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Birds and People: A Book Review

10,000 Birds

It’s relatively easy to classify birds into family groups based on physical characteristics. It’s very hard to organize the many ways in which human beings relate to avian beings into comprehensible text. We view them as our enemies when they eat our crops and as an extension of our family when we see them at our feeders.

Birds 205
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Deconstructing Slate's "Pepper" Series

Animal Person

For those who didn't read the five-part Slate series " Pepper, the stolen dog who changed American science " by Daniel Engber , I recommend it for the history, but also for the misconceptions and assumptions that you might want to discuss on the Facebook discussion about the series. It "guarantees humane treatment?" Maybe on paper.

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Better Living Through Birding: Notes From a Black Man in the Natural World–A Book Review

10,000 Birds

It is also about Chris’s personal history: his boyhood in suburban Long Island, college years at Harvard and the struggle to come out, ‘nerdy’ passions beyond birding–namely science fiction books and films, career highs at Marvel Comics, travels to foreign countries, and his complicated relationships with his parents.

Emotional 219
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Gifts of the Crow: How Perception, Emotion, and Thought Allow Smart Birds to Behave Like Humans

10,000 Birds

The single greatest challenge facing any book of science writing is balance. Otherwise, there would be no science writing, everyone would just go straight to the journals. Nothing keeps a human reader more engaged than a genuine character, and the birds here are exactly that. Pinyon Jay by Dave Menke of the US FWS.

Humane 139
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Selling Birds Short: A Heretical View Of Avian Intelligence

10,000 Birds

And if you look into it enough, it presents a classic case where science can fail us. I believe in science. Science is based on logic and evidence, which I think is a very respectable way to look at the world. But what many people fail to realize, and too often scientists themselves, is that science is elastic.

Emotional 198
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On Letting Your Emotions Rule the Day

Animal Person

However, many of our concerns about modern food production stem from purely emotional concerns, in which we try to overlay our social mores onto sectors where they traditionally haven’t been applied. We give them human names and provide them with the same amenities we enjoy as humans. What's all this about emotion, anyway?

Emotional 100
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That Awkward Moment With Feral Cats and Family

10,000 Birds

I come from a large family: five sisters, two brothers and almost everyone has kids. Most of my family lives in Indiana, but thanks to social media we can easily keep in touch. Case in point: some of my family members have become active with feral cat colony organizations. Well played, older sister, well played.