[.ca] Clever as a Fox: Animal Intelligence and What It Can ... (ISBN 0674008707)

Funny, smart book:
Yoerg's intellectual history of the study of animal intelligence is informative and witty. She's tough on everyone--from behaviorists to cognitive science types to animal rights kooks--because she seems to want more than pat answers to the questions of who's smart and who isn't. There are plenty of animal stories for readers who enjoy them (who doesn't?) and plenty of meaty issues for those who like a intellectual battles. Altogether a readable, clever book.

Frustratingly Interesting:
The author challenges a number of traditional assumptions about the nature of intelligence and about our ability to 'rate' the intelligence of various animals based on our preconceived notions of either 'great chain of being' thinking or on a Darwinian evolutionay model. Why, she asks, do we rate behaviors that appear equally sophisticated as indicative of different degrees of intelligence (or non-intelligent instinctual reactions) based not on the behaviors themselves but on the 'type' of animals that exhibit them. We are far more likely to give a primate credit for exhibiting problem solving ability than we are to a scrub jay even though both routinely perform very similar actions. In addition the author offers a wide variety of ancedotal evidence for intelligence among species that normally are not regarded as being among the sharpest knives in the drawer. She also quesitons the various defintions of 'intelligence' concluding that although we use the word and think we can understand it, none of us can really offer an adequate defintion. And it is herein that my frustration lies. Our author raises a lot of questions and debunks a lot of myths. But I am left, after reading the book, asking myself exactly what MORE do I know now about animal intelligence than I did before. Perhaps I should, like Socrates, be happy just to become more knowledgeable of my own ignorance, but, to be honest, I want to know more about what THIS author thinks are some answers to the very questions she's raised.

Animals and their tireless human examiners:
In this accessible and smart book, Sonja Yoerg writes that as a child in Vermont she "spent a lot of time lying on the rooty ground under shady trees, looking up through the overlapping layers of impossible green," observing bugs and plants, watching and waiting with an eagle eye, preoccupied during summers by the thrilling specifics of the natural world, until fall, when "all would flame out in red, yellow, orange, take the dive of Newton's apple, and contribute to the leaf pile goal line for touch football." Even as a kid she had the instincts of a scientist - and likely played touch football, too. She brings this brainy, sturdy, and playful approach to this book, too. She is self-aware but not self-absorbed. It's a pleasure. This is not a polemic either in support of or against animal rights. It is a serious conversation regarding the yardsticks used to define and then assess animal intelligence. Dr. Yoerg is especially interested in the origins and the meaning of the persistent human urge to order the animal world. What is animal intelligence?, she asks, and then, even more importantly, Why has it been so important to our society to measure it? She asserts that the ancient (and contemporary) urge to design a hierarchy of intelligence ( usually God first, man next, then apes, and so on) says more about us than about the animals that behavioral and biological research has (often foolishly) refused to observe in context, but instead has sent through mazes, tested in boxes, and hypothesized in a variety of ways over time - for a variety of reasons. Sometimes deeply-held beliefs are turned on their ear. For example it is widely assumed that sheep flocks respond to herding dogs, who in turn are responding to the rancher's whistle. But Gujarti shepherds in India "whistle just like their British counterparts" while the dogs often sleep. The sheep respond to the shepherd's whistle. The dogs protect the flocks from predators - but the sheep "herd" themselves. Dr. Yoerg supplies the reader with some surprising tidbits. "During the Middle Ages, all sorts of creatures were convicted of criminal behavior and tried by the courts," and later, "In 1386 a sow was convicted of the murder of a child and was led to the public execution dressed in man's clothes." (pp. 71-2) Her point is that human opinions regarding the animal world have been a highly mutable thing - subject to religion, politics, economics, and emotion. Dr. Yoerg offers a reasonably detailed historic overview of this contentious field - from Aristotle to the middle ages to Darwin, the behaviorists, the Germans and Gestalt theory as advanced by Wolfgang Kohler, cognitive psychology, and many more. In addition, rather than being a collection of 'things you might not have known about animals,' it is an orderly and thoughtful discussion. There is sly humor (why doesn't a dog use a mirror to right an inside-out ear?) and wealth of interesting information here - why some animals (the rat, the crow, the coyote and the fox for example) are comparatively unpopular in the US - and are reputed to be 'cunning,' 'wily,' 'crafty,' and 'sneaky,' whereas others (dogs, cats, squirrels) are more often described as 'clever,' 'smart,' or 'cute.' (Disney and Warner Brothers and TV have a lot to do with it, Dr. Yoerg asserts.) Animal research - and the fact that our pets kill other animals. (Quoting another writer, A.H. Herzog: "If each pet cat in the US ate only two mice, chipmunks, or baby birds each year, the number of animals slaughtered by pets would greatly exceed the number of animals used for research.") Neoteny - the existence of juvenile features (big eyes, round head - the cuteness factor) in the adult of the species- is a contributor, too, in human opinions about the species. The dicey matter of different cultures' treatment of the dog is discussed. Notions of love and attachment - and a convincing send up of behaviorism - are included.. Dr. Yoerg has taken a wide array of material and organized it and presented it in an accessible and lively way. She ranges widely and well. The bibliography names over a hundred books and articles, and the index is excellent. She comes to no sweeping conclusions. Instead she has begun a variety of thoughtful and thought-provoking conversations. She's a terrific teacher. A great read.

