If I may ask. Why are you breeding May? I thought it was generally a bad idea to use feral birds because we don’t know their genetic history
Of course! It's a great question.
It's because feral pigeons have a type of intelligence that can't be ethically sourced any other way.
There is a huge difference between maintaining intelligence over generations and building it up in the first place.
The same way Racing Homers are more structurally sound and fitter, with a much more robust and adaptable immune system than any other pigeon, because they are bred to race hundreds of miles and thousands of them from all over the country are exposed to each other all at once and then to the wild when they are transported to a race and then released.
No other breed has that kind of strength or stamina, and no other breed has to endure exposure events of such magnitude.
Ferals have the single most rapid uptake of new information and highest learning flexibility of any pigeon breed because they survive entirely on their wits.
Racers are the second most intelligent breed, capabpe of independent decision making, with a very long memory.
But they are extremely rigid thinkers. Once something becomes a habit for a racer, they can't unlearn that habit with new information they way ferals can.
No other breed comes close to a Racer's intelligence.
I have Rollers and Tumblers in the program because generations of working with their breeder (looking to him to be called in away from a hawk or storm) have made a very biddable bird, but they are not intelligent enough to think as independently as a racing homer, because there is no pressure to.
There is no humane way to recreate the pressures that built feral intelligence.
So, the best way to get feral intelligence into the project is to breed from a healthy feral, and then figure out what mental exercises can be done to keep that keenly reactive, adaptable intelligence into future generations.
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Insects join list of species capable of solving simple ‘box-and-banana’ problem that demonstrates basic intelligence
Bumblebees can use tools to solve a problem, according to experiments that demonstrate their remarkably advanced cognitive abilities.
The bees were given an adapted version of an experiment that, 100 years ago, first demonstrated chimpanzees could work out how to retrieve an out-of-reach banana by stacking boxes. Since then, various other primates, elephants and crows have joined an elite cohort of species known to be capable of this level of insight and spontaneous problem solving.
In the latest research, bees were shown to be able to roll a polystyrene ball to a specific location and climb on to it in order to access an artificial flower on a low ceiling. The findings challenge the longstanding assumption that insects operate purely on instinct and mindless trial-and-error learning.
“Most people think insects are reflex-based machines,” said Dr Olli Loukola, a behavioural ecologist at the University of Oulu, Finland, and senior author. “That they can’t have any emotional states or feel pain. Some people don’t even realise that they have brains. I hope that these results change the worldview about that.”
The bees, which were only a couple of weeks old, were first trained to associate a blue artificial flower with a reward of sugar water. During the test, the flower was moved to the ceiling of a transparent petri dish-style chamber whose ceiling was too high for them to reach, but with insufficient space for them to hover. A ball was also introduced into the chamber. To reach the flower, the bee had to roll the ball under it and climb on top – a behavioural sequence they had never previously encountered or been trained to perform.
In the most basic version of the test, 75% of the bees were successful in reaching the flower. “This is essentially an insect version of the classic ‘box-and-banana’ problem,” said Loukola. “The animal must realise that an object can be repositioned and then used as a tool to reach an otherwise inaccessible goal. What stands out about the result is that this kind of spontaneous problem solving is now demonstrated in an insect.”
A question remained, however, about whether the bees were really solving the problem. An alternative possibility was that the bees simply enjoyed the sensation of rolling a ball along and – separately – were attracted towards the blue dot, meaning that they fortuitously ended up positioning the ball in the right spot.
To test this, the scientists put the bees through increasingly complex versions of the challenge. In the final setup, the bees were allowed to explore a left and right chamber, one of which featured the artificial flower, before the ball was introduced. The scientists then illuminated the chamber with red light, preventing the bees from seeing the blue flower, and introduced the ball. To complete the task, the bees needed to recall the location of the flower and position the ball beneath it – and 23 out of 30 bees were successful.
“We are not claiming that bees think like humans,” said Loukola. “But our findings show that miniature brains can generate flexible solutions to novel problems in ways we are only beginning to understand.”
