Whales being killed by humans = not too smart?
If you think that the fact that whales aren't terribly bright because
they "let" humans hunt and kill them, then what does it say about the
species that does the killing - and seems to have plenty of members
who kill and are killed by their own kind all the time all over the place.
I am reminded of the quote from Douglas Adams' The Hitch-Hiker's Guide
to the Galaxy about how humans thought cetaceans weren't intelligent
because they didn't have televisions, cars, and nuclear bombs. The
cetaceans thought the exact same thing about us because we *did*
develop those things.
Intelligence is not a one-size-fits-all concept. This is true for beings
on Earth and certainly for inhabitants of other worlds.