Uploaded October 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
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An account of Clever Hans - the Orloff stallion who, after four years of intensive training with his master Wilhelm von Osten, gave performances in Berlin, Germany in the early 1900s - wowing audiences with his displays of intellect. He seemed able to read German, French, do arithmetic, convert fractions to decimals, identify tones of the musical scale and intervals in C, recognize faces from photos and more. But he was a horse...so how was this possible? Was he a 200 IQ horse? Or was the whole thing a ruse put on for money? The truth may surprise you.
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SOURCES
Laasya Samhita & Hans J Gross (2013) The βClever Hans Phenomenonβ revisited, Communicative & Integrative Biology, 6:6, DOI: 10.4161/cib.27122
tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10.4161/cib.27122?needAccess=true
Clever Hans (The Horse of Mr. Von Osten) by Oskar Pfungst
weirdhistorian.com/clever-hans-horse-knew-everything-sort
scientificamerican.com/article/correspondence-1904-11-12
mirrorservice.org/sites/ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/5/4/9/2/54922/54922-h/54922-h.htm
equilibregaia.wordpress.com/2023/02/19/hans-the-wonderhorse
Fabio De Sio, Chantal Marazia, Clever Hans and his effects: Karl Krall and the origins of experimental parapsychology in Germany, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Volume 48, Part A, 2014, Pages 94-102,
faunalytics.org/global-animal-slaughter-statistics-and-charts
youtube.com/watch?v=vEmKe7KlskQ
amusingplanet.com/2020/05/clever-hans-horse-who-could-do-math.html
instagram.com/p/DEiB8z0z4Vt/?img_index=4
0:00 The Great Question
2:03 Meet Clever Hans
3:53 Method
6:35 Hans in the Press
9:44 Tricks of the Trade
11:23 Schillings Shills
14:08 Stupid Hans
15:58 All Hans on Deck
18:19 Hans Revealed
23:11 The Clever Hans Effect
25:22 To Fill in the Gaps Which Forever Persist
Try everything Brilliant has to offer by visiting brilliant.org/wrathofmath and you'll also get 20% off an annual premium subscription!
An account of Clever Hans - the Orloff stallion who, after four years of intensive training with his master Wilhelm von Osten, gave performances in Berlin, Germany in the early 1900s - wowing audiences with his displays of intellect. He seemed able to read German, French, do arithmetic, convert fractions to decimals, identify tones of the musical scale and intervals in C, recognize faces from photos and more. But he was a horse...so how was this possible? Was he a 200 IQ horse? Or was the whole thing a ruse put on for money? The truth may surprise you.
π Check out my math fashion brand! mathshion.com
β€οΈ Join Wrath of Math to get exclusive videos, lecture notes, and more:
youtube.com/channel/UCyEKvaxi8mt9FMc62MHcliw/join
More Math Chats: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLztBpqftvzxXQDmPmSOwXSU9vOHgty1RO
Business Inquiries: wrathofmathlessons@gmail.com
Follow Wrath of Math on...
β Instagram: instagram.com/wrathofmathedu
β TikTok: tiktok.com/@wrathofmathedu
β X: https://x.com/wrathofmathedu
SOURCES
Laasya Samhita & Hans J Gross (2013) The βClever Hans Phenomenonβ revisited, Communicative & Integrative Biology, 6:6, DOI: 10.4161/cib.27122
tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10.4161/cib.27122?needAccess=true
Clever Hans (The Horse of Mr. Von Osten) by Oskar Pfungst
weirdhistorian.com/clever-hans-horse-knew-everything-sort
scientificamerican.com/article/correspondence-1904-11-12
mirrorservice.org/sites/ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/5/4/9/2/54922/54922-h/54922-h.htm
equilibregaia.wordpress.com/2023/02/19/hans-the-wonderhorse
Fabio De Sio, Chantal Marazia, Clever Hans and his effects: Karl Krall and the origins of experimental parapsychology in Germany, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Volume 48, Part A, 2014, Pages 94-102,
faunalytics.org/global-animal-slaughter-statistics-and-charts
youtube.com/watch?v=vEmKe7KlskQ
amusingplanet.com/2020/05/clever-hans-horse-who-could-do-math.html
instagram.com/p/DEiB8z0z4Vt/?img_index=4
0:00 The Great Question
2:03 Meet Clever Hans
3:53 Method
6:35 Hans in the Press
9:44 Tricks of the Trade
11:23 Schillings Shills
14:08 Stupid Hans
15:58 All Hans on Deck
18:19 Hans Revealed
23:11 The Clever Hans Effect
25:22 To Fill in the Gaps Which Forever Persist
