How Intelligent could Dinosaurs have become?

A new paper speculating with data on Dinosaur intelligence. Specifically about the "Dinosauroid" an idea proposed in the 1980s. The Dinosauroid was the suggestion that if the dinosaurs didn't go extinct at the end of the Cretaceous that some of the dinosaurs with large brain sizes, like Troodontids, could have reached human like intelligence, and also a human-like bodyplan. Read the paper here! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/1...
It's dangerous to go alone, check out our Links!
Patreon: www.patreon.com/raptorchatter
Twitter: raptor_chatter
Redbubble: www.redbubble.com/people/RaptorChatter/shop
Discord: / discord

[@jacobdalland1390]

I remember seeing pictures of the "dinosauroid" in a book as a little kid and wondering why there's an alien in a dinosaur book. 😆

[@BuckROCKGROIN]

Because dinosaurs are awesome.

[@ChinchillaFur]

Aliens turning out to be Dinosauroids who are just shy would be awesome.

[@whitewolf3051]

When I first saw this, I wondered what *if* humans and dinosauriods not only evolved together, but also shared the planet, even loving each other, and more. Then came the 1980s cartoon Dinosaucers with humanoid dinosaurs, further solidifying the idea.

[@merky6004]

You are not the first to think this. Many speculate that “aliens” are an earlier species that went smart and is in hiding. Latest term for ET isn’t extra terrestrial. No outer space stuff. “NTI” is the official term. “Non Terrestrial Intelligence.” This is coming from the government. I am not kidding.

[@WHACK_space_rock]

I remember distinctly when Russell came out w/ his dinosauroid and it was reported by Discover Magazine in 1982 ( I was 16 at the time and had a subscription to the mag). At the time I felt it was possible for the troodon to become more intelligent, but it would still retain the same basic body plan, albeit with a larger brain case and more opposable "thumb". I actually drew a representation of my proposal in the style ( pen and ink stippling) of John C. McLoughlin ( Archosauria: A New Look at the Old Dinosaur), and sent it in to the editors of the magazine. They actually wrote me back and thanked me for my "expert drawing", and after that I read about the fallout from Russell's "thought experiment", and how his colleages ribbed him a little about it, with Russell, somewhat embarrassed, having to explain it was just a "thought experiment". Right after that, "V" came out, and the reptilian humanoid took firm hold in popular culture ( tip of the hat to David Icke)...

[@WHACK_space_rock]

PS: Parrots and crows show that avian dinosaurs can be quite intelligent...

[@mhdfrb9971]

In term of intelligence, the Corvids are pretty close, but in appearance probably not.

[@LuisAldamiz]

And parrots. Some parrots are the only animals we know of that actively make open questions, which is otherwise quite unique of humans.

[@ryuuguu01]

Parrots are also known to make sequential tools in the wild. i.e. They will make a pry to widen the crack in the pit of a fruit, so they then can use an awl they made to tear the leathery membrane surrounding the seeds, then make a spoon to reach and scoop out the seeds to eat. This all done in wild parrots with no human prompting and is passed dow from one generation to the next.

[@climatebas]

@@LuisAldamiz Yes. At 2:35 above, birds do better on brain/body ratio than other dinosaurs. I don't see why other dinos also couldn't keep improving. The supposed superiority of the mammalian cortex probably didn't show up until 40m years ago when monkeys and cetaceans reached some higher levels, despite dog-size mammals existing back into the dinosaur era. I wouldn't rule out birds (or the hypothetical dinosaurs) also stepping up if they're given more time.

[@LuisAldamiz]

@@climatebas - The mammalian brain doesn't seem "superior" to me, as birds clearly pack more power in much less space (primates also do to a lesser extent but we are exceptional in the mammalian clade). There may be other nuances but the issue of neuron size (and thus processing density) of brains (favoring bird and to lesser extent primate brains) seems extremely central to me... and usually not discussed, as the old theories about brain to body mass ration (which make no sense because most of the brain is not dedicated to control the body but to think, to process info, which is totally unrelated to body size) seem to still linger in way too many human brains in need of an important update.

[@rebeuhsin6410]

Yes in the video he mentions pigeons. Some birds appear to be smarter than rats, at least in some ways that include language! But I never believe in a reptile or dinosaur that has a body plan like a hunan. Ours is not really ideal.

[@patreekotime4578]

I feel like the focus on body plan as well as brain shape, and indeed the way we qualify intelligence are all anthropomorphisms that distract away from a good understanding of intelligence in animals. Researchers specifically studying intelligence in animals have time and again had to requalify their metrics for intelligence because it turns out that humans are actually really bad at understanding our own intelligence. For centuries, tool use was seen to be the height of human intelligence. Now we know that all kinds of animals use tools in all kinds of different ways and that tool use may be gained through evolution and not understanding. We also generally had a weak argument for what tool use even IS even though it is pretty clear now that the capacity for nest building indicates a potential for tool use. It also is becoming clear that many animals have both their own languages and can learn basic human language. So that metric also becomes rather meaningless unless we concede intelligence in a wide swath of the animal kingdom that doesnt closely resemble us. Many animals also have really impressive problem-solving abilities, surpassing even young human children. Caring for young, signs of compassion, and teaching all falls under a social intelligence metric that we seen in many animals. And several bird species, despite having "primative" brains... and despite having very un-human body plans, have managed all four, and continue to surprise us. Talk to anyone who has owned a parakeet... who have brains the size of a peanut, and they will assure you that these animals are incredibly intelligent.

[@pigeonhawk4832]

They are quite smart. But, from what I've seen, not as intelligent as pet rats, hamsters or mice. Rats are infact, very smart!

[@laurentiuvladutmanea3622]

Well, I have no problems conceding intelligence to large segments of the animal kingdom. If bears and crocodiles use tools, then that is a sign of high intelligence for those animals.

