'Birdbrain' Is a Misnomer. Crows Make Decisions Faster Than We Can

Re:'Birdbrain' Is a Misnomer. Crows Make Decisions Faster Th... by Animats on Sunday November 15, 2026 @02:17PM (#50509768)

Intelligence has evolved on Earth at least three times - mammals, corvids, and octopuses. All the mammals have roughly the same brain architecture. But the corvids are not on the same evolutionary branch, and have a different neuron design and a different brain architecture. "Such behavioral flexibility might seem unexpected because a layered cerebral cortex, the highest integration center in the mammalian brain, is not existant in birds."[1] So there's more than one way to do intelligence. Useful to know for AI purposes.

Octopuses have a much more distributed system than mammals, suggesting a quite different approach is possible.

[1] https://niederlab.org/Nieder%20(2017)%20COBS.pdf

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:'Birdbrain' Is a Misnomer. Crows Make Decisions Faster Th... by greymalik on Sunday November 15, 2026 @03:15PM (#50510260)

Adrian Tchaikovsky explores each of these kinds of intelligence across his sci-fi Children of Time trilogy.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:'Birdbrain' Is a Misnomer. Crows Make Decisions Faster Th... by Computer0 on Sunday November 15, 2026 @03:28PM (#50510364)

Spiders?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:'Birdbrain' Is a Misnomer. Crows Make Decisions Faster Th... by olivermuty on Sunday November 15, 2026 @03:33PM (#50510419)

Are written like mammals in this book, just with a different way of comminucating.

Tiger shrimp are also in the picture eventually.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:'Birdbrain' Is a Misnomer. Crows Make Decisions Faster Th... by shostack on Sunday November 15, 2026 @03:36PM (#50510438)

Cato is actually more of a mantis shrimp.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:'Birdbrain' Is a Misnomer. Crows Make Decisions Faster Th... by shostack on Sunday November 15, 2026 @03:37PM (#50510446)

Yes, and the third book, Children of a Memory, which features the corvids, is particularly interesting in the age of AI and questioning what intelligence really is.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:'Birdbrain' Is a Misnomer. Crows Make Decisions Faster Th... by larodi on Sunday November 15, 2026 @03:38PM (#50510452)

like Siglip, Dino and LFM :D

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:'Birdbrain' Is a Misnomer. Crows Make Decisions Faster Th... by glenstein on Sunday November 15, 2026 @03:55PM (#50510640)

Can we count mammals and corvids separately if their common ancestor was already set on the path to intelligence? The amazing book Other Minds by Peter Godfrey Smith hinges it's argument on minds evolving twice, on the fact that the common ancestor of humans and octopi was probably a simple worm-like creature that had little or nothing in the way of a brain or consciousness.

I have to imagine that corvids and mammals had a common ancestor with more working brain structure. Though maybe you can make the case that "intelligence" showing up later on isn't the same thing as simply having a brain.

But it's much more impressive to me that there's convergent evolution from brainless to brain-having, than from brains to intelligent brains. Don't get me wrong, it's still awesome but doesn't feel like an out of nowhere path for natural selection to take.

[ Parent | on HN ]