How to Define Animal IQ?

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Gollum

Likewise, most animals which sound to be bright don’t really use tool. They can manipulate them intelligently, like the corvids do, build very complex things (nests, anthills ...), but none of them build any tool that it will keep for other tasks. The only real tool animals use is their mind and their body.

Capuchin monkeys, corvids, dophins, chimps, and gorillas all make tools and hang on to them. Often not for very long because tools made out of twigs and sea sponges aren't terribly durable, but they do.

Actually the example with the monkeys is a little weird because they're making tools too big to move (stone hammer and anvil for cracking brazil nuts), but they go out of their way to return to the same ones repeatedly which I think counts - recognizing the value of the tool and re-using it. The nut cracking sites had initially been mistaken for archaeological sites of human activity, until someone caught the monkeys at it. They dry the nuts under the brazil nut trees so the shells become brittle, then carry them to the hammer and anvil stones, place the nut on the anvil, and lift up the hammer (the monkey equivalent of a 50lb boulder) and drop it on the nut. This takes skill or it just squirts out the nut to one side or misses or drops on their toes.

This is cultural, btw. One population of Capuchin monkeys does this. They teach their children.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

Additionally, size of neurons matters as well as number of connections. Apparently human brain neurons are smaller than those of many animals, allowing more neurons in a smaller space.

Yes but more neurons in a smaller space actually means more connections.

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

The social insects like ants, bees, and some termites should probably have some sort of "hive intelligence" or "swarm intelligence". Individually, members of these species are "dumb" but as a group, they become collectively smarter.

I fully do agree. I don’t remember his name, but a famous ethologist said that we don’t understand ants as long as we consider each ant as an individual. We immediately notice their outstanding intelligence as soon as we do not take into acount each ant, but the whole hive. Ants are like the cells of our body. Autonomous cells, but still the cells of the same big intelligent individual.

Originally Posted by Bruno

Capuchin monkeys, corvids, dophins, chimps, and gorillas all make tools and hang on to them. Often not for very long because tools made out of twigs and sea sponges aren't terribly durable, but they do. […]

I did know that they made and use tools, but didn’t know that they were able to keep those tools for future tasks.

Thank you very much for that information.

Originally Posted by Bruno

This is cultural, btw. One population of Capuchin monkeys does this. They teach their children.

Yes. A lot of animal comportments are cultural, actually. Biologists who were thinking that the man was the only one to have a culture and that animals only behave instinctively in the past centuries do notice it more and more.

The next step is plants. More and more studies show that they can do things that we thought impossible for them: feeding their babies, unite with another plant to fight a third one, calling insects to destroy parasites and even making rain fall. But that is another topic.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by Gollum

Yes but more neurons in a smaller space actually means more connections.

True, but it also means that you can put the same processing power in a smaller space. Being smaller means fewer neurons you have to devote to things like controlling bigger muscles or getting feedback from larger areas of skin. It might also allow for more efficient oxygenation of the brain.

Another factor that humans seem to have is that the myelin sheaths around our neurons are a bit thicker than those of other animals, which results in less "signal loss" and slightly faster "processing speed" (although that's more of a function of synapse efficiency).

But, what makes one brain more efficient than another is still something of a mystery. In humans, there are over 1100 genes for intelligence which have been identified so far. There are probably also a whole host of epigenetic factors as well.

Originally Posted by Gollum

I fully do agree. I don’t remember his name, but a famous ethologist said that we don’t understand ants as long as we consider each ant as an individual. We immediately notice their outstanding intelligence as soon as we do not take into acount each ant, but the whole hive. Ants are like the cells of our body. Autonomous cells, but still the cells of the same big intelligent individual.

Probably E.O. Wilson. That sounds exactly like something he'd say.

Originally Posted by Gollum

The next step is plants. More and more studies show that they can do things that we thought impossible for them: feeding their babies, unite with another plant to fight a third one, calling insects to destroy parasites and even making rain fall. But that is another topic.

Plants are masters of chemical warfare and signaling.

Individually, plants might not be intelligent, but it's just possible that vast communities of plants might have a sort of emergent IQ.

[Pursuivant]

Thanks for everyone's suggestions.

With a bit of research, I've more or less answered my own question. There are many aspects to IQ, to the point that most researchers have given up trying to formally define it.

EQ (Encephalization Quotient) gives a baseline for animal IQ, with 1.0 being defined as approximately the same brain/body surface ratio as a house cat. It isn't a perfect measure though, particularly for non-mammals and the smarter creatures.

