Category: Natural Intelligence | Page 4

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
April 20, 2022

Categorized
Ethics, Natural Intelligence}

Claim: Research Shows That Animals Have a Moral Sense

_{We are informed at Nautilus, the Templeton Foundation’s magazine, that “ It’s time to take moral emotion in animals seriously.” Really?} _{Denyse O'Leary
April 20, 2022

4

Ethics, Natural Intelligence}

Philosopher James Hutton starts out his article as a sort of a “trick.” He describes the animals he works with as if they were colleagues. Then, in paragraph four, he announces, “But there are a couple of important details about Amy and Sidney that you should know. The first is that they aren’t workers in any conventional sense, but participants in an experiment.” Coming to the point, they’re dogs. And anyone who had been reading carefully would realize that they were animals, probably dogs or horses. But now here is the supposed big revelation from the University of Vienna experiments Hutton describes: The first big idea is that the moral attitudes of human beings are thoroughly emotional in nature. Of Read More ›

Beautiful autumn tree with mushrooms and moss in forest

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
April 13, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence}

Not Just Plants — Even Fungi Like Mushrooms — Talk To Each Other?

_{They are NOT judging us but they do have complex communications systems interacting with their environment} _{Denyse O'Leary
April 13, 2022

4

Natural Intelligence}

The patterns that fungi like mushrooms use to communicate are said to be “strikingly similar” to those of human speech. But how?: Fungi send electrical signals to one another through hyphae—long, filamentous tendrils that the organisms use to grow and explore. The Guardian reports that previous research shows that the number of electrical impulses traveling through hyphae, sometimes likened to neurons, increases when fungi encounter new sources of food, and that this suggests it’s possible that fungi use this “language” to let each other know about new food sources or injury. Natalia Mesa, “Can Mushrooms “Talk” to Each Other?” at The Scientist (April 6, 2022) The paper is open access. That would make fungi, one of the kingdoms of life, Read More ›

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
April 9, 2022

Categorized
Biology, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Plants (consciousness issue), Plants (memory), Venus Flytrap, Vernalization}

How Plants Talk When We’re Not Around

_{Some aspects of plant behavior can be studied in the same terms as animal or human behavior} _{Denyse O'Leary
April 9, 2022

6

Biology, Natural Intelligence}

One genuine surprise in recent decades has been the discovery that plants have nervous systems like animals and use some of the same compounds in communications — for example, TMAO to relieve stress and glutamate to speed transmission. Biologist Peter Rogers pointed out recently that the similarities may shed a bit of light on issues around anaesthesia. Surprisingly, it is possible to anesthetize a plant. The shameplant (Mimosa pudica) and the Venus flytrap demonstrated that: Thirty years after anesthesia debuted in the operating room, Claude Bernard, a French physiologist, demonstrated that the shameplant (Mimosa pudica), which bashfully folds into itself when touched, was unresponsive to touch after exposure to ether, a commonly used anesthetic. The plant also folds into itself Read More ›

Super macro shot tiny fruit flies on the top of a banana

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post

News
Date
April 7, 2022

Categorized
Medicine and Health, Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience, Philosophy of Mind

Tagged
Fruit flies (brains)}

The Brain Unfolds Like a Drama, With Neurons in Different Roles

_{Researchers studying fruit flies hope that spotting the stages at which human neurons go missing or wrong can help develop treatments to insert or replace them} _{News
April 7, 2022

3

Medicine and Health, Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience, Philosophy of Mind}

We are not accustomed to thinking of fruit flies as even having brains. But they have 120 types of neurons in their visual system alone (which could be why they are so pesky): In the research published in Nature, the researchers studied the brains of the fruit fly Drosophila to uncover the complete set of tTFs needed to generate the roughly 120 neuron types of the medulla, a specific brain structure in the visual system of flies. They used state-of-the-art single-cell mRNA sequencing to obtain the transcriptome — all of the genes expressed in a given cell — of more than 50,000 individual cells that were then grouped into most of the cell types present in the developing medulla… The Read More ›

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
April 5, 2022

Categorized
Ethics, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
David P. Barash, Pain in animals, Sentience (in invertebrates)}

Evolutionary Psychologist Argues That Worms Feel Pain. But How?

