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Snake
SFN Addict
USA
2511 Posts |
 Posted - 08/09/2002 : 12:12:20
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CNN.com - Crow shows she's no bird-brain - August 9, 2002
Crow shows she's no bird-brain
August 9, 2002 Posted: 3:39 AM EDT (0739 GMT)
Betty, a New Caledonian crow, holds the wire hook she crafted to get food
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OXFORD, England -- Oxford scientists have discovered that a crow called Betty is no bird-brain.
Betty astonished scientists by deliberately bending a straight wire into a hook and using it to extract food from a container, the journal Science said on Friday.
The feat, it is said, makes her the first animal other than a human that has shown a clear understanding of cause and effect, and fashioned a tool for a specific task using new materials not encountered in the wild.
Not even chimpanzees, our closest cousins, have this ability.
But Betty's older male lab-mate Abel had a more direct route of securing his meals -- he would snatch the wire or steal the food from Betty. He was not tested to see if he could bend the wire.
Betty and Abel are two captive New Caledonian Crows being studied by Oxford University's Behavioural Ecology Research Group.
In their native home, the South Pacific island of New Caledonia, crows of such species are known to make tools out of twigs and leaves to winkle out grubs.
Scientists first spotted Betty's ability by accident after an experiment to see whether the birds would select a hooked wire rather than a straight wire to use as a tool.
After Abel snatched away the hook Betty was left to adapt by bending the straight wire.
Wired up
She was able to repeat the skill nine times out of 10, using more than one technique.
Professor Alex Kacelnik, who heads the research group, said: "First she tried to get the food with the straight wire, and couldn't reach it. So she pushed the tip of the wire in a crack in the tray and bent it to form a hook. She then used this to get the food.
"We were somewhat surprised. To verify that what we'd observed was not a fluke, we tested the same animal again but only gave her a straight wire. Nine times out of 10 she solved the problem to perfection.
"What is more, she didn't do it the same way each time. Sometimes she stood on the wire with one foot while pulling the tip with her beak.
"Or she stuck the wire into a crevice and worked on it, coming from different angles. If it didn't work right at first, and she couldn't get the food, she'd take it out and fix it so that it did."
Professor Kacelnik said the team planned to see whether other New Caledonian Crows captured from the wild had similar abilities, and whether they might be shared by other birds.
Professor Kacelnik said just because Betty was a gifted tool-maker, it did not mean she was necessarily bright in other areas.
"What we believe is that there isn't a single kind of intelligence," he told the UK's Press Association. "Different species have developed different kinds of intelligence appropriate to their particular needs."
There have been many cases of birds showing surprising levels of intelligence.
Crows and ravens are both good at solving problems, and experiments have shown that pigeons can identify humans and recognise letters of the alphabet.
The most famous intelligent bird is Alex, an African grey parrot studied by Dr Irene Pepperberg in the United States in the 1980s.
He was able to use more than 100 English words correctly to refer to objects, ask questions, and make requests.
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Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
 Posted - 08/09/2002 : 13:07:09 [Permalink]
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quote:
The feat, it is said, makes her the first animal other than a human that has shown a clear understanding of cause and effect, and fashioned a tool for a specific task using new materials not encountered in the wild.
Not even chimpanzees, our closest cousins, have this ability.
Cool story, but they are wrong about the chimps. All apes can do this with no problem at all.
In fact Koko the gorilla can draw and read maps of her enclosure. And she has bent and nibbled off part of her toothbrush because her fingers are too thick to fit in a Macadamian nut jar.
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My business is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonize with my aspirations. ---Thomas Henry Huxley, 1860
Edited by - slater on 08/09/2002 13:08:03 |
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Rift
Skeptic Friend
USA
333 Posts |
Posted - 08/09/2002 : 14:33:55 [Permalink]
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Yup, chimps devise tools to pull termites out of their mounds all the time.
Find a twig that looks good... chew all the leaves of of it... as much, or more, thought goes into it as this crow did...
Other animals make tools too... Otters banging clams on a rock they put on their chest... scads of examples.
This is really no big deal...
