Latest / Common Sense Health / Never Happened Before
Transcript
- Stephen Thomas BSc. Hons: Hello, today I'm going to talk about parrot. one who realized that he was gray and what his final words teach us about animals. I haven't lost the plot. promise you. I know I spend a lot of time on this channel looking at human blood markers and optimizing metabolic health and picking apart academic studies. But today we are taking a slight detour into the avian world. And specifically we are looking at a 31 year old male who died suddenly of an acute cardiovascular event. So it all will make sense. All right. So this pair of was named Alex. He was an African grey parrot. I'm not even going to try the Latin name but I'll put it on the screen here. Hopefully I'll remember to do that. Now if you spend any time in the weird misinformed corners of the internet, you might have heard about the grey parrot called Alex and his final words before dropping dead. Apparently, he said, what's happening? Where am I going? Now, that's really gripping and fantastic. But of course, it's the internet we're talking about. So that is actually fiction. So today we're going to look at the actual science of Alex's brain, the moment he hacked his unconsciousness and what his real final words tell us about the biology of communication. I promise you it's even more interesting than than the fiction on the internet. Now for decades, avian neurology was dismissed by human scientists who assumed that without a layered cerebral cortex, birds were just biological automatons running around on instinct. Then came Dr. Irene Pepperberg. In 1977, she bought Alex from a pet shop. For the next three decades, she subjected him to rigorous peer-reviewed cognitive testing. Now, Alex didn't just parrot. words he processed them. the end of his life, Alex possessed the emotional intelligence of a human two year old and the cognitive reasoning of a five year old. Sounds a bit like a vegan I met the other day. Anyway, he could identify 50 different objects, which is better than the vegan by seven colors and five shapes. He understood quantities up to six and grasped the concept of zero, which is a mathematical milestone that often human children take years to master. Now to understand how profound Alex's mind was, we have to look at the single most important event in animal psychology history. It happened when Alex looked into a mirror. Now, lots of animals can see reflections. Dogs occasionally bark at them. Cats tend to ignore them. And chimpanzees eventually realize that they are looking at themselves. But Alex did something completely unprecedented in the history of biology. He used language to investigate his own existence. Now, Alex had already learned the words for colours such as red, green and yellow by looking at plastic blocks. But one day, while standing in front of a mirror, he caught a glimpse of his own reflection. He tilted his head, looked at his body and asked a two word question. What colour? Now, Dr. Pepperberg was stunned and replied, you're grey. You're a grey parrot. Alex repeated the word gray six times until he internalized it. Now, why is this a massive biological big deal? Because it is the only time in human history a non-human animal has ever asked a question about itself. To ask a question, a brain must realize that it lacks data, identify a source that possesses that data, and formulate a query to bridge that gap. But to ask what color am I requires an even deeper layer of neuromachinery. Alex had to consciously realize that he was an independent entity separate from the rest of the world. Notice a physical trait about himself and care enough to name it. He wasn't just reacting to the stimulus. He was self aware. Now it is in my contract to talk about nutrition. So we need to understand why this 31 year old very clever bird did drop dead of heart disease. So we'll come back to the talking in a minute. Now in the wild canopy of central Africa, African grays are highly active fliers. They're fuel driven birds. use lipid dense foods. They get a primary fuel source, which is the bright red fruit of the African oil palm and it's supplemented by hard nuts and seeds and figs. And they burn off this intense nutrient dense fat through hours of strenuous daily flight. Now in captivity, obviously this changes because it's a sedentary cage life and that cannot support that level of fat intake. Veterinarians recommend commercial parrot pills or pellets. These processed nuggets are formulated from a ground grain base of corn, wheat and oats and plant proteins like soybean and peas. Now here is the problem. To make these pellets hold their shape and appeal to the bird, manufacturers add vegetable oil, soybean and sunflower oils. Now why this creates a balanced profile on paper? It introduces a dangerous biological trap for a captive bird. Zero energy expenditure. A in a lab or home doesn't fly miles a day. its physical output is near to zero. Now, please pay attention to the next sentence. And this is written up in academic papers on the parent's demise. And it said, feeding a sedentary animal a daily combination of processed grain, carbohydrates and added vegetable oils triggers chronic disease. Pretty interesting. So over a 30 