Prof Lars Chittka, a behavioural ecologist at Queen Mary University of London, and author of The Mind of a Bee, who was not involved in the latest research, said: “We’ve seen bees do all kinds of remarkable things in our lab: counting, impressive object manipulation – but they surprise me every time. This is the clearest demonstration yet of some kind of comprehension of what’s at stake.”
“There’s a general perception that intelligent behaviour requires big brains because we are big-brained and relatively intelligent among animals,” Chittka added. “Bees are a model of how much intelligence you can squeeze into a small nervous system … It’s a good reminder of there being a motivation to pay some respect to these other beings.”
The findings are published in the journal Science.
here's something that should make you deeply uncomfortable: chimpanzees are better at admitting they were wrong than most people. experiments show they actually update their beliefs when the evidence shifts. your intuition about animal intelligence is lying to you.
Read more on Paradox Feed
"Recent research has revealed that bumble bees are much more cognitively advanced than previously thought: They play with balls, count, recognize faces, and even feel rhythm. However, it has not been shown that they could achieve one of the highest peaks of cognitive performance: the ability to spontaneously solve a problem. Bhambore et al. tested this ability by providing bees with a ball that could be used as a tool to reach an otherwise unreachable flower reward. Bees that had been allowed to play with a ball and experience the flower spontaneously learned to move the ball to access the flower when they were present together."
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.ady1618
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Orcas are not “humans of the ocean”. This implies that they are capable of understanding human concepts of morality, which we have no data to even remotely support.
What may seem horrific to us may be an adaptive survival strategy to them. For example, injuring prey and then allowing calves to practise hunting it is clearly a very successful way to pass on hunting skills.
This is unfortunately the danger of pushing this idea of the hyper intelligent animal that’s “just like us.” No. They’re not. They’re separated from us by millions of years of evolution and perceive and experience the world differently from us. Intelligence isn’t on a scale with humans at the top - intelligence is a range of cognitive abilities, spanning across a vast spectrum and dependent on the needs of that species survival.
There is nothing in the literature to suggest that orcas are capable of human levels of reasoning and therefore it is ridiculous to call them “humans of the ocean” when they engage in behaviours that are not exactly uncommon in other social species.
Tampering and destroying human property also isn’t new. Think about the kea in New Zealand that break off windshield wipers of cars seemingly for the fun of it.
Or, a personal anecdote, I recently had to take down my bird feeder camera because a sulphur crested cockatoo had deliberately bitten through the wire attaching the camera to the solar panel. There were seeds spread out for them to eat but they destroyed the wire instead - so no clear reinforcement value other than… fun?
Social learners like orcas are easily influenced and may do things just because it’s fun - which is likely what is happening in the Gilbrater Strait.
But that still doesn’t mean we should be calling them “humans of the ocean” and perpetuating the idea that they are capable of human level reasoning. Or framing their behaviours as malicious as if they’re aware of their actions and governed by morals. Thats a slippery slope into demonising animals and not helpful in any way.
New research reveals that bumble bees (Bombus terrestris) are much more cognitively advanced than previously thought:
We've known for a while that they play with balls, count, recognize faces, and even feel rhythm. Now we know they can achieve one of the highest peaks of cognitive performance: spontaneously solving problems.
And like the chimps in prior research, using a tool was the bees’ own idea.
"This is essentially an insect version of the classic ‘box-and-banana’ problem," study author Olli Loukola said.
"The animal must realize that an object can be repositioned and then used as a tool to reach an otherwise inaccessible goal."
And then they did it.
This is the first research proving bees can have insights on par with large-brained vertebrates. It’s remarkable when you consider the vast difference in brain size - a bee’s 1 million neurons are capable of the same goal-oriented problem-solving as a chimp’s 2.8 billion.
Imagine the implications! How might you use this discovery for worldbuilding fantasy creatures and science-fiction aliens?
