Intelligent life

[MaxP]

so im reading this well brainyfied book about the serach for intelligent life.
maybe i have a subconcious wish to try and get some of this intellegence for myself

the author made a well valid point that made me stop reading and have a think myself..
he says that half the problem is that we would automatical assume that all intelegence is like ours and that we belittle other forms of intelligence becasue it dosnt conform to our way of thinking.

an example he says is the dolphin.
the dolphin is an extreamly intellegent animal, far greater than many people realise. he says it been documented where a group of dolphins will send a few individual's out to scout a new area, these individuals then discuss the results as a small group within the bigger group and its these few dolphins that seem to agree a plan that th whole group adhears too.
he also says that dolhpins have a very deep and complex structure of language and do appear to participate in details teo way conversations.
he also points out that dolphins regulaly perform actions of a selfless heroic nature, this is the preserve of high intellegence.

so you allready knew of a lot of that but heres the twist...
if an alien intellegence was to come to earth and it was equaly capable of communicating with humans and dolhpins, which (man or dolphin) would the alien consider to be the higher intellegence ?

ofcourse we would assume that as we have technology, writing , money , politics , weapons.... its obvious that we are far more intelligent.

the dolphins might reply they are the more advanced intelligence, as they have No war No Famine No Crime, no one gets murdered and no one goes hungry. in addition to this they live in total harmourny with their surroundings and acutly intune with the enviroment.

oh bugger....!!!

as the autor writes, these are all holy grails that the human race can only wish to achive and in all honesty will never ever conqure.

makes you think dosnt it...are we being a bit premature and selfsurving by suggesting we are the only higlhly intelligent beings on this planet let along among the stars.

the book is well worth a read.
Title Looking for Aliens
Authors Jenny Randles and Peter Hough
part of "the Ufo Files" books

[dan288]

hmmm i would love to see a human an alien and a dolphin arguing about who is more intelligent

[Shambles]

Thank god we don't get preyed on by tiger sharks and killer whales, or stranded on coastlines, or have nematode worms living in us, or get lost when relying on the earths magnetic field (actually we do don't we).

I'm also glad we can survive in or out of water.

If we do get "visited" by alien life forms, I just hope they can't swim, which will give us a slight advantage over dolphins when vying to be top dog

Good post max

[blaggard]

Thank god we don't get preyed on by tiger sharks and killer whales, or stranded on coastlines, or have nematode worms living in us, or get lost when relying on the earths magnetic field (actually we do don't we).

I'm also glad we can survive in or out of water.

If we do get "visited" by alien life forms, I just hope they can't swim, which will give us a slight advantage over dolphins when vying to be top dog

Good post max

It might be better if they could ONLY swim!

[MaxP]

It might be better if they could ONLY swim!

wasnt that a simpsons episode ?

[Soulassassin]

But what if the aliens are far superior intelligence to us?
Then treat us as we treat lesser intelligent species than us...may be for example a cockroach...