[wozniacki]

Crows are incredibly smart.

They are known to memorize curbside garbage pick up routes of city vehicles and the specific days for each neighborhood, within a city. They are also quick to adapt, given a change in schedule and only visit those specific neighborhoods only on those specific days, from miles away.

Here's a video of crow performing a multi-step tool action test - a test of intelligence - for the first time, without guidance and solving it in the first attempt.

[1] Crow Intelligence - Multi-Step Tool Action Test

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JY8-gP3Sw_8

[balabaster]

This one's my favourite: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUiGEDnf5e4

Crow keeps undoing the guys shoe laces so he can steal the frying pan while the guy's doing his shoe laces up. Classic.

[zzalpha]

To be fair, that's pretty basic reinforcement learning. The other video, on the other hand, shows adaptation of existing knowledge to solve a problem, along with multi-step planning, which is really incredible!

[balabaster]

That may be true, but the more advanced one isn't nearly as funny :P

[sk5t]

Only if the crow had significant experience with untying shoes as an opportunity to swipe something interesting... bit of a long shot, no?

[zzalpha]

You're over thinking it.

On its own shoelaces are interesting. Pulling on the loose end may have started as curiosity.

The person then puts the pan down to tie them. Crow grabs the lace again because, again, curious and playful (birds can be incredibly mischievous), and once again the pan reappears!

Now we're in reinforcement territory.

Now don't get me wrong, the crow learns fast. But it still could be just basic reinforcement of a natural behavior, which is the same technique used to teach various animals "tricks".

[balabaster]

It makes me want to tame a crow because it's animals with these kinds of personalities I love. They make life fun.

[zzalpha]

It's important to recognize that this crow would have been exposed to these types of problems before, so each problem element is likely familiar.

But, the act of synthesizing that knowledge, applying that knowledge to a new problem, formulating a plan, and executing it... that really is incredible!