5 Animals I Would Love to Be A Little Less Smart

5 Octopuses

Before we start, pedants, find yourself hoisted on your own petard if you’re thinking, “Don’t you mean octopi?” That’s a common misconception. As for the animal itself, hoo boy, do I hate hearing stories about these things. Even if they were dirt-dumb, they’ve still got eight legs, and I wouldn’t want one anywhere near me. Unfortunately for my mental health, octopuses are remarkably intelligent. They solve puzzles, easily navigate mazes and can figure out how to escape all sorts of attempted enclosures. 

Stories go around of octopuses doing things like sneaking out of their tank at night in an aquarium to harvest fish, leaving aquarium workers highly confused. They also use tools, including the common blanket octopus wielding the venomous, severed tentacles of the Portuguese man o' war as a weapon. We need to be watching them 24/7.

4 Dolphins

Dolphins exhibit one famous marker of intelligence that I deeply dislike: their ability to recognize themselves in a mirror. This is such a complex train of thought, involving real recognition, analysis and arrival at a conclusion, that I refuse to ever let a dolphin see or hear compromising information about me. 

Look, I’m a full-blown human, and every once in a while, I get thrown by an unexpected mirror in an unfamiliar place, which means me and dolphins are dangerously close together. Not to mention, they've already demonstrated a capacity for violent crime.

3 Crows

You’ve probably heard some stories about crows’ ability to problem-solve and use tools. Dropping a couple pebbles in a graduated cylinder in order to float food to the top? That’s the sort of isolated, food-motivated brainpower I’m okay with. Unfortunately for our possible future, it doesn’t stop there. Crows are also capable of remembering human faces, specifically the faces of those who have helped or wronged them. 

However, it’s one particular discovery that gives my spine a slight shaking feeling. Like dolphins and mirrors, it was something I didn’t know how much I hated until I heard it. That’s the discovery that, unlike many other animals, when presented with a problem, crows sometimes literally stop and think about it. 

I have human friends who don’t do that.

2 Pigs

I know it’s not sensible, but it’s more palatable to me that smart animals are the ones who look weird or well-put-together. Of course crows can stack cups, they’re wearing that smart black outfit! What I don’t like is seeing an animal rolling in slop and turds and knowing it made a conscious decision to do that, because it feels good. I’m talking, of course, about the famously loud and filthy pig — something I say with love. 

Research shows that not only are pigs capable of problem-solving and complex emotion, they have distinct personalities from pig to pig. It’s just bad news knowing that any of our primary meats are climbing up the ladder to consciousness. I feel like we could apologize to octopuses for the whole calamari thing, but we’ve clocked too much pork over time for any mea culpa to hold up.

1 African Grey Parrots

All I had to read was a single sentence — “these impressive birds have the mental and emotional capacities of a five-year-old human child” — and I’m immediately out, even before it starts speaking the Queen’s english. Something with eyes that creepy getting smart isn’t good for us. 

There’s a guy on TikTok who keeps teaching his to identify different materials and I think that’s something the government should shut down. It starts with “glass” and ends with “flesh.”