DailyDirt: Smarter Than The Average Bear Cat... Bird?
from the urls-we-dig-up dept
Animals aren't as dumb as you might think, and the more we study our pets -- the more we find that we may not just be anthropomorphizing our favorite animals. Some animals definitely have personalities, and some can exhibit some pretty complex cognitive skills. If we can understand more and more animal brains, maybe we'll be able to figure out our own brains, too, someday. Here are just a few things to remember about cats, fish and birds.- Cats are pretty smart pets, and they may understand more than you think -- like cause and effect. Okay, that ability isn't exactly surprising, but cats might also understand a bit of physics, too -- but it probably won't help them when they're trapped in a box with a radioactive source connected to trigger a release of poison.
- How long does a fish's memory really last? Finding Dory makes a joke out of fish having short term memory loss, but some researchers have measured some fish with memory spans that can last 3 months.
- Bird brains are surprisingly packed with more neurons per pound than mammals (including primates). This might explain how some birds can make tools, pass the mirror test, understand cause and effect, and even be said to be as smart as a 5-year-old human child.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: animal cognition, biology, birds, brains, cats, fish, intelligence, smart animals, tool
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Why Can Bird Brains Be So Much More Efficient Than Mammal Brains?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Fish memory. Fish attention span
http://www.cnet.com/news/goldfish-the-actual-fish-not-the-crackers-may-have-a-better-attenti on-span-than-humans/
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Why Can Bird Brains Be So Much More Efficient Than Mammal Brains?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: About 8 seconds.
“Oh, what a wonderful view!”
“Oh, what a wonderful view!”
“Oh, what a wonderful view!”
If you made it slightly smaller, say 7 seconds, then it would be
“Oh, what a wonderful view!”
“Hang on, I’ve seen this bef--Oh, what a wonderful view!”
“Hang on, I’ve seen this bef--Oh, what a wonderful view!”
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Smart birds - dumb reporters
That would be per CUBIC inch.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: CUBIC inch.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: CUBIC inch.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Can we make a corollary to "animals are smarter than we think"
I am sure many of our blunders come from presuming we're smarter than we are.
[ link to this | view in thread ]