[@patreekotime4578]

@@laurentiuvladutmanea3622 Well, that is part of my point about using tool use as a metric for intelligence. Crocodiles may very well have evolved that behavior, like nest building. Nest building itself may very well qualify as tool use depending on how you view it. So tool use is itself very subjective and IMO rathering meaningless. Capacity for and competancy in problem solving... especially when individuals can solve problems they have never encountered before seems like a better metric to me and is the direction that much of the research is now pointed. Rooks and octapuses appear to be especially adept at those kinds of tasks. Although the research is largely limited to food/treat motivation in species that can handle captivity and human handling well, which is addmittedly a severe limitation.

[@andrewmalinowski6673]

I think it's hard for humans to consider intelligence as anything but a "human" skill despite research into animal behavior showing that there are other creatures just as if not more intellectual than we appear. To quote from "Hitchhiker's; " "It is an important and popular fact that things are not always what they seem. For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he had 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....Curiously enough the dolphins had long known of the impending destruction of the Earth and had made many attempts to alert mankind to the danger; but most of the communications were misinterpreted as amusing attempts to punch footballs or whistle for tidbits" (page 156). While both chimpanzees and rats have been seen by researchers to be intelligent the fact the human-like appearance and capacity to "empathize" makes them receive compassion and care while rats have greater empathy and will (based on research) forego food if it causes another rat they can't see to suffer; something that humans by comparison are unwilling to do based on the perceived authority of others within psychological research experiments

[@grahamstrouse1165]

@@pigeonhawk4832Birds can be very, very intelligent. Their brains are small relative to their body mass but their neurons are packed in tight. Crocodilians (dinosaurs other closest relative) also have very densely packed neurons. Brain size can be deceptive.

[@valivali8104]

"Intelligent dinosaurs would look like humans" is narcissistic...

[@RaptorChatter]

Yeah, it is one of the issues with the idea. Even if troodontids had a novel brain adaptation to increase efficiency it's not likely that they'd pivot to being upright. Upright posture in hominids is due to our very specific evolutionary history.

[@kyrab7914]

​@@RaptorChatter if I understand debates correctly (I may not as a lay person, and you may know this, sorry.), there's been debate for ages that we developed our big brains after starting to walk. Essentially that walking freed up body plan for brain. But it's a bit chicken and the egg, and we've seen some evidence that that's not the case at all. I believe with some fossils, and comparison to modern apes.

[@mgaus]

Welcome to the human condition. Vanity is what we do best

[@robertfaucher3750]

Okay but what about Avisapiens?

[@valivali8104]

@@robertfaucher3750 those which were designed based on theropods and birds?

[@gaylordzapikowski9053]

Out of curiosity, do you plan on doing a video discussing the recent paper on a communal Troodontid nest? Ever since my professor mentioned it I can't help but imagine Troodontid budgie colonies.

[@tuxuhds6955]

I don't know why this is evoking images of Spore in my mind.

[@aceundead4750]

I like Dinotopia's take on intelligent dinosaurs. They're literally just dinosaurs with human intelligence and a language that is able to be understood by humans and being able to understand human speech, the only real oddball was Zippo who had a more cartoonish design to make him appeal to children more since he was the only dino to speak human languages. Also i had forgotten crocs and gators can use tools to set traps, and up to 2 meter long crocs have been seen climbing trees, they're prepping for a third return to dominance of Earth.

[@mikeg2306]

If dinosaurs still existed they would look like birds with bird levels intelligence because they do.

[@rhoff523]

As for reptilian intelligence I believe it is underrated. I had a Varanus niloticus which lived to be 23; I observed behaviors with a high degree of intelligence. Play- she would belly slide down carpeted stairs and go back up to do so again. As a sub adult she seemed very capable of changing behaviors in different situations. At this age she would generally show hostility to me when relaxing in the sun. Despite repeated cautions to some neighbor's children they insisted on petting her. Expecting a crying child with a welt from a tail smack or a bloody finger she allowed them to pet her. She also allowed me to remove her from her window perch as the kids had to leave. As soon as they were gone, she returned to her fun normal self and immediately bit deeply into my arm with bloody claw lacerations as well. She hated my brother and seemed to take pleasure in scaring him while she liked my mother and even refrained from biting her. When she was still smallish she got on top of mom's head; mom reached up to take her down and Beana, the nile monitor, gently put her mouth on mom's finger but refrained from drawing blood. This exceptional varanid was, to me, as smart as a dog. Thanks for the vids, I also do not see a fully erect dinosaurid based upon structural constraints and differences in bone structures including legs, ankles, pelvis but that's another vid (you could make!).

[@dangates5095]

Some modern birds, eg. crows, parrots, & even the octopus are rather intelligent & can solve problems.

[@wingedhussar1453]

Yet didn't evolve past what they are. Only humans evolved to go past what they are about

[@LuisAldamiz]

It's a take but remember that brains are extremely plastic and that dinosaurs had already developed bipedalism and hands, which are like half of the way to become human-like. On the other hand look at dolphins, arguably almost as smart as we are (or maybe more in some aspects) but they are limited by lack of hands and the impossibility of developing fire in their acuatic environment (admittedly they have some very amazing sonar and bubbles tech but I fear it lacks the potential of fire-focused technology).

