more intelligent beings on Earth

[gib65]

A thought occurred to me the other day;

 

We think of ourselves as the most intelligent animals on the planet. Why? Because we compare ourselves to all other animals and come to the conclusion that we display the greatest degree of intelligent behavior in response to our environment. But then I thought of something: if there were other animals on this planet who were more intelligent than us, would they make themselves available to us for comparison and judgement? If they were more intelligent than us, they would probably have the good sense to hide from us and they would probably have the ability to do so.

 

I'm not sure how they'd hide (this is speculation after all) or how they'd cover up their tracks - maybe they'd live underground; maybe in the oceans; maybe they're actually one of the known species like birds or dolphins but they only act oblivious as a means of staying inconspicuous.

 

Just a thought . If there were more intelligent species living with us on Earth, would they allow themselves to be known by us?

[bascule]

If there were more intelligent species living with us on Earth, would they allow themselves to be known by us?

 

I'm going to go with yes. What's the advantage to hiding? Depriving yourself of potential trade and resources?

[gib65]

Well, I'm being kind of cynical here. I'm thinking along the lines of how humans have a track record for terrorizing other animals and harming the environments they live in.

 

If another, more intelligent, species had any interest in us, they'd probably satisfy that interest best by intervening in our affairs inconspicuously. I'm sure they probably could partake in trade and commerce, and it might do them some good, but I'd guess they'd probably want to disguise themselves so that they blend in with us - kind of like the aliens in Men In Black (God, this is sounding stupid now ).

 

Also, I'm not talking about a species with an average IQ of 120 or 130 - more like 200 or 300. In other words, their doing trade and commerce with us would be like us doing trade and commerce with monkeys - might be a fun experiment, but hardly profitable.

[Mokele]

Because someone has to post this quote:

 

"...on planet Earth, man had always assumed he was more intelligent than dolphins because he achieved so much - the wheel, New York, wars, and so on - while all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man - for precisely the same reasons."

-- Douglas Adams

[Edtharan]

Would you considder yourself more intelegent than a Dog? But we haven't hidden ourselves from Dogs have we.

 

Why do we think that more intelegent beings would hide themselves from us?

[gcol]

Our measure of intelligence is anthropocentric, and skewed towards manipulating numbers, strings of alpha characters, and a test of vocabulary. It does not assess morality, ethics, unselfishness or humanitarian coexistence, probably because we cannot agree how these desirable properties can be quantified, tested and codified.

 

An intelligence test that included such attributes might well not place us so highly.

 

An extra-terrestrial species that placed emphasis on these traits might well have concluded that we should be left alone until we had grown up and acquired a better sense of values.

 

Interfering in other cultures here on earth has seldom, in my opinion, reaped mutual benefits. Not the right kind of intelligence, surely.

[bascule]

It does not assess morality' date=' ethics, unselfishness or humanitarian coexistence, probably because we cannot agree how these desirable properties can be quantified, tested and codified.

 

An intelligence test that included such attributes might well not place us so highly.[/quote']

 

Who would rank ahead of us?

[gcol]

Who would rank ahead of us?

 

I cannot honestly think of an earthly candidate, and I was guilty of going off-topic by widening the search area. I realise I was thinking of a previous thread to do with dinosaur intelligence, and the general idea that it was not reasonable to judge other species' intelligence only by our own narrow measurement system. Tongue in cheek, perhaps, I wondered if an intelligence test designed around dolphin attributes might show that, by their standards, they were more intelligent than us.

 

Sometimes I like to be plain awkward.

[Sisyphus]

How could we be surpassed in humanitarian virtue? The word is named after us.

[gcol]

How could we be surpassed in humanitarian virtue? The word is named[/i'] after us.

 

Oh, woe, I hoped I had humanitarian values, and now you have dragged what was a nice friendly word down into the gutter of mass murder and general mayhem.

 

Dammit, I shall have to find another word.

