15 种可能比你聪明的动物 | 

我们人类对自己的大脑和所谓的“统治”地球上的其他生物感到非常自豪。但动物王国充满了聪明生物，如果给他们机会，他们的智慧和技能一定会让最聪明的人类感到震惊。以跳舞、欺骗和魔术手法为例，这些都是人类发明，被认为是仅限于智人的？再想想。准备好惊叹于地球上一些最聪明的动物——其中一些可能会让你感到惊讶！

There’s a reason dogs are man’s best friend. Not only are they adorable, they’re also very smart. They have emotions, they learn tricks, they recognise their owners, they can sense others’ feelings – and that’s not even all of the clever things dogs can do. According to Live Science, they’re as smart as a two-year-old child. “The finding is based on a language development test, revealing average dogs can learn 165 words (similar to a two-year-old child), including signals and gestures, and dogs in the top 20% in intelligence can learn 250 words,” says the Live Science article. “While dogs ranked with two year olds in language, they would trump a three- or four-year-old in basic arithmetic, [Stanley Coren, a canine expert and professor emeritus at the University of British Columbia] found. In terms of social smarts, our drooling furballs fare even better.”
狗是人类的最佳朋友，这并非没有原因。它们不仅可爱，而且非常聪明。它们有情感，能学技巧，能认出主人，能感知他人的情绪——这还不是狗能做的所有聪明事。据《Live Science》报道，它们的智力与两岁儿童相当。“这一发现基于一项语言发展测试，显示平均狗狗可以学会 165 个单词（与两岁儿童相当），包括信号和手势，而智力排名前 20%的狗狗可以学会 250 个单词，”《Live Science》文章说。“虽然狗狗在语言能力上与两岁儿童相当，但在基本算术上，它们甚至能超过三岁或四岁的孩子，[斯坦利·科伦，不列颠哥伦比亚大学的犬类专家和荣誉退休教授]发现。在社交智力方面，我们这些流口水的毛球表现得更好。”

OK, we know dogs are smart, so make sure you know how to train your puppy.
好的，我们都知道狗很聪明，所以请确保你知道如何训练你的小狗。

Besides being able to mimic humans, parrots can solve puzzles based on logical reasoning. According to Live Science, these parrots are as smart as a three-year-old child. “Parrots can draw conclusions about where to find a food reward not only from clues as to its location, but also from the absence of clues – an ability previously only seen in humans and other apes. “It suggests that Grey parrots have some understanding of causality and that they can use this to reason about the world,” study scientist Christian Schloegl, a researcher at the University of Vienna, told Live Science.”
除了能够模仿人类，鹦鹉还能根据逻辑推理解决谜题。据《Live Science》报道，这些鹦鹉的智力与三岁儿童相当。“鹦鹉不仅能从食物位置的线索中得出结论，还能从线索的缺失中得出结论——这种能力以前只在人类和其他猿类中看到。”维也纳大学的研究员、研究科学家克里斯蒂安·施洛格尔对《Live Science》说：“这表明灰鹦鹉对因果关系有所理解，并且可以利用这一点来推理世界。”

Unsurprisingly, chimpanzees are one of the most intelligent animals on this planet – next to humans. Similar to how humans inherit their intelligence from their mothers, a chimpanzee also greatly relies on its genes for intelligence. “They can learn words, play with objects, and mourn the deaths of their friends,” says National Geographic. Genes determine about half of the variability in chimp intelligence, while environmental factors determine the other half, according to primatologist William Hopkins, of the Yerkes National Primate Research Center in Atlanta. Chimps also have their own way of making life a little easier. “Chimps are known to make and use tools for simple tasks like opening fruit and nuts. In fact, studies have shown some of these primates to fashion spears to hunt smaller prey and long branches to dig for termites,” according to health and wellness expert Caleb Backe.
不出所料，黑猩猩是地球上最聪明的动物之一——仅次于人类。与人类从母亲那里继承智慧类似，黑猩猩也极大地依赖于其基因来获得智慧。“它们可以学习单词，玩弄物体，并为朋友之死哀悼，”国家地理杂志说。根据亚特兰大耶基斯国家灵长类动物研究中心的灵长类学家威廉·霍普金斯的研究，基因决定了黑猩猩智力变异的一半，而环境因素决定了另一半。黑猩猩也有自己让生活变得轻松一些的方式。“黑猩猩以制作和使用工具而闻名，用于简单的任务，如打开水果和坚果。事实上，研究表明，这些灵长类动物中的一些会制作矛来猎杀较小的猎物，以及长树枝来挖白蚁，”健康和福祉专家凯勒布·巴克说。

Now discover 30 of the rarest animals on Earth.
现在发现地球上 30 种最稀有的动物。

Although chickens can sometimes have an unintelligent rap, they are actually very smart. In fact, they can even differentiate certain shapes and colours. According to Melissa Caughey, author of How to Speak Chicken and A Kid’s Guide to Keeping Chickens, in one study, chickens were clicker trained to peck at one of four different shapes, such as a circle, square, triangle and rectangle. They would always pick the right shape out of the grouping, regardless of how the shapes were arranged. “When their particular shape was removed, the chickens looked quizzically for it and wouldn’t peck at the other shapes. When the correct shape was reintroduced, they pecked at it as taught.”
尽管鸡有时会唱出一些不明智的 rap，但它们实际上非常聪明。事实上，它们甚至可以区分某些形状和颜色。根据《如何与鸡交流》和《孩子养鸡指南》一书的作者 Melissa Caughey 的研究，在一次研究中，鸡被训练用点击器啄击四种不同形状之一，如圆形、正方形、三角形和矩形。无论这些形状如何排列，它们总是会从这些形状中挑选出正确的形状。“当它们特定的形状被移除时，鸡会好奇地寻找它，而不会啄击其他形状。当正确的形状再次引入时，它们会像被教导的那样啄击它。”

