5 ms·

Our very definition of intelligence is part of the issue. There's no question that animals exceed our knowledge in specific domains, a bird who can fly must be

Our very definition of intelligence is part of the issue. There's no question that animals exceed our knowledge in specific domains, a bird who can fly must be vastly more knowledgeable about variable wind conditions than we are. There's a great scene in Lev Grossman's The Magicians where they speak to a talking bear, but all the bear wants to talk about is caves, and area in which his knowledge is so complete that the humans cannot really even talk to him. But our definition of intelligence is narrowed to domains which we live in. That tends to be a wider than most animals, but it's hardly complete.

vixen99 4y ago
As with spiders' k. domains it seems. More limited than I thought. My garden orb weaver found a dried leaf as large as herself in her huge web and proceeded to truss it up as nicely as she could before belatedly realizing that the operation was not going to be to her advantage.
celrod 4y ago
Reminds of the Geifer grizzly. It raided human dwellings for food, signing its death warrant. It wore a radio collar, so it seems like it shouldn't have been a problem to track down. Yet, it evaded hunters for over a year, while still raiding houses for food, without ever being seen. It learned it could cross into Canada for safety when the pressure from the hunters tracking it got to be too much, and then return and invade more houses. Eventually, it was shot and killed by a random hunter in Canada who had no idea who that bear was. The bear didn't know Canadians could also be dangerous, otherwise it probably wouldn't have let anyone see it there either... I think a lot of animals are probably very good at what they've evolved to do. Bears are great at tracking and surviving being tracked (probably more typically by bigger bears); reading about it felt like getting a glimpse into another animal's domain and being totally outmatched.
- elevaet 4y ago
  Thats a great story!
- mmsimanga 4y ago
  We have baboons and they are smart. They can open all sorts of doors. They ignore you if you are a woman or don't have anything in your hand that could cause them harm. They know how to bluff an attack making you throw away food that is in your hands. The stand upright make scary noises and charge at you. Quite frightening and most just throw whatever it is in your hands away. So yes animals can be smart.
tialaramex 4y ago
In Lem's "Golem XIV" Golem (a machine built to help plan World War III) explains to the humans that its intelligence isn't just greater than theirs along some singular dimension, like it understands way more about high energy physics or jazz or ethics than they do, but is instead categorically greater - and worse that it is definitely categorically impossible for humans to achieve such intelligence. The humans really don't like that and Lem's story struggles to really sell it because of course Lem was human, so it's hard to play the role of "Machine which is just categorically more intelligent than my whole species" effectively. One of the clever tricks in Vinge's "Tatja Grimm's World" is that Tatja is way more intelligent than everybody else on her planet, yet because of why she's more intelligent than everybody else Vinge doesn't need to somehow imagine being far smarter than he is.
- camjohnson26 4y ago
  A good analogy is looking at how chess grandmasters talk about playing against computers, especially early on when it wasn’t known whether the best computers would ever be able to beat the best humans. They say it’s like playing a super intelligence. Interestingly, I believe the engine + grandmaster combination can still defeat the best engines.
  - genera1 4y ago
    Kasparov also believes this to be true, but the last example I can recall of top level player teaming up with a computer was in 2014, when Nakamura played exhibition match with engine against Stockfish and lost 1.5/0.5, since then computers only got better. Maybe someone dedicated to playing computers could perform better, but I doubt it, since anti-computer chess haven't really been a thing outside of bullet and maybe blitz for years, now that computers search way deeper and prune better.
webmobdev 4y ago
I used to be arrogant about this in my teens and think that people who aren't good at maths and science have a lower IQ. Till one day I learnt about the different types of intelligence - linguistic, logical, geospatial, social, musical, empathetic etc. - that really made me rethink how I look at people, and how flawed the whole IQ thing is. When we talk about someone having a "gift" or a knack for something, we don't realise we are appreciating the intelligence of that person in that area.
- agentwiggles 4y ago
  I have gotten into fishing this summer and _damn_ do those pro/YouTube dudes know a lot about fishing. They study bass behavior and do all kinds of experimentation with tackle and lures and the time of day and every conceivable variable that could affect the bite. When I was getting into weightlifting, which I had always dismissed as a pursuit for dumb bro types, I was similarly impressed with the knowledge out there about nutrition, anatomy, the way that muscles tear and repair and grow, etc. I think it's an all too common "nerd social fallacy" to assume that people who don't have that "traditional" scientific/math intelligence aren't smart, but as I've gotten older it seems to me that, on average, most humans are pretty damn smart about one thing or another.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - midoridensha 4y ago
    >I think it's an all too common "nerd social fallacy" to assume that people who don't have that "traditional" scientific/math intelligence aren't smart Dunning-Kruger effect. It's all too common on places like HN.
    - ericmay 4y ago
      Eh we are a bubble. Many people assume because you are good at math or something that you must be skinny and weak and not into weightlifting or fly fishing, or you can’t get a partner.
ethbr0 4y ago
> but all the bear wants to talk about is caves, and area in which his knowledge is so complete that the humans cannot really even talk to him I talk to people like that at work often. Do you think they might actually be bears?
7thaccount 4y ago
What an excellent show (although very weird and crazy too). The books showed what to me is one of the more interesting ways for an author to come up with a systematic system of magic. It isn't just saying a spell or anything like that. In the book (spoilers), only the most intelligent people can begin to take all the variables into account in doing a spell (hand signs, words, positions of the planetary bodies, temperature, humidity, constellations, phase of the moon, mood of the caster, and a ton of other things are all factored in and tables are cross-referenced. The author did a better job of explaining it. In relation to your above comment I felt they did a good job throughout the series showing the difficulties in communicating amongst lowly people and entities and creatures that are higher up in the pecking order.
JackFr 4y ago
In Philosophical Investigations Wittgenstein famously said that "if a lion could speak, we could not understand him".

