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Raven Consciousness

Beginning With the Bees:

In the 1960s, Heinrich conducted research on the foraging behavior of bumblebees and honeybees, discovering a complexity and sophistication he had not expected. They found that bees could measure food quality, due to displays akin to excitement upon finding flowers with high nectar content. He wasn't able to determine if the bees consciously knew the food was better or if it was a reflexive response. He saw no evidence that "their sometimes complex responses could not be accounted for by programming alone." Also, bees are difficult to analyze except through the greater perspective of the colony. In some ways, individual bees are better thought of as cells, with the colony as the organism, than as independent, autonomous individuals.

And Going to the Birds:

Ravens are solitary, territorial breeders, making them ideal research subjects. Considering this, there should be no reason for ravens to share the spoils of a food "bonanza" and yet, Heinrich was led to a raven feast by loud vocalizations. Heinrich set out to answer three questions:

1) Does their vocal activity draw in others?

2) Do those that are drawn in get to feed?

3) Is there an advantage in vocalizing to attract others?

The answer to all three? Yes. Because "[t]he sharers were juveniles who got access to new, untested and hence feared food and/or food defended by more dominant adults." After this advantage was established, other advantages, like sharing the risk of not finding food, were added on as "riders" or secondary advantages.

Heinreich also tested his theory using what he called the string test, which essentially consisted of food at the end of a string that required several cognitive steps to reach. He speculates whether ravens are capable of modeling behavior in their brains before trying it out, as a way to skip many costly errors in reality, and proposes several experimental models to address this question. He observed innate behavior, learning, and cognition, ultimately that the ravens could execute problem solving.

It seems like in all of these studies we have been reading, the researchers keep trying to figure out what animals are "thinking" through their behavior. We have no way of knowing what animals are thinking; we can only attempt an analysis in terms of human behavior and thinking, which is unfair, unreliable, and likely to cause confusion.

Social pairing was also tested as well through food gather techniques. You would have to observe whether there was a level of occupational optimism.