Since many species of animals have larger brains than humans, why aren’t they as intelligent as humans are?
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Brains aren’t just for thinking! They also control your entire nervous system, motor functions etc, so generally the rule is the bigger the body the bigger the brain.
What makes an animal ‘intelligent’ (intelligence being a very broad term) is what proportion of the brain they use for pure thought rather than bodily functions. This is why a better measure of ‘intelligence’ is the ratio or brain size to body size.
Hope that’s an acceptable answer, I’d just like to throw my own opinion in here and say that intelligence is a very subjective term, dogs for instance are adept at reading emotions (arguably better than humans) and whilst you wouldn’t think an octopus is even capable of reading emotions they are without doubt excellent problem solvers. Apes share most of the tool-making and social behaviour that we have but lack capable linguistics, whilst whales and dolphins have complex and meaningful songs but no need for tool-making. So intelligence is really a rather broad set of skills we associate with being human.
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