ALMOST all intelligent creatures, be they parrots, sharks or human beings, are vertebrates. This is inconvenient for anyone trying to understand the nature of intelligence because it means, by and large, that he can study only how it has developed down a single evolutionary path. But there is an important exception. Molluscs branched off to form their own lineage before any organism had a spine—and one particular class of them, the cephalopods, has since become smart enough to rival some vertebrates.
Modern cephalopods are octopuses, squid, cuttlefish and an unusual shelled creature called the nautilus. Octopuses, in particular, are rated as intelligent. Some carry coconut shells across the seafloor to assemble shelters. Other have worked out that fishing boats offer easy pickings. There have even been cases of them climbing out of aquarium tanks to raid a neighbouring tank that contained a tasty morsel. Many researchers would like to know whether these behaviours have come about in a different way from vertebrate intelligence, or if there are common traits that are necessary for smart creatures of any sort.
Caroline Albertin,...
from The Economist: Science and technology http://ift.tt/1TuRXnG
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