Seriously, are we the only intelligent animal in Earth?
I believe there are high chances of existing other ones, like the gator child, info about them are hard to find, but they're said to be intelligent and use tools.
Maybe nowadays we're the only intelligent animal, but how about in the fututre? How about the millions of years waiting to come?
What do you think?
Note: I'm not including aliens, only EARTHLY animals.

Define intelligence.

You lost me with the gator child. What is this action, here?

When I say "intelligent animal" I mean rational animal, animals that can reason, animals that have feelings like us.

Dolphins and chimpanzees are usually considered to be sentient, if that's what you're talking about.

I think no one is understanding me. I mean animals as intelligent as we are, animals that can build cities, vehicles, feel love and laugh. Animals that think just like us and have a smart communication system, not jut grunts.

Quite a lot of animals use tools, such as sea otters, eagles, monkeys, etc.
Anyone who spends a lot of time observing animals in the wild (without prejudice) has seen grizzly bears playing (not just learning the ropes), coyotes likewise. Animals have fun, just as we do, just in different ways.
Most non-domestic animals use their sense differently than we surmise. For instance, it was long thought that wolf packs simply killed whatever elk, deer, caribou, came their way. Through research, it is now accepted that wolves cull a herd of the sickly or otherwise infirm animals: so, how is it they do this? Can we consider this to be some form of intelligence? Perhaps.
Personally, I think we, as humans, are rather egotistical in our rationale of our status. If we go one on one with a griz or a tiger, with no weapons, we lose, mostly. Most wild animals are far more competent than we, today.
Could be we should measure animal intelligence in a different way.

I totally agree

Thank you, indeed!

Yes I also would like to know what the crap a gator child is.

Gator child= half gator, half human animal sighted in USA, I think it's a hoax. There's a pic of one, I'm gonna try to find it.

That's as outrageous as a mermaid...

Sure, there are rationale and sentinent beings like dolphins and elephants...If that was percieved as a disease, humans have an advanced stage while other animals have earlier stages...

In Gainesville there EVERYWHERE. Poor dears are FORCED to watch college football in that wretched town.

Why, watching the Gators should be a joy!

So should marriage....what's your point.(jk)

Oh, nevermind

Hahahaha.......quitter.

I think your opinion of intelligence is very limited.
Intelligence in a species cannot be defined, in my opinion, by technology. Yes, we're smart enough to read books, and built computers, and animals are not. Does that simply make them stupid? No, not at all. It makes us advanced, but it doesn't mean we're more intelligent than animals.

Take the comon North American Prarie Dog, if you will.
This animal has an extremely advanced and defined social structure. Thousands of them live underground together in little towns, built by themselves. Each animal has a little home to call it's own, with a ebd and everything. The towns have specific areas for lavatories and for food storage, even night clubs where they can go and meet mates. They communicate extremely well with each other, discussing such matters as humans do. Danger, social interaction and mating, what they're going to have for lunch even. They feel fear, anger, happiness and sadness.
Are they intelligent? Not by your definition, but i certainly consider them to be. This is just one example of many different species on this planet. Even plants are intelligent, although they are basically a network of programs designed to make them exist for longer and multiply in the most effective way for them.

All creatures on the earth are ingelligent, for their purposes. Every living thing exists to live, and multiply, and for all purposes, each living thing achieves this very well for their environment, social structures etc.
A human tending to his garden, is no different than an Ant tending to it's very own Fungal garden deep within it's nest. A human mother feeding it's baby from a bottle, is no different than a bird bring food to it's home to give to it's child. And a father holding his kid as it takes it's first steps, is no different than a bird pushing it's chick from the nest, teaching it to take flight.

Intelligence isn't measured in MSN communications or government politics.

many animals are very intelligent, they just use their intelligence differently. like for instance, dolphins dont build towers and buildings, because they have no use for a house or city street. dolphins brains are both larger and more, dunno how to say this, "wrinkled" i guess, than ours. (albert einstein had a more wrinkled brain than normal human, but otherwise the same) maybe dolphins understand nature and the universe much more than we, although we are considered the only intelligent being on earth. it all comes down to how you allocate your intelligence.

Who were you talking too Burn?

The original post.

Gotcha...intelligence is a shaky word...it is not clearly defined.

Primarily, dictionary.com defines intelligence as:

The capacity to acquire and apply knowledge.
The faculty of thought and reason.

So really, the question is, do animals have the capacity to acquire and apply knowledge? Are they able to think, and reason?


Many examples of this are seem in nature, all the time. A bird using a rock to break open a particularly tasty and hard egg. A beaver cutting down trees and floating them downstream to build a dam, the only entrance being underwater where a storage of leaves is frozen for the winter months. An ant taking spectacular care of a honey-dew catapillar, to milk it for it's honey. The catapillar allowing the ants to carry it into their nest and feed it all the food it could want. And early man, picking up a stick and drawing a circle in the mud with it.

* shakes head* drop the mermaids frogfish

why?

adding to Burn...the ability of an octopus to open a jar to reach food...for whales to be able to cradle their young....elephants mourning their dead...Birds dropping acorns on a intersection to wait for cars to crack them...not to mention the wide, wide range of emotions displayed by animals...

Exactly.

I always thought that intelligence was measured by whether or not an animal was self-aware. IF you show a mirror to a dolphin, it can recognize itself. Rather than thinking it's another dolphin.

I think what the guy is trying to say is that are we the only race on earth like is there other Earthy races in hiding

I doubt there are any other intelligent races living on our own planet, otherwise we would have seen them by now. Unless they are living underground, which wouldn't make sense, cause every time there is an earthquake they would be dying. There are probably undiscovered species as smart as dolphin living around, but not as smart as humans.

They wouldn't all die cause mass human deaths accer every day because the pop. so large

Not 100% sure, might be talking about Jake ROFL.

Well said there....

I never heard about that smart dogs, and the gator child is the one in the link (it's probably fake). I know many animals are intelligent, I guess I'm not intelligent. But do any other animal aside from humans have their own culture, I know some animals do dance, sing and laugh.
But, for an example a group of dogs in eastern Europe have a different culture from a group of the same wolf species in western Europe? I guess I'm a bit dumb.

Oh gost THAT is truly horrible!!

They do?

In that case chimps have been shown to be self-aware

Probably?

See this statement just gives credence to the 'dolphins are smarter than humans' theory.

Probably someone dressed as a reptoid for Hallowe'en...

There was an experiment done with a chimp and a monkey in the 80s or early 90s. They sat the monkey in front of a mirror with a blob of paint on the mirror. The monkey looked at it for a moment then tried to rub paint off itself. When they did this with the chimp, it rubbed the paint of the mirror . So there you have it. Chimps are intelligent. Case closed. End of. Quod erat demonstrandum.

the should make bush do that, bet he will fail

Or could it be that the chimpanzee wiped the mirror because it couldn't comprehend that that the chimpanzee in the mirror was itself?

It's only my opinion (correct me if I am wrong) but I consider the 'mirror test' to be flawed in some areas, for the reason that many animal's eyes work alot differently then ours do, maybe a mirror should be replaced with an echo or odour in some cases?

Or is it already?

not that different...especially primates...their eyes are just like ours.