Re:Crows Are Even Smarter Than We Thought
by TeMPOraL on Saturday August 31, 2024 @05:33AM
(#41407592)
Train is a bit of a shorthand here, though. Basic operant conditioning probably won't cut it. But the idea itself came to me after encountering similar thread about crows on HN many years ago - both comments and referenced articles would contain personal anecdotes about human-crow relationships, and from those I gathered that it's possible to kind of befriend a crow (or a group), and teach them behaviors as a kind of play.
So, I don't expect it's easy to train crows like dogs and pigeons, where one person "pre-trains" them and gives/sells them to someone else. But I think it should be possible to "train" a crow for yourself - bond with it and have it voluntarily indulge you reliably enough that it's pretty much like training.
Re:Crows Are Even Smarter Than We Thought
by jonplackett on Saturday August 31, 2024 @08:01AM
(#41408239)
It’s interesting how our view of animal intelligence is massively shaped by the animals we see every day - pets, farm animals, zoo animals. All animals that have had their natural intelligence degraded substantially.
Re:Crows Are Even Smarter Than We Thought
by hypercube33 on Saturday August 31, 2024 @07:00AM
(#41407917)
Badgers are incredibly smart and we seem to not be able to train them at all. There's a pair on YouTube that figure out how to escape their sanctuary
Re:Crows Are Even Smarter Than We Thought
by KineticLensman on Saturday August 31, 2024 @10:04AM
(#41408958)
Honey badgers? I visited a place in Africa where a pair were housed in an old tile-sided swimming pool because they could get through anything else. Until someone left a long-handled garden tool in there and they used it to climb out. One of the two was never seen again. The other was caught in a lion enclosure - it had cornered of the lions who was trying to avoid a fight, allegedly.
Re:Crows Are Even Smarter Than We Thought
by ChrisMarshallNY on Saturday August 31, 2024 @10:21AM
(#41409064)
A classic Honey Badger Meme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4r7wHMg5Yjg
Re:Crows Are Even Smarter Than We Thought
by sadcherry on Sunday September 01, 2024 @01:21AM
(#41414509)
Dogs are wolves. All of them.
Re:Crows Are Even Smarter Than We Thought
by ChrisMarshallNY on Sunday September 01, 2024 @04:30PM
(#41420110)
The inevitable result: https://cmarshall.com/images/WhatsTheWorst.jpg
One of my favorite nature vignettes, is a part of Planet Earth, by the BBC, about Cape Hunting Dogs[0]. It looks like a military assault. They are really clever, and work well, as a team.
But if you could train crows, they would probably be marvelous.
[0] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MRS4XrKRFMA