[ExI] dolphins making tools and developing a technology: RE: Psi and gullibility

ablainey at aol.com ablainey at aol.com
Wed Jan 27 23:16:31 UTC 2010


 Have you seen the birds that have not only discovered they can drop nuts on the road and 
passing cars will crack them. but also that if they drop the nuts at a pedestrian crossing.
They can wait for the cars to stop at the light so they can retrieve tha nuts without 
risking getting run over!

I can't remember whether they were Crows or Magpies. Either way corvids have to be up
there with the smartest of animals.

 
Also in London, some pigeons use the underground to travel between nesting and feeding sites.




 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: spike <spike66 at att.net>
To: 'ExI chat list' <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org>
Sent: Wed, 27 Jan 2010 17:59
Subject: [ExI] dolphins making tools and developing a technology: RE: Psi and gullibility




The psi discussion here has produced an insight: if a phenomenon exists but
we haven't the memetic infrastructure to support it, we wouldn't recognize
it even if we saw it.  We would seek alternative explanations, as I do with
psi.  

In my misspent youth I recall being taught that humans were the only tool
users, but that the notion was being challenged.  As a fallback, the text
book claimed that humans are definitely the only tool makers.  Now we know
plenty of nonhuman beasts do that too.

Check this way cool dolphin behavior:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQ50PYMXDCQ

Note that the guy making the mud ring does not himself get fed, but the
others do.  So this requires some rethinking of our evolutionary memeset.

spike


 
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