Re: Dinosauroid Revisited

[Patrick Norton <ptnorton@suscom-maine.net>]

Sim,

If this video is accurate, it is remarkable.  The short article linked to 
the video has a number of limitations, including a small number of trials 
(17) and a lot of ambiguity about the independence of those trials, not to 
mention others. Taken on its face, however, the article appears to report 
that more than 50% of the trials resulted in the subject crow retrieving the 
food item after bending a wire into a hook. I'm intrigued by this idea, but, 
Bernd Heinrich notwithstanding, I am skeptical about the interpretation of 
the results of this experiment.  The problem solving ability of corvids 
today is subject to experimental testing (and seems to be a potentially 
fascinating area of study), but views about what such a capability may have 
meant with respect to the evolution of dinosaurs in the absence of the KT 
event is, unfortunately, forever limited to realm of speculation.

PTN