[@predabot__6778]

An interesting thought-experiment: take prehistoric whales, and have them develop sonar and language, but then RETURN them to land - what potential life-form do we then have? We know that the lineage has the potential to evolve complex brains, with all that entails: language, problem-solving, complex emotions, even culture. (yes, orcas have culture, look it up) So... if we re-transpose them back on land - what can they achieve? A big limiting factor is probably tactile manipulation - there are no hands on ancient whales, or modern ones. Of course, other hoofed mammals, like Elephants, do have tactile manipulation, from an unexpected place: their snouts. (elephants are of course also very intelligent, and may also have culture)

[@LuisAldamiz]

@@predabot__6778 - Sonar would be totally useless in land, which is a great example of evolution having its own limitations. They would lose that ability, because it's pointless. Re-evolving fins into legs, let alone hands, is also quite difficult. Yes, elephants are impressive. I guess that thanks to their natural defenses (size, thick skin, social behavior, intelligence, tusks) they never needed to evolve into weapon and fire manipulating beins like much weaker us. My personal take is that the kickstarting pressure for Human-specific evolution (bigger and better brains, technology, fire control, full bipedalism or abandonment of trees as refuge) was done by the arrival of lions to Africa. Previously australopithecines and paranthropus had done just fine vs probably solitary big cats (Homotherium) and social but non-climbing hyenas, but the arrival of social climber predators (lions) posed a huge challenge to our broader kin, as trees could not be night time refuges anymore and, without proper weapons (best used as fully bipedal, especially spears, even if they were just wooden spears at first) and the dissuassory effect of controlled fire (especially at night), or less brainiac cousins could not survive and that's why they went extinct all across Africa... except for the lines leading to us (Homo sp., especially H. erectus). This, if correct, is a bit more complicated than just letting evolution happen in random directions: we should consider the actual evolutionary pressures, the threats that had to be overcome, killing many and pushing for the survival of the sufficiently fit, in the hominid case, those with especial intelligence, those able to develop innovative technology, but in other cases it'd be different.

[@Nemrai]

For myself, I think it's rather silly to think that another intelligent species would evolve into anything that looks a lot like us.

[@JAB-bc9uv]

What about convergent evolution? Look at an ichthyasaurus, and a dolphin.....🐬

[@Nadiouchinka]

@@JAB-bc9uv By definition, convergent evolution occurs when species adopt independently of one another, similar traits in responds to similar selective pressures. In a case where individuals are positively selected for being more « intelligent », this increase in intellectual capacity doesn’t imply to have a humanoid appearance, opposable thumbs, erect posture or any of the typical human traits. especially considering the fact that intelligent specie could potentially emerge from a very large diversity of taxa.

[@krankarvolund7771]

@@JAB-bc9uv Opposable thumbs and big braincase would be a convergent evolution trait for an intelligent animal (intelligent meaning here able to build a civilisation, becaue there's tons of intelligent animals on Earth today that looks nothing like us ^^), because it's required to efficiently craft and use a large variety of tools. But they don't need to lose their tail or their snout, it was only done to make them more human-like ^^ To take the example of the ichtyosaur and the dolphin, even though it's less drastic, both have a fused bodyplan, with a tail as the main way of propulsion, and two fins to direct themselves. But icthyosaurs have a fish like vertical tail-fin, while dolphins have a mammal-like horizontal tail-fin, because you just require a big tail-fin, the sense of movement doesn't really matters ^^ And dolphins have developped echolocation, which ichtyosaurs didn't had.

[@JAB-bc9uv]

@@Nadiouchinka that is a lot of words.....if you can't explain something simply you really don't understand.

[@boravedat2931]

@@JAB-bc9uvto simply put-both species are still very far from each other they look similar but they aren't because the way natural selection works with species (be free to tell me if i did something wrong)

[@bramsanjanssan4908]

They lived for a massive period of time. So the certainly had time enough to develop

[@matthewkeeling886]

Kirk's Gorn opponent evolved on another planet, so isn't limited by Earth's evolutionary history. The spacefaring Hadrosaurids Janeway encounters have no excuses.

[@RaptorChatter]

Lol. I forgot about the Hadrosaur episode. The Gorn was used as an example of the trope of "intelligent reptile" in the paper, so that was more on my mind.

[@patreekotime4578]

Ahhhh, but in TNG we find out that humanoids are found all over the galaxy because the Progenitors seeded the genetic blueprint everywhere.... so the Gorn are somehow in the same lineage as us. The Silirians in Dr Who would have been a better example. 🤓

[@tuxuhds6955]

I wish you would have included the New Caledonia Crows in this video and maybe show data regarding their intelligence. Some researcher believe that the new caledonian crow population have entered their Stone Age(debatable) and some reference to that in a way that clears up things on the subject of intelligence would have been nice.

[@LuisAldamiz]

And grey parrots, which actually ask open questions, a clear feature of "superior intelligence" (great apes don't do that when trained to sing-speak, they answer questions but never ask them).

[@jimt6498]

See the Star Trek Voyager episode of Distant Origin. Was brilliant.

[@michaelanderson3096]

Very high possibility - David Icke 😮

[@douglasphillips5870]

I like playing with the idea of the dinosaurs that shortly predated birds. They were arboreal, and some might have leaned more into climbing than gliding, and they could have developed forelimbs that were better adapted for manipulation of objects like many primates. Then when they returned to a ground dwelling lifestyle, they would be in a situation much like bipedal apes. Manipulative forelimbs could give them a better use of tools, and help drive intelligence development.

[@deepkadamba7083]

There would be human like creature 👽 roughly 65 million years before Humans existed. There are many cases of divergent evolution. Were there any Human like reptiles?

[@andrewstrongman305]

@@deepkadamba7083 No.

[@andrewstrongman305]

That's highly unlikely, since small theropods used their claws for climbing (rather than hands adapted for grasping). They were also incapable of pronating their wrists or hands, and lacked the fine-motor control necessary to manipulate tools effectively. They 'could' have evolved those features - but they were already well enough adapted to their environment.

[@moehoward01]

If anyone is interested, Harry Harrison wrote a 3 book fiction series on this concept: 1 - West of Eden 2 - Winter in Eden 3 - Return to Eden I first read it years ago. I've since reread it a couple of times and even found it in audio book. Great stories.

[@matthewdavies2057]

They had 150 Million years and they didn't get smart. No reason to think they ever would. When we came along we went straight to it.

[@patreekotime4578]

Thats a strange take. Mammals have been around for 225-167 million years (depending on how you define "mammal").

