| For us, as intelligent species which have a civilisation, we have:
1. Ability to predict future
2. Language. This enables sharing group knowledge.
3. Abstract ideas. This has overlap to language.
4. Use of tools. The use of tools is relevant to building a civilisation after developing intelligence. To give an example why it matters, reflect how many tools are relevant to us today or centuries ago. For example,
which a more efficient transport - an eagle gliding is more efficient than a human walking. But a human using a wheel (bicycle) is more efficient. The use of wheels, controlled fire, stakes, controlled microclimate through clothes derives from the use of tools. Given the above list, we can see that sharks and dolphins do not use tools. They have some use of language and share knowledge. They do not use tools as they are not suited for it in the water. Humans have hands which enable them to operate on multiple surfaces.
Perhaps an octopus can developer higher intelligence and a civilisation? Note civilisation requires an intelligence, but it is a superset of intelligence. Note that for any species developing intelligence and civilisation is a very energy consuming process. In a human the brain is a very power-hungry organ. Its purpose is to enable a better survival for the species it operates in. On an evolutionary scale, for humans and mammals, the brain structure we see today developed over multiple millennia - it was not a one-shot change, but going from a local minima to another local minima, if we are using optimisation language. Going back to the octopus - perhaps it’s brain does the job done; now and then an evolutionary change might occur to develop an even more organised brain. If it works for the species, the change propagates. But if the change lowers the survival rate of the octopus due to the higher energy usage or complexity of operating a high brain - then the change will not propagate to next generation. There is a last question, back to the dinosaurs - perhaps there was a civilisation at one of the multiple dinosaur die-offs - but most of its artefacts are wiped out? What evidence do we really have that there was not a civilisation before ours? References:
1. Antonion Damasio. Descartes Error.
2. Adam Frank. Was There a Civilization on Earth Before Humans?
https://amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/557180/ 3. A book on Aikido, which I cannot find. |
"In Shark Bay, Western Australia, bottlenose dolphins Tursiops sp. carry conical sponges Echinodictyum mesenterinum on their rostra in the only documented cetacean foraging behaviour using a tool" - https://www.int-res.com/abstracts/meps/v444/p143-153/
Also, octopuses: "The use of tools has become a benchmark for cognitive sophistication. Originally regarded as a defining feature of our species, tool-use behaviours have subsequently been revealed in other primates and a growing spectrum of mammals and birds [1]. Among invertebrates, however, the acquisition of items that are deployed later has not previously been reported. We repeatedly observed soft-sediment dwelling octopuses carrying around coconut shell halves, assembling them as a shelter only when needed." - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S096098220...
Lastly, your terrestrial experience might limit your understanding of what a 'tool' might be: "tool users in water often use other animals (and their products) and water itself as a tool ... Octopodes, as well as squids and cuttlefishes, also use water as a tool for protection by using jets of water to aid in burrowing for camouflage ... Humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) singly and collectively expel bubbles to create nets that encircle, contain and concentrate schooling prey for easy gulping " - https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rstb.201...