AN INTELLIGENT SURVEY OF THE FIELD OF ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE:
"If God were to hold out enclosed in His right hand all Truth, and in His left hand just the active search for Truth, though with that the condition that I should ever err therein, and should say to me: Choose! I should humbly take His left hand and say: Father! Give me this one; absolute Truth belongs to Thee alone."--Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1781) Recently someone remarked, "Only a weak mind seeks ultimate answers." Not so. The error is not in seeking ultimate answers but in the presumptuous boast to have found them. One should say, "Only a naive person claims to possess ultimate answers." I believe that the author of CLEVER AS A FOX would agree. In her lucid and fascinating exposition of animal intelligence and what it can teach us about ourselves, Sonja Yoerg points out that science is not a closed system, but a discipline that leaves doors open to entertain new paradigms of reality. "In science as in life," writes the author, "the goal is to find that elusive middle ground somewhere between chaos and dogma, a theory that is a meaningful arrangement of everything we know about how animal minds work. At their best, theories are headquarters for facts. At their worst, they are prisons." In this spirt, Yoerg surveys the confused (and confusing) field of research relating to animal intelligence. "The literature \oon this subject\c," she writes, "is a mess of methodological pitfalls (and pratfalls), ingenious designs, reckless interpretation, muddled theory, fascinating possibilities, and philosophical and moral dark alleys." Are dogs smarter than cats? Why do we consider mammals to be more intelligent than reptiles? Are predators more intelligent than prey? Why do we think that dolphins are so smart? And what IS thinking anyway? What IS intelligence and how do we measure it? How does Darwin's theory of evolution by means of natural selection (the survival of the fittest) unwittingly . . . always unwittingly . . . equip intelligent animals for success? What is the payoff in being smart? "The only currency that evolution recognizes," writes Yoerg, \ois\c survival of more kids." In other words, for a species the secret of the success is reproduction--the ability to survive long enough to pass on one's genes to offspring and to future generations. Yoerg examines in some detail divergent schools such as behaviorism and cognitive science, and comments on the concept of artificial intelligence (computer technology). Her answers are few; her questions are many. If you are searching for "ultimate answers," this book is not for you. It falls short of arriving at a clearly defined goal of unshakable scientific truth. The path along which the author guides us, however, is an intriguing one. Yoerg points us, as did Lessing, to choose "the left hand of God." CLEVER IS A FOX is not a "keeper" like Darwin's ORIGIN OR SPECIES or THE DESCENT OF MAN. Nevertheless, it is an intriguing study of animal intelligence, written engagingly by an author who has intelligently surveyed her field.

A"Great Read" for a scientific overview:
I purchased Ms. Yoerg's book in San Diego (her hometown). Little did I know that I bought a signed copy! I felt the book was very interesting, and written with great wit. Ms. Yoerg knows her stuff, and has done extensive research in her field. I found her animal/insect comparisions informative, and quite funny (you'll know what I mean when you read about Portia, the spider). I am currently an undergraduate, and will be using her book for some of my research. I would highly recommend this book for anyone who wants a good overview of animal behavior and intelligence.