16 Features The RGS Gazette Issue 12 July 2024 Are We Really A Smart Species? Imagine a world where we are the most intelligent species on earth. Some of you may be thinking we already live in that world and have reached the pinnacle of human evolution, but what if I told you that we are not even close? In this article, I will address the biggest problem in our society: the problem of pretentious empowerment. "We believe we are the smartest species on the planet for no real reason." When there are people participating in street interviews who cannot even point to their own country on a map, it makes you question the matter. Is this superiority rightly justified, or is there something huge that we are missing? Determining the difference between a smart and stupid organism is quite a subjective topic, but I am sure you have all done it before by comparing test scores to find your friend has beaten you by one grade. However, ‘intelligence’ is such an arbitrary term that even experts in the field cannot come up with a concrete definition. There are so many different categories that one word or measurement should never, and could never be used to describe them all, but if that is the case, how do we know if we are being outperformed here on Earth? A 2007 study that tested the memory of adolescent and adult chimpanzees against a group of college students showed our brains are surprisingly comparable to those of our primate ancestors; the adults scored about the same as the students and the teen chimps scored significantly higher. Similarly, animals like dolphins, elephants, crows, goats, and even octopi seem to possess a cognitive ability on par with our own. In fact, octopi have 8 more brains than we do, with each tentacle able to move independently and scan surroundings without seeing them and simultaneously collectively containing over 2/3 of the total neurones in the whole body. I would be surprised if something like that was not intelligent. "In fact, octopi have 8 more brains than we do" Before you start panicking or preparing for animals to overthrow humanity, there is one thing that separates us from all these other species: culture. Our ability to efficiently process and accumulate traditions and customs is what draws the line between us, and other animals mentioned. Although you may not have realised it, we use it every day in the form of language. If you have ever tried to create your own language you will notice how abysmal it turns out! So how did cavemen make something as complicated as language thousands of years ago? They did it through culture. Through years of trying to communicate, it just happened. From Inuit hunting techniques to surviving in the Amazon, there are many things that few people could innovate today but somehow an underdeveloped brain from the Ice Age managed to come up with. They accomplished this through culture. Despite the fact we may not have the most neurones or largest brain, we have culture, and it is a privilege that other species might not access for another million years, if ever. So, in answer to my question, are we at all close to being intelligent? I hope you can come up with your own conclusion, but just remember this: whether or not we are intelligent, we have culture. Alexander Roberts (Year 10) examines whether humans deserve to be known as the smartest species An octopus with eight, independent tentacles (2024) An pair of chimpanzees (2024) A pod of dolphins (2018)
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