Joshua Klein: The intelligence of crows

Prevoditelj: Senzos Osijek Recezent: Mislav Ante Omazić - EFZG

How many of you have seen the Alfred Hitchcock film "The Birds"?

Koliko vas je gledalo film Alfreda Hitchcocka "Ptice"?

Je li se netko od vas stvarno uplašio?

Any of you get really freaked out by that?

You might want to leave now.

Možda sada želite otići.

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

So this is a vending machine for crows.

Ovo je automat za prodaju za vrane.

Over the past few days, many of you have been asking,

I već nekoliko dana mnogi pitaju:

"How did you come to this? How did you get started doing this?"

"Kako si došao na ideju? Kako si započeo to raditi?"

It started, as with many great ideas,

A počelo je, kao i mnoge velike ideje,

or many ideas you can't get rid of, anyway,

ili ideje kojih se ne možete riješiti,

at a cocktail party.

na koktel zabavi.

About 10 years ago, I was at a cocktail party with a friend of mine.

Prije 10 godina bio sam na koktel zabavi s prijateljem,

sjedili smo tamo i on se žalio da mu vrane

We were sitting there, and he was complaining about the crows

dolaze stalno u dvorište i prave veliki nered.

that were all over his yard and making a big mess.

And he was telling me we ought to eradicate these things,

I rekao mi je da bismo morali probati istrijebiti tu vrstu.

Sve ih moramo ubiti jer prave veliki nered.

kill them, because they're making a mess.

Rekao sam da je to glupo,

I said that was stupid,

znaš, možda ih samo trebamo istrenirati da rade nešto korisno.

maybe we should just train them to do something useful.

A on je rekao da je to nemoguće.

And he said that was impossible.

And I'm sure I'm in good company in finding that tremendously annoying,

A ja sam jedna od osoba koja se ne može pomiriti s time –

when someone tells you it's impossible.

kada netko kaže da je nešto nemoguće.

Tako sam proveo zadnjih 10 godina čitajući o vranama u svoje slobodno vrijeme.

So I spent the next 10 years reading about crows in my spare time.

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

And after 10 years of this, my wife said,

I nakon 10 godina moja žena je konačno rekla,

"You've got to do this thing you've been talking about,

"Gledaj, moraš napraviti to

o čemu pričaš i sastaviti taj automat za prodaju."

and build the vending machine."

Tako sam i napravio.

So I did.

Razlog zašto mi je to bilo zanimljivo je

But part of the reason I found this interesting is,

dijelom to što sam

I started noticing that we're very aware of all the species

počeo primjećivati da smo poprilično svjesni svih vrsta

that are going extinct on the planet

koje će izumrijeti na planetu kao rezultat proširivanja ljudskog prebivališta,

as a result of human habitation expansion,

a nitko ne obraća pažnju

and no one seems to be paying attention to all the species

na sve vrste koji zapravo žive – koje preživljavaju.

that are actually living; they're surviving.

Govorim osobito o sinantropskim vrstama,

And I'm talking specifically about synanthropic species,

vrstama koje su se prilagodile posebno ljudskoj ekologiji.

which have adapted specifically for human ecologies,

Vrste poput štakora, žohara i vrana.

species like rats and cockroaches and crows.

And as I started looking at them, I was finding that they had hyper-adapted.

Počeo sam ih promatrati. Shvatio sam da su oni hiperadaptibilni.

Postali su ekstremno adaptirani za život s nama.

They'd become extremely adept at living with us.

And in return, we just tried to kill them all the time.

A za uzvrat, stalno ih pokušavamo ubiti.

(Laughter)

And in doing so, we were breeding them for parasitism.

I čineći to pretvaramo ih u parazite.

We were giving them all sorts of reasons to adapt new ways.

Dajemo im razne razloge da se prilagode novim načinima.

So, for example, rats are incredibly responsive breeders.

Na primjer štakori se brzo prilagođavaju i razmnožavaju.

And cockroaches, as anyone who's tried to get rid of them knows,

A žohari, svatko tko je pokušao riješiti ih se zna da

have become really immune to the poisons that we're using.

brzo postanu imuni na otrove koje koristimo.