Because there are so many aspects to IQ, some animals do really well on tasks like counting, face recognition, maze-running, optimizing performance on certain game theory-based tests, pattern-recognition, spatial memory, etc., but less well on general learning speed, "theory of mind," or creativity.

In GURPS terms, these strong areas should be modeled as advantages or perks. Likewise, behavioral oddities should be modeled as Quirks or even disadvantages. In particular, "hard to train" species, like cats, should probably have traits such as Stubbornness.

Animal species which are good at "training" their handlers might develop limited ability with skills such as Panhandling or Psychology.

Arguably, in contradiction to RAW, even living creatures with IQ 0 should be able to take "mental" traits which are based on purely instinctive behavior, such as Absolute Direction or Compulsive Behavior.

So, here's the list:

IQ 0 "Non-sentient"

These creatures are alive, but lack anything like a brain. They might have chemical receptors or other methods of perceiving their environment, and even fairly sophisticated ability to react to certain stimuli, but there is no evidence that they are aware of themselves to any degree and they lack anything like learning capacity on a human timescale. Some organism in this IQ range demonstrate very limited forms of "collective" or "emergent" intelligence, particularly in the areas of communicating information about potential threats to allied species.

Archaea
Bacteria
All Eukaryotes except certain Animals (e.g., Fungi,* Plants,* Protista).

IQ "0.25" "Lesser Animals"

These creatures have a nervous system and limited ability to learn, but no real "brain." GM's choice as to whether they are IQ 0 or 1, but they are closer to IQ 0 overall.

Microscopic Annelids (worms)
Microscopic or Sessile Arthropods (e.g., barnacles, brine shrimp, mites, springtails, etc.)
Bryozoa
Microscopic Chordates
Cnidaria (jellyfish, etc.)
Echinoderms (sea stars, sea urchins, etc.)
Nematodes (microscopic worms)
Platyheminthes (e.g., flatworms, planarians, tapeworms)
Rotifers
Sponges

IQ 0.5 “Simple Animals”

These creatures have a nervous system, a simple brain, and limited pattern recognition and learning ability, but almost no "real time" problem-solving ability. Depending on how the GM defines IQ, they could just as easily have IQ 0 or IQ 1.

Annelids (worms)
Parasitic Arthropods (e.g., fleas, ticks)
Simple Chordates (e.g., sea squirts)
Simplest Molluscs (e.g., shellfish, slugs, snails).

IQ 1 "Dumbest" Animals

Lowest level of creatures to have an actual brain, variations in behavior, trainability in more than one task, etc.

Some Amphibians (e.g., salamanders)
Most Arthropods (e.g., arachnids, centipedes, crustaceans, insects**, millipedes)
Smallest (i.e., SM -14<) Chordates
“Dumbest” Fish (e.g., lungfish)
Most Molluscs (except cephalopods)

IQ 2 "Dumb" Animals

Typical Amphibian
"Dumb" Cephalopod (e.g., small squid or cuttlefish)
Typical Fish
Typical Reptile (e.g., most turtles)
“Dumbest” Birds (e.g., domestic turkey, kakapo, some dove species).
“Dumbest” Mammals (e.g., hamsters, koalas, tree shrews, possibly opossums, possibly giant pandas).

IQ 3 "Average" Animals

Smartest Fish (e.g., sharks, tuna, certain reef fish)
Typical Cephalopod (e.g., typical octopi or large squid)
Smart Reptile (e.g., hunting lizards, some snakes)
Typical Bird or Mammal (e.g., most filter feeders, herbivores, or insectivores).

IQ 4 "Smart Animals"

Smartest Reptiles (e.g., Crocodilians or Komodo Dragons).
Smart Birds (e.g., Most foraging or hunting birds)
Smart Cephalopods (e.g., large octopi)
Smart Mammals: Bovines (Cattle), Caprines (Goats), Cetaceans (Whales), Equines (Horses), lesser Simians (e.g., lemurs and smaller Old World Monkeys), certain Rodents (e.g., Rats).

Most Carnivora, e.g., Hyaenidae (Hyenas), Mustelids (Weasels), Pinnepedia (Seals), Raccoons, Ursidae (Bears)).


