I read this book a long time ago, when it was new, and thought I would reread it.

The information about Alex remains fascinating, but this time I was somewhat put off by the use of jargon. (Why say allospecific instead of cross-species, for example?) Still, I did appreciate the careful scientific view of what the Alex studies can tell us. And it was interesting also, to follow her analysis of why the methods used for training Alex were so successful, when other experimenters failed to get birds to communicate with people the way Alex could.

African Greys are excellent mimics, and many of the videos (on you-tube) show mostly rote memorization. But I know that sometimes birds really do use their verbal skills in ways that require something like thinking skills.

Our Grey repeats a lot of things my husband has said. But he also does some surprising things with words. He had learned to sing the song from the movie South Pacific, about Bloody Mary, who was always "chewing betel nuts." One day, he varied it by replacing the name Mary with the name of one of our other parrots. I'm not sure he had any clue as to what sort of thing a betel nut might be, but it seemed that he know Mary was someone's name, and he put in somebody else's name.

It will be quite a while before I read this again, but it stays on our shelves, because my husband read it too.
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This is an extremely academic book, deep, readable but not really entertaining. The other book Dr Pepperberg wrote, [b:Alex & Me: How a Scientist and a Parrot Discovered a Hidden World of Animal Intelligence--and Formed a Deep Bond in the Process|3018307|Alex & Me How a Scientist and a Parrot Discovered a Hidden World of Animal Intelligence--and Formed a Deep Bond in the Process|Irene M. Pepperberg|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256053364s/3018307.jpg|3048873], when Alex died a few years ago is exactly the opposite, very entertaining but not enough rigorous scientific research. Maybe one day there will be one in the middle! ( )

Quite remarkable. We are always startled to learn that other species have intelligence and make observations. We wonder why they didn't initiate communication if they are so bright. But maybe it just didn't occur to them - any motre than it would occur to us to try and communicate with a table or the rain. ( )

Cognitive and Communicative Abilities of Grey Parrots