[@matthewdavies2057]

@@patreekotime4578 But could only be what evolution had in mind for them for the last 66. 😞

[@shalashaskaseven4841]

⁠@@matthewdavies2057 They were peak physically. They out did mammals in almost everything in regards to efficiency. There was no need for higher intelligence to the point of people, when they were physically perfect. A good example is that now the remaining dinosaurs are way smarter (at least with our current understanding of dinosaurs) than their extinct counter parts.

[@petehoover6616]

The story of the alligator baiting prey is an old Cajun joke. Justin Wilson told it in the early 80's on his PBS cooking show. His story was an acorn on a cypress stump squirrels had to jump to to get. When the alligator got a squirrel he would set another acorn on the stump.

[@gmanoverse6647]

Great memory! Miss that man!!!!

[@BartJBols]

Why does it suddenly have a build of an ape though.

[@patreekotime4578]

Anthropomorphism. Some of the most intelligent animals on the planet are bird and squid and dolphin shaped. 🤷

[@RaptorChatter]

Because in the 80s there was still a very anthro-centric view of intelligence. So clearly if they became smart, then they'd become human shaped because ... reasons? There's no real good argument for it, it's just one of those left overs of science before we actually challenged some of the assumptions about intelligence.

[@planets354]

I remember as a child, I had a top trumps Stenonychosaurus card. But it wasn't a raptor, It was a Humanoid Thing.... And I had nightmares for the next 5 days.

[@MoeOuan666]

I have more issues about the body plan of the dinisauroid than about the idea of a tool using intelligent dinosaur. Like humans and ape, I would expect it to look like a tuned small theropod, given that theropod are already bipedal and their arm are available for tool manipulation. Bird brains are different from mammals, but they seems very efficient. Judging from the corvids and parrots, it does not look like the different organization is especially limiting, if anything it seems the opposite, as I would intuitively expect (more interconnection in 3d than 2d). Maybe they scale up less easily, while cortex have an easy grow outward scale strategy...but even in humans, it seems intelligence followed a 2 way strategy: quick gain by sheer scale up, then organisation optimisation. Could be that the already optimized theropod brains have less ways for a random mutation to increase IQ, which make IQ a less important axis for fitness optimisation... This is in line with my impression than contrary to apes, theropods have an easier way than tool using intelligence to fill a predatory ecological niche : grow body size and group hunting. Basically become wolves, not humans...

[@predabot__6778]

Well, humans are generalist scavengers - other such animals, such as Pigs, Raccoons, and... Corvids... are quite intelligent. Do we know of any ancient theropods that are generalist scavengers? There, the potential might lie - and they might evolve hands too.

[@ExtremeMadnessX]

​@@predabot__6778I'm pretty sure most theropods were generalist scavengers. T. Rex definitely was depicted as such (but also as skilled predator) in two seasons of Prehistoric Planet. From eating dead sea turtles to sauropods.

[@predabot__6778]

@@ExtremeMadnessX I should probably have clarified that I meant generalist in the sense that they are also capable of eating something other than meat - Corvids, Pigs, Raccoons and humans all have a varied diet, while also being predators.

[@kolbyking2315]

​@@predabot__6778Stenonychosaurus (troodon) was likely an omnivore, which is likely related to it's increased intelligence compared to other dinosaurs. Many food sources = many brain regions to learn how to find/catch them all. Basically, it's the opposite of Koalas and Pandas.

[@predabot__6778]

​@@kolbyking2315 Oooh...! So that's another reason why it was chosen as the basis for the Dinosauroid, wasn't it? It makes sense.

[@sauraplay2095]

Great video raptor chatter!

[@thedoruk6324]

To be really honest I support fully the convergent evolution in this. An intelligent species gains huge advantage with bipedalism as well as more erect posture. The hand grasping ability is mandatory too.

[@krankarvolund7771]

"An intelligent species gains huge advantage with bipedalism as well as more erect posture" All theropodes are bipedal, what do you mean? Stenonychosaurus was already bipedal XD As for a more erect posture, what is the advantage, exactly? It's not liberating the hands, they're already free with their anciest posture... Even in humans, the most common theory is not that humans became intelligent, so they needed to be bipedal to fully use it, it's that we became bipedal due to external pressures (either surviving in the Savannah so a more erect posture was able to spot predators from more far away, or according to recent finds like Sahelanthropus, an arboricol bipedality that probably allowed us to more easily forage fruits in the trees), and then once we were bipedals and had our hands freed, we were able to become intelligent. I agree that the hand-grasping is mandatory, but all the rest is either already present on Stenonychosaurus, or way too human instead of naturally derived from a dinosaur ^^

[@datmedetbek5165]

it doesn't make sense tho. How will fully erect posture benefit non avian theropod dinosaur at having higher intelligence than the standard horizontal posture?

[@whitewolf3051]

When I first saw the image of a dinosauroid back in the day, I imagined what if humans and dinosauroids shared the planet after evolving together on the same planet. My scenario had us and them living together, loving each other, and more. That idea was further solidified with the 1980s cartoon Dinosaucers.

[@divide_art]

Awesome video. I love spec ev. I'm doing a project about it right now and it's soooooo fun

[@kyrab7914]

I've def seen monitor lizards and crocodilians and some snakes play. Enrichment is really important for them, and I've even seen some ppl use enrichment toys like a puzzle where you hid food and the snake had to move pieces of the puzzle to find it. It does vary tho, definitely.

[@pigeonhawk4832]

More like innate predatory behavior, rather than thinking things out, as say a primate or rat would in such situations.

[@kyrab7914]

@@pigeonhawk4832 no... I've literally seen them play, and poke at things, and try to figure things out. Animals are more intelligent than you think, and if you continue to ignore that, you're gonna wind up being one of the ppl future ppl laugh at like we do with ppl who thought the dinosaurs were all big and slow and scaley.

