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From a quick Googling it looks like birds' nest-building techniques can differ by individual and can be learned/shared among social peers. So, yeah, it seems li

From a quick Googling it looks like birds' nest-building techniques can differ by individual and can be learned/shared among social peers. So, yeah, it seems like they maybe should be classified as tools. Contrast this with "fixed action patterns" like the way cats try to bury their shit and piss even to the point of pawing at the smooth floor next to their litterboxes. Superficially it seems like a fairly sophisticated behavior, but it's really a hardwired compulsion. Nest-building might be somewhere in the middle. I don't know if a bird raised with zero socialization is typically capable of building a nest.

eloff 7y ago
Ants are interesting in that their use of agriculture predates humans. Somewhat humbling to think that ants with their insignificant insect brains had that figured out for millions of years before our ancestors did.
- matt-attack 7y ago
  Who’s to say humans didn’t copy the ants? I’ve always been fascinated by what I call “uninventable inventions”. These are things we use commonly but never had the chance to invent ourselves due to their common occurrence in nature. Examples are: the fluid carrying tube (since arteries would easily be observed in killed animals), the sphere (think eye balls), or wings to fly with (i.e. the general shape of a modern jetliner).
  - kortilla 7y ago
    Interestingly the wings on a jetliner (and man-made planes in general) don’t really look anything like wings on birds or insects nor do they function in the same way. In fact, one of the big breakthroughs in flight was to stop trying to make them like birds. Planes fly like birds in the same way that submarines swim like fish, i.e. they don’t.
    - Retric 7y ago
      Many aspects are. A rounded leading edge cross-section and a sharp trailing edge cross-section. Upward slopping Dihedral and rear slopping wing. Tail feathers and aircraft’s tails. Winglets are similar to features on many bird species, though this is most obvious during down flapping.
    - matt-attack 7y ago
      You might be right to 2nd order, but the fact is it's no accident that these two objects look so similar: https://imgur.com/a/dKLQQ2j https://imgur.com/a/dKLQQ2j
      - caconym_ 7y ago
        Even better is the similarity between a bird seen side-on in level gliding flight and the same view of a B2. I tried to get an image link to put here but the internet has become impossible to use, so just Google it I guess. It seems that the biggest difference between bird wings and airplane wings is that the former use a bell-shaped (per Prandtl) span loading that induces proverse yaw on on roll and allows them to turn without separate yaw input. The elliptical span loading used by the vast majority of man-made aircraft causes adverse yaw, which is probably the biggest reason most aircraft need rudders. Even the B2 has split-aileron drag rudders at its wingtips for this reason.
        matt-attack 7y ago
        Wow thanks for that! For anyone being lazy, please take a look: https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryPorn/comments/dxwi51/b2_stealth_bomber_side_view_1015_x_1027/ https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryPorn/comments/dxwi51/b2_ste...
pretzell 7y ago
I'm reading "bachteria to Bach" by Dennett and he talks about this I believe. Birds that are born/raised without their mother can build a species-like nest their first year, and will build a better nest the following year, but will build a better nest the first year if they aren't taken from their mother. So the book talks about learning vs hard wired. The idea in the book is that nest building is both, but seemed quite a bit hard wired

eloff 7y ago

Ants are interesting in that their use of agriculture predates humans. Somewhat humbling to think that ants with their insignificant insect brains had that figured out for millions of years before our ancestors did.

matt-attack 7y ago
Who’s to say humans didn’t copy the ants? I’ve always been fascinated by what I call “uninventable inventions”. These are things we use commonly but never had the chance to invent ourselves due to their common occurrence in nature. Examples are: the fluid carrying tube (since arteries would easily be observed in killed animals), the sphere (think eye balls), or wings to fly with (i.e. the general shape of a modern jetliner).
- kortilla 7y ago
  Interestingly the wings on a jetliner (and man-made planes in general) don’t really look anything like wings on birds or insects nor do they function in the same way. In fact, one of the big breakthroughs in flight was to stop trying to make them like birds. Planes fly like birds in the same way that submarines swim like fish, i.e. they don’t.
  - Retric 7y ago
    Many aspects are. A rounded leading edge cross-section and a sharp trailing edge cross-section. Upward slopping Dihedral and rear slopping wing. Tail feathers and aircraft’s tails. Winglets are similar to features on many bird species, though this is most obvious during down flapping.
  - matt-attack 7y ago
    You might be right to 2nd order, but the fact is it's no accident that these two objects look so similar: https://imgur.com/a/dKLQQ2j https://imgur.com/a/dKLQQ2j
    - caconym_ 7y ago
      Even better is the similarity between a bird seen side-on in level gliding flight and the same view of a B2. I tried to get an image link to put here but the internet has become impossible to use, so just Google it I guess. It seems that the biggest difference between bird wings and airplane wings is that the former use a bell-shaped (per Prandtl) span loading that induces proverse yaw on on roll and allows them to turn without separate yaw input. The elliptical span loading used by the vast majority of man-made aircraft causes adverse yaw, which is probably the biggest reason most aircraft need rudders. Even the B2 has split-aileron drag rudders at its wingtips for this reason.
      - matt-attack 7y ago
        Wow thanks for that! For anyone being lazy, please take a look: https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryPorn/comments/dxwi51/b2_stealth_bomber_side_view_1015_x_1027/ https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryPorn/comments/dxwi51/b2_ste...

pretzell 7y ago

I'm reading "bachteria to Bach" by Dennett and he talks about this I believe. Birds that are born/raised without their mother can build a species-like nest their first year, and will build a better nest the following year, but will build a better nest the first year if they aren't taken from their mother. So the book talks about learning vs hard wired. The idea in the book is that nest building is both, but seemed quite a bit hard wired