[padren]

I think we'd be seen as pretty noxious, the only reason we put up with each other is because we think we're the best we got, and even then, we don't pull any punches when it comes to genocide and the like.

 

If there was a more intelligent species on this earth, it would have to not be consuming the same resources, or be affected by our actions. In other words they wouldn't really fit in anywhere in what we know of physical reality.

 

Otherwise, we could do too many things for too stupid of reasons that would effect them too much, and I doubt that would be considered very tolerable.

 

Maybe if it was combined with some "hollow earth theory" or critters like in "the abyss" but it seems unlikely.

[Sisyphus]

Oh' date=' woe, I hoped I had humanitarian values, and now you have dragged what was a nice friendly word down into the gutter of mass murder and general mayhem.

 

Dammit, I shall have to find another word.[/quote']

 

Eh, seeing as how we're the only known species with anything like either ethics or abstract sympathy (even if its clear that neither is anything like universal), the name fits alright.

[Phi for All]

I'm not sure how they'd hide (this is speculation after all) or how they'd cover up their tracks - maybe they'd live underground;

What if they're in plain sight, but our sense of the plain sight they're in is not fully adapted yet? Ever notice how pre-Renaissance paintings lack a 3-D depth of field, often simply portraying far away objects as being at the top of the painting, while near objects are lower down? What if that was actually the way they "saw" things then? What if the eye is evolving to perceive better in multiple dimensions and eventually we may "discover" that there is more to some familiar beings than meets the "eye"?

 

Maybe rats ARE pan-dimensional beings....

[gib65]

Would you considder yourself more intelegent than a Dog? But we haven't hidden ourselves from Dogs have we.

 

Why do we think that more intelegent beings would hide themselves from us?

 

1) Dogs aren't a threat to us.

 

2) Wanting to hide is one thing' date=' but are we intelligent enough to be [i']able[/i] to hide from dogs? Maybe. Maybe not. Either way, the "more intelligent beings" I'm talking about would be.

 

Interesting idea, Phi, but I'm not so sure. Unfortunately, evolution gave us 3D vision long before medieval Europe came about (or is this fortunate ?). Evolution bestowed us with the right kind of neural wiring to see the world in 3D long before our ancenstors ventured into Europe. But I completely agree with you that vision is a perpetually evolving thing. Perhaps in another million years or so, we will just begin noticing these "camouflaged" beings.

 

Maybe rats ARE pan-dimensional beings....

 

Are they? What's "pan-dimensional"?

[ecoli]

Are they? What's "pan-dimensional"?

 

There existance spans multiple dimensions. (Read Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy to get the reference.

 

Interesting blog-like thing on the matter: http://crucial-systems.com/31375/pan_dimensional_beings_experience_things_differently

[Phi for All]

1) Interesting idea, Phi, but I'm not so sure. Unfortunately, evolution gave us 3D vision long before medieval Europe came about (or is this fortunate ?). Evolution bestowed us with the right kind of neural wiring to see the world in 3D long before our ancenstors ventured into Europe. But I completely agree with you that vision is a perpetually evolving thing. Perhaps in another million years or so, we will just begin noticing these "camouflaged" beings.

It's kind of like those pictures you have to stare at a while before you suddenly see the mystery picture. When someone describes it to you or shows you the trick you suddenly go, "Oh yeah!" But until they do it makes no sense.

 

A monumental thing has just happened but your brain reasons that what you are now able to see was there all along so it's really no big deal. Your, "Oh yeah!" moment doesn't get reported, the media is none the wiser and the history books will mention none of this to later generations. It will just be an unsung transition in biological perceptions.

 

I'm speculating that perhaps the real world has more things in it that our eyes haven't adjusted to, or more dimensions that are visible if we just suddenly get an, "Oh yeah!" moment. What if someone back in medieval Europe said to his buddy, "Just let your eyes unfocus as you stare beyond the tree and you can see a bit more depth back there". And his buddy squinted and blinked and suddenly said....

 

 

 

 

Are they? What's "pan-dimensional"?