So I thought, let's build something that's mutually beneficial;

Zato sam pomislio, hajdemo izgraditi nešto što

koristi svima i

something that we can both benefit from,

pronaći način da stvorimo nove odnose s tim vrstama.

and find some way to make a new relationship with these species.

Zbog toga sam napravio automat za prodaju.

So I built the vending machine.

But the story of the vending machine is a little more interesting

Priča o automatu za prodaju još je zanimljivija

ako znate više o vranama.

if you know more about crows.

It turns out, crows aren't just surviving with human beings;

Ne samo da one preživljavaju među ljudima –

one to čine jako uspješno.

they're actually thriving.

They're found everywhere on the planet except for the Arctic

Mogu se pronaći svugdje na planetu osim na Arktiku

i krajnjem sjeveru Sjeverne Amerike.

and the southern tip of South America.

I u svim tim regijama rijetko

And in all that area, they're only rarely found breeding

kad se razmnožavaju dalje od pet kilometara od ljudi.

more than five kilometers away from human beings.

Možda ne razmišljamo o njima,

So we may not think about them, but they're always around.

ali one su uvijek u blizini.

And not surprisingly, given the human population growth,

I nimalo iznenađujuće je, s obzirom na rast ljudske populacije –

more than half of the human population is living in cities now.

više od polovice ljudske populacije živi u gradovima.

And out of those, nine-tenths of the human growth population

To znači da se devet desetina

rasta ljudske populacije događa u gradovima.

is occurring in cities.

We're seeing a population boom with crows.

Vidimo i populacijsku eksploziju među vranama.

So bird counts are indicating

Broj ptica pokazuje da ćemo možda

that we might be seeing up to exponential growth in their numbers.

vidjeti eksponencijalni rast njihova broja.

To i nije neko iznenađenje.

So that's no great surprise.

But what was really interesting to me was to find out

Ali ono što mi je zapravo bilo zanimljivo je otkriće

that the birds were adapting in a pretty unusual way.

da se ptice prilagođavaju na poprilično neobične načine.

Dat ću vam primjer toga.

And I'll give you an example of that.

Ovo je Betty. Ona je vrana iz New Caledona.

This is Betty. She's a New Caledonian crow.

And these crows use sticks in the wild

Ove vrane koriste štapiće kako bi u divljini

to get insects and whatnot out of pieces of wood.

vadile insekte i što sve ne iz dijelova drveća.

Here, she's trying to get a piece of meat out of a tube.

Ovdje pokušava izvaditi komad mesa iz cijevi.

Tu su istraživači imali problem.

But the researchers had a problem.

They messed up and left just a stick of wire in there.

Pogriješili su i ostavili jedan komad žice tamo.

Ona nikada nije imala priliku učiniti ovo prije.

And she hadn't had the opportunity to do this before.

Vidite, ne ide joj baš najbolje.

You see, it wasn't working very well.

So she adapted.

Zato se prilagodila.

Ovo je posve sama napravila. Nikada nije vidjela ovo napravljeno.

Now, this is completely unprompted; she had never seen this done before.

No one taught her to bend this into a hook

Nitko ju nije naučio da savije to u kuku,

or had shown her how it could happen.

nitko nije pokazao kako bi se to moglo dogoditi.

Sve je učinila sama.

But she did it all on her own.

So keep in mind -- she's never seen this done.

Imajte na umu da nikada nije vidjela kako se to radi.

(Laughter)

Right.

Da.

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

Yeah. All right.

U redu.

(Applause)

(Pljesak)

So that's the part where the researchers freak out.

Ovo je dio kada su istraživači poludjeli.

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

It turns out,

I tako smo počeli otkrivati sve više i više

we've been finding more and more that crows are really intelligent.

da su vrane stvarno, stvarno inteligentne.

Mozak im je proporcionalan,

Their brains are in the same proportion as chimpanzee brains are.

u istim proporcijama kao i čimpanzin mozak.

Postoje razne anegdote za razne vrste inteligencije koje posjeduju.

