Talk:Animal cognition

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Learning

For the time being, I've removed the following passage:

"Robert Yerkes proved in The Mental Life of Monkeys and Apes (1916) that monkeys and apes are capable of transfer their learning to new tasks (Sebeok, 1990)."

It is not clear what the point of including this is. Transfer of training is a very general phenomenon - any animal that can learn anything at all will transfer some kind of learning to some kind of new task. Offhand, I can't think of anything that Yerkes showed about transfer in his 1916 book that is still of distinctive significance now. If you want to put this back, please discuss it here first and explain why it matters - it may be a perfectly valid point that just needs some rephrasing. seglea 01:33, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)

What's wrong with covering the history of the study of animal cognition? Hyacinth 18:22, 8 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Anti-behavoralist

The article seems to have a bit of venom towards behavorists. Also, it only lists two sources. PragmaticallyWyrd 14:14, 25 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Relative intelligence

To get over the 'original research' label on the 'Relative Intelligence' section a citation to Shettleworth's Cognition, Evolution and Behaviour' on the bit about different niches might be helpful. dbrodbeck

Who are these 'many' that don't like the scientific approach? What journals do they publish in? If someone can find a citation fine, but if not, I would like to remove that section. Dbrodbeck 19:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This whole "widely believed to be the smartest bird or ape or whaterver" bit is getting out of control. First of all it is full of weasel words. Secondly, the study of animal cognition is not about ranking species. Read the book I mention above, or pick up a copy of JEP:Animal and find me somewhere where this is mentioned. Dbrodbeck 11:26, 17 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Some Studies might be nice | Also comment on owls

It'd be interesting to see some studies. I concede that the research is too poorly conducted to say anything with authority. And though it mentions controversy over the relative intelligence of dogs and cats, at least it doesn't argue that either of them are "the smartest animals" (despite s few weasel words implying it.

From what I've heard from people who work with these various animals, (and from newspaper articles, which I tend not to trust on matters of science) the ranking seems more or less accurate. But the categories are so broad that it's difficult. Domestic dogs aren't as smart as wolves (selection for infantilism), and Neophemas cannot approach the African greys. Then there are individual species which rise above the pack. Every falconer I've met(all three) insists that Harris hawks are far smarter than other raptors, and human intelligence certainly exceeds that of Oranguatangs (though considering the state of the planet, some may dispute this). Since this is original research, and hearsay to boot, please don't add this to the article, these are just observations for what might be improved.

The one thing I will say for certain is that most of an owl's head is taken up by the eyes. And back to hearsay mode, at least one falconer I know makes a routine of insisting on their relatively low intelligence. They're certainly not up there with parrots, unless maybe you're talking something like cockatiels (cutest parrots there are, but also the dumbest, I swear).

Damn looking at this now I want to do some experiments on animal cognition myself. Might make a good Div II Project. Any rate, this is yet another article which has improved since I last saw it, though still in need of much work. A good sign that the idiots who write what they "know" may, finally, be starting to loose on Wikipedia. Keep this pattern up and I may come back and start editing again. ~Luke --71.192.117.127 21:21, 19 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Intelligence or cognitive ability if you will, is proably modular (see Galistell's Organization of Learning for a nice primer). Asking if say, a rat shows similar intellgence to a human is like asking if humans can fly by flapping their arms. There are several nice treatments of such 'rankings' including Kamil (1987) and of course Shettleworth (1998, I think).Dbrodbeck 21:40, 19 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This relative intelligence seciton is getting silly. Who cares what people think is the smartes species, or what the 'widespread belief' is? Dbrodbeck 00:17, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Absolutely. I have taken an axe to it. I have also started putting in some of the admittedly necessary references (I wrote most of this page at a time when Wikipedia was not bothering so much about such things, and I didn't want to clutter it). Any help would be welcome! seglea 22:04, 2 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Now the section has returned. Let me point out why this section ought to go. This is a science right? Beliefs are not important. It is, well, that simple. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dbrodbeck (talk • contribs) 12:09, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Vegetarianism

