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This one impressed me so much, I never looked at Crows again the same way:

"Are Crows the Ultimate Problem Solvers?"

https://youtu.be/cbSu2PXOTOc



They are smart but TBH that crow already did all the sub-puzzles independently, he knew what the possible moves are just had to execute them in some order.


To be fair, that's how most of us approach puzzle games. "Okay I've learnt the individual tricks, now let me just try piecing them together in the order that they become available."


Yes but usually you have 100s or millions of possible combinations, in that crow puzzle he had to do 5 things and the order between 2,3,4 didn't matter. Effectively permutation of 3 so 6 possible orderings :)


I dont think a Dog could do the connecting of the several tasks. What about this one?

"Smart Crow uses cars to crack nuts in Akita, Japan near Senshu Park"

https://youtu.be/NenEdSuL7QU


I'm pretty sure some dogs could do this (if the tasks were changed to suit their natural range of motions and interactions with environment). When you teach a dog 4 tricks and try to teach him 5th he will randomly repeat the previous 4 in different combinations trying to get the treat. At least some dogs, others don't care much and if the first thing isn't working they give up.

My parents had a dog that was very smart and pretty aggressive to our cat. He had a dog kennel in a small section of backyard enclosed with high fence. Near the fence there was a small cherry tree where our cat liked to climb.

Cat wouldn't climb the tree when the dog was outside of his part of backyard, so the dog not only learnt to open the gate to the rest of the backyard (lifting a wire loop over the fence and pulling it just right), but also to shut it slightly to fool the cat. He would lie there pretending the gate is still closed, not reacting to the cat. Cat would climb the tree and then the dog would stop pretending, open the gate, go under the tree and bark at the cat till we come and free him. If we weren't home that could take hours - neighbors weren't too pleased.

Other example is dogs burying and re-burying treats when they see each other watching them bury it. That requires at least rudimentary theory of mind.

As for crows - I've personally seen them doing this trick (on a parking lot not on a pedestrian crossing, but same thing - they understood where the traffic is just right to be used for nut-cracking).

They are also huge assholes to other animals, bullying them in very creative ways.

I don't doubt crows are smart, just don't think that experiment was that impressive.




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