The cunning crow

The weak male knew the box was empty, pretended to be food and dropped the strong male in the trash * The sophisticated deception strategies of crows

People like to consider themselves unusual. Animals do not have complex languages ​​that include rules of syntax, and it also seems that most of them do not excel at the level of consciousness that humans have. Many philosophers believe that humans are the only species that understands that others of their species have thoughts of their own. This understanding is called by experts "theory of the mind" and is considered the key feature on which other distinct human qualities are based, such as empathy and the ability to lie.

Biologists have learned to treat such claims with caution. They discovered evidence for the Theory of Mind in a variety of mammals, from gorillas to goats. But two recent studies raise the possibility that even the study of mammals is not a broad enough category to examine the question. Now it seems that even birds may have a theory of the Mind.

In an article published in the journal Society" "Proceedings of the Royal" Brand Heinrich and Thomas Bonnier of the University of Vermont in Burlington describe a series of experiments they performed on crows. The researchers wanted to check how these birds, which are considered particularly intelligent and sociable, react to the human gaze. The reaction to the gaze is considered a good indication of the degree of development of the theory of mind in children. By the age of about 18 months, most children develop the ability to follow another person's gaze and draw conclusions about the gaze. Failure to develop this ability is an early sign of autism.

To test whether crows are able to follow a gaze, Heinrich and Bonnier sat five crows, one after the other, on a device on one side of a room in the center of which a partition was placed. The experimenter sat about a meter away from the partition, on the side where the crow is. He moved his head and eyes in a certain direction and looked like that for 30 seconds, until he looked back. Sometimes he looked up, sometimes to the corner of the room where the bird sat, and sometimes to the area of ​​the room that was hidden behind the partition. The experiment was recorded on video.

Heinrich and Bonnier found that all the birds were able to follow the gaze of the experimenters in all cases, including when they looked across the partition. The curious birds even sometimes got off the facility and walked around the partition to see what was there, or jumped on it and peeked from above. There was never anything there, but the Crows were determined to prove it with their own eyes.

Another study conducted by Bunyar and published last month in the journal "Animal Cognition" shows that crows are also gifted with the ability to deceive others. The find was discovered by chance. Bonier conducted a study at the time designed to test what crows learn from each other when searching for food. During the research he noticed puzzling interactions between two male crows: Hugin, a socially inferior male, and Monin, a dominant male.

The crows' task was to try to figure out which boxes of photographic film had pieces of cheese in them, and then pry off the lid of the box and eat its contents. The inferior male was much better at this task than the dominant male. However, he never managed to swallow more than a few pieces of cheese before Munin, his dominant experiment partner, would approach his sled. From this it turned out (not unexpectedly) that crows are able to learn from each other about food sources. They are also capable of bullying to gain access to food.

But then something unexpected happened. Hugin, inferior but prudent, tried a new strategy. From the moment Munin approached to harass him, he moved to a row of empty boxes, took off their lids with great enthusiasm and pretended to be eating. Munin followed, and then Hugin went back to the full boxes and ate to his heart's content.

At first Bunyar could not believe his eyes. He debated whether to reveal the observation, fearing that no one would believe him. But Hugin, he is convinced, clearly deceived Monin.

As it turned out, Munin was no fool either. In a short time he picked up on the method, and refused to fall victim to another scam. He didn't even spare his dignity and started looking for the pieces of cheese himself. This development infuriated Hugin. "He got very angry," Bonyar says, "and started throwing objects everywhere." Perhaps the crows have another common feature with humans - they hate to be exposed in their spoilage.