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October 31, 2006
Take a look at yourself
I read a pretty cool story in the Tribune today that suggests elephants are one of the few animals that know they are looking at themselves in the mirror, and not another animal:
If you're Happy and you know it, pat your head. That, in a peanut shell, is how a 34-year-old female Asian elephant in the Bronx Zoo showed researchers that pachyderms can recognize themselves in a mirror complex behaviour observed in only a few other species.
The test results suggest elephants or at least Happy are self- aware. The ability to distinguish oneself from others had been shown only in humans, chimpanzees and, to a limited extent, dolphins.
That self-recognition may underlie the social complexity seen in elephants, and could be linked to the empathy and altruism that the big-brained animals have been known to display, said researcher Diana Reiss, of the Wildlife Conservation Society, which manages the Bronx Zoo.
In a 2005 experiment, Happy faced her reflection in an 8-by-8- foot mirror and repeatedly used her trunk to touch an "X" painted above her eye. The elephant could not have seen the mark except in her reflection. Furthermore, Happy ignored a similar mark, made on the opposite side of her head in paint of an identical smell and texture, that was invisible unless seen under black light.
Personally, if I was an elephant, the first thing I would do is find a way to get the zookeepers to help me out so that I'm not standing in my own shit all day.
Posted by oz115 at October 31, 2006 08:47 PM
Comments
My old dog, Buster, would bark at himself in the mirror when he was puppy, but he seemed to figure things out as he got older. If I snuck up behind and gave him bunny ears or something he would turn around and look at me, maybe wag his tail.
-G
Posted by: G at November 2, 2006 12:06 AM