butterworth, author of Can fish count? (Basic Books, 2022), talks about animal number sense in a recent article in Psyche: He offers many examples of animals counting single digit numbers but then helpfully addresses the question of how they do it. We are talking here about a variety of very different types of neurological equipment — insects vs. amphibians, for example. Neuroscientists are beginning to pinpoint specific brain functions associated with counting for specific tasks: Female túngara frogs benefit by mating with the male that can produce six croaks in one breath, over the male that can manage only five, because this is an indicator of respiratory fitness. Naturally, the male will try to Read More ›

Microtubule, 3D illustration. A polymer composed of a protein tubulin, it is a component of cytoskeleton involved in intracellular transport, cellular mobility and nuclear division

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News
Date
October 14, 2022

Categorized
Biology, Natural Intelligence}

One-Celled Life Form Uses Early “Computer” To Stand In For Brain

_{Researchers found that that’s how Euplotes eurystomus controls “legs” in a sort of walking pattern} _{News
October 14, 2022

4

Biology, Natural Intelligence}

One unexpected thing that the computer has done is given us some insight into how life forms that are utterly different from ourselves manage to do things. For example, there is an analogy between the way ants think and computer programming. That helps us understand how an anthill can be organized in a very complex way without any individual ant ever seeing the big picture — or needing to. In the same way, a single-celled organism uses an “internal ‘computer’” to walk without needing a brain: Most animals require brains to run, jump or hop. The single-celled protozoan Euplotes eurystomus, however, achieves a scurrying walk using a simple, mechanical computer to coordinate its microscopic legs, UC San Francisco researchers reported Read More ›

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
October 7, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence}

The Remarkable Deceitfulness of Birds — But Is It Really Deceit?

_{The birds themselves are not agents making a moral choice to deceive; they are carrying out a behavior pattern they have inherited} _{Denyse O'Leary
October 7, 2022

4

Natural Intelligence}

When Clinton Francis, a specialist in bird behavior, challenged student Wren Thompson to find out how many types of birds use deceit in their defences against predators of their nests, he hardly expected to find that the number she was able to discover was 285: Mapping those behaviors onto the avian phylogenetic tree revealed that the trait spans from some of the most basal bird families, including pheasants and ducks, to more recently evolved taxa such as songbirds. “It’s pretty amazing,” Francis says, adding that he was surprised how “particular clades on the avian tree of life really just light up,” including blackbirds, warblers, and sparrows. The frequent and disjointed appearance of the behavior across the tree suggests it evolved Read More ›

Galapagos Giant Tortoise head shot smiling walking slowly on Galapagos Islands. Animals, nature and wildlife close up of tortoise in the highlands of Galapagos, Ecuador, South America.

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
October 6, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

How Can the Two-Headed Tortoise Have Different Personalities?

_{Many would be surprised to learn that either head had any personality, and yet…} _{Denyse O'Leary
October 6, 2022

4

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

Recently, a “two-headed” tortoise at the Geneva Museum of Natural History reached the remarkable age of 25, thanks to constant care by his handlers: Janus also has two hearts, two pairs of lungs, and two distinct personalities. Sometimes the heads wish to go in different directions. “The right head is more curious, more awake, it has a much stronger personality,” Angelica Bourgoin, who leads the turtle’s care team, said. “The left head is more passive and loves to eat.” News, “Two-headed tortoise Janus celebrates 25th birthday” at DW (September 3, 2022) So how could the tortoise heads have two different “personalities?” Janus — despite the single name given — seems to be a set of conjoined tortoise twins. (Here’s a Read More ›

EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND Bobby a Skye Terrier monument

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News
Date
September 9, 2022

Categorized
Archeology, Arts & Culture, Natural Intelligence}

Can Myths About Dogs Give Us a Clue re Their Origins?

_{A French historian studies the relationship between ancient stories told about dogs and information from genetics and archeology} _{News
September 9, 2022

7

Archeology, Arts & Culture, Natural Intelligence}

Just how and when dogs originated has been the subject of much research. In one account, “Dogs originated from wolves domesticated in Europe, 19,000-32,000 years ago,” based on DNA studies (2013). But other research points to many other possibilities: “Central Asia, the Middle East, South Asia or Southeast Asia” some time between 10,000 and 38,000 years ago. Some think they were tamed twice. Historian Julien d’Huy of the College of France in Paris suggests another approach, looking at stories about dogs: “With mythology, we can have explanations of archaeology, we can have reasons for domestication, we can test hypotheses,” he says. D’Huy found three core storylines for the earliest myths related to dogs: The first links dogs with the afterlife, Read More ›

The little chimpanzee monkey put his human friend's hand on his head, hugged him. made a grimace. Sits in a green stroller, wearing blue shorts. Walk down the street. in the background palms,

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News
Date
August 31, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience, Philosophy of Mind}

Researchers Find More Ways That Human and Ape Brains Differ

_{Underlying the significant differences in brain — to say nothing of the vast difference in mind — is a genetic mystery…} _{News
August 31, 2022