"Ignorance has caused more calamity then malignity" H.G. Wells |
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Snake
SFN Addict
USA
2511 Posts |
Posted - 08/09/2002 : 20:18:12 [Permalink]
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quote:
Yup, chimps devise tools to pull termites out of their mounds all the time.
Find a twig that looks good... chew all the leaves of of it... as much, or more, thought goes into it as this crow did...
Other animals make tools too... Otters banging clams on a rock they put on their chest... scads of examples.
This is really no big deal...
I was waiting for some posts before I replied. I thought so too, that's the 1st thing I thought of when I read that story, that chimps make tools.
I also wanted to say that my dog makes decissions and if he had a thumb instead of a paw I bet he could think of making a tool too. He knows how to do a lot of thing by reasoning.
That's why I say humans are stupid, they think they are so smart!
And yes, it is a big deal IMO, when we find(when more people find out) out that more and more other animals besides the human one can think intelligently.
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*Carabao forever
*SAN FERNANDO VALLEY SECESSION - YES
*All lives are movie settings, it's what channel you're on that counts. Zatikia
*Just because I don't care, doesn't mean I don't understand.
Homer Jaye S. |
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Badger
Skeptic Friend
Canada
257 Posts |
Posted - 08/09/2002 : 21:09:28 [Permalink]
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A few of things that people use in order to give the impression that we're above other animals are tool useage, self awareness, and language.
There are a significant number of animals out there that fit the above 3 criteria. We aren't so special. This comforts me in that if we manage to become extinct, something else intelligent will come along.
If you think it's work, you're doing it wrong. |
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Snake
SFN Addict
USA
2511 Posts |
Posted - 08/10/2002 : 00:15:22 [Permalink]
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quote:
A few of things that people use in order to give the impression that we're above other animals are tool useage, self awareness, and language.
There are a significant number of animals out there that fit the above 3 criteria. We aren't so special. This comforts me in that if we manage to become extinct, something else intelligent will come along.
The X!
And about another animal taking over...yeah maybe, but will they invent cars to pollute the Earth and ruin the rivers and dig holes in the mountians for gold? And kill off other animals and trees in order to pave over the ground with cement? Who knows which animals really is more intelligent!
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*Carabao forever
*SAN FERNANDO VALLEY SECESSION - YES
*All lives are movie settings, it's what channel you're on that counts. Zatikia
*Just because I don't care, doesn't mean I don't understand.
Homer Jaye S. |
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Donnie B.
Skeptic Friend
417 Posts |
Posted - 08/14/2002 : 18:55:22 [Permalink]
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Let's not forget, this is a crow we're talking about! Not a large-brained chimp or gorilla, but a literal bird-brain.
But still, it's not that surprising to me. It seems fair to say that there's a continuum of intelligence in the animal kingdom, and the notion that we are somehow quantitatively different and superior is just a bit of hangover from an older religious mind-set (God gave him dominion...)
-- Donnie B.
Brian: "No, no! You have to think for yourselves!" Crowd: "Yes! We have to think for ourselves!" |
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Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
Posted - 08/14/2002 : 21:29:42 [Permalink]
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quote:
A few of things that people use in order to give the impression that we're above other animals are tool useage, self awareness, and language.
And corporate savvy
http://www.koko.org/world/daily.php?offset=49
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My business is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonize with my aspirations. ---Thomas Henry Huxley, 1860
Edited by - slater on 08/14/2002 21:30:50 |
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Snake
SFN Addict
USA
2511 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2002 : 00:12:16 [Permalink]
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quote:
quote:
A few of things that people use in order to give the impression that we're above other animals are tool useage, self awareness, and language.
And corporate savvy
http://www.koko.org/world/daily.php?offset=49
LOL.
Do you think that this is like Lassie the dog? When one died they just replaced him with a look alike to keep the story continuous. In the gorillas case to keep the cash coming in!
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*Carabao forever
*SAN FERNANDO VALLEY SECESSION - YES
*All lives are movie settings, it's what channel you're on that counts. Zatikia
*Just because I don't care, doesn't mean I don't understand.
Homer Jaye S. |
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