_{Wait. Barash’s hypothesis overlooks the fact that suffering is more than an alarm system. An alarm could be going off in an empty building} _{Denyse O'Leary
April 5, 2022

8

Ethics, Natural Intelligence}

A web site for fans of earthworms tackled the question recently: Yes, it is now accepted that worms feel pain – and that includes when they are cut in half. They do not anticipate pain or feel pain as an emotional response, however. They simply move in response to pain as a reflex response. They may curl up or move away, for example, from painful or negative stimuli. Aimen Mirza, “Do worms feel pain? (Can Earthworms Sense Painful Stimuli?)” at WORMMY (October 12, 2021) Possibly in line with the growing support for panpsychism in science, University of Washington evolutionary psychology professor David P. Barash, asks us to consider that worms do indeed feel pain in a deeper sense than an Read More ›

Two stingrays are swimming on the blue sea near the underwater rocks and white sand.

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
April 1, 2022

Categorized
Mathematics, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Rafael Núñez}

Did Researchers Teach Fish To “Do Math”?

_{Some test fish learned how to how to get food pellets but the difficulty, as so often, lies with interpretation} _{Denyse O'Leary
April 1, 2022

4

Mathematics, Natural Intelligence}

University of Bonn researchers think that they may have taught fish to count. They tested the fact that many life forms can note the difference in small quantities between “one more” and “one less,” at least up to five items. Not much work had been done on fish in this area so they decided to test eight freshwater stingrays and eight cichlids: All of the fish were taught to recognize blue as corresponding to “more” and yellow to “less.” The fish or stingrays entered an experimental arena where they saw a test stimulus: a card showing a set of geometric shapes (square, circle, triangle) in either yellow or blue. In a separate compartment of the tank, the fish were then Read More ›

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
March 25, 2022

Categorized
Ethics, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Kristin Andrews}

Researchers Ask—Serious Question — Do Crabs Have Emotions?

_{Recent research has created some unexpected ethical problems for the seafood industry} _{Denyse O'Leary
March 25, 2022

4

Ethics, Natural Intelligence}

At one time, the question of whether crabs or squid had emotions would seem ridiculous. Dogs and cats have emotions but squid and crabs don’t. Right? But in recent decades, it has become evident that there is no straightforward evolutionary path to “smartness.” What about the ability to experience pain or emotion as a dog or cat would? “A London School of Economics (LSE) report commissioned by the U.K. government found there is strong enough evidence to conclude that decapod crustaceans and cephalopod molluscs are sentient,” says York University Professor and philosopher Kristin Andrews, the York Research Chair in Animal Minds, who is working with the LSE team. Andrews co-wrote an article published today in the journal Science, “The question Read More ›

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
March 24, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence}

Are Birds Really Smarter Than Reptiles?

_{Scientists clash over how to measure animal intelligence: brain volume, brain organization, numbers of neurons…?} _{Denyse O'Leary
March 24, 2022

6

Natural Intelligence}

It used to be: Dog vs. cat, Who’s smarter? Now it’s Bird vs. reptile: Who’s smarter? Experts on the fascinating world of animal intelligence are locked in a debate over whether number of neurons or brain volume indicates intelligence (cognitive capacity): In previous work, [Pavel] Němec and colleagues showed that birds have high neuronal densities. “They basically compensate, with these densely packed neurons, [for] the fact that they have relatively small brains in absolute terms, but they have just as many neurons as mammals,” he says. But they didn’t know whether that was true of reptiles as well. In the new study, the researchers found that reptiles have very low neuronal densities, with an average neuron number 20 times lower Read More ›

