<story><title>A parrot has a question for humans</title><url>http://nautil.us/issue/75/story/the-great-silence</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>DonHopkins</author><text>From Richard Stallman&amp;#x27;s Rider:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;github.com&amp;#x2F;ddol&amp;#x2F;rre-rms&amp;#x2F;blob&amp;#x2F;master&amp;#x2F;rider.txt&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;github.com&amp;#x2F;ddol&amp;#x2F;rre-rms&amp;#x2F;blob&amp;#x2F;master&amp;#x2F;rider.txt&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt;If you can find a host for me that has a friendly parrot, I will be
very very glad.  If you can find someone who has a friendly parrot I
can visit with, that will be nice too.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt;DON&amp;#x27;T buy a parrot figuring that it will be a fun surprise for me.  To
acquire a parrot is a major decision: it is likely to outlive you.  If
you don&amp;#x27;t know how to treat the parrot, it could be emotionally
scarred and spend many decades feeling frightened and unhappy.  If you
buy a captured wild parrot, you will promote a cruel and devastating
practice, and the parrot will be emotionally scarred before you get it.
Meeting that sad animal is not an agreeable surprise.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=3159210&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=3159210&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;secure.mysociety.org&amp;#x2F;admin&amp;#x2F;lists&amp;#x2F;pipermail&amp;#x2F;developers-public&amp;#x2F;2011-October&amp;#x2F;007647.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;secure.mysociety.org&amp;#x2F;admin&amp;#x2F;lists&amp;#x2F;pipermail&amp;#x2F;developer...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>A parrot has a question for humans</title><url>http://nautil.us/issue/75/story/the-great-silence</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>brownbat</author><text>Years and years ago, there was an aol live chat with Koko, the gorilla who could sign. An early experimental cross species AMA.&lt;p&gt;The crowd mostly asked questions like &amp;quot;is there a god?&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;The ape generally replied that she was bored and wanted food.&lt;p&gt;Gray parrots and corvids and dolphins and squids are exceptionally fascinating and worth studying. They aren&amp;#x27;t the same as the mythologized first contact people are hoping for. The precise expectations we have for such an exchange may say something about the Fermi paradox. Very similar intelligences can still be so different as to render communication, a real exchange of ideas, impossible.</text></comment>