Pigs are known to be intelligent animals. However, now we may have to start looking at them with different eyes, as they show abilities that previously might have seemed impossible. Specifically, American researchers have discovered after tests that pigs can play video games. Specifically, scientists claim to have taught four pigs to play games on a computer.
The four animals – named Hamlet, Omelette, Ebony and Ivory – were trained to use a joystick to direct a cursor on the screen and move it until it hit a virtual wall. Each time they succeeded, they were given food as a reward.
Researchers at Purdue University in the US, who published the relevant paper in the psychology journal Frontiers in Psychology, according to the BBC and the Guardian, said that the fact that the pigs were able to understand the connection between the lever and the gamewas no small feat. The researchers described the pigs' efforts as more deliberate and focused, rather than random.
What is particularly impressive is that the pigs continued to play undeterred even when the machine that gave them food broke down during the tests. In other words, they continued to pass levels, with the prompting and guidance of the researchers.
Dr. Candace Croney, the lead researcher on the study, said that this type of project is important because, as with sentient beings, how we interact with pigs and what we do to them affects them and is important to them.
Furthermore, the scientists pointed out that the fact that pigs could play video games in general is particularly remarkable, given that they are animals with presbyopia and without hands or thumbs.
This is not the first time that pigs have shown their abilities and high intelligence. In other experiments that have been conducted in the past, they had given clear signs of their intelligence, since they could learn commands such as "sit." Of course, pigs do not have the abilities of more advanced animals, such as chimpanzees, who are even better at video games, thanks to their hands. In future experiments that will be conducted on pigs, touch screens will be used instead of controllers.
