Read this excerpt from "are dogs dumb? " by karen hopkin. chimps can use sign language to talk to their trainers. monkeys can learn to count. a crow can figure out how to use a stick to get at that hard-to-reach grub. chickens can learn to play checkers. even worms can be taught to run mazes. so which animal is the smartest? you're probably thinking that chimps are smarter than chickens. and that crows are smarter than worms. and that you’re smarter than all of them. what is the author's purpose in this paragraph? to give information about animal intelligence to explain that humans are the smartest animals of all to argue that bigger animals are smarter than smaller animals to describe how intelligent chimps are