4

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience, Philosophy of Mind}

Yale University researchers have identified more specific ways the human brain differs from the brains of all other primates. Using “hundreds of thousands of cells collected from the dlPFC of adult humans, chimpanzees, macaque, and marmoset monkeys,” they found After grouping cells with similar expression profiles they revealed 109 shared primate cell types but also five that were not common to all species. These included a type of microglia, or brain-specific immune cell, that was present only in humans and a second type shared by only humans and chimpanzees. The human-specific microglia type exists throughout development and adulthood, the researchers found, suggesting the cells play a role in maintenance of the brain upkeep rather than combatting disease… An analysis of Read More ›

Woman in bedroom terrified by big spider crawling over her bed

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
August 31, 2022

Categorized
Ethics, Human exceptionalism, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
David M. Peña-Guzmán, When Animals Dream (book)}

Should Spider Dreaming Really Give Us “Ethical Pause”?

_{The incidental discovery of REM sleep in spiders is morphing into vast claims that we have “urgent and inexorable ethical obligations” to them and other life forms} _{Denyse O'Leary
August 31, 2022

4

Ethics, Human exceptionalism, Natural Intelligence}

Anyone familiar with the current “animal consciousness” scene might have seen this one coming. At The Scientist, we learned earlier this month that animals dream, according to researcher David M. Peña-Guzmán. Recently, it was spiders that were found to dream. Therefore, it is now implied, human and animal consciousness do not differ very much: In When Animals Dream, I argue that the mere fact that animals dream poses a formidable challenge to that bastion of traditionalism that is the human-animal divide, raising provocative ethical questions about the status of animals as moral subjects toward whom we have urgent and inexorable ethical obligations. This fact also frustrates the common view that only humans are “cognitively free” because only we can liberate Read More ›

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
August 23, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Relationships

Tagged
Dogs}

Study: Dogs Cry for Joy as Well as Pain

_{Recent research has focused on how dogs respond to the world they share with us} _{Denyse O'Leary
August 23, 2022

3

Natural Intelligence, Relationships}

A recent study looked at dogs reuniting with their human friends: When a person is overcome with emotion, their feelings stream down their cheeks. Even positive emotions can turn on the waterworks, as people bawl when they win awards, express love for their partners, or are reunited with a long-lost friend. But these feelings-driven tears may not be a wholly human experience. Dogs can also cry happy tears, according to a study published today (August 22) in Current Biology. Although the animals’ eyes don’t overflow, they well up when they’re reunited with their owners after spending even just hours apart, the researchers found. And they have hunch as to why: a sudden increase in oxytocin, the so-called love hormone, named Read More ›

A brazilian wandering spider (Phoneutria sp.) waits in ambush on a leaf at night in Costa Rica.

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
August 19, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience

Tagged
Featured, Günter Bechly, Michael Egnor, Spiders and dreaming, When Animals Dream (book)}

Can Life Forms Like Spiders, That Lack a Neocortex, Really Dream?

_{Paleontologist Günter Bechly argues that it’s highly unlikely. Michael Egnor sides with Aristotle; they dream about what they can perceive} _{Denyse O'Leary
August 19, 2022

5

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

Recently, paleontologist Günter Bechly took issue with neurosurgeon Michael Egnor on the question of whether spiders dream. Egnor was willing to accept the possibility, noting that spiders can dream only about things they can think about: “If spiders and bacteria dream, they dream of flies or chemical gradients, but not of philosophy.” Bechly, on the other hand, thinks it’s a filament too far for the spider (never mind the bacteria) to dream at all: … I tend to concur with those neuroscientists who doubt any organisms possess phenomenal consciousness that lack a neocortex (found only in mammals) or a comparable structure (in birds and maybe cephalopods). Rapid eye movement may indicate neural activity, but the concept of dreaming for me Read More ›

coconut octopus underwater macro portrait on sand

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
August 18, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Evolution of intelligence}

Octopuses Create an “Origin of Intelligence” Conundrum

_{Outstandingly bright — with eyes that strikingly resemble ours — yet their ancestors split from mammals and birds 600 million years ago…} _{Denyse O'Leary
August 18, 2022

5

Natural Intelligence}

In a recent book excerpt at Nautilus, James Bridle, author of Ways of Being: Beyond Human Intelligence (2022), reflects on the fact that “Octopus brains are nothing like ours—yet we have much in common.” Like many authors, he reflects on the cephalopod’s extraordinary intelligence, for example, Otto, an octopus living in the Sea-Star Aquarium in Coburg, Germany, first attracted media attention when he was caught juggling hermit crabs. Another time he smashed rocks against the side of his tank, and from time to time would completely rearrange the contents of his tank “to make it suit his own taste better,” according to the aquarium’s director. One time, the electricity in the aquarium kept shorting out, which threatened the lives of Read More ›

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
August 16, 2022

Categorized
Ethics, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Michael Egnor}

Animal Mind — Can You Clone Your Beloved Pet’s Personality?

