The brain of crows never ceases to amaze them

Black plumage like ebony. Strict and piercing look. Wicked chirping. A clear tendency to anatomy. In our imagination, the raven is often associated with bad omens. Moreover, does he not sign with his pen anonymous letters intended to harm the people to whom he is addressed? Thus, over the centuries, the ordeal bird has often been persecuted. nailed up on door Hoping to ward off the bad Eye.

However, in Native American mythology, the common raven – a majestic bird whose wingspan can reach 160 cm – appears as the protector of humanity. A good creator, we do not owe him only water and shooting. but also starsThe moon and the the sun.

For scholars, the raven is above all a symbol of a Extraordinary intelligence. Studies have shown, for example, that he is able to use tools. To use tools and even to make them. By selecting twigs of the appropriate length. or the correct diameter. Or by forming hooks from bendable materials.

To their surprise, the researchers also discovered that the crow is able to recognize a human by its face alone. . amazing ability wild animals and not domesticated. Especially since a crow can remember a human face for years. And he passes this memory on to teach his fellow human beings how to behave in the presence of the person concerned.

Interneurons to stimulate intelligence

The crow also knows how to show some self-control. The ability we see as likely to help us make the right choices, to plan for the future. In fact, serve it, on a rotating table, with a treat that is immediately accessible, but small, and a treat that is larger, but only accessible later, and the crow will prefer to be patient to get to the latter.

If that still doesn’t convince you of a levelintelligence From the crow, know that it is one of those animals that can recognize itself in the Mirror. To protect his food, he can resort to deception, pretending, for example, that he is dead or deposit his loot somewhere to really hide it somewhere else afterwards. The crow is also playful and capablesympathy to his comrades. And while the majority of birds communicate only vocally, he knows how to exchange information by means of signals. For example, it happens that he points to an object with his beak.

Recently, researchers somehow put icing on a cake of crow’s intelligence. In their opinion, the crow knows … it knows! He is able to think about the contents of his mind. He has sensory awareness. A form of high intelligence that has always been considered reserved Humans and some monkeys.

This level of intelligence may be due to being in brain From the crow, an unusually large number of cells involved in information processing. from interstitial nervesScientists say. They are at the heart of the decision-making process: from risk assessment to task planning. Therefore, the crow will enjoy approximately 300 million of these inner neurons. For comparison, know that a chicken has only 40 million. And humans are about 1.3 billion.

Other work has already shown that an area of ​​the crow’s brain, the pallium, is organized like ours Dandruff. and the Dandruff, in humans, is the area of ​​the brain dedicated to tasks that can be described as superior. language or memory. Thus, evolution seems to have found a way to improve on the very small things the sound Available in brain cavity From the crow to maximize his cognitive abilities. And make him a bird.. not that stupid!