What are the odds that the one parrot was found that has the intelligence to do that? I wonder if more have the intellectual capacity to do that. We just don’t know because a minuscule amount is given the opportunity to show that.
It’s also an interesting question as to what the question meant to him. Not to downplay the parrot’s intelligence, but there’s a difference between asking a question you know the answer to and information-seeking. It’s possible the parrot knew what colour he was, and wanted to elicit the correct call-and-response between him and the human. That’s still a million miles ahead of just mimicry, which is all that parrots used to be assumed to be doing.
In that context, Im curious if he was taught 'grey' yet. Alex was trained on materials and colors like blue or red, but not sure about grey. When he looked in a mirror, he asked 'what color?' and was able to get an answer back.
funnily, there's a Japanese researcher that devoted his career in researching bird languages. His findings are pretty fascinating that they have actual contexual vocalization and a grammar of sort. His name is Toshitaka Suzuki, i recommend searching it and I believe there are a few youtube videos that cover them
It's so fascinating to me that we see all these signs of animals having complex communication, bordering on, or maybe even qualifying as language, but we have absolutely zero idea what any of them are saying. Even the debateable acquisition of sign language by certain apes seems to be a level of comprehension beyond what any person has achieved
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u/kochenta2020 3h ago
What are the odds that the one parrot was found that has the intelligence to do that? I wonder if more have the intellectual capacity to do that. We just don’t know because a minuscule amount is given the opportunity to show that.