Beginning
One early November morning, while the days were getting colder, I noticed that Franje, a female chimpanzee, was gathering all the straw from her bedroom. She took it under her arm out onto the large island at the Burgers' Zoo, in the Dutch city of Arnhem. Her behavior took me by surprise. First of all, Franje had never done this before, nor had we ever seen other chimps drag straw outside.
This book explores the oddities and complexities of animal cognition ― in crows, dolphins, parrots, sheep, wasps, bats, chimpanzees, and bonobos ― to reveal how smart animals really are, and how we’ve underestimated their abilities for too long. Did you know that octopuses use coconut shells as tools, that elephants classify humans by gender and language, and that there is a young male chimpanzee at Kyoto University whose flash memory puts that of humans to shame? Reading this book will convince you to rethink everything you thought you knew about animal ― and human ― intelligence.
2 comments:
This sounds like a fascinating read! I'm always intrigued by the animal kingdom because surely we can't be the only "intelligent" species on this planet! Especially when there is octopusses around who are so smart! I clearly need to add this to my reading list! I hope you have a lovely weekend :)
Juli @ A Universe in Words
Wow, it sounds so interesting! I definitely want to read more, I love reading about animals. Thanks for sharing :)
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