Random Nature Discussion

[rebelknight]

I take a strong disliking for most monkeys and apes.

Are Humans in your list?

 

[Hengwulf]

Some are yes

 

[FrisianDude]

There was a cool video I found on BBC (I think) some time back about a raven/crow/black bird solving a puzzle. I think someone might have linked it to this forum somewhere too.

Yea, this. Says its broken for me, though.

that was cool.

 

[Anthropoid]

Bummers, still not working for me.

 

[Oyipggy]

Weird, because mine's the same. I remember watching it on that very page too.

Luckily, the internet is vast, mysterious, and all knowing.

 

[Anthropoid]

Weird, because mine's the same. I remember watching it on that very page too.

Luckily, the internet is vast, mysterious, and all knowing.

Very cool. Wouldn't seem to be a bad thing to be reincarnated into! 

 

[Oyipggy]

It doesn't really make much sense the more I think about it. I wonder if they were honest about it. Maybe it spent like 3 hours on each part and they just edited it down.

 

[Magorian Aximand]

Do remember that in the beginning they say that 007 was familiar with all of the objects. This was the first time he had them all together in this multi-stage puzzle, but if he's already familiar with the concepts involved I don't think it's unreasonable. This isn't the first thing I've seen applauding the intelligence of crows.

 

[Oyipggy]

I'd heard ravens/crows/black birds could use simple tools, but just never appreciated it, I guess.

I wonder how far off the bird people are.

 

[Vieira151]

It's probably a type of Acer or Platanus. Can't tell which from this far though, you'd have to see the buds to make that determination.

How about discussing some animals then?

One of my personal favorites, the Harpy, because it eats monkeys. I take a strong disliking for most monkeys and apes.

Spoiler

One of my favourite birds. I remember when I was 11/12, I made a real size paper mache model of one, with help of my Gran. It was fantastic. 

Other raptors that I like:

Spoiler

Spoiler

 

[Magorian Aximand]

I'd heard ravens/crows/black birds could use simple tools, but just never appreciated it, I guess.

I wonder how far off the bird people are.

 

[Anthropoid]

It doesn't really make much sense the more I think about it. I wonder if they were honest about it. Maybe it spent like 3 hours on each part and they just edited it down.

I think the bird had likely used all of the implements in the past. So each step in the task he was familiar with, but in previous experiments he had only had to do one or maybe two steps. They said as much in the intro.

So I don't think they are being 'deceptive' or dishonest, so much as they are focusing on the end product of their experiment in teaching Crows problem-solving abilities.

The take homes being:
1. Crows can learn
2. The can learn to use tools and remember how to use them
3. The can use tools in 'complex' (meaning actions that are not closely resembled to fixed action patterns they normally exhibit naturalistically) fashion and apply what they have previously learned in novel ways of solving more complex problems
4. They can string what they have learned into creative 'syntactical' strings of behavior
5. When presented with a novel permutation of tools with which they have previous experience, they can spontaneously use what they have learned to 'create' even more complex novel problem solving 'syntax.'

No way a wild crow, with no experience with any of those apparatus would ever be able to fly in there and solve it. 007 was able to do it because he had been 'trained' with each apparatus. The fact that he was able to learn any of them alone is amazing, but the fact that when presented with a novel permutation of them he was able to spontaneously figure it out is mind boggling.

Seems about on a par with a capuchin monkey, maybe even a chimpanzee, at least on the cognitive dimensions that those tasks reflect. Obviously a fellow primate, 'equipped' with a bauplan and basic life history more like our own, will have many psychological abilities that crows, as birds, probably lack completely--facial recognition, eye-gazing, and related social intelligence being the first things of which I am thinking. With respect to those types of abilities, crows may well be totally incompetent. But it doesn't diminish the fact that their specific psychological adaptations include elements that are eerily 'human like.'

ADDIT: the features I would be very curious to know if they have:

Theory of Mind, which some argue chimps have to some degree and some have even argued that dogs may have it. ToT is considered by most psychological anthropologists to be the 'pinnacle' of human social intelligence.

Displacement (linguistics), another human ability that virtually ALL of us have to a great degree, but which seems to be quite challenging for most animals.

Symbolization, I would imagine they have, as it actually seems to be quite common to many intelligent problem solving type animals. But the capacity for high levels of abstraction and/or the capacity for symbolic productivity or even more impressive creative productivity would be the question. The fact that a crow can learn a sequence of steps involved in getting access to a visceral reward suggests they may have the rudimentary capacity for complex syntax and communicative productivity, but who knows. What a challenge designing the experiment(s) to test for those abilities!

 

[rebelknight]

I watched a documentary once about a type of ants that wage war on other ants and actually take over other nests.
They even make the conquered ants their slave.
So war IS natural.

Dem hippies were proven wrong! 

 

[Anthropoid]

So much like us; no wonder they beget "man's best friend."

 

[Pharaoh Llandy]

It's probably a type of Acer or Platanus. Can't tell which from this far though, you'd have to see the buds to make that determination.

I agree. I suspect it's an American Sycamore (Platanus occidentalis) as the colour of the trunk and shape of the leaves seems to conform more closely to sycamore than maple. Also, wiki says about the sycamore:

The American sycamore is also well adapted to life in Argentina and Australia and is quite widespread across the Australian continent especially in the cooler southern states such as Victoria and New South Wales.

I seriously doubt they are oaks. The leaves are the wrong shape, and it's rare to find oaks in such close proximity to each other; they are a highly competitive plant species which 'neutralise' the ground around them with a type of toxin (can't remember it comes from fallen leaves, or the roots, can't even remember what it's called) which prevents other plants from growing around them, thus allowing more nutrients for the oak. Unless there's a break in the canopy due to storm damage, one oak will normally outgrow the other and the smaller will die due to a lack of sun and nutrients.

