Feathered culture (about crows)
Culture, civilization, proto-civilization — definitions that carry a bright anthropocentric shade. But if you remove that human-centricity from there, you can definitely say that crows have culture (and a technological one at that) and that they are a proto-civilization.
Culture:
- New Caledonian crows accumulate improvements in their techniques for solving various tasks over time, passing them through generations.
- They have social learning — young crows learn from their elders.
- They use binocular and monocular vision differently depending on the situation, and these are cultural patterns in exploring the world.
Interestingly, such cultural skills help them survive.
Proto-civilization:
- Crows have social hierarchy and role specialization.
- Technological traditions are passed between generations.
- They control territories and coordinate group actions.
- They accumulate and transmit knowledge without writing.
As for a full-fledged civilization, it's more complicated, but for example, one author in their research proposes that civilization arises when violent intraspecies competition is replaced by non-violent struggle. And crows prefer to cooperate instead of constant fighting, care for weak members of the flock, and use intelligence instead of brute force. With this definition, you could say that civilization exists in dolphins, elephants, bonobos, and a bunch of other species.
I don't want to force a square peg into a round hole and play with terms, but it seems to me that most people don't notice that they live right next to amazing creatures that are just background to us, or worse — scavengers carrying disease. We don't see or recognize them, but they constantly observe and study us carefully for millennia.
Here's more just random interesting stuff about them:
- They manufacture tools and modify them, and can observe how their kin do it, form a mental model, and then reproduce it.
- They have real regional dialects in "caws" and signals.
- Playful behavior. For example, they slide down roofs in winter on a piece of bark or a can. Or they might caw at a person to watch their reaction.
- They can crack nuts with cars: place them under the wheels, then wait at the traffic light.
- They can count to 7 and understand the concept of zero.
- They plan for the future — can bring a tool that will be needed in an hour.
- They hold funerals — gather in a large group around a dead crow and caw.
- They have "courts" — can exile a crow from the flock for breaking the rules.
- They give gifts to people they like (shiny objects, pretty pebbles), which is a sign of the highest appreciation.
- They deceive and impersonate other animals. For example, they can pretend to be lame, or for fun impersonate another bird.
- They remember people's faces for up to 25 years and distinguish up to 250 of their kin.
- They pass information about people through generations — if someone offended them, the whole area will know the scoundrel by sight for decades. But the same goes for people who are good to them.