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Another set of mad science anthologies, including zombie robot birds (Kane would be proud), conservatives buying more name brand products, and decreased packaging size of pharmaceuticals reducing overdosing.
Weird Science programs its zombie robot sparrows to KILLOriginally Posted by John Timmer
There's so much weirdness here, I'm not even sure where to begin. First, there's the jargon-filled opening sentence: "Signaling often involves complex suites of behaviors that incorporate different sensory modalities." The "sensory modality" in question here is visual, in that it involves a bird waving its wing around as part of a territorial dispute among sparrows. If this sounds like much ado about nothing, be aware the press release claims the sparrows in question will sometimes fight to the death.
But the real thing setting this paper apart is its technique: It took taxidermy sparrows and reanimated them with robotics to see how living sparrows would respond to them. According to the PR, "The live birds responded most aggressively to the invading, wing-waving robotic sparrow, which Anderson [the lead researcher] said she expected." Clearly, she has formed expectations about things I never expected to see happen.
Another set of mad science anthologies, including zombie robot birds (Kane would be proud), conservatives buying more name brand products, and decreased packaging size of pharmaceuticals reducing overdosing.