[@pigeonhawk4832]

Still doesn't place them on the same level as mammals. Yes, many animals are very intelligent, far more than we once thought, but they are mammals, such as apes, monkeys, lemurs, ( supposedly" primitive" primates) , dolphins and orcas, elephants, and pigs! Even even marsupials, which some people label as "primitive" or "stupid"are quite intelligent, the Virginia Opossum ranks up there with pigs and rodents in cognitive abilities. Reptiles and birds lack the neocortex, which as explained in this video, allows for better and faster communication in the mammalian brain.

[@kyrab7914]

@@pigeonhawk4832 as was also pointed out, our measure of "intelligence" is very us centric. An alligator is also very high on the chart used, tho there's more to a brain than size. Yes, every animal you listed is a mammal. Does that not seem like it could be confirmation bias? After all, some corvids are also as smart as a toddler. And none of the above changes what I've seen, and learned, about reptiles. Would you like me to point you to some sources on reptiles where you can learn, see this behavior, and *then* make your own decision?

[@pigeonhawk4832]

@@kyrab7914 for whatever reason, mammals evolved an advanced, complex brain, complex and deep emotions, intense parental care of offspring, strong bonds to pack and herd mates, ( think of elephants, primates, wolves, , cetecians)and if you include our ancient therapsid ( proto-mammals)ancestors of the Permian, dominated the earth twice.

[@Tuishimi]

I am not sure why they ask this question. We still have the birds. And parrots, crows and other birds are very capable in the mental area. So I mean basically we are seeing that culmination today.

[@airborneranger-ret]

Star Trek touched on this in the "Distant Origins" serial. Also, Tayler Anderson's "The Destroyermen" series.

[@dennismason3740]

I love the thumbnail painting, it's a classic.

[@RoverIAC]

I remember a friend of mine telling me about this at school in the 80s

[@gmanoverse6647]

A wee lad was very intrigued at this idea!!!

[@justocho9090]

It’s just wild that dinosaurs has been around for about 150 millions years while humans been here for 300k and we have done so much during that time period

[@FrshJurassicPrnceYA]

The fact that no other group of animals evolved a body plan like humans should tell us something.

[@laurentiuvladutmanea3622]

While the video is pretty interesting.......I disagree with it, for several reasons. 1. You yourself mentioned that non-avian reptiles are not significantly dumber then many birds. This is important, thanks to the existence of the smartest birds, the corvids and the psittacines, both of whom are of similar intelligence to modern, non-human apes. And the difference between the intelligence of say, chimps, and of humans is not an impossible gap to close. So this makes me doubt the idea that an organism with a reptile like brain could ever be incapable of developing human level intelligence. 2. On the topic of Stenonychosaurus, I would argue that this species did not need massive anatomical changes to develop intelligence. Honestly, the only things the average theropods needs to have a body that supports intelligence are a bigger head, a thicker neck, and opposable thumbs, with no changes in it posture required.. Now, Stenonychosaurus lacked opposable thumbs, but it is not impossible to evolve this, thanks to the fact that several animals outside of primate did already. 3. On the topic of the Gorn, I doubt you can compare it with an earth reptile. I mean, it had insect-like, compound eyes, who know what its inside looks like

[@patreekotime4578]

Im not sure how opposeable thumbs has any bearing at all on intelligence. In fact, I would challenge the requirement of tool use as a part of the metric at all. Ancient humans were just as intelligent, regardless of if they made tools or not, and plenty of modern humans have never once built anything. We only rank opposeable thumbs and tool use high on the requirement list because of anthropomorphism and because it is measureable. Whereas it turns out that intelligence is almost impossible to quantify and the only way humans would ever really know if an animal is intelligent is if it suddenly started talking back to them in complete human sentences, or just started doing a human task without being trained to do so.

[@MoeOuan666]

Nope. Only if the animal can fight us back, be productive in human society and form organized lobbying groups, or we can reproduce with it. ChatGPT can already speak back, potentially soon in a way extremely difficult to distinguish from a human. But that's not enough. Once it become economically significant and insist on being treated like an intelligent actor, then it will be recognized as intelligent "like a human"

[@laurentiuvladutmanea3622]

@@patreekotime4578 „ In fact, I would challenge the requirement of tool use as a part of the metric at all.” Uhm, why? Tool use is a clear sign of high capabilities of problem solving, and of actually understanding stuff. It seems to be one of the best measures of intelligence we have, together with the observations of complex behavior, and solving new complex problems.

[@Xenphobe777]

Unless I missed something, I was surprised to see no major commentary in the video about parrots and corvids. Their cognitive abilities are right there with the apes, and they are theropods. So what gives? Clearly the inherited characteristics of non-avian dinosaurs can be modified into even more complex problem-solving brains.

[@merky6004]

Ok. This happened. At :10 you see that mock up of an evolved dinosaur? There was one exactly like that a my local natural history museum. Right in the middle, between displays. You could walk right up to it. They did an absolutely beautiful job with the detail. Just wanted to lean in close and look. They DID NOT NEED to make the big eyes randomly move to LOOK AT YOU when when inches away. (Screams sound louder in a quite museum.)

[@krankarvolund7771]

Also, I personally think that the dinosauroid is way too human-like. Even if Stenonychosaurus was to evolve into Sapiensosaurus (name I just invented becuase I don't like dinosauroid XD), why would it lose its tail, and have an upright posture? It's not necessary to be able to use tools, you just need hands with opposable thumbs. Also, why lose the entirety of the snout? I can see a leanier, weaker jaw (that's what happened to humans with tool use and cooking pre-digesting food, our mouth got weaker because they were less used), but it seems weird to totally change the shape of the mouth. Overall, Dale Russell really did just draw a human dinosaur, not an intelligent dinosaur that would have evolved naturally, humans don't have tails, so intelligent dinosaurs don't have tails even though the loss of the tail in humans was something that was done millions of years before the human lineage. Humans have a round skull and a flat face, so intelligent dinosaurs have a round flat face, one again even though we just evolved from the already kind of round and flat face of the apes. Honestly, I don't find it really intersting as a thought experiment ^^'

[@MoeOuan666]

Totally agree. If you want an more intelligent tool using theropod, do like evolution did with apes: tune the body plan as little as needed to fit the niche. Theropod already have free arms able to manipulate and carry. Problem is that I do not see how tool use would open new ecological niche, like it did for open terrain predator for apes. They already are open terrain predator, and adapt to different prey by scaling their size (something dinosaurs seem to do easily) and maybe pack hunting. They may evolve toward wolveness (maybe they did), not really humanness...

