Creatures Caves

True - fair point. But yeah, just keep in mind that what that test evaluates isn't actually "intelligence".

You also have to keep in mind what your definition of "intelligence" is. If your definition is 'able to survive on their own without problems', then my brainedits are stupider than standard Norns. The edits that allow them to develop personality and have more sophisticated social networks also cause some occasional individuals (not most, but some) to develop maladaptive behaviors that lead to an early death.

Is this realistic? Yes. Look at how people behave. Many of us die much sooner than we could have because - for example - we'd rather eat whatever we want, no matter how bad it is for us, than eat in a healthy way.

But does it mean the survival rate of individuals left to wolf is lower than that of more 'robotic' breeds, who all make the 'correct' decision pretty much every time? Yes.

So that's something to remember too. In my view of what constitutes intelligence, my brainedits (CLARITY EDIT: really, they're Geat_Masta's edits for the most part, I've just implemented and tested them) are -far- smarter than a standard Norn. But if you're solely looking at 'how often does the Norn make the 'correct' decision in a given situation', they fail next to standard Norns. But most people prefer CFE, CFF, etc. to standard Norns precisely BECAUSE they're more varied and therefore more interesting. CFEs, CFFs, and these latest brainedits exhibit more complex, individualized learning and behavior, which makes them more lifelike. But the result of that is that a few individuals learn stupid stuff and don't do very well.

In short, you can have a kind of 'intelligence' that ensures that all individuals more or less do the same things and therefore pretty much all have the same 'survivability', or you can have a kind of 'intelligence' that ensures that individuals learn and develop in different ways, so that no two are quite alike as adults, and some are more 'survivable' than others. The latter is more realistic, and what most people seem to wind up preferring based on the relative popularity of the available genomes. But not everyone uses Creatures the same way or has the same idea of what's fun or worthwhile. Plenty of people use the base genomes and were/are fine with that. So it all boils down to what you want.

That's the beauty of this software. It's flexible.