_{People who can charge a great deal for cloning insist that the personality is not cloned… so why do it?} _{Denyse O'Leary
August 16, 2022

5

Ethics, Natural Intelligence}

Michael Egnor has noted that the famous philosopher René Descartes (1596–1650) thought that animals were biological machines that did not have minds at all. Many arguments can be mustered against that view but the recent development of animal cloning may prove a new one. Barbra Streisand brought attention to the business of cloning deceased pets when she had her dog Samantha cloned in 2018 (though the process had been available for more than a decade). The cost? US$35,000 for a cat, $50,000 for a dog, and $85,000 for a horse. That’s hardly spare change yet, we are told, some less well-heeled folk will put off a new car or down payment to bring back a deceased companion: Kelly Anderson never Read More ›

Spanish jumping spider Saitis barbipes with fruit fly

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Michael Egnor
Date
August 11, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind

Tagged
Featured, Franz Brentano and intentionality, Intentionality (as trait of consciousness)}

Yes, Spiders Dream — But That Doesn’t Make Them Leggy People

_{We don’t know where on the tree of life “mind,” in the most basic sense, begins. It might include bacteria but not viruses} _{Michael Egnor
August 11, 2022

10

Natural Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind}

A recent research article from Germany, which has made quite a splash in the popular press, raises some very interesting questions about animal minds. Animal behaviorist Daniela C. Rößler and co-authors studied 34 young spiders while they slept and found that their eye movements seemed analogous to the eye movements of human beings and other higher animals that occur during REM sleep and are associated with dreaming. They pointed out that this seems to suggest that arachnids may have mental states and dreams that are more akin to those of human beings then previously thought. The article, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is open access. The research is fascinating in its own right but I Read More ›

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
August 11, 2022

Categorized
Human exceptionalism, Natural Intelligence, Panpsychism, Philosophy of Mind

Tagged
Animal Algorithms (book), Anthropomorphism (and bees), Catherine WIlson, Eric Cassell, Lars Chittka}

What Does It Mean To Say Bees “Feel and Think”?

_{The New Scientist reviewer is unsure that we are ready for such a radical message. Unsure? At one time, it would have been branded “NOT science!”} _{Denyse O'Leary
August 11, 2022

5

Human exceptionalism, Natural Intelligence, Panpsychism, Philosophy of Mind}

Behavioral ecologist Lars Chittka’s book, The Mind of a Bee (Princeton University Press, 2022), is a fascinating detailed description of bee behavior that will cure us of believing that the insect world is devoid of intelligence or sensation. Indeed, in a 2018 essay with Catherine Wilson, Chittka offers many research findings in a shorter format. It’s only in Chapter 11, toward the book’s end, that he makes a controversial claim: From the very start, early in evolution, nervous systems were inseparable from movable bodies with sensors, and developed in order to integrate perception and action. The challenges of survival and self-replication (reproduction) that a moving organism faces are most efficiently met when brain and body are intimately connected, enabling the Read More ›

Macro of a bumblebee collecting nectar on flower

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Denyse O'Leary
Date
August 5, 2022

Categorized
Ethics, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Bee sentience, Eric Cassell, Insect sentience}

Bees Feel Pain. And Therefore… Insect Rights?

_{As we learn more from research about how various life forms respond to experiences, a more complex picture may raise political issues} _{Denyse O'Leary
August 5, 2022

5

Ethics, Natural Intelligence}

From an online newsletter from Vox writer Kenny Torrella, we learn of a research study confirming that bumblebees feel pain: In a study published last week in the journal PNAS, researchers in the United Kingdom found that bees make trade-offs about how much pain they’re willing to tolerate in order to get better food. The finding suggests bees aren’t just mindless automata responding to stimuli but rather conscious, feeling creatures that can experience pain and engage in complex decision-making. Kenny Torrella, “Can a bee feel,” Vox (August 5, 2022) The paper is open access. Essentially, the researchers offered bumblebees sugar water in color-cued unheated containers, at solutions of 10%, 20%, 30%, or 40%. Then they introduced a catch: They heated Read More ›

Senior woman with dog on a walk in an autumn nature.

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
August 3, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence}

Can Old Dogs Learn New Tricks? Scientists Aim To Find Out

_{Not much is known for sure about how dogs age. The Dog Aging Project aims to change that through systematic research programs} _{Denyse O'Leary
August 3, 2022

5

Natural Intelligence}

Founded in 2014, the Dog Aging Project has enrolled 40,000 pet dogs in an effort to understand, among other things, when dogs’ mental functioning reaches its peak and how it declines with age. Researchers at the University of Washington and Texas A&M are tackling the question via veterinary records, DNA samples, health questionnaires and cognitive tests on the dogs. Better understanding and care for aged pets is a key goal, of course: “There’s a lot we just don’t know about how dog cognition changes with age,” says comparative psychologist Evan MacLean, director of the Arizona Canine Cognition Center at the University of Arizona in Tucson and a collaborator on the Dog Aging Project. What is normal cognitive aging? Do early Read More ›