Brains…
I was reluctant in choosing a suitable title for this post…
When I watch my dog or cat navigate through the house with perfect precision, I can’t help but wonder. What’s going on inside their heads? I’ve narrowed it down to two possibilites. It’s either muscle memory from countless repetitions or they have the ability to draw the floor plan in their minds, similar to humans. But even for me, it’s tough to produce a two dimensional picture of the floor plan of a house in my mind. Instead, I can visually think my way through. I can imagine that I’m walking out of my room and taking a left down the hallway, where I take a right into the living room. I pass the couch to my left, with artwork to my right. I can’t tell you the number of steps I need to take, but I can think it through in my mind. I believe the animals are doing the exact same thing.
I’m a somewhat experienced hunter, having been sitting in the woods every season since I was just 10 years old. I’ve come to know a fair amount about the patterns of the animals, most notably deer. They have intricate trail systems spanning for miles upon miles through the woods. Trails that the average person wouldn’t even recognize as they’re so complex. Yet the deer don’t just make new trails whenever, they follow the existing ones. We frequently create new trails with our 8 wheeler out through the swamps. We do it every two years or so, to keep the vegetation in a constant cycle so we don’t destroy the land. Every time we create a new trail, there is countless deer sign (prints, rubs, scrapes, poop) up and down it. They’ll follow the trail, probably because it’s just easy walking, but it’s the fact that they use the trails that caught my curiosity.
If we don’t create a new trail, neither do they (assuming that there aren’t any other significant changes to the woods). So here’s miles of trails that the deer systematically, and predictably, follow throughout the year. They’re not randomly walking these trails, which means that they have to be doing the exact same thing that we do when we walk the floor plan of our house.
It makes sense that other animals would be able to do such similar things with their mind. It’s necessary for survival. Imagine the animals that couldn’t remember their way back to safety. Don’t you think natural selection would have killed these off very early? Of course.
I think that the difference between their minds and ours is very little. If anything, it was only our body that enabled us to rise to where we are today. Had we not developed the capabilities to vocalize, use our opposable thumbs, etc. our brains would be little use to us. Passing down the acquired knowledge and skills would be infinitely harder (although we frequently see this, for instance in crows which was recently discussed at TED). It’s almost as if our brain is capable of nearly anything, it’s just waiting for the necessary mechanical pieces to finish the puzzle. Evidence of this might be shown in the latest experiments with animals and humans controlling computers using thoughts. The monkey with the robotic arm is exceptionally eye-opening. So isn’t it possible that the brain size is directly proportional to the complexity of the body? Obviously, as you look at various animals their respective brains change in size with their body size.
My apologies if this is dated or debunked. I’m just thinking out loud.