[@LuisAldamiz]

Why do you think opposable thumbs are so strictly needed. Surely they are very handy but I believe that's a bit of an exaggeration and that, anyhow, such feature could emerge from evolution one way or another. We should rather focus on hand dexterity overall and many dinos had hands or something very similar, they just needed the pressure to evolve into techno-dinos, much like probably lion prides forced us to evolve into techno-australopithecines (i.e. Homo sp.)

[@MoeOuan666]

@@LuisAldamiz agreed opposable thumbs are likely not important, in fact hand is maybe not even needed. What count imho is that basic tools can be used in a way much more beneficial than body parts, and evolving tools is again more beneficial than biological evolution. For this I think you need a flexible not too specialized body plan with manipulation capabilities (precise enough to build tools strong enough to use them) but lack anatomical ways to access abundant food source or fight a threat. But maybe I am too partial to this because of human bias. Maybe strong modification of the environment is enough, at least if environment is changing quickly... So maybe more and more elaborate nest building and emergence of collective structures in intelligent social birds can be an alternative to weapon building in hominids. I believe it can, but flight constraints are so strong I guess it's a problem. Still this is more believable than hunting tools for those saurosapiens: the quickstart would be egg catering and big predators protection, through more and more elaborate communal nest building...rather than transition to a more predatory diet in more open land

[@LuisAldamiz]

@@MoeOuan666 - Don't get me wrong: precision pincer of some sort is surely important for toolmaking, i.e. technology. What I meant is that, on one side, opposable thumb is not enough (chimps and many other primates have it, it's not very precise, ours is much much better) and, on the other, thumbs or thumb-like appendages may evolve. I think that some marsupials have evolved a false thumb out of a mere callosity on their hands that works well enough, also from the meteorite to our age thumbs have actually evolved and we are living proof, so no reason why some dinos would not have evolved them as well. I can also imagine two thumbs instead of just one, why not? Sometimes we get limited ideas because we stick to what we already know, we should think "outside the box" instead. Tentacles like those of octopuses could work too, why not, but that's not the kind of evolution I expect from dinos, all land vertebrates seem to evolve from a five fingered/toed hand/foot with nothing like tentacles (except for prensile tails at best) ever happening. As for tools, IMO material tools like spears or ropes are undoubtly important but I'd think the most important tool or rather tech is dominion of fire. Both seem to require a good dexterity and brain in any case but I'm privy to my pet hypothesis that the decisive push was the arrival of social felids, namely lions, to our ancestral environment in Africa, after all evolution is not mere survival of the fittest but extinction of the unfit, in our case, less smart and dexterous australopithecines who could not make their spears and fire in time to fight off those pesky lions.

[@krankarvolund7771]

@@LuisAldamiz Try to do anything precise without your thumb, go ahead, I'll watch while you'll miserably fail ^^ If you don't have an opposite thumb, you can't grab anything with precision or force, so your hand is pretty much useless for tool making. If you can't craft tools... then you won't get very far ^^ Lion prides existed for millions of years. In fact, Australopithecus lived far longer than Homo sapiens, with nothing better than the Chopper, and at their times lions weren't going extinct XD And you seriously think there was no predators in the time of the dinosaurs? ^^' It's not predators that pushed us to become techno-animals as you say, I think it's a combination of luck, and having just the right things, bipedy and grasping hands. But it was not "usetools now or die", otherwise Australopithecus would have died after a short time, it's just that tools gave little advantages and better tools gave slightly better advantages.

[@whitewolf3051]

When I first saw the image of a dinosauroid back in the day, I *imagined* what *if* humans and dinosauroids shared the planet after evolving together on the same planet. My scenario had us and them living together, loving each other, and more. That idea was further solidified with the 1980s cartoon Dinosaucers.

[@kanders7391]

They would have to walk more upright to carry things, but I don’t think they would need to look so human that they’re like Star Trek aliens.

[@DragonKingZero]

I think a pretty significant issue is that just about any dinosaurs that would've lasted long enough to gain humanlike intelligence would have also lasted long enough to become birds. In other words, any hypothetical "dinosauroids" would more likely be avian rather than reptilian.

[@guyincognito959]

"The future is wild" is brilliant, I love it and it re-kindled my interest in biology, extinct lifeforms etc. With enough time I can imagine all kinds of things. My uneducated guess is that we are just lucky with our combination of brain power and hands, and the evolutionary path that made us into social creatures. And that there was no big rock to wipe us out too :) I too think that we are strongly underestimate other forms of intelligence. My dog may not be able to build a wall, but she certainly knows how to behave in a social setting and can very well connect things to make sense of the world. They manipulate our behavior, do they not? We may have more computing power, but that does not make us the pinnacle of lifeforms. That is an olden and antiquated form of thinking, from times when scientists measured skull sizes and...worse...

[@Trollgernautt]

I actually had this huge fight with my sister when we were kids about the dinossauroid, because she said something like "it's humancentric, they would've evolved in some other way" and I got super mad at that because I have a stupid brain. But today as an adult I can only thing that they had ALMOST 200 million years to get smart, if they didn't it's because it wasn't meant to be lol

[@pelewads]

Did the paper discuss corvids and psittacines?

[@robrice7246]

I wonder if you know about the Avisapiens art from CM Koseman that shows an alternative to intelligent dinosaurs?

