Birdbrainy: New Caledonian crows make tools using mental images

New Caledonian crows use mental pictures to twist twigs into hooks and make other tools, according to a provocative study that suggests the notoriously clever birds pass on successful designs to future generations, a hallmark of culture. “We find evidence for a specific type of emulation we call mental template matching,” co-author Alex Taylor, director of the Language, Cognition and Culture Lab at the University of Auckland, told AFP. “Put simply, crows can reverse engineer tool designs using only a mental image of that tool.”
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jun/29/birdbrainy-new-caledonian-crows-make-tools-using-mental-images?source=Snapzu