My cat refers to himself as the "master of the humans"
The crows in our yard call themselves "obsidian fecal depositers". They
have a pretty good sense of humor
On Thu, Apr 1, 2021, 04:20 Matt Bartels <
mattxyz at earthlink.net> wrote:
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As our technological capabilities have advanced, an unexpected obstacle
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has arisen to confound a worthwhile project. In the past year, Bird Names
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For Birds <https://birdnamesforbirds.wordpress.com/> has elevated the
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long discussion over how we name birds. After beginning by calling out the
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problematic behavior of many species' namesakes, the discussion evolved to
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ask why any species should be named after humans at all?
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One recurring theme in the re-naming debates was that bird names should
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stop centering humans. Before long, the natural next step came to mind:
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Wouldn't it be better if we could just call birds by the names they call
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themselves and each other? As initiative co-founder Jordan Rudder said at
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the time 'the solution was right there in our name: *Bird* names for
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birds!" The goal moved beyond just removing human names to the bigger
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aspiration to call birds what they want to be called. Until recently, this
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was an idea beyond our capabilities. Then suddenly, technology caught up
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and the seemingly impossible became reality.
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In the past decade, sensor technology has evolved faster than ever.
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Sensors are now increasingly able to record and translate brain activity
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into understandable thoughts, actions and yes, names. It was only a matter
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of time before a group of curious ornithologists adapted this work to ask
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'what do birds call themselves and each other?'
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Unfortunately, once results began to come back, problems quickly emerged.
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First, when scientists uncovered self-referential names, they quickly
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realized that birds tend to be a bit dramatic in their self-evaluations:
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"It is simply astounding how many species of raptor refer to themselves as
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essentially 'the bringer of terror from the skies' said one researcher.
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She continued, "Essentially all passerines, even sparrows, use some variant
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of 'most beautiful creature ever' to refer to themselves. Hummingbirds
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found a way to combine titles of both 'most beautiful and most fierce' into
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their names…" What became apparent was that self-referential names would
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never do the trick of distinguishing between species, because only a few
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titles were ever in use. Of the over 10,000 species worldwide, scientists
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projected that only 50-100 names were in use. Birds, it turns out, are not
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particularly creative in their chosen names.
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The situation became even worse, believe it or not, when scientists looked
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at birds' names for each other. The hope for more variety was realized, but
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another problem emerged. As one researcher put it "I never expected so much
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profanity….We just couldn't begin to publish the phrases that corvids use
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for other passerines; shorebirds use remarkably colorful names to disparage
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the feeding abilities of sparrows, and tubenoses uniformly use horrible
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language to refer to less agile flyers. There was widespread disdain for
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ducks and their sexual exploits that led to vulgar names that, again, could
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never be printed in a field guide." Human insults turn out to be some of
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the most mild of the animal kingdom.
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In the end, Bird Names for Birds project is considering a name change.
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While less eloquent, the project may soon be known as "Slightly Less
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Problematic Names for Birds" or maybe the simple "Better Names for Birds."
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Matt Bartels
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Seattle, WA
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>
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>
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