Are you smarter than a chimp? (Full Version)

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Owner59 -> Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/4/2007 6:00:31 PM)

http://www.abcnews.go.com/print?id=3948256

In a memory competition of man versus chimp, Japanese researchers found that chimpanzees performed better than humans.
"No one could imagine that chimpanzees -- young chimpanzees at the age of 5 -- have a better performance in a memory task than humans," Kyoto University researcher Tetsuro Matsuzawa said in a statement.



sappatoti -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/4/2007 6:09:23 PM)

I'm seeing this memory test as a bit flawed. The chimp, as far as science knows, has nothing more to think about than the sequence of numbers flashing on the screen. At the end, he or she gets his food.

The humans taking the test... unless they could completely clear their mind of all other thoughts, such as bills to pay, how their families are doing, what they're missing on the telly, their projects at work, and all other manner of thoughts that each one of us constantly think about... were at a significant disadvantage.

Just my thoughts as seen through my maybe not-so-knowledgeable eyes.



Real0ne -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/4/2007 6:29:02 PM)



I think a lot has to do with training your mind to it in the first place.

The chimps have been trained to do just that and the kids have not.

Now lets buy the kids one of those games that do that and i will lay bets the kids kick the crap out of the chimps



dcnovice -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/4/2007 6:50:54 PM)

quote:

Are you smarter than a chimp?


Probably not.



bipolarber -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/4/2007 9:14:41 PM)

This story has been everywhere this newscycle... a perfect example of how the media mis-represents a scientific finding, and tries to twist it into else: The chimps involved with the test were trained to do this. The human test subjects weren't. Like any video game, you become more proficient with practice. Secondly, all it supposedly proved was that the short term memory of chimps was better than a human's. Yeah, and? Dogs can smell better and hear better than humans too... does that say anything about how we are "less than" dogs? The club tailed dragonfly is the most well endowed animal on the planet, it's penis making up almost a full third of its body mass. Does this mean God loves me less because he gave me an average 6.5" penis? Hardly.
    Lets see the chimp bash out a script for Hamlet... or even something brainless like a sitcom or a Gor novel... Have the chimps beaten us to the moon? Did the chimps record any top 40 albums recently? ("The Monkees" don't count.)
    If this proves anything at all, it proves that there's more to animals than we give them credit for. Maybe they deserve better treatment by humans because of it.



stella41b -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 1:37:27 AM)

ANIMAL SOLUTIONS IN ASIA

A new trend is emerging in Asian countries in customer service departments and call centres where more and more international corporations are employing primates in a new innovative way to reduce labour costs even further.

We can reveal that Microsoft was the first corporation to do this several years ago when they first started training orang utans from the Borneo jungles as IT experts and computer programmers to work on the development of Windows Vista. Microsoft felt the move to be so successful that they even gave the orang utans free rein to create their own solutions in various areas of the operating system, including hardware support, multimedia capabilities and security. The orang utans are paid in bananas grown locally, and this means a saving of $500 off the cost of the licences to new users and it is widely believed that the orang utans have made the operating system more user-friendly than Windows XP.

Another increasingly popular area in which employing primates is becoming increasingly popular is healthcare. Many US health insurers have secretly allowed baboons and chimpanzees to make important decisions with regard to their policies and the NHS in the UK use orang utans to update medical records from audio files sent over the Internet, which saves the British Ministry of Health hundreds of thousands of pounds every year.

Airlines are also finding primates very useful as baggage handlers. In fact Continental Airlines reports a 35% drop in claims for lost or misplaced baggage over the past year after employing mountain gorillas as baggage handlers on many routes between the United States and South East Asia.

However employing primates can often lead to problems as MacDonalds have recently learned to their cost in China. In a special pilot scheme they employed gorillas in ten restaurants around Shanghai. The experiment was considered unsuccessful as customers complained that the gorillas scared children, threw food at customers, screamed and made threatening gestures and some spent time beating their chests and even throwing customers out of restaurants. However the food prepared by the gorillas was generally of the same standard as in other MacDonalds restaurants and the service was just as quick.

However the whole scheme was abandoned after a MacDonalds drive in restaurant was completely demolished by gorillas ten miles outside Beijing, by the manager known as 'Bubba', who became enraged when 'Giggles' another male gorilla started to make advances on 'Doris' his mate. Fortunately the restauarnt had just closed when the incident happened so no humans were involved but it took over 50 police officers and vets to contain the gorillas. Initial findings appear to suggest that Giggles had been drinking root beer before the incident and this had made him feel very frisky. Plans to introduce a new banana flavoured milkshake were abandoned after it was unclear whether any of it was ever sold to humans.

