Parrots will share currency to help their pals purchase food (2020)
A fascinating article that once again demonstrates we are just barely scratching the surface when it comes to understanding the intelligence, let alone the lived experience, of other animals.<p>This reminds me of the recent debate we were having here regarding the conclusion in the UK that lobsters are sentient beings and therefore should be treated with some minimal amount of consideration. A common argument made by those who argued they should not, or should not be placed into a similar category as octopuses, is that lobsters are neuronally less complex than other beings. But here we see that these birds, which also have fewer neurons than other animals we consider to be more “advanced”, are capable of remarkably complex behaviours that hint at an interior life we simply do not understand.<p>We’ve poured money into SETI to try and answer the anguished question, are we alone? Well, it seems that we aren’t, but we might be too stupid and self-absorbed to notice.