There's all kinds of anecdotes

for the different kinds of intelligence they have.

Na primjer, u Švedskoj

For example, in Sweden, crows will wait for fishermen

vrane će čekati da ribar baci udicu kroz rupu u ledu.

to drop lines through holes in the ice.

A kada se ribar makne

And when the fishermen move off,

vrane će doletjeti dolje, izvući udicu i pojesti ribu ili mamac.

the crows fly down, reel up the lines, and eat the fish or the bait.

To poprilično frustrira ribare.

It's pretty annoying for the fishermen.

On an entirely different tack,

Na posve drugoj strani,

at University of Washington a few years ago,

u Sveučilištu Washington, prije nekoliko su godina

radili eksperiment zbog kojega su zarobili nekoliko vrana na kampusu.

they were doing an experiment where they captured some crows on campus.

Neki studenti uhvatili su ih u mrežu,

Some students went out, netted some crows, brought them in,

donijeli unutra i vagali, mjerili i što sve ne,

weighed and measured them, and let them back out again.

a zatim ih ponovno pustili van.

And they were entertained to discover that for the rest of the week,

Bilo im je zanimljivo otkriti

da su do kraja tjedna te vrane,

kad god bi se određeni student pojavio na kampusu,

whenever these particular students walked around campus,

graktale bi na njega,

these crows would caw at them and run around,

letjele oko njega i zagorčavale im život.

and make their life kind of miserable.

(Laughter)

Bilo je sve manje zanimljivo kada se to nastavilo sljedeći tjedan.

They were significantly less entertained

when this went on for the next week.

I sljedeći mjesec. I nakon ljetnog raspusta.

And the next month.

And after summer break.

Until they finally graduated and left campus,

Sve dok nisu diplomirali i otišli s kampusa,

and -- glad to get away, I'm sure --

sigurno im je bilo drago što su otišli.

came back sometime later, and found the crows still remembered them.

Kasnije su se vratili i otkrili da ih se vrane još uvijek sjećaju.

(Laughter)

Pouka je, nemojte razljutiti vrane.

So, the moral being: don't piss off crows.

Sada studenti Sveučilišta Washington

So now, students at the University of Washington

that are studying these crows, do so with a giant wig and a big mask.

koji proučavaju vrane čine to

s velikim vlasuljama i maskama.

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

It's fairly interesting.

Poprilično zanimljivo.

(Laughter)

So we know these crows are really smart,

Znamo da su vrane stvarno pametne,

but the more I dug into this, the more I found

ali što sam više kopao po tome,

otkrivao sam da zapravo imaju izraženiju prilagodljivost.

that they actually have an even more significant adaptation.

Video: Crows have become highly skilled at making a living

Video: Vrane su postale iskusne u življenju

u novom gradskom okruženju.

in these new urban environments.

In this Japanese city, they have devised a way of eating a food

U ovom japanskom gradu izmislili su način

kako da jedu hranu koju obično ne mogu –

that normally they can't manage:

drop it among the traffic.

ispuste ju u promet.

The problem now is collecting the bits, without getting run over.

A sada je problem pokupiti komadiće

i ostati nepregažen.

Wait for the light to stop the traffic.

Čekaj svjetlo da se promet zaustavi.

Then, collect your cracked nut in safety.

Zatim pokupi svoj razbijeni orah u sigurnosti.

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

(Applause)

(Pljesak)

Joshua Klein: Yeah, pretty interesting.

Joshua Klein: Da, da. Poprilično zanimljivo.

What's significant about this isn't that crows are using cars

Ono što je značajno ovdje nije to da vrane koriste automobile kako bi razbile orah.

to crack nuts.

Ovo je zapravo stari trik vrana.

In fact, that's old hat for crows.

To se dogodilo zapravo prije 10 godina

This happened about 10 years ago

in a place called Sendai City, at a driving school

u Sendai Cityju, u autoškoli

in the suburbs of Tokyo.

u predgrađu Tokija.

And since that time,

Od tada se

all the crows in the neighborhood are picking up this behavior.

sve vrane iz susjedstva ponašaju tako.