Extreme magnification - Jumping spider portrait, front view

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
March 11, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience

Tagged
Betsy Mason, Brain size (impact), Bridge spiders, Christa Lesté-Lasserre, Dan Robitzski, Jumping spiders, Portia (jumping spider), Spiders (hunting in groups), Spiders (strategies)}

Spiders Are Smart; Be Glad They Are Small

_{Recent research has shed light on the intriguing strategies that spiders use to deceive other spiders — and prey in general} _{Denyse O'Leary
March 11, 2022

6

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

Spiders, like octopuses, have eight legs. But they share something else as well — like octopuses, once we got around to studying them, they turned out to be much smarter than expected. What makes spiders even more unusual is that they are smart with very small brains: “There is this general idea that probably spiders are too small, that you need some kind of a critical mass of brain tissue to be able to perform complex behaviors,” says arachnologist and evolutionary biologist Dimitar Dimitrov of the University Museum of Bergen in Norway. “But I think spiders are one case where this general idea is challenged. Some small things are actually capable of doing very complex stuff.” Behaviors that can be Read More ›

team of ants gathering strawberry, agriculture teamwork

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post

News
Date
March 2, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Animal Algorithms (book), Ants (algorithmic thinking), Eric Cassell}

Ants Use Algorithms Similar to Those of the Internet

_{Optimization algorithms enable the ant colony to decide how many ants to send to a given food source and when to drastically reduce the number} _{News
March 2, 2022

3

Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence}

Researchers are beginning to understand how ant colonies can make complex decisions. It’s best understood, they say, as something like an optimization algorithm: Scientists found that ants and other natural systems use optimization algorithms similar to those used by engineered systems, including the Internet. These algorithms invest incrementally more resources as long as signs are encouraging but pull back quickly at the first sign of trouble. The systems are designed to be robust, allowing for portions to fail without harming the entire system. Understanding how these algorithms work in the real world may help solve engineering problems, whereas engineered systems may offer clues to understanding the behavior of ants, cells, and other natural systems. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, “Deciphering algorithms Read More ›

cropped shot of robot playing chess on wooden surface

^{Type
post

Eric Holloway
Date
February 28, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
AlphaGo, AlphaZero, Artificial Intelligence, chess, DeepMind, Go (game), Google, Lee Sedol, Natural Intelligence}

Is AlphaZero Actually Superior to the Human Mind?

_{Comparing AI and the human mind is completely apples and oranges} _{Eric Holloway
February 28, 2022

3

Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence}

The Google-backed AI company DeepMind made headlines in March 2016 when its AlphaGo game AI engine was able to defeat Lee Sedol, one of the top Go players in the world. DeepMind followed up this great achievement with the AlphaZero engine in 2017, which made the remarkable achievement of soundly beating AlphaGo in Go as well as one of the world’s best chess engines in chess. The interesting difference between AlphaGo and AlphaZero is that AlphaGo uses databases of top human games for learning, while AlphaZero only learns by playing against itself. Using the same AI engine to dominate two different games, while also discarding reliance on human games suggests that DeepMind has found an algorithm that is intrinsically superior Read More ›

Super macro shot tiny fruit flies on the top of a banana skin

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post

News
Date
February 25, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

Single Neurons Perform Complex Math — Even in Fruit Flies

_{The fly wants something simple — to avoid getting swatted or eaten, for example — but that requires some algebra} _{News
February 25, 2022

4

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

We may not think of our neurons as performing complex calculations but they must do so in order to determine where sound is coming from or where a moving object is headed. For a long while, how they do it has been a mystery. Recently, researchers at the Max Planck Institute reported that they have “discovered the biophysical basis by which a specific type of neuron in fruit flies can multiply two incoming signals,” the “algebra of neurons”: We easily recognize objects and the direction in which they move. The brain calculates this information based on local changes in light intensity detected by our retina. The calculations occur at the level of individual neurons. But what does it mean when Read More ›

