In the early 1900s, there was a horse named Clever Hans, who was famed for being able to solve arithmetic problems by stomping his hoof the same number of times as the answer to a math problem on a board that his handler wrote. However, what actually happened is that the owner would involuntarily relax a little when Hans reached the answer, and Hans took that cue to stop. Most people of the time thought that this was all a scam because the horse couldn’t really do math. But while the horse couldn’t do math, he could notice the minute differences in his handler’s face, which is arguably more impressive. He just changed the game to get the same desired result. Can we really say that Hans was unintelligent?

Clever Hans, the horse that couldn’t do math

Often when people are asked what separates humans and animals, they say intelligence. After all, how is a jellyfish supposed to be a Mensa member? But at the same time, like Hans, animals have many strong suits that circumvent our common measures of intelligence like IQ tests. To see whether humans are actually at the top, I’ll see how humans compare to animals in three main fields: communication, emotional intelligence, and problem solving ability. Obviously, not all animals have the same intelligence, so for each category, I’ll compare the best animal examples with the average human.

When it comes to communication, it’s pretty safe to say that humans take the cake. The main thing that humans have over animals is called displacement, where beings can talk about events that are not spatially or temporally present. This includes talking hypotheticals, recounting events from a long time ago, or expressing wishes for the long future. These are important for all human innovations because they allow us to create goals, debate, extrapolate from previous experiences, and collaborate, letting us use and grow our intelligence. Although animals like ants can do incredible things under collaboration, their scope of communication is ultimately confined to the recent past and basic things like food and appropriate building sites, which works for them, but doesn’t demonstrate advanced capabilities like that of a human. Probably the best evidence that human levels of communication aren’t unique to humans is the communication between the two bonobos Kanzi and Panbanisha. Both bonobos were raised by humans from an early age, and were spoken to in English, with both of them being taught Yerkish, a form of communication made by pressing keys on a keyboard. They actually reached a point where they could understand roughly 3000 English words and communicate with each other complexly in Yerkish. To some, it seemed that the only thing separating them from a human child is not having a throat that can produce all of the sounds of spoken languages. 

Kanzi the baboon, who knows more English than I know French after taking it for five years.

Many animals don’t have emotions on a complex level, but ones that do seem to have them can sense emotions at a higher level than humans. Clever Hans is a prime example. He sensed the involuntary relaxation of the handler, which most humans probably couldn’t do. Similarly, the reason that dogs are common support animals is because they can sense human emotions and act in a way that comforts them. Furthermore, animals have an ability to control their emotions, a clear sign of emotional intelligence. An example is my own dog, who sometimes clearly wants to eat human food, but restrains herself from biting my hand to eat it because she knows it’s wrong to bite people.

Dogs always know how to contribute positive energy into our lives.

Overall, humans are pretty good at problem-solving. Even opening a door might be impossible for some species, so the fact that humans can get through each day with different challenges and difficult solutions is comparatively impressive. However, one class of species rivals humans: cephalopods. Including octopi and squids, octopi show incredible situational awareness, generally gathering information with their eight tentacles before processing that information to solve a problem. Ever since I saw the Mark Rober video with an octopus seamlessly going through a tough maze as if it was casually strolling through, I realized that they could probably be more intelligent than humans but just didn’t have the chance to create a complex civilization.

There is no proof that octopi are not aliens.

Seeing the above comparisons, humans are more intelligent than animals in many areas. However, animals can be superior to humans, and shouldn’t be underestimated. Regardless of species, we’re all trying to survive, and all species have done their best to find areas to excel in. Just as we can’t judge a human by its ability to fend off predators, we can’t judge a porcupine based on its ability to do complex tasks, as long as both species live long enough to create a second generation. Furthermore, there is a heavy human bias to any measure of animal intelligence, as we are basing them off of the ways humans express intelligence. I just think that it’s fascinating how often beings that we regard as “simple” can understand us better than we understand ourselves.