A Raven's Memory

Summary: Scientists from the Department of Cognitive Biology have done some research on ravens previously. They have discovered that ravens can memorize different relationships based on previous encounters. They also remember how things went and how the relationship is categorized, just like people. For people, you categorize different people you meet into mean, nice, weird, smart, all of the above or can’t-figure-this-person-out. Ravens do the same sort of thing, just not as complicated. It is even said that they have a different call for friends and enemies. For example, if a friendly call is heard, they will respond with another friendly call. If a “mean”, aggressive one is heard, however, the response will be just as mean and arrogant if not more. Critique: There’s not really much I can say other than “it’s cool”. Because it is cool. Ravens have always been the equivalent of crows except they’re not a bad omen and a sign of death. It’s hard to imagine that their memory is as good as ours, because their brains aren’t as big as ours. The scientists weren’t even saying that in their article, I just thought of it myself, but then I realized the above. See, mammals had been known to remember things like humans, but apparently this new research shows that ravens have more memorization skills than any other of their avian friends. Impact: There’s really no impact, but while on the topic of memory, I had the most amazing revelation that probably won’t ever work. What if there was some way to cure Alzheimer’s Syndrome with the memory of an animal? It sounds crazy, but if a raven has more memory potential than we thought, what other animals have that that we don’t know of? We could maybe study the brain or find some way to connect that memories to ours. It could be possible or impossible, but I think it would be interesting to see how their memories are really that different from ours. I mean, hasn’t anyone seen “Planet of the Apes”? but I guess they just tested it on animals and didn’t use their memories . . . http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120419132558.htm