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
February 18, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience

Tagged
Animal Algorithms (book)}

When a Tiny Brain Is Actually an Advantage

_{Small size — which includes having a small brain — hones the gnat ogre’s remarkable neurological abilities} _{Denyse O'Leary
February 18, 2022

5

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

The University of Minnesota, pointing to a just-published research paper, asks us to contemplate a remarkable piece of flight engineering on the part of a rather frightening fly: For those of us who occasionally trip over a curb or bump into a door frame, it’s hard to imagine an organism with a brain smaller than the period at the end of this sentence deftly maneuvering around obstacles while chasing fast-moving prey on the wing… The research, carried out by Paloma Gonzalez-Bellido, Mary Sumner, and Trevor Wardill of the University of Minnesota’s College of Biological Sciences, and Sam Fabian of the Imperial College London Department of Bioengineering, focuses on the aerial feats of a miniature robber fly known as a gnat Read More ›

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
February 15, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Andreas Nieder}

The Remarkable Things We’re Learning About Bird Intelligence

_{These findings are only among birds that have actually been studied; most birds have not been studied for intelligence} _{Denyse O'Leary
February 15, 2022

5

Natural Intelligence}

At one time, there was an assumption — not really a theory — that vertebrates would be more intelligent than invertebrates and mammals would be more intelligent than birds. Well along came the octopus, which turns out to be as intelligent as a typical mammal. And the New Zealand crow, which can be as smart as an ape. These life forms have significantly different brains from each other so intelligence does not appear to reside in a specific organization of the brain. While researchers puzzle that out, let’s look at some recent findings as to what the bird (avian) brain can do. We are looking at behaviors that probably require some individual intelligence, not just an inherited program: ● Cockatoos Read More ›

Cute little baby looking into the camera

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post

News
Date
February 8, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience, Philosophy of Mind

Tagged
Autism spectrum disorders (ASD)}

The Mystery of How Newborns Know Things Gets Deeper

_{But learning more about it may help us understand autism spectrum disorders better} _{News
February 8, 2022

8

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience, Philosophy of Mind}

Neuroscientist Giorgio Vallortigara ponders the mystery of how exactly babies quickly recognize things when they are born — like human faces — that they simply cannot have learned. We might call it “imprinting” or “instinct” but that’s just a classification, not an explanation. The author of Born Knowing (MIT Press, 2021) decided to start with chicks. That’s a bit simpler. Psychology students know, of course, that newly hatched chicks seem to know that they should follow their mother and do what she does. But what specific cues enable them to identify their mother? It turns out, according to his and colleagues’ research, that they are looking for specific geometrical patterns: Chicks need to actively explore and learn about their environment Read More ›

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post

News
Date
February 4, 2022

Categorized
Biology, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Casey Luskin, Eric Cassell}

Source of Most Animal Intelligence Still a Mystery

_{Eric Cassell takes questions: If life forms are born or hatched knowing this stuff, it isn’t learned. But if it’s in the genes, where is it?} _{News
February 4, 2022

16

Biology, Natural Intelligence}

Recently, geologist Casey Luskin interviewed Eric Cassell, author of Animal Algorithms: Evolution and the Mysterious Origin of Ingenious Instincts (2021) on one of the central mysteries of biology: How do animals “know” things that they can’t have figured out on their own? This is the third and final part. Here’s the first part, with transcript and notes and here’s the second. Below is the third part, the audience questions, with notes and partial transcript: Eric Cassell is an expert in navigation systems, including GPS whose experience includes more than four decades of experience in systems engineering related to aircraft, navigation and safety. He has long had an interest in animal navigation. His model for animal navigation is the natural algorithm: Read More ›

^{Type
post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
February 3, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience

Tagged
Anthropomorphism (and bees), Brain stem (and mind), Catherine WIlson, Hive mind (and intelligence), Lars Chittka}

