◎管淑平
We already knew that they are rather good at finding their way home. But it seems that pigeons have another remarkable talent – they can count.
我們已經知道牠們相當擅長找到回家的路。但鴿子似乎有另一項了不起的才能：他們能數數。
Until now, only humans and other primates were thought to be able to use abstract numerical rules in this way.
在此之前，只有人類和其他靈長類被認為能夠以這種方式使用抽象數字規則。
The researchers initially trained the pigeons by presenting them with 35 sets of three images, each with one, two, or three objects of different size, colour and shape. They were rewarded with wheat when they pecked the images in the correct ascending sequence.
研究人員先給鴿子看35組影像，每組有3張影像，呈現1個、2個或3個不同尺寸、顏色和形狀的物體，訓練牠們。當牠們以正確的從小到大的順序啄這些影像，就會獲得麥子當獎賞。
Next, they were presented with pairs of images with between one and nine objects and tested on their ability to respond to them in ascending order.
接下來，在牠們面前出示1到9種物體的兩兩一組影像，以從小到大的順序排列測試牠們的反應能力。
’Somewhat surprisingly, their performance is on a par with that of monkeys,’ said Dr Damian Scarf, of the University of Otago in New Zealand.
「牠們的表現有點令人意外地與猴子不相上下」，紐西蘭奧塔哥大學的戴米安．史卡夫博士說。
’Our findings add to a growing body of evidence that pigeons are among a number of avian species exhibiting impressive mental abilities that really do give the lie to the old "bird brain" insult.’
「我們的發現為越來越多的證據再加一筆，鴿子是展現出令人佩服心智能力的幾種鳥之一，這些能力的確反駁了『像鳥一樣沒什麼腦袋』這句羞辱人的老話。」
新聞辭典
bird brain：俚語，意指一個人沒什麼腦袋，笨蛋。形容詞：birdbrained。例句：She is really a bird brain.（她真是笨蛋。）
somewhat：副詞，稍微、有點；或當代名詞，某事／物、幾分，後接of。例句：I’m somewhat upset about your attitude.（你的態度令我有點不爽。）
give the lie to：片語，揭穿謊言、不正確或不真實之事，反駁。例句：The government’s statistics gave the lie to it’s own claims of economic boom.（政府的統計數據反駁了政府自己宣稱經濟繁榮的說法。）
Show to be false, refute, as in His black eye gave the lie to his contention that he hadn't been fighting. [First half of 1500s]
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