Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id LAA20467 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Tue, 5 Sep 2000 11:49:45 +0100 Message-ID: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D31017459E0@inchna.stir.ac.uk> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: The Alex Studies : Cognitive and Communicative Abilities of G rey Parrots Date: Tue, 5 Sep 2000 11:47:24 +0100 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Sounds like an interesting book.
I recently saw a children's nature programme on which they had parrots
performing various different exercises. The key to the demonstration was
that each of the parrots had learnt how to do things in different ways (for
example getting to a pot of food hanging from a long rope- one pulled the
pot up to them by pulling the rope and holding it under a foot, another
climbed down the rope to the pot). The fact that the parrots were capable
of problem-solving in a variety of ways, and this of course is highly
adaptive behaviour, is a good sign of intelligence.
What would be interesting, from a memetics point of view, would be if
parrots were capable of imitating each other's strategies. Perhaps that
book you're talking about may cover that topic. From the TV show I saw, the
parrots performed their different strategies in plain sight of each other
without changing their strategies- although interestingly they did appear to
be different species of parrot (one was the blue backed yellow chest kind,
the other was the mainly red kind- as you can tell I'm an expert on parrot
species :-)!).
I read in New Scientist a while ago that the researcher you're talking about
was considering the notion of giving the parrot access to a kind of
'internet' to elleviate the boredom of the lab!
Vincent
> ----------
> From: Raymond Recchia
> Reply To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Sent: Tuesday, September 5, 2000 3:23 am
> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Subject: The Alex Studies : Cognitive and Communicative Abilities of
> Grey Parrots
>
> Finally got around to picking up "The Alex Studies : Cognitive and
> Communicative Abilities of Grey Parrots"
> by Irene Maxine Pepperberg (Harvard University Press 2000). This book
> summarizes 20 years of Doctor Pepperberg's research into the cognition and
> linguistic capacity of a grey parrot. I've only gotten about 80 pages
> into
> it so far but I am very impressed with the care with which Doctor
> Pepperberg
> conducted her research and with the interesting results she was able to
> achieve.
>
> Dr Pepperberg was able to teach her parrot about 100 words. At the point
> that I am at in the book the parrot has proven capable of labeling
> individual objects, describing them in terms of their color and quantity,
> and recognizing color and quantity as separate categories themselves.
>
> Amazon's review is at
>
> http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/067400051X/qid%3D968119632/102-5756
> 51
> 5-6174542
>
>
> Raymond O. Recchia
>
>
> ===============================================================
> This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
> Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
> For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
> see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
>
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
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