What is intelligence?

de Jean Khalfa

What is intelligence? is a stimulating invitation to think how you think... and to consider if your dog or computer can think too. Human dominance in the animal kingdom and success in responding to the rigours of the physical world are due entirely to intelligence: the mental toolkit that gives us access to the stored experience of humankind and allows us to communicate, to reason, to test our ideas, and to plan for the future. How we define intelligence, what it consists in, how it evolved, and how we can enhance it are the questions addressed by the eight expert contributors to this remarkable book. What is intelligence? originates in the seventh annual series of Darwin College Lectures, delivered in Cambridge in 1992. The contributors include Richard Gregory on the intelligence of the eye, Nicholas Mackintosh on animal intelligence, George Butterworth on perception in infants, Roger Schank and Lawrence Birnbaum on artificial intelligence, Roger Penrose on mathematical intelligence, Simha Arom on musical intelligence, Daniel Dennett on language and intelligence, and Dan Sperber on 'understanding verbal understanding'.