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There are all kinds of intelligence. What is unique about human intelligence, which has been known since Aristotle, is our ability to recognize abstractions and

by cicero 7y ago

There are all kinds of intelligence. What is unique about human intelligence, which has been known since Aristotle, is our ability to recognize abstractions and make generalizations, which then leads to human language. Various plants and animals might react to red things, but we can abstract red as a color, thinking and talking about it as separate from the things that are red.

mnem 7y ago
The difficulty with that reasoning is that you can say that you can abstract red, but you can't definitely state that I can abstract red any more than other animals may. Interestingly, we're starting to find evidence for grammatical rules in other animal languages: https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20615-first-evidence-that-birds-tweet-using-grammar/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20615-first-evidence-...
jbotz 7y ago
What you say has been "known since Aristotle" appears to be wrong. There is really no evidence that this ability, or any cognitive ability, is "unique to humans". Yes, humans have more of this ability to "recognize abstractions and make generalizations" than pretty much any other species on this planet, but it is not unique to humans. In the contrary, there is lots of evidence that generalization and some amount of abstraction are fundamental to all forms of problem-solving (and "all life is problem-solving") and that the fundamental neural mechanisms that lead to these capacities are no different in quality between different species, just in quantity. This is being demonstrated in objective research again and again... there is no cognitive capacity we humans have that you can point to and say "this is totally different, no other animal has anything like this." Yes, your linguist abilities are orders of magnitude more sophisticated than those of most other animals, but even there it is only a matter of degree, not of a fundamental kind. For a very good treatment of this subject by a highly respected primatologist, see Frans de Waal's recent books. But he isn't alone... until fairly recently it was taboo to say that animals are "intelligent" or "conscious" or "sentient", but this is thankfully beginning to change, and among the current generation of biologists, ethologists and animal cognitive psychologists many consider the notion that animals aren't sentient to be outmoded, or as Frans de Waal puts it, "anthropodenial". But there is one thing that makes us truly different from all other animals and it's only indirectly related to cognition: for better or for worse we are the only animal that uses and controls fire. It's fire that really defines humans, not our big brains (and fire probably came first; cooking made our calorically expensive large brains possible). And it is fire that may be the end of us, as well.
- MayeulC 7y ago
  > for better or for worse we are the only animal that uses and controls fire Just to nitpick on that one, some wild animals seem to use fire to their advantage, such as birds of prey spreading wildfires. Some others were trained to be able to cook food, and light fire with tools. That said, to my knowledge, none are able to start fire with tools they crafted (I am not really either, to be fair). So this might be true for now, but I do not take it as a given. I like your last paragraph, though, especially the ending. Nicely put :)
soperj 7y ago
The hilarious part of your example is that the Greeks didn't have words for colours, so couldn't actually talk about it as separate from things that are red.

by cicero 7y ago

mnem 7y ago

The difficulty with that reasoning is that you can say that you can abstract red, but you can't definitely state that I can abstract red any more than other animals may. Interestingly, we're starting to find evidence for grammatical rules in other animal languages: https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20615-first-evidence-that-birds-tweet-using-grammar/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20615-first-evidence-...

jbotz 7y ago

What you say has been "known since Aristotle" appears to be wrong. There is really no evidence that this ability, or any cognitive ability, is "unique to humans". Yes, humans have more of this ability to "recognize abstractions and make generalizations" than pretty much any other species on this planet, but it is not unique to humans. In the contrary, there is lots of evidence that generalization and some amount of abstraction are fundamental to all forms of problem-solving (and "all life is problem-solving") and that the fundamental neural mechanisms that lead to these capacities are no different in quality between different species, just in quantity. This is being demonstrated in objective research again and again... there is no cognitive capacity we humans have that you can point to and say "this is totally different, no other animal has anything like this." Yes, your linguist abilities are orders of magnitude more sophisticated than those of most other animals, but even there it is only a matter of degree, not of a fundamental kind. For a very good treatment of this subject by a highly respected primatologist, see Frans de Waal's recent books. But he isn't alone... until fairly recently it was taboo to say that animals are "intelligent" or "conscious" or "sentient", but this is thankfully beginning to change, and among the current generation of biologists, ethologists and animal cognitive psychologists many consider the notion that animals aren't sentient to be outmoded, or as Frans de Waal puts it, "anthropodenial". But there is one thing that makes us truly different from all other animals and it's only indirectly related to cognition: for better or for worse we are the only animal that uses and controls fire. It's fire that really defines humans, not our big brains (and fire probably came first; cooking made our calorically expensive large brains possible). And it is fire that may be the end of us, as well.

MayeulC 7y ago
> for better or for worse we are the only animal that uses and controls fire Just to nitpick on that one, some wild animals seem to use fire to their advantage, such as birds of prey spreading wildfires. Some others were trained to be able to cook food, and light fire with tools. That said, to my knowledge, none are able to start fire with tools they crafted (I am not really either, to be fair). So this might be true for now, but I do not take it as a given. I like your last paragraph, though, especially the ending. Nicely put :)

soperj 7y ago

The hilarious part of your example is that the Greeks didn't have words for colours, so couldn't actually talk about it as separate from things that are red.