It's another Douglas Adams bit like Mokele quoted. In Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy rats had their familiar little bodies in three dimensions but possessed other parts in higher dimensions. Their pan-dimensional nature fooled us into thinking they were insignificant while they were actually the ones running things.

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

What if they're in plain sight' date=' but our sense of the plain sight they're in is not fully adapted yet? Ever notice how pre-Renaissance paintings lack a 3-D depth of field, often simply portraying far away objects as being at the top of the painting, while near objects are lower down? What if that was actually the way they "saw" things then? What if the eye is evolving to perceive better in multiple dimensions and eventually we may "discover" that there is more to some familiar beings than meets the "eye"?

 

Maybe rats ARE pan-dimensional beings....[/quote']

Perhaps they're hidden in a Somebody Else's Problem field.

[gib65]

It's kind of like those pictures you have to stare at a while before you suddenly see the mystery picture. When someone describes it to you or shows you the trick you suddenly go' date=' "Oh yeah!" But until they do it makes no sense.

 

A monumental thing has just happened but your brain reasons that what you are now able to see was there all along so it's really no big deal. Your, "Oh yeah!" moment doesn't get reported, the media is none the wiser and the history books will mention none of this to later generations. It will just be an unsung transition in biological perceptions.

 

I'm speculating that perhaps the real world has more things in it that our eyes haven't adjusted to, or more dimensions that are visible if we just suddenly get an, "Oh yeah!" moment. What if someone back in medieval Europe said to his buddy, "Just let your eyes unfocus as you stare beyond the tree and you can see a bit more depth back there". And his buddy squinted and blinked and suddenly said....

 

 

 

 

It's another Douglas Adams bit like Mokele quoted. In [i']Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy[/i] rats had their familiar little bodies in three dimensions but possessed other parts in higher dimensions. Their pan-dimensional nature fooled us into thinking they were insignificant while they were actually the ones running things.

 

Maybe that guy's buddy was the first to notice that objects that are farther away are not only higher up in our visual field, but smaller. I mean, when you see someone close up and someone else of the same height behind him, your brain tells you they are the same size even though the one who's farther away takes up less space on your retina. So maybe it required a keen observer, like some of the renaissance artists, to notice that objects that are farther away need to be drawn smaller. When they openly professed this, it must have been an "oh yeah" moment for everyone.

 

So I guess we need someone like that to point out the "hidden beings" amount us... *** Twilight Zone Music ***

[Edtharan]

1) Dogs aren't a threat to us.

Well no, but what about other canines like wolves, etc? We don't hide ourselves from them.

 

2) Wanting to hide is one thing, but are we intelligent enough to be able to hide from dogs? Maybe. Maybe not. Either way, the "more intelligent beings" I'm talking about would be.

So being more intelligent does not mean that you can hide from a less intelligent organism. What you are getting at here is a supernatural entity. Any living creature needs to have a metabolisms (or at least produce entropy). This would leave some form of evidence that we could detect.

 

If you are speculating about beings that have technology so advanced that they nolonger produce entropy, then it is not in line with the original post.

 

Ever notice how pre-Renaissance paintings lack a 3-D depth of field, often simply portraying far away objects as being at the top of the painting, while near objects are lower down?

This was more of a stylistic aproach (in line with cubism, impressionism, etc). There is evidence of paintings well before the pre-renaissance times that show proper perspectives (in greek and roman paintings and images and even before). So it was not so much that they didn't "See" in 3D, they just chose not to represent it that way.

 

"Choosing not to" and "Unable to" are completely different things, humans have not "Advanced" to see things in 3D, just the style that we choose to represent that on paper (or canvas or other 2D medium) has changed, not us.

[ecoli]

This was more of a stylistic aproach (in line with cubism' date=' impressionism, etc). There is evidence of paintings well before the pre-renaissance times that show proper perspectives (in greek and roman paintings and images and even before). So it was not so much that they didn't "See" in 3D, they just chose not to represent it that way.

