Intelligenve Without A Brain Flashcards
Intelligence
Information processing
Learning speed
Hick’s law
Press space bar when colour of disc on screen changes
More discs= slower reaction time
High IQ= shallower gradient of increase in reaction time (IQ represents processing speeds?)
Pigeons better at multiple discs than humans
Learning speed
Bees can learn in two rewarded trials but human infants need 28 (highest of all animals tested)
Increasing k index= more trials
Ethical: can starve bees for motivation but not humans
K index
Ratio of brain for biological functions to executive function
Anthropocentric definitions of intelligence
Can define certain human abilities as intelligent and look for these in animals
Eg. Theory of mind. Tool use, numeracy, language social skills
Semantics
Definitions of human behaviour have to be adapted to be applied to animals
Ignores how they develop
Teaching
Observed in ants tandem running but the definition was manipulated so it could classify the behaviour as teaching
Episodic memory
Humans remember specific episodes/events
Also seen in caching scrubjays: remember what they cached and where so can access preferred meal worms after two days , or nuts after week when meal worms have rotted
Slime mould
Unicellular
Solve maze task in shortest route
Groups when food scarce and send out tendrils in proportion to availability of food
Can show optimal transport link routes by using food density to represent population
Embodiment
Give a simple brain a body and it can produce a behaviour
Hopeful monster theory
Large changes in evolution are caused by macromutations
Eg. Humans and speech: diverged from chimps relatively recently
Seems unlikely that humans evolved all speech-related mechanisms in this time
Other primates probably have building blocks of language
Chimps able to use sign language eg nim, Washo (water bird)
Can we define intelligence in terms of evolutionary fitness?
Intelligent behaviour as an adaptive outcome rather than a mechanism
Consequences: doesn’t matter if intelligent behaviour comes from unintelligent mechanisms
Have an inclusive definition