Funny, I study animal cognition and we NEVER bring up this stuff about 'well if they are intelligent we cannot eat them'. I'll wait to see if anyone has a reason to leave the statement in, if not I will trash it. Dbrodbeck 12:55, 8 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Who is "we"? Irregardless, the argument has litte to do with animal cognition and more to do with the motivations for vegetarianism. Hyacinth 18:21, 8 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Oh sorry, I did not make that very clear now did I. Those of us that do research in animal cogntiion. I do research in the area, keep current with all of the journals etc and have never seen the issue brought up, not once. Dbrodbeck 20:08, 8 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Dbrodbeck, you might want to do a little more reading in your field. Donald Griffin discusses this a bit in Chapter 13 of <ital>Animal Minds</ital>, in the section "Ethical Significance." So does deWaal. 70.226.173.75 20:56, 15 January 2007 (UTC) (whoops, sorry for the missing sig. Rbogle 20:58, 15 January 2007 (UTC))[reply]

the converse is true, however; animal cognition is almost ALWAYS brought up in arguments about vegetarianism, possibly because morality is as irrelevant to a study of intelligance.81.107.159.5 23:20, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It smells like pov, and has no citations. Anyway it is probably in the wrong place. Diletante 04:16, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well if there are no objections over the next while I will remove it Dbrodbeck 12:14, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Im removing it, it is at worst OR, and at best doesn't belong here Diletante 00:57, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, had not had the time, been marking papers for an animal cognition class..... Dbrodbeck 12:14, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The society agreement which is a typical ground for human moral says that we agree to protect good living conditions and fair treatment for all those who are like us, so for also the animals if they qualify by this standard.

Animal testing

A question: Has it been taken into account in the experiment arrangements that since the animals are at the mercy of humans they have to listen to subtle social cues very carefully compared to free adult humans? So their behaviour just has to be primarily social whether that is their nature or not.

Another question: From where and how to get an objective opinion about my rabbits being able to read some words? There is a film at www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qv49w6IrQaI. I have now taught them the words left, right, in front, back, above and down. So it should be possible to train them to perform a labyrint guided by written words. I have already tried it once with a promising result and I will put the video to YouTube too, maybe today. My rabbits are otherwise untrained and somewhat uncooperative. They are interested in new tasks and not in repeating the same old tricks. Food rewards do not seem to work. One of my rabbits is bold and the other one too timid for labyrinth tasks.

Two points, BF Skinner taught pigeons to 'read' ages ago. 2) this is not really a forum for discussing animal cog it is a place to talk about the article. Dbrodbeck 11:43, 4 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, but I didn't find that point about BF Skinner and reading pigeons from the Wikipedia, now even from under the header rumours about BF Skinner. And could you please include information about who and where are capable of testing animals' intelligence objectively.

There are sources beyond WIkipedia. Try an intro psychology book, oh perhaps Glietman's text. Then perhaps look at Mike Domjan's Learning textbook, then W. A. Roberts' book 'Animal Cognition' or Sara Shettleworth's 'Cognition, Evolution and Behavior'. Like I said before, this is not really the appropriate place for discussing how to design experiments. Dbrodbeck 11:55, 6 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Penguins

I want to ask how are penguins intelligent? They are non-flying birds and can have large brain, but I can't find any information about their brain and intellectual abilities. Til. 29.03.07 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 213.227.194.147 (talk) 07:33, 2 April 2007 (UTC).[reply]

penguins have extremely small brains, less than few grams. They are some of the stupidest birds.

Could you explain why penguins have so small brain? They are unflying predators and could have large brain.

Reptiles?

I don't see any mention on cognition in reptiles. Could someone cover this topic? 207.119.173.108 00:04, 9 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Contradiction

other domesticated species, like horses, cows and pigs are considered intelligent. Some other, like oxen are famed for their herd animal stupidity (brains under 1 kg, several hundred grams)

Cows are intelligent, but oxen are not? marbeh raglaim 20:21, 17 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This points out the whole problem with the 'subjective intelligence ranking of species' stuff on here. I do not see why it is relevant that people have a gut feeling that species X is smarter than species Y. The question itself, which may be silly, is at best a very difficult comparative question. (See Shettleworth, 1998 or Kamil, 1987) Dbrodbeck 20:28, 17 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Is this possible in theory?

Is it possible in theory to teach a dog or any other animal to read without it taking enermous lenghts of time? See the video of a dog puppy reading at www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyiE2DmpCZY and please read the text too: it offers one possible explanation. 84.239.162.126 (talk) 13:21, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]