year lifespan, this constant metabolic mismatch led directly to a arteriosclerosis, which is the buildup of plaques that ultimately caused Alex's sudden cardiac arrest. Now, African great parrots routinely lived to the 50s or 60s in captivity. So when Alex died unexpectedly in September 2007, at the relative young age of 31, it shocked the researchers. But it doesn't surprise me at all, by the way, knowing what he was eating. the internet instantly invented this dramatic slow motion death scene. The autopsy, sorry, should say necropsy actually, revealed a much more sudden silent killer. that reminds me, just a bit of trivia if you're interested, autopsy relates to humans, derived from the Greek autopsy, which literally means to see oneself, because it's a human examining another human. is sort of seeing one's own kind. It's used strictly for human medical and forensic examinations. Necropsy is animal. It's derived from the Greek necros, which is corpse and opsi. or opsis, is sight. So it literally means viewing a dead body. So in modern medical language, it refers to a post-mortem examination performed on any non-human animal. if you're interested in words, you might ask about these two words. Can they be used interchangeably? Well, general conversation, people often say animal autopsy. So the public understands. But in scientific writing, using autopsy for an animal is technically incorrect. However, veterinarians and pathologists The occasionally use the broader term post-mortem examination, and this covers both without crossing the species line. So our parrot named Alex died from this catastrophic event. was associated with ateriosclerosis, which is the hardening of the arteries. Now, despite a healthy diet of pellets, fresh greens and fruits, know, Alex had developed lipid plaques in his circulatory system. And on his final night, sudden arrhythmia or vascular rupture took his night instantly in his sleep. There was no time for a dramatic monologue. There was no prolonged struggle. His heart just simply stopped. And his real final words, and why they matter more than what's put around on the internet? Well, because Alex died in his sleep, his final words weren't spoken to a grieving room of scientists. They were spoken the evening before, as Dr. Pepperberg put him in his cage and locked him up in the lab. It was a script they had repeated every night for 30 years. Alex looked at her and simply said what he always said. You be good. I love you. See you tomorrow. Now, while the Internet wants a ghost story about birds staring into the afterlife, the biological reality is, I think, actually more profound. Alex wasn't predicting his demise. He was engaging in a highly complex, socially binding ritual. In the wild, African greys are intensely social and they flock. Now, communication isn't just about finding food. It's also about maintaining social cohesion and safety by ensuring his flock leader, which was Pepperberg, making sure that she's going to return the next day. Alex was using language to regulate his environment and reinforce this social bond. He didn't need to ask where he was going. The bird who figured out he was grey already knew exactly where he belonged. It was just a ritual that they did every single day for 30 days, 30 years, I should say. what are your thoughts on this animal cognition versus human projection because I could be projecting, couldn't I? Let's discuss it in the comments below. Now, if you enjoyed this detour into avian physiology, consider subscribing or sharing this post with a friend or, you know, next week we're back to our regular sort of talking about nutrition, human nutrition, liver enzymes and all that sort of stuff. But perhaps Alex could have taught us even more words. If we'd been wiser about how we fed him, it's a sobering reminder that knowledge in one area doesn't automatically translate to another. And getting the fundamentals right, like proper nutrition matters more than we often realise. If he'd been fed better, more appropriate food, would he have been even more expensive with the way he spoke? mean, who knows? I don't know, obviously, but ⁓ I thought it was just an interesting subject to bring up for the video. interested in following this sort of thing, then do consider subscribing or liking or sharing this video or check out my sub stack, which would be really handy for you to see because there will be references in the sub stack. are links always in my video description to different things. For instance, the books I've written about blood tests in the context of low carb keto and carnivore, because you need to interpret bloods in the context of how you actually eat. mean, that's very crucial. And that's partly why I was interested in this story. because I think it's upsetting to hear that these people are obviously very interested in the grey parrot, you know, ⁓ 30 years with one animal is a bonding process definitely and I know from my little doggy Rupert who I've had for seven years that there's definitely some sort of communication between us and there's definitely some sort of connection. Anyway. That noise indicates we're coming to the end of the video, so please consider liking, sharing and subscribing, and I'll see you again soon.