IOPythonN (OK, in non-dead-parrot-related news):
The finding of a parrot with an almost unparalleled power to communicate with people has brought scientists up short.
The bird, a captive African grey called N'kisi, has a vocabulary of 950 words, and shows signs of a sense of humour.
He invents his own words and phrases if he is confronted with novel ideas with which his existing repertoire cannot cope - just as a human child would do.
N'kisi's remarkable abilities, which are said to include telepathy, feature in the latest BBC Wildlife Magazine.
N'kisi is believed to be one of the most advanced users of human language in the animal world.
About 100 words are needed for half of all reading in English, so if N'kisi could read he would be able to cope witha wide range of material.
Polished wordsmith
He uses words in context, with past, present and future tenses, and is ofteninventive.
One N'kisi-ism was "flied" for "flew", and another "pretty smell medicine" to describe the aromatherapy oils used by his owner, an artist based in New York.
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The thing's telepathic? Sounds like BS to me....
eta: This is supposedly from BBC news, but I can't find anything there... Still, I thought I should warn people to be on the lookout for talking telepathic parrots....
Maybe the newsletter writer had just been stabbed?
I would respect that kind of commitment.
I swear, I think the people who make this stuff must have never gotten over doing cheesy themes for high school yearbooks. Lots of pretty graphics, but they forgot to include directions to the place, which is hilarious, especially since they could have mocked up a treasure map. Basically they used a lot of pictures of parrots and boats, and then one page heading says "Walk The Plank Amusement!" Which... if that meant anything, it wouldn't mean anything good.
Ah, found the original BBC story. From 2004. Huh, you'd think that the talking psychic parrot could have been booked on a few talk shows since then....
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Um, what?!
I'm thinking the writer means that half of all words used in English conversation could be found amongst the 100 most-common words.
Stupid fake pet communication trick
Heh.
Yeah, makes sense that the parrot had been exposed as a fraud years ago....
I'm glad Language Log caught that "deathlessly moronic" line. I imagine the parrot doesn't actually use the 100 common words like, say, definite and indefinite articles, pronouns, verbs...
Good lord that was a stupid assertion.
ETA: I mean, imagine! You only have to learn 100 words in English and you can read it pretty well!
The "project" site linked somewhere in there is pretty amusing, too
Aimee is part of an emerging group of conceptually based artists interested in exploring our human relationship with Nature in work dealing with animals, biology, environmental concerns, and quantum aspects of consciousness.
She's also well versed in Newspeak!
You would think that someone qualified to be a journalist would be able to understand the concept of grammar.
