Turtles may be slow when it comes to foot races, but they're speed fiends when it comes to counting. Scientists watched as a turtle swam between cards with different numbers of blocks attached to them. The turtle knew that if it picked the card with the higher number of blocks, it would get a tasty treat.
National Taiwan Normal University's School of Life Science presented the results of its research on turtles on October 21, proving that the common Chinese stripe-necked turtle is capable of comparing numeric quantities. The turtles in the study were able to successfully sort between 22 sets of cards in just ten minutes.
As differences between the cards grew more difficult to spot, like the difference between nine and ten, the turtles even seemed to count faster than humans can.
However, the head professor, Lin Su-min, says that the study does not necessarily prove that the turtles are actually counting the blocks individually the way humans do. He says that the turtles may just be estimating the difference based on the area size or density of the group of blocks, so more research is necessary.
Previous studies have indicated that birds and mammals are more intelligent than reptiles, but research like this may put that assumption into question. Professor Lin says that earlier experiments only showed turtles and lizards capable of comparing ratios up to 3:4, and so their ability to distinguish the ratio of 9:10 is record-breaking.
Only time will tell what the full extent of these turtles' mathematical capabilities is, but people probably won't be replacing their calculators with a pet turtle any time soon.