 

[user1324865215]

I watched a documentary once about a type of ants that wage war on other ants and actually take over other nests.
They even make the conquered ants their slave.
So war IS natural.

Dem hippies were proven wrong! 

There's an entire passage in Walden about it.

Spoiler: LONG QUOTE

You only need sit still long enough in some attractive spot in the woods that all its inhabitants may exhibit themselves to you by turns.

I was witness to events of a less peaceful character. One day when I went out to my wood-pile, or rather my pile of stumps, I observed two large ants, the one red, the other much larger, nearly half an inch long, and black, fiercely contending with one another. Having once got hold they never let go, but struggled and wrestled and rolled on the chips incessantly. Looking farther, I was surprised to find that the chips were covered with such combatants, that it was not a duellum, but a bellum, a war between two races of ants, the red always pitted against the black, and frequently two red ones to one black. The legions of these Myrmidons covered all the hills and vales in my wood-yard, and the ground was already strewn with the dead and dying, both red and black. It was the only battle which I have ever witnessed, the only battle-field I ever trod while the battle was raging; internecine war; the red republicans on the one hand, and the black imperialists on the other. On every side they were engaged in deadly combat, yet without any noise that I could hear, and human soldiers never fought so resolutely. I watched a couple that were fast locked in each other's embraces, in a little sunny valley amid the chips, now at noonday prepared to fight till the sun went down, or life went out. The smaller red champion had fastened himself like a vice to his adversary's front, and through all the tumblings on that field never for an instant ceased to gnaw at one of his feelers near the root, having already caused the other to go by the board; while the stronger black one dashed him from side to side, and, as I saw on looking nearer, had already divested him of several of his members. They fought with more pertinacity than bulldogs. Neither manifested the least disposition to retreat. It was evident that their battle-cry was "Conquer or die." In the meanwhile there came along a single red ant on the hillside of this valley, evidently full of excitement, who either had dispatched his foe, or had not yet taken part in the battle; probably the latter, for he had lost none of his limbs; whose mother had charged him to return with his shield or upon it. Or perchance he was some Achilles, who had nourished his wrath apart, and had now come to avenge or rescue his Patroclus. He saw this unequal combat from afar--for the blacks were nearly twice the size of the red--he drew near with rapid pace till be stood on his guard within half an inch of the combatants; then, watching his opportunity, he sprang upon the black warrior, and commenced his operations near the root of his right foreleg, leaving the foe to select among his own members; and so there were three united for life, as if a new kind of attraction had been invented which put all other locks and cements to shame. I should not have wondered by this time to find that they had their respective musical bands stationed on some eminent chip, and playing their national airs the while, to excite the slow and cheer the dying combatants. I was myself excited somewhat even as if they had been men. The more you think of it, the less the difference. And certainly there is not the fight recorded in Concord history, at least, if in the history of America, that will bear a moment's comparison with this, whether for the numbers engaged in it, or for the patriotism and heroism displayed. For numbers and for carnage it was an Austerlitz or Dresden. Concord Fight! Two killed on the patriots' side, and Luther Blanchard wounded! Why here every ant was a Buttrick--"Fire! for God's sake fire!"--and thousands shared the fate of Davis and Hosmer. There was not one hireling there. I have no doubt that it was a principle they fought for, as much as our ancestors, and not to avoid a three-penny tax on their tea; and the results of this battle will be as important and memorable to those whom it concerns as those of the battle of Bunker Hill, at least. I took up the chip on which the three I have particularly described were struggling, carried it into my house, and placed it under a tumbler on my window-sill, in order to see the issue. Holding a microscope to the first-mentioned red ant, I saw that, though he was assiduously gnawing at the near foreleg of his enemy, having severed his remaining feeler, his own breast was all torn away, exposing what vitals he had there to the jaws of the black warrior, whose breastplate was apparently too thick for him to pierce; and the dark carbuncles of the sufferer's eyes shone with ferocity such as war only could excite. They struggled half an hour longer under the tumbler, and when I looked again the black soldier had severed the heads of his foes from their bodies, and the still living heads were hanging on either side of him like ghastly trophies at his saddle-bow, still apparently as firmly fastened as ever, and he was endeavoring with feeble struggles, being without feelers and with only the remnant of a leg, and I know not how many other wounds, to divest himself of them, which at length, after half an hour more, he accomplished. I raised the glass, and he went off over the window-sill in that crippled state. Whether he finally survived that combat, and spent the remainder of his days in some Hôtel des Invalides, I do not know; but I thought that his industry would not be worth much thereafter. I never learned which party was victorious, nor the cause of the war; but I felt for the rest of that day as if I had had my feelings excited and harrowed by witnessing the struggle, the ferocity and carnage, of a human battle before my door.

Kirby and Spence tell us that the battles of ants have long been celebrated and the date of them recorded, though they say that Huber is the only modern author who appears to have witnessed them. "Aeneas Sylvius," say they, "after giving a very circumstantial account of one contested with great obstinacy by a great and small species on the trunk of a pear tree," adds that "this action was fought in the pontificate of Eugenius the Fourth, in the presence of Nicholas Pistoriensis, an eminent lawyer, who related the whole history of the battle with the greatest fidelity." A similar engagement between great and small ants is recorded by Olaus Magnus, in which the small ones, being victorious, are said to have buried the bodies of their own soldiers, but left those of their giant enemies a prey to the birds. This event happened previous to the expulsion of the tyrant Christiern the Second from Sweden." The battle which I witnessed took place in the Presidency of Polk, five years before the passage of Webster's Fugitive-Slave Bill.