TEDTalk Tuesday: Crows Training Crows

[Occulus]

This week's TEDTALKTUESDAY presents an amusing example of how animal species- in this instance, the lowly crow- might possibly be trained to exist in equilibrium with humans, rather than be driven to extinction.

Enjoy!

JOSHUAKLEIN

Talk Title: The crow vending machine (video runtime: 10:06)



Joshua Klein

TED bio

About this Talk

Hacker and writer Joshua Klein is fascinated by crows. (Notice the gleam of intelligence in their little black eyes?) After a long amateur study of corvid behavior, he's come up with an elegant little machine that may form a new bond between animal and humans.

[Pharaoh]

1. Excellent!

K&R

[Occulus]

2. Kicking for the evening crowd n/t

[puerco-bellies]

3. Kicking for the Crow Nation.

Crows play crucial roles in many creation stories for Native Americans.

[lonestarnot]

5. Heh. See my post below.

:toast:

[lonestarnot]

4. My kid's Native American nickname is

Crow Boy. And this is a true story. We have a band of naughty crows that know what time we regularly feed the dogs. I always try to scare them away, and the crows laugh at me. CB never tries to run them off and they love him. They never do the laugh at him and will calmly hop up and take a piece of dog food out of the dog bowl if the dogs let them and sit on the wall next to the patio and look at the kid while he looks at them. It's freaky. A bond of some kind. They have never landed on him but walk close enough to him so he could touch them.

[Occulus]

6. I wonder what would happen if he offered them a choice

maybe of something tastier?

It sounds as though you could build a successful crow vending machine!

[lonestarnot]

7. I think Crow Boy is interested. He loved the video and the idea.

He watched the whole 10 minutes away from the damn games! :wow: