Mirror, mirror on the wall, which animals are the cleverest of all?
Sometimes the scientific community, requiring as it does laboratory evidence for most things before declaring them ‘real’, seems way behind when it comes to recognising what goes on in the real world. The latest news is that magpies have joined humans, apes, elephants and dolphins as animals officially declared capable of recognising their own reflections in mirrors, and knowing them for what they are. But I am surely not the only cat owner in the world who has identified through real experience that while the majority of cats show no interest in mirrors, some do—and, by observing them observing themselves, we are capable of discerning, with absolute certainty, that some cats most definitely recognise their own reflections for what they are.
tags: animal intelligence, apes, birds, cats, dolphins, elephants, experience, faith, humans, laboratories, magpies, mirrors, religion, science, self-awarenessUtterly freaky: a mystery of memory
Ever had one of those moments when you realise a celestial ball has been set in motion, the fates shifting a gear? I have had a recurring dream for some months now, not every night but usually once a week, in which I am struggling to remember the surname of someone who was my friend back in 1987 when I first lived in London, just for a year. I don’t ever recall the circumstances of the dream; all I know, in the dreamscape, is that I must remember this friend’s surname, and from that a full remembrance of other friends associated with him will fall into place. Moreover, I had to find this friend. That’s what I knew or was told in the dream.
tags: dreams, experience, Facebook, friends, memory, weird
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