Scientists studying ‘clatterings’ of Jackdaws, discover seeds of primitive democracy. The birds gather by the hundreds, and when it’s time to abandon their position en masse, the exodus is preceded by a crescendo of chattering among the clattering. What can we learn about democracy if we follow the science of Jackdaw birdocracy?
Scott Ott, Bill Whittle and Stephen Green enjoy the support of our Members which enables they to create 5 new episodes of Right Angle each week — including one Backstage show for Members only. Join us and make new conservative friends for as little as $9.95/month. Just click the big green button above.
21 replies on “Jackdaw Democracy: Follow the Science as Group Chatter Volume Leads to Mass Exodus”
“Birdocracy” is a “thought” that originally came from #46. Go figure?
As all are too familiar, democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what’s for dinner. To ascribe an attempted democratic debate to a yammering clattering of jackdaws is a stretch. (A sentence that I never could have previously imagined myself writing).
Instead, it is just as within the realm of possibility that the birds are discussing the best culinary venues in town – translated as “caw, caw” – and no one wants to seem too hungry by leaving first or wants to get there too late for the meal.
I am pretty discouraged by much of what I see in this world, but…I am so grateful to BillWhittle.com for putting this out there. It made me grin, and and that is never a bad thing.
A sincere and heartfelt thank you for that humor!
This was a fun episode! You guys are great.
I’ve had quite a bit of experience with birds and can tell you that they are much more intelligent than you would think. I’ve had many birds, i.e., parakeets; cockatiels; and a Hahn’s (mini) macaw, who have been great companions. I think the macaw is contemplating doing away with us and taking over the household. He sits in his covered cage at night, mumbles to himself, and then laughs evilly. He’s out of his cage daytimes and even our cats will not go near him. What I’ve seen, though, in videos is truly amazing. I’ve seen a raven solve a very complicated puzzle to get to some treats. I’ve seen medium size birds given a directive by a human to choose a certain type of item based on color, material and shape and unerringly choose what it was told to choose. The items were wood; metal; and plastic. The colors were red; yellow and blue. The shapes were round; square and triangular. To me, being able to choose, say, a square, yellow, wooden piece over all the other choices was very remarkable and showed a lot of smarts. They can learn and they can figure out puzzles. Why can they not communicate with each other? Just sayin’
I feel like we as a nation had a jackdaw moment when we elected Obama. Lots of following of chater, little substantial thought
more of a jackass moment
The discussion was fun and I liked the humor. It was great to have a laugh this morning. But while listening, I was waiting for the application that I think stands out the most. I don’t know if Jackdaw screeching is necessarily a textbook example of democracy or not, but the intervention of the scientists has a very definite real-world analogy. It can be seen in the use of push-polls to change the opinions of an entire society by altering the perception of “majority public opinion” to effectively produce a “democratic” shift by manufactured, fake, “social pressure”.
Anyone who has seen the documentary “The Creepy Line” will immediately note the parallel between the scientists playing recordings of bird chatter to influence the group and how Google and Facebook sort search results and do “fact checks” and modulate the feeds of public discourse until people are completely manipulated to believe things because “it’s what everybody is saying”.
Basically, the researchers were operating as the “Disinformation Governance Board”, and the fact that the birds were fooled is a great illustration of how we are all being manipulated without knowing it. This example was a better illustration of what passes for “democracy” right now than you gave it credit for, I think. 😉
These avian scientists need to go measure the dung buildup to chatter ratio. To see if there’s a increase in poo tempo as the chatter ramps up, then they all take off after having done their duty. Maybe when these dirty birds have fouled their roost sufficiently they all take off for another place to turn into a bird outhouse.
This probably wouldn’t have occurred to me if the rest of their behavior wasn’t so similar to the Democrat Left. It just seems likely the jackdaws are mimicking the Leftists or vice versa and that provides more clues to investigate. Democrat voters crap all over everything and move on, too.
Next thing to check would be to see if the birds higher in the roosting tree are trying to convince the lower birds that being shat upon is good for them and they should be grateful for the gift of dung from above.
Then they’d be so much like Democrats the only significant difference would be they wear their feathers outside their skulls. Just the opposite of a Democrat Leftist.
Jackdaw “voting” is essentially the abrogation of individual decision-making in favor of the bird-brained majority. That is quite a poignant metaphor for humanity.
I think it’s more like social media, particularly Twitter. Once the tweeting, cawing, and other birdbrain noise become too much, there’s a mass exodus to another tree.
Not sure what to make of it when the species Elonus Muskus comes in and asserts dominance.
Obligatory 5* rating for the Holy grail reference.
Bonus star that Scott caught that reference on the fly and didn’t just stumble into it. Giving Steve no reason to taunt him a second time.
Someone on YT mocked Scott for not catching the reference. I don’t argue with people on social media, so I just agreed: “Scott’s not very bright.”
You have to know these things when you’re a king.
There is a sad lack of perceptiveness and failure to grasp nuance in the world. It’s like the experiential difference between black and white films compared to Technicolor movies. Like the world was before the advent of color cinematography, those people don’t even know they’re seeing things only in shades of gray.
Such like should be pitied by I cannot muster even that much regard for them. You’re a better man than me, I’d have mocked him back for being too stupid to see what was clear and obvious.
Nah, Scott just smiled and walked another 4 miles. His revenge will be to outlive most of us by a long bit. But he misses out on Scotch and cigars. Oh, well, more for us.
We here, who know and love you best, Scott, know the difference between missing a reference, and trying to get past it as quickly as possible. Steve would have gone on at least a two minute rant had you let him.
Well, Bill, they may be “sort of” voting … not thinking or hashing out a rational plan, but by their chatter eventually “convinces” (triggers) a flight response when it gets loud enough … yeah, I think Steve has it about right.
But I doubt they ever “decide” anything based on that other than … “it’s time to go”.
Plus they might leave 6 minutes early because they’re listening to the recording and thinking, “well that’s weird” and they take off.
So mules stuffing ballott boxes is a little like playing a recording…
What a great connection and juxtaposition to make/ recognize.
Except the “mules” are trying really hard to not be heard braying, singly or in unison.