A fascinating article that once again demonstrates we are just barely scratching the surface when it comes to understanding the intelligence, let alone the lived experience, of other animals.
This reminds me of the recent debate we were having here regarding the conclusion in the UK that lobsters are sentient beings and therefore should be treated with some minimal amount of consideration. A common argument made by those who argued they should not, or should not be placed into a similar category as octopuses, is that lobsters are neuronally less complex than other beings. But here we see that these birds, which also have fewer neurons than other animals we consider to be more “advanced”, are capable of remarkably complex behaviours that hint at an interior life we simply do not understand.
We’ve poured money into SETI to try and answer the anguished question, are we alone? Well, it seems that we aren’t, but we might be too stupid and self-absorbed to notice.
> We’ve poured money into SETI to try and answer the anguished question, are we alone? Well, it seems that we aren’t, but we might be too stupid and self-absorbed to notice.
There was an episode of the second season of the new "Cosmos" where they looked at SETI.
One of the points of the episode was that we might be looking right at intelligent life and not even recognize it. We tend to only see intelligence when it comes from an individual organism with a brain. We tend to dismiss or not even consider other ways there might be intelligence and gave a couple examples from here on Earth.
One example was bees. A bee hive as a group exhibits intelligent-like behavior beyond what an individual bee is capable of.
Another example was forests. Underground in forests there is a vast network of mycelium linking the plants together. When something bad happens to a tree that gets communicated through the mycelium network to other trees and they react making changes to better cope with the threat. It operates very similarly to a nervous system for the whole forest, but much slower than animal nervous systems.
If most intelligence in the universe is hive minds or is big slow brains like planet-spanning mycelium networks we might completely overlook it.
"If most intelligence in the universe is hive minds or is big slow brains like planet-spanning mycelium networks we might completely overlook it."
Or intelligent life made up off entirely other principles(and with very different goals to survive), than what we know. Do we understand what is going on inside of jupiter? Or inside the sun? Maybe there is life, that starts to evolve at certain pressures and temperatures? Well, maybe not likely, but I am glad, that the self centered philosophy, that the sun and the whole universe all are moving around us humans who are on top of it all, fades a bit more. I mean, we clearly are awesome at technology and so far we have not seen much technology from any other species. But maybe very advanced life has no need for our tech anymore, so we would not spot it, by looking for it.
I think when we talk about finding intelligent life, what we really mean is "intelligent life on other planets". We know there's intelligence here on earth in those examples you describe. But what of it? We are already studying those things and trying to understand them. What's groundbreaking is not that there is intelligent life, but that there might be on different planets.
There are two ways to approach such findings. One is to think of birds/lobsters/octopuses as more cognitively complex, intelligent and such. The other is to think of ourselves as less so.
Sometimes the latter probably is more true.
By way of analogy... When I was a pup studying philosophy, we studied the "other minds problem." How do we know what others feel and experience? Are we sure they're not faking it? How well can we understand another's mind? It's an old problem, and the philosophical tradition of questions, answers and arguments are rather old and formulaic.
I think newer thinking, both scientific and philosophical, tends to reverse the "problem." We understand others by forming a mental model of them, narrated with feelings and experiences. This is a lot like we understand ourselves.
We really do understand ourselves much like we understand others. Same mechanisms, more or less, I think. Mental model of a person + constant narratives to explain choices, feelings and such.
You can either think of this as a solution to the "other minds problem" or a further problem.
We tend to not have mental models of others at all. Our brains run "flat" copies of ourselves and any deviation from that model, results in discomfort and categorization as either "inferior" or "superior" depending on visible outcome of actions. The effect of "genius" is, that seemingly stupid choices by others result in perceivable good outcomes, without us having a mental model to fill that gap.
So we do not have mental models for others- at all. We have a world filled with copies of ourselves and at best a zoe of heuristics and anecdata, were the "other" begins and ends.
The closest you get to having a real mental model- is a longterm relationship and getting to know that partner really well. And even then..
Poured money into SETI? Which money is that? SETI hasn't recieved meaningful public funding for a long while, decades. As a species, we spend more on makeup glitter than we do on searching for extraterrestrial intelligence.