Ronald MacDonald was unavailable for comment.



subfever -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 5:08:58 AM)

Ah yes... even more nonsense to reinforce people's beliefs that they need government to take care of them. After all we're even dumber than freaking chimps... [:D] 



Sinergy -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 7:51:30 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Real0ne



I think a lot has to do with training your mind to it in the first place.

The chimps have been trained to do just that and the kids have not.

Now lets buy the kids one of those games that do that and i will lay bets the kids kick the crap out of the chimps



I have a suggestion, test which group remembers where the traps and ambushes are in Halo better.

Sinergy



sappatoti -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 7:56:39 AM)

I'd definitely be dumber than a chimp with Halo... never could get started in that game... guess I don't have the Halo gene.



EPGAH -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 8:00:42 AM)

Why is everyone so big on HALO? FEAR was better in every way that counted, especially the physics/ragdoll engine(s?) (Although they don't have vehicles yet! Sniff![:(])
Or even better, Gears of War! Now THAT is a game that has it all together!



ghitaPVH -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 8:00:59 AM)

Sappa...you have to be youger than 18 for that game....Im compleatly lost with halo too...but the 17yo UM has absolutly the entire game memorized....from about two days after he first got it in fact.....



sappatoti -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 8:11:11 AM)

Perhaps you should invite some chimps over and see who the King of Halo would be... might be a better test of intelligence than this recent test that the media so blatantly hyped.



Sinergy -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 8:24:46 AM)


I am rather amused that I broke a thread about whether one is smarter than a chimpanzee by mentioning an extremely violent computer / video game.

Go me.

Sinergy



sappatoti -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 8:29:48 AM)

Kudos to you. I hadn't thought about that irony.

:-)



philosophy -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 10:13:13 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sinergy


I am rather amused that I broke a thread about whether one is smarter than a chimpanzee by mentioning an extremely violent computer / video game.

Go me.

Sinergy



(in a transparent effort to break the thread again)

civilisation II rox!
civilisation IV sux!



Zensee -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 12:10:34 PM)

I don't see where in the text there is any claim that chimps might be smarter. That was the OP's spin and more of a teaser line than an interpretation of the study, I'd think.

The chimps performed better on memory tasks, not playwrighting. Memory is one aspect of brain function in all creatures with a brain, it is not the defining quality of human consciousness. Animals often excel humans in functional abilities (stronger, faster, better eyesight...), that does not make them human nor does it make them better or worse than humans, just different. You'd think this crowd would understand different.

Why do people take offense at discoveries that hint we humans could do with a little more humility? We are so special that we can use the earth and its other inhabitants without regard for anything other than our own comfort. Where has that attitude got us?


Z.



sappatoti -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 12:27:27 PM)

It wasn't just the OP's spin... that's how the media outlets hyped the presentation of the report to the masses.

I watched the ABC report on its Nightly News broadcast the other night. The teasers leading up to the story were spoken with lines like "Do you think you know who's smarter between a chimp and a human? You'd be surprised to find out..."

I think that one part of the point being made here is how the media spins and hypes reports of this nature as "breaking", "developing", or even "earth-shattering" news... must see spectacles.

Personally, I find the study flawed and have said so, perhaps not as succinctly as now.



missturbation -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 1:15:24 PM)

quote:

Are you smarter than a chimp?


Nope.
But i am smarter than the average bear.
Yogi 



Sinergy -> RE: Are you smarter than a chimp? (12/5/2007 1:27:11 PM)



On a related note, I suspect the issue is more about the difference between associative and cognitive memory. 

An easy way to think of this would be to consider two examples.

1)  I need to balance my checkbook.  Associative memory is useless in this regard because the fact that my checkbook is the same color blue as my old Fiat from 1979 wont help.  So cognitive memory must be used.  It must be dredged up how to perform the calculations.  I must transfer numbers from point A to point B.  I must use addition.  And so on.

2)  I see a stove.  My associative memory kicks in with helpful associations of the time when I was 4 years old and I burned my hand on a stove.  It throws in other associations with burning my mouth on soup I pulled off the stove.  Lighting my joint with the stove.  etc.  In this example, my associative memory which spends all of it's time making associations to disparate data points in order to protect me kicks into overdrive.  I check the stove for heart.

I suspect chimpanzees spend most of their time over in the intuitive / associative memory, and much less time in the cognitive / abstract reasoning memory side.  It might be that this test is skewed to reward those whose life has been genetically programmed for survival by the use of the associative brain.

Sinergy



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