111–120 of 140 posts
There's an old 4Chan thread where a user starts 'World War Crow' by favoring a certain group of crows over another. Allegedly, after some time, the two groups of crows have an all out battle over which group gets french fries. http://usvsth3m.com/post/69700674556/has-an-anonymous-4chan-...
I hope someone saved it!
I had a pet crow when I was about 6 years old - he was a fledgeling who'd left his nest on the hottest day of the year and was dehydrated. My brother and I were squirting eachother with water and he cawed at us until we squirted him. He decided this was the best thing ever, and basically adopted us from then onwards. He was the terror of the local cats and dogs, but left our two siamese alone because he knew they wer…
Similar story, ~10 years ago a friend's dad (a hunter) found this crow alone and starving (he was probably 1 month old). He gave it to me. I feed him for 1/2 months and instead to leave him in a cage I decided to let him living outside... free. He was super smart, he was able to recognize me he was playful but the thing that most surprised me was that he was really lovable he really liked to be petted and every time…
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That is mind-blowing, and makes me want to reevaluate the concept of gift giving.
There's a famous quote attributed to the Inuit that Marcel Mauss mentions in The Gift: "Gifts make slaves like whips make dogs." Both halves of that statement are provocative.
Konrad Lorez, one of the founders of the field of animal behavior and a Nobel laurete, did a lot of his research on jackdaws, which are a close relative of the crow. His book King Solomon's Ring is a really enjoyable read into his insights about their intelligence and social life.
The final explanation of why a loving father of four can firebomb a city filled with innocent people blew my mind as a younger man and shaped my worldview.
I think I'll add King Solomon's Ring to my amazon cart now.
Cheers for reminding me of him.
There already exists an automated exploit for this behavior: Joshua Klein's Crow Machine: https://www.josh.is/crow-machine/ see also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=470840
A lot of people refuse to believe that animals (or birds) can show any kind of advanced thinking. "Oh, the crow was probably carrying something in its beak; it saw the peanut, and dropped the thing in its beak" is their explanation. I'm sorry, but animals are far more perceptive than they're given credit for. Also, how do you explain this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5NuBk5_Izc
I blame this on the "DreamWorks Effect", animators have done such a good job giving animals human traits and emotions that millinials+ really can't help but be animists.
Which is a shame since the opposite is also true, animals can have emotions and intelligence. Just it's doesn't necessarily look the same as humans characteristics.
"DreamWorks Effect" millinials+ sorry but I don't think you could be more wrong.
Disney has being doing this since the 40/50's.
Bambi, Dumbo, Disney nature docos were awful, even David Attenborough who improved the situation vastly is also guilty.
It is at least the post WW2 generation.
There's an old 4Chan thread where a user starts 'World War Crow' by favoring a certain group of crows over another. Allegedly, after some time, the two groups of crows have an all out battle over which group gets french fries. http://usvsth3m.com/post/69700674556/has-an-anonymous-4chan-...
True or not, this story is amazing.
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Crows are incredibly smart. They are known to memorize curbside garbage pick up routes of city vehicles and the specific days for each neighborhood, within a city. They are also quick to adapt, given a change in schedule and only visit those specific neighborhoods only on those specific days, from miles away. Here's a video of crow performing a multi-step tool action test - a test of intelligence - for the first time…
This one's my favourite: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUiGEDnf5e4 Crow keeps undoing the guys shoe laces so he can steal the frying pan while the guy's doing his shoe laces up. Classic.
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I've always heard that crows are incredibly smart. Great story. :)
Crows are incredibly smart. They are known to memorize curbside garbage pick up routes of city vehicles and the specific days for each neighborhood, within a city. They are also quick to adapt, given a change in schedule and only visit those specific neighborhoods only on those specific days, from miles away. Here's a video of crow performing a multi-step tool action test - a test of intelligence - for the first time…
But, the act of synthesizing that knowledge, applying that knowledge to a new problem, formulating a plan, and executing it... that really is incredible!
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I think it is very surprising even given findings about corvid intelligence. I know of studies showing crows can count, but that kind of intelligence does not at all imply that a creature will spontaneously give gifts in exchange for food. This requires either some kind of ethics including reciprocity, or it requires that the crows reason that giving gifts will make someone more likely to give more food. The latter r…
Crow flies with thing in its beak. Sees food, drops thing, grabs food. Comes back later, sees more food! Assumes food came from dropping thing (See "Superstition in the pigeon" [0]). Meme spreads among the crows. No ethics or deep reasoning required. Random rewards lead to irrational behavior. [0] http://psychclassics.asu.edu/Skinner/Pigeon/
So, to be clear, you're positing an alternative theory wherein one or more crows learn a behaviour, and teach that behaviour to other crows, who learn this complex concept and repeat the feat while they, too, pass it on.
And you think that's no big deal? :)