Sada svaka vrana unutar pet kilometara stoji pored ceste

Now every crow within five kilometers is standing by a sidewalk,

i čeka da pokupi svoj ručak.

waiting to collect its lunch.

So they're learning from each other. And research bears this out.

Znači one uče jedna od druge. A istraživači misle sljedeće.

Čini se da roditelji uče svoje mlade.

Parents seem to be teaching their young.

Oni uče od svojih prijatelja i neprijatelja.

They learn from their peers, they learn from their enemies.

If I have a little extra time,

Ako budem imao malo viška vremena, pričat ću vam o slučaju nevjernosti

I'll tell you about a case of crow infidelity

u vrana koji to lijepo pokazuje.

that illustrates that nicely.

Poanta je to da su razvili kulturološku adaptaciju.

The point being, they've developed cultural adaptation.

I kao što smo čuli jučer

And as we heard yesterday,

that's the Pandora's box that's getting human beings in trouble,

to je Pandorina kutija koja stavlja ljude u probleme,

i mi to počinjemo viđati među njima.

and we're starting to see it with them.

Sposobne su se jako brzo i fleksibilno prilagoditi

They're able to very quickly and very flexibly adapt

to new challenges and new resources in their environment,

novim izazovima i sredstvima u okruženju,

which is really useful if you live in a city.

što je stvarno korisno ako živite u gradu.

Znamo da ima puno vrana.

So we know that there's lots of crows.

Otkrili smo da su vrlo pametne i da mogu učiti jedna od druge.

We found out they're really smart and they can teach each other.

I kada sam to saznao,

When all this became clear,

I realized the only obvious thing to do is build a vending machine.

shvatio sam kako je jedina očigledna stvar koju treba učiniti, napraviti automat za prodaju.

So that's what we did.

To smo i učinili.

This is a vending machine for crows.

Ovo je automat za prodaju za vrane.

And it uses Skinnerian training to shape their behavior over four stages.

Pomoću Skinnerovog treninga oblikuje njihovo ponašanje kroz četiri stadija.

Poprilično je jednostavno.

It's pretty simple.

Basically, what happens is that we put this out in a field

Ukratko, o čemu se radi jest da to postavimo vani na polje

or someplace where there's lots of crows.

ili negdje gdje ima puno vrana,

We put coins and peanuts all around the base of the machine.

i stavimo novčiće i kikiriki svuda oko automata.

S vremenom će vrane doći i jesti taj kikiriki

Crows eventually come by, eat the peanuts,

i naviknuti se da je automat tamo.

and get used to the machine being there.

S vremenom će pojesti sav kikiriki.

Eventually, they eat all the peanuts.

Tad će primijetiti kikiriki ovdje na ploči za hranjenje

Then they see peanuts here on the feeder tray,

and hop up and help themselves.

i poslužiti se njime.

Then they leave, the machine spits up more coins and peanuts,

A kada odu automat će izbaciti još novčića i kikirikija,

i život je tada jako ugodan ako ste vrana.

and life is dandy if you're a crow --

Možete se vratiti bilo kada po kikiriki.

you can come back anytime and get yourself a peanut.

So when they get really used to that, we move on to the crows coming back.

A kada se naviknu na to, koncentrirat ćemo se na vrane koje se vraćaju.

Sada su se navikle na zvuk automata i stalno se vraćaju

Now they're used to the sound of the machine;

they keep coming back and digging out peanuts

i vade kikiriki iz hrpe novčića koja se nalazi tamo.

from the pile of coins that's there.

Kada postanu sretne

When they get really happy about this, we stymie them.

zbog toga mi im otežamo.

We move to the third stage, where we only give them a coin.

Pomičemo se na treći stadij gdje dobivaju samo novčiće.

Now, like most of us who have gotten used to a good thing,

Sada, kao i većina nas koji smo navikli na dobre stvari,

ovo ih jako iritira.

this really pisses them off.

Zatim čine ono što im je u prirodi, ono što rade kada traže nešto –

So they do what they do in nature when they're looking for something:

kljucaju uokolo sa svojim kljunom.

sweep things out of the way with their beak.