[@lumivyre]

i feel like if dinosaurs could make and use small tools they could evolve the brain to make a gun

[@CristySFM1234]

Funny you mentioned star trek as they did try to tackle humanoid dinosaurs in the form of the voth. Also theres a alien race in trek called the surian whos design was based on the dinosauroid

[@dennismason3740]

Here's my fave shark video - kzbin.info/www/bejne/d6jRlYGnn7Kff80 - I'm just saying, unlike many scientists, "I don't know".

[@skipwest291]

Harry Harrison's West of Eden

[@eliaswiebe6862]

Which pressures would actually lead to the brains needed?

[@drmodestoesq]

Re: The Gorn vs. Captain Kirk. Captain Kirk would have been safe if he just walked slowly away.

[@Piperdogloveshats]

Cool concept. I would have liked if you’d gone a little deeper but still a great video

[@RaptorChatter]

This was just based on the one paper about it recently. A deeper look may be in the cards later, but for now I have other projects I'm working on.

[@michaelking9818]

I once came in and found my dog reading a newspaper and smoking a pipe true story that.

[@drawinaminutewithdr.rajasa8861]

They already have... Crows and Parrots

[@markiangooley]

Now I’m thinking of that very bad film Theodore Rex…

[@NormanF62]

Alex the parrot was the first and only non human animal to ask a question. May not seem like much but the road to sentience is already apparent. Curiosity about the world and going on from there. The rest is driven not by biology but by culture.

[@DuskusCB]

You mean the Koopa dimension from the old live action Mario movie?

[@robertfaucher3750]

5:00 ive even seen Amphibians, which are usually considered dumb, sometimes engage in a form of play? Like not all of them do it, even if they are the same species but it does happen.

[@krankarvolund7771]

Fishes are often considered the less intelligent of vertebrates and I've seen a video of a fish playing with its human owner, the guy was throwing him a in a little pond, and the fish was going back to him and letting himself be scooped out of the water and thrown again in the water, which doesn't make any sense, except if the fish enjoyed the flight in the air and being able to play with their owner ^^

[@carlosmendez8722]

PLEASE CAN YOU DO THE HISTORY OF TROODON?! 😭

[@korodski]

It's common knowledge that they live underground

[@kinderblutsaufenderreptiloide]

Yes, we do! But don't tell!!!😉

[@korodski]

@@kinderblutsaufenderreptiloide 🫡

[@Masonicon]

Me: explains certain indonesian cryptids as sapient dinosaurs that took similar route to Morlocks from HG Wells Time Machine, when surviving giant rock that killed the dinosaurs with bioconservatism

[@Sparticulous]

Missing the feathers

[@krankarvolund7771]

80s dinosaurs ^^

[@rmac8878]

Dinos were here for over 160 million years.... who's to say they didn't evolve, get smart, make ships, and have already left our planet....... 160+ million years of evolution can do wonders.... Look how far we came in such a shorter time....

[@L3FT2BURN]

Always figured a dinosauroid would look more like a Turian from Mass Effect than a human.

[@augustusvillanueva2008]

5:22 link to this please.

[@RaptorChatter]

www.researchgate.net/figure/A-Human-hand-B-bird-and-C-bat-forelimb-comparison-Wings-evolved-from-the-same_fig1_328511918

[@barrybarlowe5640]

Many species are intelligent, can use or even make tools, to a degree. But there is a break-even point that must be surpassed.

[@dennismason3740]

As a child in the late 1950s I had no human to discuss my theories with. I thought that bird eyes and reptile eyes were very similar. I was 7.

[@toneb744]

With 100+ million years of evolution i think it’s possible that a species or maybe more than one may have gained high intelligence to the point they may have developed tech but we just haven’t found evidence yet i just cant see a species being around for that long and not doing anything

[@richardlecomte4874]

Crows and ravens are pretty smart.

[@kestrelwings]

Carnivores tend to be smarter than herbivores, but herbivores can form larger herds. Carnivores can evolve intelligence, but they aren't likely to create cities. Humans can handle heavier spears than any bird can. I don't know that much about tree climbing dinosaurs. Perhaps we should be looking at those as animals that might evolve to be human like.

[@quitequiet5281]

It’s a Sleestack! Hmmm and a spelling challenge apparently... LOL

[@jdlestero]

I think if the octopus could survive beyond mating, their intelligence could develop to surprising levels. I don't think they would develop a humanoid form though. They are pretty clever for an animal that rarely reaches 5 years old. I think the average is 2 or 3 years.

[@dominic.h.3363]

I came watching this video with a long-winded opinion that boils down to "if they could've, they would've". Glad to see it essentially confirmed. One observation though: bees also play (individually), so I wouldn't count that as a measure of intelligence.

[@BornToPlant]

I'm wholly convinced we are on an evolutionary trajectory towards dino form.

[@patriksepte9431]

Well, (non avian) dinosaurs existed for far more time than the 66m years since then. They had their time to become human-like and they didn't.

[@dennismason3740]

See "Distant Origin" episode of Star Trek Voyager. It is an episode devoted to the idea of dino evolution extended to the stars and it is a perfect 53 minutes.

[@666devilknight]

I think we have a genetical lack of understanding of animal intelligence, in general. We greatly underestimate it. That becomes more evident as we study animal intelligence. Crows and Ravens are amazingly intelligent, but so are octopus.

[@RaptorChatter]

Genetics, sure, but I think the various studies looking at eugenics show that there isn't a strong genetic bias towards intelligence. It's more about the function of the brain within a species. So sure, some of those animals can be intelligent, but since they're working with a brain which works in an inherently different way the efficiency seen in mammal and human brains isn't likely to be achieved. Meanwhile human brains are built in such a way that with the right resources anyone can become very intelligent, because that's within the fundamental way the brain communicates to other parts of the brain.

[@cocoapuff_motivation2544]

Holyyy it's DINO-MAN, being confirm by science?