The vast majority of seti is about combing through data from other projects. Basically zero telescope time is used for actually looking. Every candidate signal (ie BLC1) is discovered after the event. And zero telescopes are actively listening for repeat signals.
Several people have objected to my use of the phrase "poured money into SETI". To clarify:
1. I agree that "poured" is an overstatement (and I support spending more!)
2. However, by "SETI" I did not mean NASA's SETI program but more broadly, programs and research with the goal of finding extraterrestrial life and then subsequently, extraterrestrial intelligence. Do the Mars rovers, for example, fit into this broader SETI category? It's debatable.
What I was really referring to, however, is our myopia when it comes to seeking evidence that we aren't alone. Imagine we did receive a radio transmission from outer space. How much money would we spend on understanding it, and the beings that sent it? I'd wager the sums would be vast.
Meanwhile, there are apparently only ten vaquitas (a species of porpoise) left in the world. Science was unaware of this species until 1958. We know cetaceans are incredibly intelligent, but what if vaquitas are far more intelligent than we suspect? I expect that what we don't know about them far outweighs what we do. What if they, or some other species we've either destroyed or almost destroyed, are the "aliens" we're looking for?
I know this seems like a stretch, but just how confident are we about this? If you look at what we've learned about animals in the past century, how much more might we learn in the next ten centuries? How much would we have learned had we not killed them?
And plants too, we do not see in this way. I am reading Overstory, from Richard Powers. Apart from bring beautiful stories, it shows how plants are not too different, when looked at a different timescale.
I believe we consider more advanced what looks more like us (dog yes, insect no).
For SETI to be safe, first we must ensure we are safe! And that requires funding, funding into the military, to test, and develop our weaponry, our soldiers, to ensure that when those alien hordes hear our signals, we are ready for them!!
You don't want to destroy us all, to give in to those evil, ungodly alien hordes, do you Mr President?
Another problem is when people argue based off words rather than knowledge of the subject.
The differences between the meager number of neurons and simple layout in a lobster and the extremely large and complex nervous system of an octopus are in no way comparable to the differences in nervous system complexity between a human and a bird. A lobster literally can be understood. It's nervous system is that simple, only ~100,000 neurons in small groups (less than a fruit fly!). There is very little mystery in it's operation. It is feasibly enumberable, developmentally predictable, and it's parts are knowable in function. It is not conscious like a mammal, bird, or octopus is conscious.
Bird and human brains are of a similar order of complexity. Complex enough we can't even begin to hope to understand the functioning yet.
> It is not conscious like a mammal, bird, or octopus is conscious.
I do not see how you could know this, because consciousness and how it forms is exceptionally poorly understood. If in the past two years major breakthroughs have happened on this subject I would love to read about it. Perhaps you can point me in the right direction.
You don't need anything discovered in the last 40 years to be able to state that lobsters are not sentient. But, Rodolfo R Llinás' "I of the Vortex: From Neurons to Self" is a really great book that explores the underpinings of sentience from single neurons on up. The tldr; is that the structures which seem to be necessary (if not sufficient) for consciousness in mammals (like 30-40 Hz thalamo-cortical loops) do not and cannot exist in the structures provided by the lobster nervous system. Do lobsters have some seperate, unrelated implementation of sentience? There's no behavioral evidence to support it. They're just big insects. I think anyone claiming that 100k neurons can support sentience needs to be providing the proof, not me providing the context and evidence for why not.
Normally I would defer to your superior knowledge, but sadly I have done some amount of relevant university-level study of this subject with teachers that were experts in the field. They have always maintained that theories about how sapience develops and exists are just that: Theories. There is no solid proof of anything.
Since your response leans on "seems" and then deflecting to saying that the opposite of your claim should be proven (even though both are equally unknowable), I'm going to assume you don't have solid evidence one way or the other about it either.
