This is a headgum podcast. I don't know what to think I don't know what to say.

Yeah, that's all right.

That's okay.

I don't know anything.

Hello and welcome to Factually, I'm Adam Conover.

Thank you so much for joining me on the show again.

We have got a hell of a Galaxy Brain episode for you today.

You know in the last couple months we've done topics about the existence or

non-existence of free will and other big philosophical topics.

Well this week we have an episode that is going to make you change how you think about the nature of intelligence itself.

For real. But you know what, before we get into it, let's back up for a minute.

Just what is intelligence at all? In our daily lives, when we're not thinking too hard,

we have heuristics that we use to help us decide whether or not another being is intelligent,

and it's usually based on how similar that being seems to us.

The more like us it is, the easier it is for us to understand it as intelligent.

So for instance, I've concluded that my dog is at least somewhat intelligent because in addition to being in communication with me about walking going to the bathroom or food, I can also see her dream and I dream so that makes me go, she's is similarly intelligent to me in at least some ways

a crow shows that it's intelligent by using tools and solving problems just like a human does and an octopus shows is intelligent by

changing colors when it's frightened and by generally acting like a weirdo little

sea freak just like me when I'm in the ocean. When we recognize that another being feels, thinks, and experiences sort of like we do it

changes how we think about that creature. That's part of why some people feel okay

eating plants but not animals because plants seem a lot less like us than animals do.

They seem less intelligent.

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