Can Insects Be Conscious? Let’s Look At Bees First

_{Consciousness does not seem to reside in the neocortex so complex behavior in bees has raised the question for biologists and philosophers alike} _{Denyse O'Leary
February 3, 2022

7

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

Honeybee scientist Andrew Barron and philosopher Colin Klein, both then at Macquarie University in Australia, argue that bees have some form of consciousness. Let’s look at what they have to say: According to an article in Smithsonian Magazine, Barron broached the question of bee consciousness with Klein, who was highly skeptical at first. But Barron pointed out that at least one key theory holds that …the core of human consciousness is not our impressive neocortex, but our much more primitive midbrain. This simple structure synthesizes sensory data into a unified, egocentric point of view that lets us navigate our world. Insects, Barron and Klein now argue, have midbrain-like structures, including a “central complex,” that seem to allow bugs to similarly Read More ›

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post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
February 2, 2022

Categorized
Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience

Tagged
Deborah M. Gordon}

How Do Insects Use Their Very Small Brains To Think Clearly?

_{How do they engage in complex behaviour with only 100.000 to a million neurons?} _{Denyse O'Leary
February 2, 2022

6

Natural Intelligence, Neuroscience}

If we had a skeleton that was outside, not inside, our body — and six legs — we might find it easier to understand how insects think. But only a bit easier. Despite complex behavior, insects are working with 100,000 to maybe a million neurons, compared to our, maybe, 86 billion — but insects make the most of what they have. Consider, for example, the dragonfly. How does it manage to deal with all the issues that a fighter pilot must address, while catching prey? One adaptation is specialized neurons: Dragonflies (order Odonata) and hoverflies (order Diptera) are among insect flyers equipped with special neurons for targeting with optic flow. “The ability of insects to successfully pursue targets in clutter Read More ›

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post

News
Date
January 31, 2022

Categorized
Information Theory, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Casey Luskin, Epigenetics, Eric Cassell, William Dembski}

Can Animal Behavior Simply Be Transferred Into the Genome?

_{For example, how do Monarch butterflies from Canada get to the same trees in Mexico as their great-grandparents landed in?} _{News
January 31, 2022

13

Information Theory, Natural Intelligence}

Recently, geologist Casey Luskin interviewed Eric Cassell, author of Animal Algorithms: Evolution and the Mysterious Origin of Ingenious Instincts (2021) on one of the central mysteries of biology: How do animals “know” things that they can’t have figured out on their own? Here’s the first part, with transcript and notes. Below is the second part, which looks at some “how” questions. Eric Cassell is an expert in navigation systems, including GPS whose experience includes more than four decades of experience in systems engineering related to aircraft, navigation and safety. He has long had an interest in animal navigation. His model for animal navigation is the natural algorithm: The animal’s brain is “programmed” to enable navigation. Here’s Part II of our Read More ›

Common octopus in large sea water aquarium

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post

News
Date
January 29, 2022

Categorized
Biology, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Octopus (intelligence)}

Science Paper: Could Octopuses Be Aliens From Outer Space?

_{It’s the octopus’s intelligence that causes such usual theses to float in the science literature} _{News
January 29, 2022

7

Biology, Natural Intelligence}

A 2018 science paper that suggests that the brainy cephalopod might have originated off the planet has been receiving new attention. The basic thesis is that the Cambrian Explosion, which produced most of the basic animal life forms we see today, was the outcome of extraterrestrial viruses carried on a meteor that crashed onto Earth 540 million years ago. The underlying theory is panspermia, a hypothesis espoused by Francis Crick, that some viruses and bacteria travel on the tails of comets or meteors and may take root on planets: These comets could have introduced Earth to novel life-forms that evolved on other planets, including viruses, durable microorganisms like unearthly tardigrades or, as the new study suggests, even fertilized animal eggs Read More ›