The Great Beyond, a science news blog from the Nature scientific journal, has posted an article about a session titled "Intelligence of Dolphins: Ethical and Policy Implications", which will be held at the 2010 Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) . Here's the session description from the AAAS's web program:
The dolphin brain has a large cerebral cortex and a substantial amount of associational neocortex. Most anatomical ratios that assess cognitive capacity place it second only to the human brain. More important, recent research in marine science has revealed that dolphins have a remarkable degree of cognitive and affective sophistication. For example, dolphins can recognize their image in a mirror as a reflection of themselves -- a finding that indicates self-awareness similar to that seen in higher primates and elephants. These and other studies, which have found that dolphins are also capable of advanced cognitive abilities such as problem-solving, artificial language comprehension, and complex social behavior, indicate that dolphins are far more intellectually and emotionally sophisticated than previously thought. Considerable research indicates that they are significantly different from fish and other marine species, and this research has significance for commercial policy and practice. This symposium will present the scientific findings and explore their ethical and policy implications.
One of the speakers at this session, neuroscientist/behavioral biology Lori Marino of Emory University, had the following abstract posted for her speech:
Many modern dolphin brains are significantly larger than our own and second in mass to the human brain when corrected for body size. Despite evolving along a different neuroanatomical trajectory than human brains, cetacean brains exhibit several features that are correlated with complex intelligence, including a large expanse of neocortical volume that is more convoluted than our own, extensive insular and cingulate regions, and highly differentiated cellular regions. These characteristics of dolphin brains are consistent with current behavioral evidence. In this presentation I will discuss the neuroanatomical basis of complex intelligence in dolphins, how the neuroanatomy provides evidence for psychological continuity between humans and dolphins, and the profound implications for the ethics of human-dolphin interactions. Specifically, I will focus on the growing worldwide industry of capturing and confining dolphins for amusement in marine park shows, "swim-with-dolphin" and "dolphin-assisted therapy" facilities. Our current knowledge of dolphin brain complexity and intelligence suggests that these practices are potentially psychologically harmful to dolphins and present a misinformed picture of their natural intellectual capacities.One of the other researchers who will be speaking at this session titled his speech "Ethical Implications of Dolphin Intelligence: Dolphins as Nonhuman Persons", suggesting that in light of new research on dolphin intelligence should change how we think about human practices involving or harming dolphins, and that the "development of an interspecies ethic that can apply to human/dolphin interaction—and that will be accepted by policymakers, industry leaders, consumers, etc." would be part of the solution.
These are pretty big statements about dolphin intelligence, and they are proposing that these findings should have real consequences that could completely change your Sea World experience. This issue could become complicated very quickly when you start asking what definition of "intelligence" the researchers (and speakers) are using to judge the dolphins as so smart. (We humans can't even seem to figure out what human intelligence is, and have been debating for years on whether intelligence can even be measured by any "IQ" index at all, besides about how to design an accurate and unbiased IQ test. To make that concrete, can you imagine how it would feel to be denied admission to a university because you scored too low on an IQ test? Thought so.) This point has been made four years ago, in another flurry of blogging about research on dolphin intelligence. Science blogger Coturnix from ScienceBlogs' A Blog Around the Clock cites anthropomorphism as the core problem; he writes:
"the concept of "intelligence" is often defined in human-like terms. If an animal can do stuff we do, it is deeemed smart. If it can be easily trained like our immature offspring can, it is smart. If it can talk, it is smart. If it builds structures, it is smart. BS. Intelligence has to be defined from the vantage point of that species: what makes ecological and evolutionary sense for that species to be able to do. Bees are smarter than ants because they have a more sophisticated ability to orient in space and time, not because they speak English, French and Chinese."
We have to be very careful in what we consider an intelligent creature. He also addresses the anatomy of dolphin brains as a tricky point on which to base our judgement of intelligence:
"Why should unrelated species of high intelligence have brains similar to us? They evolved their high intelligence at different times, in a different lineage, with different raw materials to work with, and under different ecological pressures, for different purposes. Many birds are very intelligent - but in their own way. Clarke's Nutcrackers, African Grey Parrots, pigeons, and most corvids (ravens, crows, jays) are highly intelligent creatures with huge capabilities for episodic memory (remembering spatial and temporal aspects of personal experiences), play, problem-solving, spatial orientation and perhaps even insight (planning for the future). And their brains look nothing like ours. Octopus is a very smart animal. Its brain looks nothing like ours. Macs and PCs can do all the same stuff (roughly), but look nothing like each other under the hood. Many kinds of harware can run the same kinds of software and do same kinds of things, so why should brains have to be all built the same way in order to make an animal "intelligent"?"
This is particularly interesting, since that first speaker for the AAAS's dolphin intelligence session started off her abstract saying the dolphin brain is bigger than ours, and has a higher ratio to body size than the brains of other nonhumans. That sort of statement reminds me that Neanderthals also had a larger brain capacity than humans...but were they necessarily smarter? (Thank you MCB61) Definitely gives us a reason to be critical of these sort of claims about "big brain = big intelligence".
Also, as Coturnix mentions, tons of animals are really smart too...like the species of octopus that uses coconut shells as armor (yeah, okay, I just really love this finding. How cool is that video?!) But really, intelligence is a really tough one to nail down, and if I were able to attend that AAAS session, I would be very wary of any claims directly linking neuroanatomy to intelligence, or even behavior to intelligence. (The behavior-intelligence link smells to me a hell of a lot like the behavior-consciousness link. If you've taken a Philosophy of Mind or an intro to Cognitive Science course, you may recognize that means you'll have to deal with the whole Chinese room problem, [Cal's own John Searle, anyone?] of the Strong AI concept.)
It is important to note, however, that aside from the issue of intelligence and right to moral standing, there are still very legitimate animals rights issues surrounding dolphins; lots of dolphins are killed by fishing practices every year, by demand for dolphin meat or by getting caught in nets meant for other fish; and concerns about captivity conditions and the extent to which dolphins are performers in sea-park shows as well.
MadCog
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