dipole
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As human beings, it's easy to look at other animals and imagine they are inferior to us in most ways. Sure, most animals are faster than us, but they run on four legs and we run on two. And most animals have far better hearing and smell, but we tend to have better eyesight. We don't have sharp claws, warm fur, or large teeth, but we have incredibly dexterous hands which can build any tool we need. These sort of physical attributes are not what I'm talking about.
What I mean is that when you look at how wide our range of cognitive and physical abilities are - that is, the range of acquired skills we are capable of, it can sometimes feel like animals are just simply inferior. Humans can perform complicated cognitive tasks like poetry, humor and mathematics, and we can still perform incredible physical feats like juggling, acrobatics, or rock climbing.
But sometimes there are really amazing examples of animals performing cognitive or physical abilities that seem to surpass those of human beings. For example, look how effortlessly this otter "juggles" a rock.
And look how effortlessly this chimpanzee plays a memory game.
The otter's sense of proprioception, and the chimpanzees short-term memory seem to actually greatly surpass that of most humans. So I wonder, what other examples exist out there? Please post some if you know of any.
What I mean is that when you look at how wide our range of cognitive and physical abilities are - that is, the range of acquired skills we are capable of, it can sometimes feel like animals are just simply inferior. Humans can perform complicated cognitive tasks like poetry, humor and mathematics, and we can still perform incredible physical feats like juggling, acrobatics, or rock climbing.
But sometimes there are really amazing examples of animals performing cognitive or physical abilities that seem to surpass those of human beings. For example, look how effortlessly this otter "juggles" a rock.
And look how effortlessly this chimpanzee plays a memory game.
The otter's sense of proprioception, and the chimpanzees short-term memory seem to actually greatly surpass that of most humans. So I wonder, what other examples exist out there? Please post some if you know of any.
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