Years ago, I went caving out in the sticks with an outdoors group. To change into my caving outfit, I went behind the end of a cornrow, next to a pasture fence. A group of three cows up the hill noticed, and moseyed down the hill to watch. It was pretty clear from their body language that they were bored and curious. (And also, voyeurs.)

The lead cow mooed at me in a way that kind of sounded like a question. What the heck, I figured, and mooed back. I don’t know what I said, but it was scandalous. The cows’ faces looked like they were positively shocked, and they promptly turned around and marched back over the hill. It was like a real-life “My mother was a saint!” sitcom joke, but with cows instead of a foreign language.

Yeah, I had no doubt that there was intelligence there.