 

"Choosing not to" and "Unable to" are completely different things, humans have not "Advanced" to see things in 3D, just the style that we choose to represent that on paper (or canvas or other 2D medium) has changed, not us.[/quote']

 

Are you sure about that? I was pretty sure that, with the fall of the Roman empire, the methods used for this type of drawing was pretty much lost until they were 'rediscovered' in the Renassaince.

 

But, I'm not sure about this.

[gib65]

Well no, but what about other canines like wolves, etc? We don't hide ourselves from them.

 

Well, we certainly stay clear of them. We generally feel that so long as we're sheltered and protected from them - by inner city life, housing, defenses like guns, etc. - there is no reason to hide (although this might constitute a sort of "hiding" itself). If dangerous animals could systematically and strategically find us and hunt us down, we might be more inclined to put up some kind of pretense that made it look like we didn't exist.

 

So being more intelligent does not mean that you can hide from a less intelligent organism. What you are getting at here is a supernatural entity.

 

I'd prefer to leave the word "supernatural" out of this' date=' as I conceive of these beings as animals no less than any other known creature. Hiding or camouflaging is a very feasible [b']and natural[/b] survival tactic that thousands of species use all the time.

 

Any living creature needs to have a metabolisms (or at least produce entropy). This would leave some form of evidence that we could detect.

 

If you are speculating about beings that have technology so advanced that they nolonger produce entropy' date=' then it is not in line with the original post.

[/quote']

 

Of course no such technology could be invented. Technology is based on the laws of nature, so no technology could ever violate the laws of nature. But what about a technology that could transform the evidence these beings leave behind into a form that we wouldn't recognize as evidence - that is, a technology that doesn't get rid of the evidence, but changes how we perceive it. Maybe it doesn't even have to be based on technology - maybe their waste and other products of entropy take on a disguised form naturally.

 

Anyway, I realize this is all deeply speculative (which is why it's in the "speculation" forum ). I myself am not taking this idea seriously enough to defend it to the death, so if you really find the idea implausible, you might be surprised to find I'm inclined to agree. My original post was more of a question (Could a more intelligent species exist if they had a natural ability and drive to hide from us?), not a theory that I'm pushing. So far, I haven't come across any conclusive reasons for either a "yes" or "no" answer.

[Edtharan]

What if they're in plain sight, but our sense of the plain sight they're in is not fully adapted yet? Ever notice how pre-Renaissance paintings lack a 3-D depth of field, often simply portraying far away objects as being at the top of the painting, while near objects are lower down? What if that was actually the way they "saw" things then? What if the eye is evolving to perceive better in multiple dimensions and eventually we may "discover" that there is more to some familiar beings than meets the "eye"?

This is what it is in reponse to.

 

Are you sure about that? I was pretty sure that, with the fall of the Roman empire, the methods used for this type of drawing was pretty much lost until they were 'rediscovered' in the Renassaince.

Even so this invalidates the premise that we have changed from percieveing 2D to 3D.

 

Maybe it doesn't even have to be based on technology - maybe their waste and other products of entropy take on a disguised form naturally.

This would be an extremely unlikely occurance. That they evolved (or posessed technology that could do such a thing) so as to hide themselves, their waste products, their source of food/energy and their physical existance from us and our remote sensing devices (some of which have never been in nature before - eg measureing the gravity diferences that exist on Earth can even detect individual buildings - and there is no know way that you can block gravity).

 

My original post was more of a question (Could a more intelligent species exist if they had a natural ability and drive to hide from us?), not a theory that I'm pushing. So far, I haven't come across any conclusive reasons for either a "yes" or "no" answer.

Unless they violate the known laws of nature, then the answer is a definite No (or at least not in significant numbers or with a permanent station).

 

We can examine the entire surface of the Earth down to a few metres (with comercial satalites - I'm not sure what the military could do ). It is therfore unlikely that any operation could go undiscovered for long.