Why Did Consciousness Evolve? Exciting Research on Bird Brains

I know this is the low tier answer scientifically speaking, but it seems pretty obvious to anyone whos ever had a pet that most animals are definitely conscious

I find it fascinating that some people don't believe other animals are conscious.

Crows actually mourn the death of other crows. That gather around the dead crow and hold a vigil.

I train horses, and herding dogs. But got the shock of my life when we got our first bird… a one ounce, tiny Pacific Parrotlet. 30+ years of animal training, but within day one “training” this tiny bird (4 months age), he learned everything I planned on training for the next many months.😮 He’s 10 now, and by far the most intelligent creature here. He also talks 🫣 which is ofc not about meaning of the words, but his associative learning is off the charts. And I swear he calls the cat just to annoy the dog. 😁 His favorite phrases are “it’s not rocket science” and, “you got this.”

it bothers me how far we believe we are removed from nature.

i just watched my 9 week old kitten's mind get blown when she saw my hand come out from under the blanket and she finally put 2 and 2 together. She looked back and forth from my hand to where she was attacking it under the blanket, her jaw dropped, then stared off into space recalling all the times she'd attacked it, mind totally blown.

12:27 There was a documentary on PBS once called 'A Murder of Crows' that dealt with their intelligence and self awareness. For over a year, a research team observed a murder, which is what a flock of crows is called, that lived in an inner city area. What was seen was astonishing. Among many things, they had learned to collect large walnuts from a city park and then land on the supports at intersections that traffic signals were attached to. They would watch the signal, and when it turned green, they would drop the nuts in front of cars so that the cars would run over them and crack them open. They watched children sliding down a hill on the sleds, and mimicked the same behavior after the children left by sliding down the same hill on their backs. What was amazing was that even though they could fly back up the hill, they chose to walk back up to the top.

I have seen animals invent ways to show me things I needed to be aware of. They are not only consciously aware of their own minds, but also aware of ours.

There’s a great book called Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are that talks about how hard good experiment design is, among other things.

It’s nice when science catches up with what we can see with our own eyes every day