Thursday, December 27, 2012

Clever cockatoo invents tools to reach food | Essentials

Clever cockatoo invents tools to reach food

Red-tailed Black-Cockatoo in Flight
Red-tailed Black-Cockatoo in Flight by Hasitha Tudugalle
License (according to Flickr): Attribution License
Excerpt:

This Goffin's cockatoo named Figaro is believed to be the first parrot ever observed to craft tools for reaching food and other objects. / Alice Auersberg Parrots are not known to use tools in the wild, but scientists say they've observed a captive Goffin's cockatoo named Figaro crafting implements to snatch food that's just out of reach. Figaro was spotted playing with a pebble in the aviary where he lives at a research facility near Vienna, and at one point, the bird dropped the stone outside the mesh of his caged enclosure. When he couldn't reach the pebble with his beak or claw, Figaro grabbed a small stick to fish for the stone, the researchers say.   "To investigate this further we later placed a nut where the pebble had been and started to film," said Alice Auersperg of the University of Vienna.

People:

Figaro

Overall Sentiment: 0

Relevance: 0.930282

Alice Auersperg

Overall Sentiment: 0.0287222

Relevance: 0.216771

SentimentQuote
-0.0638431"To investigate this further we later placed a nut where the pebble had been and started to film," said Alice Auersperg ...
-0.0618445"To investigate this further we later placed a nut where the pebble had been and started to film," said Alice Auersperg of the University of Vienna. "To our astonishment he did not go on searching for a stick but started biting a large splinter out of the aviary beam. He cut it when it was just the appropriate size and shape to serve as a raking tool to obtain the nut. It was already a surprise to see him use a tool, but we certainly did not expect him to make one by himself."
Sentiment Stats:
  • Number of Quotes: 2
  • Aggregate Sentiment: -0.1256876
  • Mean: -0.0628438
  • Standard Deviation: 0

Alex Kacelnik

Overall Sentiment: 0.0596968

Relevance: 0.213658

SentimentQuote
-0.124329"We confess to be still struggling to identify the cognitive operations that make these deeds possible," Kacelnik said. ...
-0.0367176"We confess to be still struggling to identify the cognitive operations that make these deeds possible," Kacelnik said. "Figaro, and his predecessor Betty, may help us unlock many unknowns in the evolution of intelligence."
Sentiment Stats:
  • Number of Quotes: 2
  • Aggregate Sentiment: -0.1610466
  • Mean: -0.0805233
  • Standard Deviation: 0

Alice Auersberg

Overall Sentiment: 0

Relevance: 0.17523

Betty

Overall Sentiment: 0.197442

Relevance: 0.150223

Key:

  • Aggregate Sentiment is meant to be an indicator of an individual's overall sentiment.
  • The Mean is meant to be an indicator of an individual's average comment sentiment.
  • The Standard Deviation, when there are enough quotes, will indicate an individual's consistency of sentiment (i.e. a Standard Deviation of 0 would mean they were very consistent in their sentiment and 1 would mean they were very inconsistent).

Note that quote stats are likely to be meaningless beyond the aggregate score due to the tiny sample size. However, they are always provided just in case you find something useful there.

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