Hitchcock Was Prescient

asechrest

asechrest

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Crows Spontaneously Exhibit Analogical Reasoning

They [crows] might not understand what they have in common with brothers of the Night’s Watch or why “as the crow flies” means traveling in a straight line, but hooded crows are capable of analogical reasoning. According to a study published in Current Biology this week, they can solve higher-order relational matching tasks like humans and other primates.

http://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/crows-understand-analogies
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This is the strongest evidence yet of analogical reasoning in a nonprimate species
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Link to the study: http://www.cell.com/current-biology/abstract/S0960-9822(14)01557-7

Video:

 
I watched a Raven one time, he took a single Cheeto out of a dumpster and showed it to his buddies, then took off. All the other Ravens were chasing him trying to steal the Cheeto. He led them on a merry chase away from the dumpster. Suddenly he pulled up , dropped the Cheeto and all the other Ravens went after it. The first Raven reversed course and went back to the dumpster. He came out with a bag of Cheetos and flew off in the other direction, and enjoyed all the Cheetos for himself.

That took some kind of thought and planning. Or maybe he watched humans do the same thing and learned.
 
Crows and ravens are really smart, though I always have reservations about such studies. Too many of them have turned out to be stupid pet tricks.
 
One winter in Manhattan, a snow storm blew in while I was at work. I ran to the bodega to get milk since I knew I'd be snowed in later. To keep the milk cold while I finished my work day in the overheated office, I made a knot in the plastic bag and wedged it in the window. Soon the snowy light from the window was eclipsed by a great shadow. I turned around to see a giant bird, think it was a gull. It had spotted (smelled?) a carton of milk inside a plastic bag six stories up, had swooped in, pierced the bag and carton, and was drinking the milk. Can they read?
 
Saw a raven get a walnut, take it to the street, waited for a car, set it down where the car would run over it and crack the shell.
 
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