IQ 5 "Very Smart Animals"

Very Smart Birds, e.g., Corvids (crow species) or Psittaciformes (parrot species).
Very Smart Cephalopods, e.g., large cuttlefish, octopi, or giant squid.
Very Smart Mammals, e.g., mostly foraging or hunting species, including Canines, Elephants, Felines, Mustelids (Sea Otter or Wolverine), Simians (Monkeys), and Suidae (Pigs).

IQ 6 “Presapient Animals"

Certain Cetacean species (e.g., Dolphins, Orca)
Certain Great Apes (Bonobos, Chimpanzees, Gorillas, Orangutans, Gorillas).
Possibly certain bird species (e.g., African Grey Parrot) or dog breeds (e.g., Border Collie).

* Collectively, a large number of fungi, plants, or similar organisms might effectively have IQ 1 for very limited tasks.

** Collective intelligence of social insects might be as high as IQ 2-3.

[Flyndaran]

Slime molds should be above 0 as they have been shown to learn kind of. They seem able to react to harsh environments like cold before they occur if they've been happening at regular intervals.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Slime molds should be above 0 as they have been shown to learn kind of. They seem able to react to harsh environments like cold before they occur if they've been happening at regular intervals.

True. They've also got a sort of vaguely intelligent "quorum sensing" ability that intrigues biologists. Ditto for some of the other eukaryotic protista such as ameobas.

That sort of "IQ" is a bit above nothing, so I considered it to be close enough to things like phototropism in plants that I "rounded down" to zero. But, IQ 0.25 wouldn't be a bad place to put them.

Just about every animate living being has some degree of learning ability. For GURPS, however, I've heavily weighted IQ towards learning speed, memory, ability to generalize from example, pattern recognition, creativity, etc.

Really low IQ might mean ability to learn a simple task after however many dozen trials, but high IQ might mean not just fast learning, but also ability to perform the same task in different ways, change strategies, and proactively take outside factors into account.

[whswhs]

That scale is mostly plausible, though from some reading I've done I think that the smartest cephalopods might rate one point above the smartest fish.

Just one mathematical note, though: the encephalization quotient as I've seen it is a ratio of brain mass, not to body mass, but to body surface area. The studies of allometry I've looked at say that these are roughly proportionate, at least for large groups of vertebrates such as, say, the majority of birds. (At least in mammals, where the neocortex dominates brain mass, the thickness of cortical columns doesn't seem to change with body size, so brain mass is brain surface area x (constant) brain thickness, and it kind of makes sense that brain surface area should be proportionate to body surface area.) I write subject to correction from current research, but that's my understanding.

[Skarg]

If I were interested in rating individual animals' intelligence against each other, I would either:

1. Assign a base-10 IQ to the individuals, which represents how smart each animal is relative to other animals of the same species, in the standards relevant to that animal's frame of reference. (i.e. an average bobcat has a bobcat-IQ of 10. A smart bobcat might have a 12 in thinking like a bobcat about things bobcats care about.) From human frames of reference, the standard GURPS IQ could still be used. I would research what expert species researchers know about the species' ways of thinking, preferring researchers who have spend lots of time observing the animals (q.v. the book Are We Smart Enough To Know How Smart Animals Are?)

and/or

2. Figure out what I am going to use the IQ-like ratings for (probably perception and skills, I would think, but maybe also certain situations), and then assign them whatever value seems appropriate for each of these. This is more or less what GURPS Bestiary does - animals get perception ratings and skill levels that are just what they are, and can vary a bit for each individual.

[AlexanderHowl]

A Cognitive Focus [-10/level] disadvantage might simplify things, with an animal suffering an IQ penalty equal to the level to any task not related to its natural behavior. Nonsapient animals would have a miming of five levels while borderline sapient animals would have four levels. Since you would not need to buy back Per and Will, it would simplify the character sheets of animals.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by whswhs

That scale is mostly plausible, though from some reading I've done I think that the smartest cephalopods might rate one point above the smartest fish.

I gave the largest/smartest cephalopods IQ 5 because the more we learn about certain species the smarter they seem to be.

Chromatophores give certain squid and cuttlefish highly complex signaling and camouflage ability, such that one species can flash one signal to the squid on its left while flashing another signal to the squid on its right.

Humboldt Squid show pack hunting behavior.

Certain octopi show broadly-adapted simple tool use and problem-solving abilities, including looking for and robbing lobster traps, and coming aboard crabbing boats to steal prey.

The one problem is that they are typically very short-lived, which doesn't fit the pattern for other smart animals.