• Question: why are we more clever then any other animal?

    Asked by fayeadamou to Cat, Daz, Holly, Johnson, Pamela on 22 Jun 2011. This question was also asked by taraleeburton.
    • Photo: Johnson Soronnadi

      Johnson Soronnadi answered on 15 Jun 2011:

      Hi Fayeadamou,
      We are more clever than other animals because our brains are more developed as a result we tend reason more and faster than other animals

      Hope this answers your quetion?

      Johnson

    • Photo: Cat O'Connor

      Cat O'Connor answered on 15 Jun 2011:

      Hi Fayeadamou and taraleeburton,

      Great question guys and it’s one that I think about a lot! I think Johnson has answered it really well though so I haven’t much more to add!

      What I like to think is that our brains have evolved to do exactly what we need to do to survive. But if you think of a Zebra….who are we to say we’re smarter than a zebra? They might not have evolved to be about to do live chats with scientists on I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here but they are damn good at what they are meant to do!

      So I like to not think that we are that much smarter than animals, it’s just that we need to be smart at different things! So we’ve got different smarts. But saying this, If I had to go on The Weakest Link, I think I’d prefer to go up against 9 zebras than 9 humans 🙂

      I hope this makes you think about intelligence guys and also doesn’t make me come across as a complete loon!

      Please comment or ask another question if you want to chat about this some more!

      Cat

    • Photo: Pamela Lithgow

      Pamela Lithgow answered on 15 Jun 2011:

      Hi fayeadamou and taraleeburton,
      I spoke about this question with my work mates and Cat comments about “are we cleverer than animals came up a lot”. The thing is tests we design to measure intelligence are designed by us and therefore most likely to favour us. A bit like us trying to do a test in Spanish or any language you don’t speak. So in some ways you are asking why are animals not as intelligent as perceived by us?!
      Having said that we are obviously different to many animals as Cat said we have evolved a brain to do what we need to do to survive. In some ways we needed to be more intelligent to survive. Whereas some animals like a tiger run fast and kill things humans have survived mostly because of our adaptability. We can survive eating a wide variety of stuff in a wide variety of environments and this has required immense adaptability so with that comes intelligence.
      I think why do our brains make us “cleverer” than others is also an interesting question. One thing is we have a big brain compared to our body size, I heard that if a cat had a brain as big as ours its head would droop down. But size isn’t everything because elephants have really big brains and although they can remember alot they are not as “clever” as humans apparently this is because our brains have more folds!! So it is very complicated but we are cleverer because of our brains!
      Hope that helps
      Pam 🙂

    • Photo: Darren Braddick

      Darren Braddick answered on 22 Jun 2011:

      Hi fayeadamou and taraleeburton!

      Because the other guys gave such good answers I will say what I know for sure – we are so much more clever because of the size of our brain! We can have a bigger brain because we do not grow from eggs, which always limits the size of a brain. Birds always have tiny tiny brains!

      We probably became able to evolve this big brain because we managed to learn how to walk on two feet. Our very very early ancestors would have used all four limbs (feet and hands) to move. The fact we didn’t, meant we could use our hands to make tools and basic technology.. And from that point onwards, human intelligence has grown every second of every minute and day. Our brain gives us cleverness and intelligence which have given us so much control and power!

      So I think the method that humans give birth (which is not with eggs) and the ability to walk on two feet.. They are two very important steps in giving us such intelligence.

      I hope this helps answer your question !

      Daz

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