vixen99 4y ago

As with spiders' k. domains it seems. More limited than I thought. My garden orb weaver found a dried leaf as large as herself in her huge web and proceeded to truss it up as nicely as she could before belatedly realizing that the operation was not going to be to her advantage.

celrod 4y ago

Reminds of the Geifer grizzly. It raided human dwellings for food, signing its death warrant. It wore a radio collar, so it seems like it shouldn't have been a problem to track down. Yet, it evaded hunters for over a year, while still raiding houses for food, without ever being seen. It learned it could cross into Canada for safety when the pressure from the hunters tracking it got to be too much, and then return and invade more houses. Eventually, it was shot and killed by a random hunter in Canada who had no idea who that bear was. The bear didn't know Canadians could also be dangerous, otherwise it probably wouldn't have let anyone see it there either... I think a lot of animals are probably very good at what they've evolved to do. Bears are great at tracking and surviving being tracked (probably more typically by bigger bears); reading about it felt like getting a glimpse into another animal's domain and being totally outmatched.

elevaet 4y ago
Thats a great story!
mmsimanga 4y ago
We have baboons and they are smart. They can open all sorts of doors. They ignore you if you are a woman or don't have anything in your hand that could cause them harm. They know how to bluff an attack making you throw away food that is in your hands. The stand upright make scary noises and charge at you. Quite frightening and most just throw whatever it is in your hands away. So yes animals can be smart.

tialaramex 4y ago

In Lem's "Golem XIV" Golem (a machine built to help plan World War III) explains to the humans that its intelligence isn't just greater than theirs along some singular dimension, like it understands way more about high energy physics or jazz or ethics than they do, but is instead categorically greater - and worse that it is definitely categorically impossible for humans to achieve such intelligence. The humans really don't like that and Lem's story struggles to really sell it because of course Lem was human, so it's hard to play the role of "Machine which is just categorically more intelligent than my whole species" effectively. One of the clever tricks in Vinge's "Tatja Grimm's World" is that Tatja is way more intelligent than everybody else on her planet, yet because of why she's more intelligent than everybody else Vinge doesn't need to somehow imagine being far smarter than he is.

camjohnson26 4y ago
A good analogy is looking at how chess grandmasters talk about playing against computers, especially early on when it wasn’t known whether the best computers would ever be able to beat the best humans. They say it’s like playing a super intelligence. Interestingly, I believe the engine + grandmaster combination can still defeat the best engines.
- genera1 4y ago
  Kasparov also believes this to be true, but the last example I can recall of top level player teaming up with a computer was in 2014, when Nakamura played exhibition match with engine against Stockfish and lost 1.5/0.5, since then computers only got better. Maybe someone dedicated to playing computers could perform better, but I doubt it, since anti-computer chess haven't really been a thing outside of bullet and maybe blitz for years, now that computers search way deeper and prune better.

webmobdev 4y ago

I used to be arrogant about this in my teens and think that people who aren't good at maths and science have a lower IQ. Till one day I learnt about the different types of intelligence - linguistic, logical, geospatial, social, musical, empathetic etc. - that really made me rethink how I look at people, and how flawed the whole IQ thing is. When we talk about someone having a "gift" or a knack for something, we don't realise we are appreciating the intelligence of that person in that area.

agentwiggles 4y ago
I have gotten into fishing this summer and _damn_ do those pro/YouTube dudes know a lot about fishing. They study bass behavior and do all kinds of experimentation with tackle and lures and the time of day and every conceivable variable that could affect the bite. When I was getting into weightlifting, which I had always dismissed as a pursuit for dumb bro types, I was similarly impressed with the knowledge out there about nutrition, anatomy, the way that muscles tear and repair and grow, etc. I think it's an all too common "nerd social fallacy" to assume that people who don't have that "traditional" scientific/math intelligence aren't smart, but as I've gotten older it seems to me that, on average, most humans are pretty damn smart about one thing or another.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- midoridensha 4y ago
  >I think it's an all too common "nerd social fallacy" to assume that people who don't have that "traditional" scientific/math intelligence aren't smart Dunning-Kruger effect. It's all too common on places like HN.
  - ericmay 4y ago
    Eh we are a bubble. Many people assume because you are good at math or something that you must be skinny and weak and not into weightlifting or fly fishing, or you can’t get a partner.

ethbr0 4y ago

> but all the bear wants to talk about is caves, and area in which his knowledge is so complete that the humans cannot really even talk to him I talk to people like that at work often. Do you think they might actually be bears?

7thaccount 4y ago

What an excellent show (although very weird and crazy too). The books showed what to me is one of the more interesting ways for an author to come up with a systematic system of magic. It isn't just saying a spell or anything like that. In the book (spoilers), only the most intelligent people can begin to take all the variables into account in doing a spell (hand signs, words, positions of the planetary bodies, temperature, humidity, constellations, phase of the moon, mood of the caster, and a ton of other things are all factored in and tables are cross-referenced. The author did a better job of explaining it. In relation to your above comment I felt they did a good job throughout the series showing the difficulties in communicating amongst lowly people and entities and creatures that are higher up in the pecking order.

JackFr 4y ago

In Philosophical Investigations Wittgenstein famously said that "if a lion could speak, we could not understand him".