I to su učinili ovdje, srušili su novčić dolje u otvor,

They do that here, and that knocks the coins down the slot.

When that happens, they get a peanut.

a kada se to dogodi, dobiju kikiriki.

This goes on for some time.

I tako je to išlo neko vrijeme.

Vrane su naučile da kada dođu,

The crows learn that all they have to do is show up,

trebaju pričekati da ispadne novčić, ubaciti novčić u otvor i dobit će svoj kikiriki.

wait for the coin to come out, put it in the slot,

then get their peanut.

A kada to savladaju i postanu jako dobre u tome,

When they're good and comfortable with that,

pomičemo se na zadnji stadij u kojemu se kada dođu ništa ne dogodi.

we move to the final stage, where they show up and nothing happens.

This is where we see the difference between crows and other animals.

Ovdje možemo vidjeti razliku između vrana i drugih životinja.

Vjeverice, na primjer, bi se pojavile, potražile kikiriki, otišle.

Squirrels, for example, would show up, look for the peanut, go away.

Vratile bi se, potražile kikiriki, otišle.

Come back, look for the peanut, go away.

They do this maybe half a dozen times before they get bored,

To bi učinile nekoliko puta prije nego što im dosadi

and then they go off and play in traffic.

i otišle bi se igrati u prometu.

Crows, on the other hand, show up and they try and figure it out.

Vrane se, s druge strane, pojave i pokušavaju shvatiti.

They know this machine has been messing with them

Znaju da se ovaj automat zeza s njima,

through three different stages of behavior.

kroz tri stadija ponašanja.

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

They figure there must be more to it.

Shvatile su da mora postojati nešto više.

So they poke at it and peck at it.

Zato gurkaju i kljucaju i što sve ne rade.

And eventually some crow gets a bright idea:

I s vremenom jedna vrana dobije odličnu ideju.

"Hey, there's lots of coins lying around from the first stage,

"Hej, tamo uokolo na zemlji leži puno novčića

još iz prvog stadija" – skoči dolje, pokupi ga i baci u otvor.

hops down, picks it up, drops it in the slot, and we're off to the races.

I tako postaje jedna sretna vrana.

That crow enjoys a temporary monopoly on peanuts,

Ta vrana uživa svoj privremeni monopol nad kikirikijem

dok njezini prijatelji ne shvate kako se to radi, a zatim svi postaju sretni.

until his friends figure out how to do it, and then there we go.

So, what's significant about this to me

Ono što je značajno ovdje nije to

isn't that we can train crows to pick up peanuts.

da možemo istrenirati vrane da kupe kikiriki.

Mind you, there's 216 million dollars' worth of change lost every year,

Svake godine izgubi se 216 milijuna dolara u obliku novčića,

but I'm not sure I can depend on that ROI from crows.

ali nisam siguran da možemo očekivati povratak tog novca od vrana.

(Laughter)

Instead, I think we should look a little bit larger.

Umjesto toga mislim da bismo trebali gledati s malo veće perspektive.

I think crows can be trained to do other things.

Mislim da se vrane mogu istrenirati da čine i druge poslove.

For example, why not train them to pick up garbage after stadium events?

Na primjer, zašto ih ne istrenirati da kupe smeće nakon događanja na stadionima?

Or find expensive components from discarded electronics?

Ili da pronalaze skupe materijale iz bačene elektronike?

Ili da tragaju za ljudima koji trebaju pomoć?

Or maybe do search and rescue?

Za mene glavna stvar, glavna poanta od svih je

The main point of all this for me is,

we can find mutually beneficial systems for these species.

da možemo pronaći obostrano dobar sustav za ove vrste.

Možemo pronaći načine da dođemo u kontakt s tim vrstama,

We can find ways to interact with these other species

a da to ne bude zbog istrebljenja

that doesn't involve exterminating them,

nego pronalaženja sredine koja je korisna ravnoteža.

but involves finding an equilibrium with them that's a useful balance.

Thanks very much.

Hvala vam puno.

(Applause)

(Pljesak)