Minds of Their Own
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内容概述：
本篇為舊題。科學家透過訓練鸚鵡 Alex 說話和交流，證明某些動物比我們想像的更聰明
，它們不僅可以懂得人類的動作指示，還能進行邏輯思維。他們也有自情感和脾氣，甚至
可以用簡單的語言來表達自己的需求。然而其他科學家覺得動物沒有這種思維能力，認為
要教也應該教猩猩，因為鸚鵡的大腦太小。這位科學家說，我教它不是想讓它說話，是想
研究鳥類的認知能力。
題型分析：判斷題(T/F/NG), 填空題(Summary)
Minds of Their Own
In 1977 Irene Pepperberg, a recent graduate of Harvard University, did
something very bold. At a time when animals still were considered automatons,
she set out to find what was on another creature’s mind by talking to it. She
brought a one-year-old African gray parrot she named Alex into her lab to
teach
him to reproduce the sounds of the English language. “I thought if he learned
to communicate, I could ask him questions about how he sees the world,” she
said
When Pepperberg began her dialogue with Alex, who died last September at the
age of 31, many scientists believed animals were incapable of any thought.
They
were simply machines, robots programmed to react to stimuli but lacking the
ability to think or feel.
Any pet owner would disagree. We see the love in our dogs’ eyes and know
that,
of course, Spot has thoughts and emotions. But such claims remain highly
controversial. Gut instinct is not science, and it is all too easy to project
human thoughts and feelings onto another creature. How, then, does a scientist
prove that an animal is capable of thinking—that it is able to acquire
information about the world and act on it?