In case you’ve forgotten, elephants have incredible memories. They’re able to recall specific routes to watering holes over incredible stretches of terrain and over the span of many years – and they never forget a friend, either. In 1999, an elephant named Shirley arrived at The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee. Immediately, a resident elephant named Jenny became animated and playful. It wasn’t love at first sight; Jenny remembered Shirley from when they performed briefly in a circus together – 22 years earlier.
大象拥有惊人的记忆力。它们能够回忆起在广阔的地形上前往水源地的特定路线，并且跨越许多年——而且它们永远不会忘记一个朋友。1999 年，一头名叫雪莉的大象来到了田纳西州的象园。立刻，园内一头名叫珍妮的居民大象变得活跃起来，嬉戏玩耍。这并非一见钟情；珍妮记得雪莉，她们曾在 22 年前一起在马戏团短暂表演过。

See if your memory is as good as an elephant’s with these Incredible animal facts part 1, part 2 and part 3.
看看你的记忆力是否和象一样好，这些令人难以置信的动物事实第 1 部分、第 2 部分和第 3 部分。

Honeybees have evolved what we call ‘swarm intelligence’, with up to 50,000 workers in a single colony coming together to make democratic decisions. When a hive gets too crowded in springtime, colonies deploy scouts to look for a new home. If any scouts disagree on where the colony should build its next hive, they argue their case the civilised way: through a dance-off. Each scout performs a ‘waggle dance’ for other scouts in an attempt to convince them of their location’s merit; the more enthusiastic the dance, the happier the scout was with her location. The remainder of the colony votes with their bodies, flying to the spot they prefer and joining in the dance until one potential hive reigns #1 bee disco of the neighbourhood.
蜜蜂已经进化出了我们称之为“群体智能”的能力，一个蜂群中最多可以有 5 万名工蜂共同做出民主决策。当春天蜂巢过于拥挤时，蜂群会派遣侦察兵寻找新家。如果侦察兵们对在哪里建造下一个蜂巢意见不一，他们会以文明的方式争论：通过舞蹈对决。每个侦察兵都会为其他侦察兵表演“摇摆舞”，试图说服他们自己位置的优势；舞蹈越热情，侦察兵对其位置的满意度就越高。蜂群的其他成员则通过身体投票，飞到他们偏好的地点，加入舞蹈，直到一个潜在的蜂巢成为街区里排名第一的“蜜蜂迪斯科”舞厅。

Dolphins are often cited as the second smartest animals on Earth due to their relatively high brain-to-body size ratio, the capacity to show emotion and impressive mimicry of the dumb apes who research them. Now, findings from the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies in Mississippi suggest dolphins may also be the second-sneakiest animals on Earth. When dolphins at the Institute were trained to pick up litter in their tanks and exchange them with trainers for fish, one dolphin named Kelly discovered a way to cheat the system. By hiding scraps of litter under a rock in her tank, Kelly discretely tore single sheets of discarded paper into multiple pieces, then turned them in one at a time to maximise her fishy reward. Kelly’s clever deception, it seems, was no accident – researchers say she did it all on purpose.
海豚常被列为地球上第二聪明的动物，因为它们的大脑与身体比例相对较高，能够表现出情感，并且能够出色地模仿研究它们的笨拙猿猴。现在，密西西比州海洋哺乳动物研究所的研究结果表明，海豚也可能是地球上第二狡猾的动物。当研究所的海豚被训练在它们的池子里捡拾垃圾并与训练员交换以换取鱼时，一只名叫凯利的海豚发现了一种欺骗系统的方法。通过在她池子里的石头下隐藏垃圾碎片，凯利悄悄地将一张张废弃的纸张撕成多片，然后一次交上一片以最大化她的鱼奖励。凯利的聪明欺骗似乎并非偶然——研究人员说她是故意这么做的。

True prison-breakers of the sea, these tentacled creatures have proven time and again their talents for popping lids off screw-top jars, compressing their bulky bodies through slit-small holes, and climbing impossibly out of aquarium tanks to their freedom. Otto, a German aquarium octopus, was even known to throw rocks at the glass and spray water at overhead lamps to short-circuit the annoyingly bright lights (on more than one occasion). Add to their rap sheet the innovation of assembling shelters from coconut shells, and there’s no denying cephalopods will one day be our overlords.
真正的海洋越狱者，这些带触手的生物一次又一次证明了它们打开螺旋盖罐头、通过狭小的缝隙压缩庞大身躯以及从水族箱中不可思议地爬出来获得自由的才能。德国水族馆的章鱼奥托甚至以向玻璃投掷石头和向头顶的灯具喷水来短路那令人烦恼的明亮灯光（不止一次）。再加上他们用椰子壳搭建避难所的创新，无可否认，头足类生物终将成为我们的统治者。

Now read 15 of the funniest animal stories from 2020.
现在阅读 2020 年 15 个最好笑的动物故事。