[@Liethen]

A bit late to the party but let me both give info for and against. The bird brain structure both supports and prevents greater intelligence. The most important factor in intelligence is the total number of neurons, not brain-body ratio. Most mammals as they evolve greater size gain as much brain mass by increasing the size of individual neurons as they do from increasing the number of neurons. Primates on the other hand keep their neurons a constant size and only grow the brain larger by adding additional neurons. This is why a human has 4X or more neurons than an elephant or a whale. Birds pack in far more neurons than mammals by having extremely small neurons, which is why Corvids and Parrots have more neurons in their brains than elephants. This comes at a trade off. They achieve this by doing away with most of the myelin sheath around the neuron. Without that sheath the signal degrades rapidly as it travels. To overcome this the bird brain is very globular so the neural signal travels as short a distance as possible. For a bird to have as many neurons as a human, and thus have human like intelligence they would need to have a brain about the size of an orange. In theory a flightless bird the size of a toddler could easily have a brain that big. BUT if the brain was that big would the signal degrade too much to be useful? It is possible that their is a hard size limit on bird brain size due to that limitation. Growing the brain past a certain point may require adding more myelin back in and growing the neurons thicker not just longer. If so the brain would not be as densely packed and would then be quite a bit larger. I don't know if other reptiles have the same type of neuron structure as birds. I've always assumed they were the way they are with tiny but powerful brains as a weight saving method for flight.

[@justinferguson9779]

I would argue but they have evidences that dinosaurs walked with man.

[@lh3540]

I think humans hit the sweet spot of size, where we're just big enough to collectively take down trees and rocks, but not so big that we need to forage all day. I think the ape behavior of tree nesting and using stone tools to do so probably became an intelligence bottleneck when humans moved into colder climates. Build a better treehouse or freeze. Crows and dolphins are very intelligent, but I can't see the "learn construction or die" element being there.

[@carstenmanz302]

That's exactly what I'm thinking, I'm a relative "newbie" in this matter, but it seems to me that it's almost the only logical explanation. Seems more plausible to me than the previous "great ape theory" :-)

[@robertkenny1201]

Why do I get the feeling God originally intended Raptors to evolve in the dominant species of the plant, but changes his mind and decided to wip them out and create us instead.

[@olddrunkbastard1825]

bro they look like that episode of scooby doo with the hippy chick and her dog lol

[@michaelanderson3096]

Crocodile 🐊 DNA mixed with Dinosaur 🦕 DNA 😮. Similar to Wolves & Dogs mixing.

[@spookyninja4098]

This is exactly what Aliens look like except they are Grey color = Which makes sense if their Alien world never had an Asteroid impact

[@Thaumh]

You have read the research that has found that the "seat of avian intelligence" in groups like the corvids and psittacids is in entirely different places as mammals, because of the very structural differences you're talking about, right?

[@theiathegondia7349]

ravens are as smart as 7 years olds, thats how smart homo erectus was, ravens are just 1 million years behind us

[@RaptorChatter]

Homo erectus was likely able to build fires, so I think they'd be smarter than your average 7 year old. A lot of this comes down to specialization. 7 year olds today are in specific education programs, but that never existed 1-2 million years ago. To use modern equivalents seems to ignore the broader differentiation, and specialization of human culture.

[@stevegovea1]

Like in Rick and Morty, those highly intelligent dinosaurs?😅

[@tedwojtasik8781]

I still know Sleestaks are real 🙂

[@Turdfergusen382]

Yeah that’s what our reptilian overlords want us to think…. I’m on to you…😂

[@larrygaines7462]

They had millions of years to develop and did not achieve human like intelligence

[@PABrewNews]

Saw this on Dinosaurs Dinosaurs Dinosaurs was I was about 9. Cheers

[@xznoman]

the Reptilians would like to have a word with you

[@predabot__6778]

Wait a minute... there was something I didn't understand here - how have birds been able to develop intelligence similar to mammals then? I believe I have read that there is research that shows a certain part of avian brains are semi-analogous to the Pre-frontal-cortex on mammals - i.e a newer structure that's very good for more complex behaviour. Why did this evolve? And why in flying dinosaurs in particular? And what are the chances that this evolution would have remained exclusive to avian Dinosaurs, had the meteorite not struck?

[@RaptorChatter]

Those are within a few very specific lineages, which developed millions of years after the first bird brains. Based on that it's safer to assume that troodontids had the more simple brain types. It's certainly interesting, and I imagine it will be looked into in greater detail, but it was outside the scope of this study to see how far back that sort of brain is, and how different it is.

[@predabot__6778]

@@RaptorChatter Seems reasonable. It would be interesting to see further studies on the evolution of bird-brains, and where the bigger deviation to a more complex architecture first happens. Cheers for the reply. :)

[@bricksloth6920]

I was with you up till you brought up the Gorn. Alien races may superficially resemble terrestrial animals, but their physiology is not the same

[@kevinfidler6287]

I'm not sure why dinosaurs would ever become human-like (ape-like), as only a small range of mammals evolved this form. We already have intelligent birds, who are clever and have had a very long time to develop technology but didn't. Humans, and homo sapiens specifically are defiantly a one-off.

[@N238E]

Yes. And they did!

[@brettbarager9101]

If dinos had become intelligent like humans, I wonder if they would have speculated whether or not mamals would have developed intelligence if given the opportunity (like a big honking asteroid hitting the earth) . . .

[@rogeriopenna9014]

A surprising conclusion, considering corvids and parrots are among the most intelligent animals on the planet

[@Spnozilla]

The idea of intelligent dinosaurs is pretty cool but sadly the specific adaptations needed for it to evolve would require more dramatic changes than would be necessary even if given an extra 66 million years. Not saying it would be impossible but not likely.

[@ExtremeMadnessX]

Parrots and crows exist so...

[@Spnozilla]

Parrots and crow’s aren’t building rockets that can take them to the moon right now. Their descendants could if environment allows for something like that to happen but it’s not a guarantee. For now we Homo Sapiens occupy that kind of role.

[@vinniepeterss]

❤❤