Improbability Principle

I asked a question because I was trying to pin down where you think the idea comes from that the crows' behavior is related to using cars as nutcrackers. I'm not sure how "the behavior of the crows doesn't differ whether cars are present or absent" fits into this ...

You don't see how that statement fits in? But that was the null hypothesis of the experimental study. The study that you seemed to be accepting had established that crows didn't use cars as nutcrackers. 

Wouldn't a better test be to compare the behaviour of crows on roads with the behaviour of crows on hard surfaces where there aren't any cars?

It would even be safer for them to place the nuts when there aren't cars around to reduce the risk of being hit.

Smart ass birds.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvTlAORb9us

That's curious, because you should be - I pointed it out in post #55.

In your post #49, you claim that an effect didn't "show up". Any effect, though, would have been based on a difference in behaviour of crows between when cars are approaching and when cars are not approaching. So, you're implicitly assuming that this difference is meaningful (to the question at issue). Others, including myself, have pointed out that it probably isn't meaningful. How do you respond?

I'm sorry. I must be missing something. You seem to be agreeing that the study shows that the crows exhibit the same behavior regardless of whether a car is on the road or not, yet you also seem to be implying that some sort of "crows use cars as nutcrackers" effect could still be present. 

What I'm wondering is, if the crow behavior is the same regardless of whether or not cars are on the road. And six times out of seven the crows take the walnuts away when a car does show up. In what way could it be said that "the crows behave in such a way as to facilitate the crushing of nuts by cars"? You seem to have something in mind. Can you describe what you're thinking of? Otherwise I'm at a bit of loss as to why you regard your criticism as valid in the first place.

Linda

Another potentially interesting discussion sabotaged.

Another potentially interesting discussion sabotaged.

You should know her game plan by now, Chris. Next she'll claim she is being picked on.

The milk bottle opening behavior may serve as the All-or-None example I referenced earlier, since there isn't ordinary tit behavior which gets in the way of observation. That is, we wouldn't expect to see tits attempting to pierce or remove bottle caps in the absence of learning/imitation/modeling about how to get cream. This becomes relevant to the OP, as All-or-None examples don't rely on our poor intuitions about probability, and so may be more reliable.

"All-or-None" is a term which refers to a particular kind of evidence in medicine. Either historically "all" subjects experienced the same outcome (commonly, death) and now some do not, or historically some subjects experienced a particular outcome and now "none" do. This potentially offers high level evidence. An example would be the initial treatment of infections which historically were often fatal, with penicillin.

A number of the claims made for psi would be amenable to the All-or-None idea - those claims which don't involve any sort of muddling with ordinary events/experiences - such as levitation. Of course, the difficult part comes with establishing that it's the extraordinary aspect which is taking place, rather than various combinations of trickery (inadvertent or otherwise).

Linda

https://tohoku.repo.nii.ac.jp/?action=re...&file_no=1

This one seems better in terms of asking about behaviors which it seems unlikely the crows would engage in if they weren't reacting to the cars.

Linda