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Horses are smart enough to plan and strategise, new study shows (www.bbc.com)

submitted 3 months ago by [email protected] to c/news

21 comments fedilink hide all child comments

You can lead a horse to water and, it turns out, convince it to drink if the reward is great enough, researchers have found.

A new study has suggested horses are more intelligent than previously thought, having been observed to quickly adapt to a treat-based game with changing rules.

Researchers from Nottingham Trent University (NTU) said they were surprised by how the horses quickly grasped the game, busting previous theories that equine brains respond only to immediate stimuli and are not complex enough to strategise.

"This teaches us that we shouldn't make assumptions about animal intelligence or sentience based on whether they are 'built' just like us," she said.

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[–] [email protected] 34 points 3 months ago (5 children)

previous theories that equine brains respond only to immediate stimuli and are not complex enough to strategise

Who held those theories? And have they ever been around horses?

Just this weekend my spouse and I had to move our mare and almost 4 month old colt. She’s quite used to riding in a small horse trailer, but the little guy was terrified of getting into it. When his mom realized it, she started getting on and off the trailer several times to show him it was fine. Then she went behind him and kept nudging him towards the trailer. Seemed pretty obvious to me that she knew what was going on and was trying her best to help the little guy understand it was all ok.

I’ve certainly met some horses that could have made me question the species’ intelligence if they were the only ones I knew. But there are plenty of intelligent horses out there. I’m really surprised that the prevailing theory was that they only respond to immediate stimuli.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 months ago

I sent this article to my wife who trains / rides horses daily and she was just like, "Duh."

She says anyone who has spent any time with horses knows this.

I guess a formal study proving something has some clout though?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago

The arrogance of our species is quite astonishing. Look at the morons who get offended at the idea that we’re evolved apes.

Obviously, nothing could have any amount of actual thought if it wasn’t human! /s

[–] count_dongulus 2 points 3 months ago

Yeah some horses are super smart. I had one that learned to open doorknobs with his mouth after seeing it used up close for a long time. Very annoying, had to start locking that barn door.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

We had a stallion that could jump the 6-foot fences of his corral. My dad would yell at him and he would jump back in. He was a bit of a jerk (stallion), but he definitely wasn't stupid.

We had a Shetland mare, and she wasn't stupid, either. Pure evil, as is the Shetland way, but not stupid.

Our Welsh was neither stupid nor evil.

Our thoroughbred might have been stupid, or could have come from an environment as unstimulating as a rat cage with nothing but food and a single wheel.

[–] Lauchs 24 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Great, so now in addition to being big enough to kick me to death they can now plan how they're gonna get away with it.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago

"Now explain the getaway plan, Carl."

"I'm thinking... We have 4 feet and can travel at the speed of a galloping horse."

"Oats, Carl. Where are we going to find oats?"

"I've stashed a bunch away in the corner of the barn."

"munch munch hard swallow The uh... corner you say?"

"God dammit, Applebottom! Farmer Bill lives, for now..."

[–] [email protected] 17 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I am constantly surprised by how often you get reports of "animal such and such is capable of basic task".

I would assume it's a case of misreporting technical information, but then you hear how entrenched some professionals on the field are when it comes to assuming some type of exceptional, unique magical property in human brains and how "antropomorphizing" is used as a dirty word and it makes you wonder. I once had a biologist get very angry at me for suggesting dogs are capable of play behavior, so all bets are off, I guess?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago (1 children)

That biologist has never seen juvenile animals of any sort then ... because they all play in their own manner.

[–] FlyingSquid 8 points 3 months ago

If I remember correctly, play in both juvenile animals and humans is primarily about practicing for adulthood in all sorts of ways. Making it enjoyable is obviously of an evolutionary benefit. Like you said- puppies clearly enjoy playing, as do adult dogs since they have been bred to retain juvenile wolf features, and wolf pups also enjoy playing, but stop when they become adults.

[–] nifty 8 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Horses are treated pretty poorly during training, many trainers assume horses don’t have any conscious functioning, like their dog for example

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

...dogs have conscious functioning.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago

so many of these behaviors are in so many animals but we can't say with any degree of confidence till a study is done. I have seen squirrels strategize.

[–] ikidd 7 points 3 months ago

We had a horse named Doc that I'm pretty sure plotted how he was going to kill me every time we went to work. More than once I had to do a tuck and roll when he suddenly decided to go over and try to crush me.

He was smart, but not smart enough to realize where that ended.

[–] FlyingSquid 6 points 3 months ago

I've never trusted horses. Now I know why. They're plotting.

[–] SirSamuel 3 points 3 months ago

As one of nature's pedestrians, I'll never trust a creature that looks at me with it's teeth. Even I could tell you those bastards are plotting something all of the time

[–] AbouBenAdhem 2 points 3 months ago

I’m curious if similar experiments have been tried with other animals? Can we tell if model-based reinforcement learning is common to all mammals, or did it evolve independently in different lineages?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

What do the horses say about researchers?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

A horse is a horse, of course, of course.