What proof do you have that enumeration of function is equivalent to understanding? If I encounter a building-size device filled with large cogs and two stones, I can’t immediately tell from looking at it whether its purpose is to grind apples or wheat. So I’m not sure you can say that an animal is or isn’t sentient based on the organization of its cells.
there's a certain type of person who are big fans of SETI type projects. They're quick to say that if there's a mars colony, they'd go in an instant. But this type rarely ventures out from the warmth of their computer den. They never go mountain climbing or scuba diving or even camping. They get out of breath from walking from their car to the doritos section at the store. I think this type of person just wants fantasy.
> We’ve poured money into SETI to try and answer the anguished question, are we alone? Well, it seems that we aren’t, but we might be too stupid and self-absorbed to notice.
We seriously underestimate other animals' intelligence, but until some other animal on earth puts a flag on the moon, it's safe to say that no other animal on Earth shares our unique brand of intelligence.
I don't believe that necessarily follows. How much of what we are is a product of what we've built up? Take all that away and revert humanity to its pre-civilization state. To an outside observer, would we obviously be capable of one day going to the moon?
The moon is a somewhat facetious benchmark, but we harnessed fire some 400k years ago. Agriculture, or more generally culvitating your own food, is another major milestone that happened 10k years ago, or thereabouts. Those are more reasonable, especially because other intelligent species could piggy back off our technology to speed up their own progression.
I agree with you that we have a “unique brand” of intelligence but we’ve gone astray in ascribing a value judgment to that, in my opinion - as in, our brand is the best. Or, our brand is so much better than others that those others are worthless.
This doesn’t just apply to other species but also to other ways of being (“cultural intelligences”?) than our neoliberal, capitalist and technology-focused society. Our great technological achievements have been fatal for millions of other species and there is a strong possibility that they will be fatal for us as well. How intelligent is that?
I recognize that when we talk about “intelligence” in the context of the original article we mean something different than the more common sense meaning I used in my last paragraph. However it seems to me that the way we define intelligence is part of the problem. What’s a greater achievement, traveling to the moon or living for millions of years in harmony with the natural systems of the planet? Or who is happier, a blue whale or a Walmart employee?
> However it seems to me that the way we define intelligence is part of the problem.
Problem isn't how we define it, the definition we have is useful because it describes a very real qualitative difference between us and other animals. I think you nailed it on your first paragraph: the problem is the value judgment that goes along with that definition.
> How much of what we are is a product of what we've built up?
At least 1.5% by mass
About 3% of our body is nitrogen, about half of it comes from fertilizers made using Haber-Bosch process, an industrial chemical process that is unlike anything found in nature.
But if we count differently and consider agriculture in general as "something we've built up", then it is about 99.9%. It is estimated that the earth would support about 10 million hunter-gatherers, we are nearing 10 billion.
Correct me if I'm wrong but it seems like you're saying "take away what humans used their intelligence to build and it'll appear that they aren't intelligent"?
Sounds about right, because if they were intelligent then surely they would have built something is the common line of thinking. So taking away what humans have built and examining them through these same lenses would lead you to conclude that they're not intelligent.
What's so special about the moon? I say no life should be considered intelligent until they can swim down the Marianas Trench and carve their initials in the wall.
I'm going to echo here that this is categorically false. All government funding for SETI was canceled in 1993. So, unless you believe zero dollars is pouring money into SETI, this is misinformation.
I'd say SETI is worth the effort. In the unlikely event we found another civilization, it would be the death blow to any religion who professes we alone were created, and in God's image. In one fell swoop, SETI could've been a Galileo or Copernicus and advanced rationality a century or two against the forces of mythology and religious superstition.
This reminds me of the recent debate we were having here regarding the conclusion in the UK that lobsters are sentient beings and therefore should be treated with some minimal amount of consideration. A common argument made by those who argued they should not, or should not be placed into a similar category as octopuses, is that lobsters are neuronally less complex than other beings. But here we see that these birds, which also have fewer neurons than other animals we consider to be more “advanced”, are capable of remarkably complex behaviours that hint at an interior life we simply do not understand.
We’ve poured money into SETI to try and answer the anguished question, are we alone? Well, it seems that we aren’t, but we might be too stupid and self-absorbed to notice.